Soviet Agat-4 computer, a knockoff of the Apple II computer.
Tips from a schizophrenic dude I talked to today who got better
- Don’t make schizophrenia your whole identity. Schizophrenia is something that happens to you, not something you are. If you start defining yourself out from symptoms of schizophrenia, you’ll become even more sick.
- So what if you got so sick that you lost your sense of self, hobbies and everything that used to define you - that means you have a clean slate. Try new hobbies, do new things, try a lot of stuff. Don’t focus on who you used to be, focus on figuring out who you can become.
- If something raises your quality of life a little, do it. No matter how unnecessary, silly, irrelevant or stupid it might seem. Everything that raises your quality of life a little is worth investing in.
- You might romanticise who you were before you were sick, but we all evolve as we age and nobody are the same place at 15 and 20. Nobody ends up where they expected they’d end up as 15 year olds. Not even neurotypicals.
- You can get a good life even if you can’t take the standard route. I never went to high school either and today I have a job that I love and a life I enjoy. Don’t kid yourself into thinking that there’s only one way to have a good life.
- Celebrate little victories. For me, the success criteria for a good day was that I got out of bed and brushed my teeth for several years. Don’t compare yourself to other people, if brushing your teeth is a struggle for you, it’s worth being proud of.
- You can retrain your brain. I wasn’t able to read books for years, last year I read 9. Cognitive tests gives a picture of where you are right now, not where you’ll be in a couple years.
- Fuck negative predictions from doctors. I have a very nice paper at home signed by a psychiatrist that states that I’ll never be able to do any kind of work. Now I have a very nice job.
- I still have schizophrenia and I have never felt better about myself and my life than I do now. A full recovery isn’t the only way to get a good life.
- Don’t let the stigma and the statistics and the negative stories get you down. You’re not a lost cause and you will get better.
