New To Schizophrenia

Hi all,
I've joined this forum in hopes of helping myself learn as much about Schizophrenia as I can. My adult son has come to live with me after years of not being apart of my life. He has been living with his Dad's side of the family. During the years of not being apart of my life he was diagnosed with Schizophrenia. I know absolutely nothing about this disorder, especially having a son come into my life that I haven't been around. It doesn't really matter why I haven't been apart of his life, all of that is in the past. Now I'm having to try to find out how to deal with this disorder on my own, with no past or present experience. He also has a substance disorder that he struggles with. I've been told that he's been involuntary been committed to a duel diagnosis hospital many times. I have been told about and now experience some of the following Schizophrenia disorder issues he deals with: him talking to only the people and voices that he can see or hear, him talking about believing that he is St Michael, he's very hyper-spiritial, he sometimes punches the air, he laughs or with the voices he hears, he really has no sense of urgency of time..in other words when we're in a hurry because we're running late for whatever we may be trying to do he doesn't know to or doesn't try to be on any time limit. These things he does aren't real bad or disruptive, these are just things he will do. He does love listening to music with his headphones on. He will be 30 years old this month. I have no idea about this disorder and I don't know where to start. This is the main reason I've joined this support forum, to learn everything I possibly can and to know all the positive things I should do for him and his disorder. I would greatly appreciate any and all suggestions and/or advice I can get in order to deal with this situation as very best as I can. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this.

My loved one was recently committed involuntarily. They have schizophrenia and possibly bipolar disorder. I have known something was wrong for many years now but I just could not understand what the heck was going on.

From living with this person for a number of years here is what I can tell you about schizophrenia.

For the most part whatever they are experiencing is very real to them. I used to get acused of cheating quite often. But it was not anything like you may think. It was more along the lines of me sneaking out of the house at night while they were asleep. Me having several children with different people and several wives all of which I was hiding. No matter what I tried to do basically spending 24 hours a day with them trying to prove this was not happening I could simply not convince them this was just not possible. So basically the best thing I found when this would happen was to just be quiet, say nothing, and let this delusion run its course.

One day the delusions changed and became far beyond anything I had ever seen. They stopped eating and things got so much worse that I simply won't post it here. Basically I was starting to get pulled into this and I had to call my family to come help. My partner ended up being involuntarily committed.

There are some very important things you may want to familiarize yourself with now. I hope you never need to use them but it won't hurt to see about.

Guardianship. This is a legal matter that will give you the legal ability to have control over things if it ever reaches that point. Without this you will not even be able to know how your loved one is doing should they need to go to the hospital involuntarily.

The biggest issue will be medications. Should they take them as the doctor prescribes then great. Should they not take them that is where guardianship can help tremendously if they need to go into the hospital.

That is enough for now from me. Feel free to ask anything you like. I also am very alone in the dark here and signed up looking for others to talk with about all of this.