existence of mental illness

hi. i was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. ive had very bad psychotic episodes and the matter seems very real to me. It seems very real that schizophrenia and other "mental illnesses" are real illnesses. However, I have been reading anti-psychiatry articles and the opinions of Thomas Szasz that have made me doubt whether or not they are real illnesses. The main doubt i have been having is " how can a behavior be a symptom of illness?" In other words, dont we have freewill? If we have freewill then how can behavior be a symptom? Also, If anyone has any other arguments in favor of the existence of mental illness, and particularly schizophrenia, please let me know.

Heya,

Please ponder this: If I have a migraine, I'd hold my head in my hands; if I have indigestion, I'd put my hand over my abdomen; if my leg was sore, I'd limp; and if I am depressed, I might just cry and withdraw myself from society. In each of these cases, I presented to you an illness and the subsequent behaviour in response to the illness. It doesn't matter whether the illness is mental or physical. The fact is that there is something 'wrong' that needs to be remedied.

If you want to avoid the notion that mental illnesses are real, then that is up to you. However, by that logic, you should also then walk normally when your ankle has been twisted, and see what the effects of that are. If, however, you want to accept mental illnesses as they are, then I wish you the best of luck in getting treatment for them.

Take care
Kevin

thank you for that response. my intention is not to avoid that mental illness is real but to assure myself that it is. i dont want to believe that my psychotic episodes, my inability to handle school, my childlike behavior is simply a result of some character flaw. id rather accept that i do these things because im ill.

your argument seems strong but a question that comes to my mind is: are a sore leg and twisted ankles illnesses? just wondering. do u have any references to support that a sore leg is an illness. much appreciate it

Gabe,

If you need help, don't deny yourself that help. Especially if you have paranoid psychotic episodes.

Whether or not Thomas Szasz would believe you have a mental illness makes no difference in the degree of dysfunction or harm your symptoms cause. Finding the cause of the symptoms means you have a better chance at being properly treated.

gabe911 wrote:thank you for that response. my intention is not to avoid that mental illness is real but to assure myself that it is. i dont want to believe that my psychotic episodes, my inability to handle school, my childlike behavior is simply a result of some character flaw. id rather accept that i do these things because im ill.

your argument seems strong but a question that comes to my mind is: are a sore leg and twisted ankles illnesses? just wondering. do u have any references to support that a sore leg is an illness. much appreciate it

haha - okay - think of it in this way: An 'illness' is anything that is not normal/common. So, if the majority of people had a twisted ankle their whole lives, then it would not be considered an illness. Perhaps having a regular ankle would be the 'illness', as such people would be walking differently from the majority due to their 'better' ankle. Now, if the majority of people were depressed or had psychotic episodes, then they would be considered normal and NOT having them would be considered 'illnesses'.

So, an 'illness' is a drift from what is common or normal.

Kevin

How about this:

Your throat hurts, and the doctor finds that it is tonsillitis. So, in order to fix the re-curring tonsillitis that keeps happened, the tonsils have to be removed. That is a cause (tonsillitis) and an effect (sore throat, constant), and the illness (recurring tonsillitis).

Or, try cancer, as it is a disease, just as an "illness" is a disease or disorder of the mind, such as a tumor.
A woman has a sharp pain in her stomach, and goes to the doctor to find out she has a large tumor, and as it is connected to many pertinent organs, she is now going to have to get chemo and radiation to have a hope of surviving, along with medications to take to help her along.
So the cause/illness/disease is cancer and tumor, the effect is the pain and the certain death if the tumor is not treated.

That might sound more drastic, but what is worse than living with psychotic paranoia? I have lived with psychotic paranoia after a mental breakdown that landed me in lockdown for 5 days in the mental ward, and coming back out of that was like crawling out of a black hole. But I made it, after some trial and error my meds are on point and keeping me stable, and I'm living an almost normal life - as normal a life as a BPD person can live.

Best of luck to you... I hope this made sense, and that it helps :0)

AMP

I never understood this. Your brain is an organ no? So if your heart doesn't work right you have an illness but if your brain doesn't work right you don't? Someone please explain this rationale to me.

with regards to tonsilitus and cancer - these are not 'chemical'. if you've got a brain tumor then there is a mass of tissue.

when it comes to mental illness, they rule out physical causes. they do not check dopamine and serotonin (though they say these are the chemicals 'outta whack') levels. they only ask questions. behaviors, thoughts.

i've never had cancer. do they look at behaviors and thoughts to locate where your cancer amassed?

no, cancer and diabetes, it ain't the same at all. at least diabetics have blood sugar levels they check, 'mentally ill' have no such levels they can check.

tonsilitus - one operation and they're out. antibiotics are only short-term, yet they want ya to take tranquilizers for life. medicine is supposedly entirely about science yet when it comes to mental illness it is just 'guess-and-check'.

oh yea, you have a say in your cancer treatment. you are not treated like a murderer just for 'having cancer'. there are no statutes regarding involuntary lockup with cancer. there are no court orders for cancer treatment.

the real mental illness is washington d.c. and the delusion is monopoly money.

if you are going to go the route that illness revolves around perception, then everyone should be force-fed tranqs. oh yea wait a second, people trade in their humanity for a couple tablets of 'dollar' and turn into zombies.

ya beat me to it!

ocular_razor wrote:with regards to tonsilitus and cancer - these are not 'chemical'.

Sure they are. Chemicals run all of our body and organs. Ever heard of trypsinogen,pepsinogen, lactase, etc. etc.? Last I checked insulin is a chemical.

right a mass of tissue is a chemical. cells components are chemical and you can easily blend the distinction between chemical and physical to get people's money out of their pockets.

and you conveniently left out that i said diabetics can check blood sugar levels meaning they can check if they need insulin.

to answer your question no i have not heard of those things. you tell me how one can check their dopamine and serotonin levels.

imnotnuts wrote:

ocular_razor wrote:with regards to tonsilitus and cancer - these are not 'chemical'.

Sure they are.

so the tonsils are not physically removed? they are given powerful drugs until they shrivel into nothing?

psych docs do not check the chemical levels of dopamine and serotonin which is their main hypothesis of mental illness where physical causes are ruled out. and what is the scientific method exactly? something involving, hypothesizing and testing and then checking results? i don't know it exactly.

it is a shame that it is sought out to be a guinea pig for the research and development firms.

since you would like to blend physical and chemical, let's blend the physical environment causing chain reactions of chemicals. instead of improving the environment, the environment is encouraged to continue to rot into oblivion while chemical treatment is encouraged to shut the brain off to this wretched environment. now that is completely scientific and reasonable. it leaves undiscussed the pink elephant in the room which is millions of people being fed powerful tranquilizers that inhibit the brain from balancing itself out (which the laws of nature that we abide by encourage) and many times causing physical addiction and hellish side-effects because it is just too hard for someone to exercise self-control.

the reason 'goin off meds' brings trouble is because these tranqs don't inhibit production of these chemicals that aren't tested for in the first place, they only block absorption. so ya get this buildup in your brain that will take even more time to 'balance' out. which if they indeed were out of balance in the first place (but how do ya know without physical tests?) they are certainly out of balance afterwards.

what's that called. rigging results? big time contracts?

it's wreckless abandon is what it is. not medicine.