I’VE BEEN DEALING with schizophrenia for as long as I can remember, but was never correctly medicated for it until seven months ago. I had been in and out of doctors’ offices and counsellors since I was nine or ten, for things like “depression” and bouts of self-harm. I was always a little different throughout primary and secondary school, I had friends but I was definitely an outcast and spent 95% of my time in a world that my mind had created.

Growing up, I never told anyone about the auditory and visual hallucinations that I had because, in my mind, I wasn’t really in the real world – my body was there physically but my brain was somewhere else entirely and there was nobody that I could trust.

From the age of about 12 I was obsessed with death and the idea of ghosts, and that maybe I was stuck somewhere in the middle. I knew I saw things that nobody else could see, but I was so far removed from reality that I don’t think it ever occurred to me that they weren’t actually real.

I was paranoid and terrified of everyone in my life

From my Junior Cert onwards, the auditory hallucinations started and I would hear sharp whispers or flies buzzing when I couldn’t see any. The visual hallucinations were easier to deal with – they always happened in the distance, a shadow or a face around the corner or in a crowd of people that would disappear, and never happened at home.

I convinced myself that “they” were actually protecting me. I was paranoid and terrified of everyone in my life. I remember being in the first aid tent during a concert one night and the paramedics trying to give me oxygen after I had been pulled from a rough crowd, and I went crazy. I didn’t believe it was oxygen, the paramedic’s faces were distorted and their eyes were stretched out. I pushed all of them away as they kept trying to hold my arms, and even threatened to put me in an ambulance. That was my first big paranoid experience.

I had my guard up at every counselling session

In Transition Year, I completely shut myself off from everyone. I went to school two or three days a week and I didn’t go out with my friends once. I was still in counselling for what my doctor still thought was depression but had my guard up at every session, terrified that “they” were listening and that I’d say something that would turn them against me.

It wasn’t until I went into 6th year that I was moved to another counsellor, the first one that I ever really connected with. Between TY and 6th year, I had started seeing myself in my visual hallucinations. I’d be sitting at the kitchen table and suddenly see a version of myself standing at the bottom of my garden. I’d see myself in shops and on the street. This is the most disturbing and stressful symptom I’ve ever had – I was terrified to look in the mirror in case my reflection moved.

Anti-psychotics help to change my reaction to the hallucinations 

This all came out one day to my new counsellor towards the end of my Leaving Cert. He was really helpful and talked me through everything, and I was allowed to move away to college on the condition that I kept in contact with the psychiatrist on campus. Between my counsellor at home and the new psychiatrists, I was put on an anti-psychotic called Quetiapine. I took one every day even though I was paranoid that the doctors were lying to me.

In the last four or five months the auditory hallucinations have decreased a lot. I still see things often but the anti-psychotics help to change my reaction to them – I’m able to stay calm now, I can go to my lectures and even go out to nightclubs now, something I had never done before.

I am more than my schizophrenia – I don’t want it to define me

I don’t tell people that I have schizophrenia because moving away from home and school to a new place finally gave me the opportunity to really be myself, take control of my illness and make new friends who appreciated me for me. I don’t feel like a burden anymore, I’m not paranoid that people are out to get me. I can start trusting people.

I wanted to write this to prove that schizophrenia gets a terrible and fake reputation on TV shows and in movies. I was never a danger to people. I’m not violent and would never hurt anyone. The only reason I’m keeping this anonymous is because I don’t want to be associated with my illness – I’m not ashamed of it but it’s just not a part of who I really am as a person. It’s just a condition, nothing to do with my personality or what I’m capable of.

This story comes from a series of anonymous contributions sent to Michaela Deane’s blog, liesandbowties.wordpress.com where she is currently undertaking a project to help destigmatise and mental health issues by humanising them, and having them explained from a sufferer’s point of view. 

If you suffer from a mental health issue that you feel is not properly understood or portrayed, and would like to contribute further to the series you can contact her Michael her social media sites: Facebook and Twitter. Or email her at: michaeladeane@gmail.com

Helplines:

Samaritans 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org

• Console  1800 247 247 – (suicide prevention, self-harm, bereavement)

• Aware 1890 303 302 (depression, anxiety)

• Pieta House 01 601 0000 or email mary@pieta.ie - (suicide, self-harm)

• Teen-Line Ireland 1800 833 634 (for ages 13 to 19)

• Childline 1800 66 66 66 (for under 18s)

The reality of mental illness doesn’t fit into a sanitised sound bite

‘The young man I saw in my outpatient department recently had changed his life around’