After my second episode of schizoaffective disorder, along with all the symptoms and social difficulties of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, I also had depression. I had lost all my friends from my episodes and I wasn’t able to function socially. After a couple years of talk therapy my mood was improving, however, I still had a number of dark emotions and feelings. There were many times I had suicidal thoughts but I worked through them. One of the main things that kept me going was having hope for a brighter future. I reflected that I had made progress from the time I had first left my second episode, where I wasn’t able to speak a coherent sentence or have any social interaction, to a point where I became a homeowner, a manager at a butchery, and where I had found my passion in writing.
One of the first steps in curing my depression was rebuilding my social life.
|
For the past couple years I have been trying to cure schizophrenia symptoms with psychoanalytical solutions. However, recently I switched my focus towards curing the depression from all those difficult years and it’s helped eliminate a lot of the symptoms and social dysfunction from schizophrenia. It informed me that part of schizophrenia symptoms have to do with my mood. I’ve always noticed when I’m more stressed I have more hallucinations but it’s been only recently that I realized when I’m in a better mood my illness is kept more at bay.
One of the first steps in curing my depression was rebuilding my social life. I had some friends that I hung out with but I kept making excuses not to hang out with people. I blamed them for things that weren’t their fault and I was searching for reasons to be angry at people instead of finding ways that I could make myself happier. One of the biggest steps in rebuilding my social life was reconnecting with all my friends I had grown up with.
Immediately after my second episode when I experienced resentment towards my friends, they would return that resentment and treat me poorly in return. However, when I was forgiving and kind to them more recently they were the same way in return. This informed me that these people never actually hated me in the years after my episodes, they just didn’t know how to treat me when I was treating them poorly for things that had happened twenty years ago. To them my middle school depression was probably not even present in their mind when in my mind it was all I was thinking of. So they had no rationale for me being mean to them and they may have just assumed I was a mean person and they had to defend themselves.
The thing I’ve found with most grudges and long-term arguments and even short-term arguments is that they are mostly a result of a misunderstanding or a number of misunderstandings. After my first episode of schizophrenia I gambled with these friends in poker and I lost a lot of money which was another reason I was resentful towards them. I thought it was wrong for them to take my money after my first episode of schizophrenia. However, in their minds they might have assumed that I sat down at the table to win and I was losing. Another piece of this misunderstanding was that all during high school we played cards every day and gambled together all the time. For them it was just a fun thing that they always did while for me I was losing money and I saw them taking it as malicious. So the misunderstanding in my mind was that they maliciously took my money when in reality taking each other’s money to a gambler is just a part of the game and it’s the goal of playing cards and they didn’t mean anything malicious by it. We both had different thoughts on the same subject but we never communicated those thoughts to each other.
My middle school depression was probably not even present in their mind when in my mind it was all I was thinking of… they may have just assumed I was a mean person and they had to defend themselves.
|
The unwillingness to be vulnerable and share my deepest thoughts ultimately lead to my long-term disagreement. From my side I didn’t share the fact that I was resentful for them taking all that money after my first episode of schizophrenia. They also weren’t with me in college so they may not have known I had schizophrenia at the time as I had not told a lot of people and I was still highly functional until my second episode occurred. I had made an assumption that they had information that they didn’t. When I talk to them today I’m sure if they were aware of these thoughts they would have apologized profusely or taken the stance that I was trying to win money. They themselves probably weren’t aware of how much money I had lost over the three months we had been gambling after my first episode. So instead of having that conversation I forgive them anyways by way of understanding the situation instead of making false accusations regarding it; which is what I used to do.
When we first reconnected there were some things that were said to me that were somewhat rude. These things happened because they had expectations to encounter a negative interaction which had been set from previous interactions. However, I knew this would happen but I also knew if I showed them I was here to be friends with them and have a fun time then they would eventually catch on and drop all the past misunderstandings. There were a few things they said at first which I let go and I continued to demonstrate kindness and friendship and they eventually caught on. So the reason they treated me poorly at first was because they were expecting me to treat them poorly and this was a defense mechanism against that treatment. Once they realized I wanted to make a friend out of an enemy (Abraham Lincoln) there were no enemies in the room and we all had a lot of fun.
Although we had experienced our differences they were still good friends and when I made efforts to reconnect they took me back with open arms. Forgiving them for the differences that we had experienced helped fill a void that I had in my heart. We had all known each other since pre-school so in a way they were family. Another thing I did was to make certain I reconnected with more recent friends who I had been less willing to hang out with. Being less judgmental of others and understanding that we all have problems that we’re coping with even if we don’t have a diagnosis opened my mind up to just accepting people for who they are.
Being less judgmental of others and understanding that we all have problems that we’re coping with even if we don’t have a diagnosis opened my mind up to just accepting people for who they are.
|
Reconnecting with old friends seemed to have a domino effect. I doubted my decision at first and my depression immediately returned. Once I let go of the past for good it helped me to move forward to a better future. My new emotional state was much better than it had been before. After not dating for a year I went back on match.com and I went on a few dates. Having the emotional health to date made me feel a lot better about myself. Another problem that was solved was my need for extra money. I have a friend from my youth who owns a construction company and he said I can pick up some extra hours as needed. This was a perfect fix for the financial burdens I was experiencing from having a reading disability along with schizophrenia and only being in my third year of my trade. Letting these people back into my life helped me to also make two or three more new friends who I hang out with regularly too. Ultimately, I believe a part of me had been blaming my childhood friends for all the hardships I had went through, when in reality they were just kids who were growing up just like me. Forgiving them for their past behaviors allowed me to make peace with my childhood depression in middle school where I had nearly killed myself. It also gave me access to therapeutic thoughts regarding this traumatic event. Working with these thoughts set me free from the vice grip that the trauma of my middle school depression had on me.
When I was able to accept the people I had regarded as foes as friends I think it helped reassure me that my past troubles in middle school would never recur. Knowing that we were friends again and they were on my side helped rationalize my mind. I was finally able to see how irrational it was for me to still be mad at them for treating me poorly in middle school, when we had experienced so many great times before and after that period.
Photo by Alex Barigelli
It seems that being informed and thinking rationally is a way to correct the mistaken feelings of paranoia that you sometimes have, do you think this is true? From studying and discussing with people, I have learned that thinking rationally uses a different (conscious) part of the brain from the more primitive, although just as necessary, emotional system, which tells us whether something appears to be an opportunity or a threat. It seems like you used to see a lot of things as a “threat” rather than harmless or friendly. That is very natural when we are in a vulnerable… Read more »