Could Schizophrenia be a myth? See the evidence!

Peptron, I giggled at the first part of your post. Thank you

I think that severity has a lot to do with "recovery" also. In the case of my aunt, she was unable to get better at all and in fact go very, very bad. She's kind of a mean person to begin with, so I guess another possibility was that she never had a desire to get better. Who knows, at this point :\

The most famous person I know that "recovered" from schizophrenia is John Nash. But he wasn't cured, he merely learned how to manage his illness to lead a successful life. He still has schizophrenia, though. OP, seen "A Beautiful Mind"? That's a true story. But please don't confuse management with cure.

WWu777 wrote:You misunderstood my story. I didn't find God and recovered from OCD. I found a new paradigm and transcendence, or a higher perspective.

The symptoms of schizophrenia may be real. No one is arguing that. But schizophrenia is more of a judgment that a disease. And a closed minded judgment.

They say that schizophrenia is uncurable. So if anyone recovers from it, then they say they never had schizophrenia in the first place. It's a defense mechanism that rationalizes away facts and cases in order to defend a closed paradigm. See how it works?

Check out these videos about people who recovered from schizophrenia:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_q ... overy&aq=f

Why don't you flip this and say that these people are wrong about schizophrenia rather than tilting at windmills and discrediting a very real problem.

Anything can be more of a judgement than a disease. Disease is also relative. Your postings seem to lack an enlightened balance. You cannot learn that which you think you already know.

Schizophrenia does exist, it just is misdiagnosed a lot of the time. I was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, yet I never had clear hallucinations, paranoia or delusions. I felt that by diagnosing me with psychosis, the doctor had labelled some of my thoughts/behaviors as wrong. I told them if I had psychosis I would rather have it untreated, with my anxiety treated instead. I felt that they had decided that some of my philosophical views were delusional, even though those thoughts had never caused me any problems. When I asked them what my delusions were they couldn't tell me, so their argument makes no sense.

I believe schizophrenia exists because I have seen people suffer as the result of hearing voices and believing their food was poisoned. It exists because people suffer from it. Perhaps it makes more sense to call it a disorder rather than a illness.

I think schizophrenia is mislabeled. I think the correct term is philosophers and highly enlightened individuals who perceive things that we do not normally perceive. If I did not write as much as I do I think I would be identified as insane or at least depressed.

JayD wrote:I think schizophrenia is mislabeled. I think the correct term is philosophers and highly enlightened individuals who perceive things that we do not normally perceive. If I did not write as much as I do I think I would be identified as insane or at least depressed.

i have always thought this myself. cant figure out why people have always labeled mental illness as "crazy". maybe we have a gift or just think outside the realm of everyone else. some of the most creative people that have ever been in the public eye were labeled. i have had dreams and produce artwork that others would consider me too be "troubled". my therapist tells me i think too much but i dont make an effort to think up crazy $#%^, it just comes out. enlightened is a great way to describe it.

themadness wrote:

JayD wrote:I think schizophrenia is mislabeled. I think the correct term is philosophers and highly enlightened individuals who perceive things that we do not normally perceive. If I did not write as much as I do I think I would be identified as insane or at least depressed.

i have always thought this myself. cant figure out why people have always labeled mental illness as "crazy". maybe we have a gift or just think outside the realm of everyone else. some of the most creative people that have ever been in the public eye were labeled. i have had dreams and produce artwork that others would consider me too be "troubled". my therapist tells me i think too much but i dont make an effort to think up crazy $#%^, it just comes out. enlightened is a great way to describe it.

Sure, it can seem that way if you gloss it over and only look at the more pleasant side or functional cases. Some people are merely eccentric. Other more rare and severe cases of mentally ill people commit murder to cast out demons, eat metal and glass and other non-foods, and there have been cases where people knocked out their own teeth and poked their own eyes out.

Crazy and sick are only words, what you use them for is up to you; but just be informed. Not everyone is just fine the way they are.

Hi,
I think I understand what you are saying and to some degree I think there could be some truth in these ideas, I have had a couple of psychotic episodes and been diagnosed with schizophrenia, but 'recovered'. My conclusion was that I never had it in the first place, that I was just going through some things in my brain and this was the way it was making me respond (temporarily).

But a couple of psychotic episodes and a misdiagnosis is very different from debilitating life long paranoid schizophrenia which causes a person to completely lose touch with the reality around them and never find their way back to it or be able to function successfully in it.

Schizophrenia is no more a myth than 'furniture' is a myth. Its a symbolic verbal representation of a collection of 'ideas' about a group of loosely connected symptoms and behaviors which we know something about, but not everything.

Furniture is connected via its purpose, and our cultural and social understanding of what we do with it. A chair is still just chunks of a dead tree and 'unusual' behavior is just unusual behavior until we categorize and label it.

Is Schizophrenia a pathway to enlightenment and higher levels of being? Maybe it can be. A lot of native cultures used various methods for inducing trance like and psychotic states in order to achieve expanded awareness and levels of conscious understanding, but it was never meant to be a permanent state of being, if you can't come back and put your new awareness to use in the real world, what's the point?

I agree that in certain circumstances, experiences labeled as psychosis, which often cause 'strange' behavior can actually be transformative in a positive way. But that doesn't prove that Schizoprenia is a myth. Schizoprenia whatever it is, is a horrible condition, it can ruin lives and cause a lot of pain and suffering.

I'm a half full cup kind of person though, and I like the fact that you made a post about the possible positive outcomes which can be achieved via something generally viewed as being nothing but negative.

gwilly wrote:

themadness wrote:

JayD wrote:I think schizophrenia is mislabeled. I think the correct term is philosophers and highly enlightened individuals who perceive things that we do not normally perceive. If I did not write as much as I do I think I would be identified as insane or at least depressed.

i have always thought this myself. cant figure out why people have always labeled mental illness as "crazy". maybe we have a gift or just think outside the realm of everyone else. some of the most creative people that have ever been in the public eye were labeled. i have had dreams and produce artwork that others would consider me too be "troubled". my therapist tells me i think too much but i dont make an effort to think up crazy $#%^, it just comes out. enlightened is a great way to describe it.

Sure, it can seem that way if you gloss it over and only look at the more pleasant side or functional cases. Some people are merely eccentric. Other more rare and severe cases of mentally ill people commit murder to cast out demons, eat metal and glass and other non-foods, and there have been cases where people knocked out their own teeth and poked their own eyes out.

Crazy and sick are only words, what you use them for is up to you; but just be informed. Not everyone is just fine the way they are.

i wasnt glossing over it and i never said that schizophrenia is good. i just said some creative minds were schizophrenic and good came from it. sure some people jump off of bridges, murder people, or harm themselves b/c the voices in their head tell them too.

however would you consider van gogh, dali, tesla, or jon nash simply eccentric. just saying good things can come of it.

themadness wrote:i wasnt glossing over it and i never said that schizophrenia is good. i just said some creative minds were schizophrenic and good came from it. sure some people jump off of bridges, murder people, or harm themselves b/c the voices in their head tell them too.

however would you consider van gogh, dali, tesla, or jon nash simply eccentric. just saying good things can come of it.

I'm sorry if I misconstrued what you intended to say, I was just following the flow of the quotes, you responded to:

I think schizophrenia is mislabeled. I think the correct term is philosophers and highly enlightened individuals who perceive things that we do not normally perceive. If I did not write as much as I do I think I would be identified as insane or at least depressed.

I figured you were continuing with that line of reasoning, because you didn't really specify otherwise. Saying that the 'correct term' is "philosophers and highly enlightened individuals" is in fact glossing over the worst cases (by ignoring them in the statement).

So if that isn't exactly what you meant, then I apologize. I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm more or less hoping for people to say what they actually mean so there will be no confusion.

Edit: furthermore, there are a great many people who are ill that are simply average, otherwise. The misunderstood genius is an exception most of the time. Most people are probably not comparable to Tesla or van Gogh, TBH.

Mental illnesses are just as real as the flu...it's just that it is in your brain. But there are many ways to perceive mental illness. You can look at someone and think they are "weird" or "crazy" and have many negative perceptions. Or you can look at someone out of love and wish to give the person comfort.

I think what the site the original poster shared is not trying to say that mental illness is a complete myth altogether. I think it is talking about our perception of mental illness. Doctors of psychiatry and physiology do tend to look at the patient as a patient and nothing more. Not all doctors do this, but many do and I have experienced this myself.

For one, I do not believe in conventional medicine because it is too regulated and all these regulations take away from seeing the patient as everything they are. You can go ahead and call me mentally ill because I feel this way...but remember that you need to know where to draw the line between opinion and delusion. Many times strong opinions are mistaken for delusions and misdiagnosis occurs.

As far as spirituality goes, you cannot simply say that just because someone is spiritual that they need help. I was once told that since I somewhat follow the old Native American beliefs, that I needed help. I was told this by a Wiccan who saw spirits follow her into the shower. She told me I needed help because I believed animals have spirits... Please tell me you see something wrong with this... You have to know where to draw the line between normal spirituality and when someone is taking it too far. If you are so caught up in it that you feel you are constantly under a microscope and you can't live your life, then something is wrong. But you can be very spiritual and be happy with it. It all depends on your perception of the supernatural world.