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July 7, 2015
May 22, 2015
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By subscribing for free today, I will send you an email notification each time I post. Simply click on the “subscribe to blog” link at the top of the panel on the right side of the page below the search field and enter your email address. I will send you a confirmation email to complete the process in which you will have to click on a link to finalize the subscription process. A second reminder email will be sent after this if you miss the first one. It is that easy! I post irregularly, usually every 2-3 weeks or longer. Save yourself the hassle of having to regularly check the blog for new posts. Subscribe for free now and unsubscribe at any time..
October 12, 2014
Schizophrenia Simulator
Anderson Cooper, from CNN, tries life as a schizophrenia using a simulator.
This is just a little teaser of interest I found to hold you over until the next installment of Langley, B.C.: Policemen Aren’t Your Friends, as I have fallen behind. The next installment should appear in the next two or three days. In the meantime, follow the link below to watch Anderson Cooper experience a simulation of hearing voices. This video shows in simulation what would take a thousand words to describe and still not convey the experience as pointedly. Watch the following video as posted on Youtube:
July 20, 2014
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By subscribing for free today, I will send you an email notification each time I post. Simply click on the “subscribe to blog” link at the top of the panel on the right side of the page below the search field and enter your email address. I will send you a confirmation email to complete the process in which you will have to click on a link to finalize the subscription process. A second reminder email will be sent after this if you miss the first one. It is that easy! I post irregularly, usually every 2-3 weeks, or more. Save yourself the hassle of having to regularly check the blog for new posts. Subscribe now.
July 5, 2014
Share Your Favorite Posts With Your Friends. It’s Quick And Easy!
Find an interesting post on the blog? Want to tell your friends about it? The blog now has the functionality to share posts with friends on social media. There are four social media links at the bottom of the post page with Face Book being the most popular. To share on your Face Book feed simply click on the blue share button at the bottom of the post, enter a comment on the pop-up window that opens, and click share link. Just two clicks gets the job done. It’s that easy! Let your friends share in the stories you find interesting. Share with them now!
June 29, 2014
Medicated For Your Protection
In my post, “Coping With Hearing Voices,” I mentioned that one of my coping strategies was the use of prescription drugs. In this post I am going to discuss in more detail my use of prescription drugs to treat schizophrenia and some of my thoughts around the use of drugs to treat this supposed disease, briefly discuss the medications I take, and finishing off by noting a couple of the side effects of taking the medication.
As it was explained to me some time after my diagnosis of schizophrenia and the beginning of medical treatment for that disease, in the simplest sense, my condition was brought on by a chemical imbalance in my brain. The use of anti-psychotics then was meant to correct that chemical imbalance. This view takes almost no interest in what has happened to you in life and focuses solely on treating the disease. The prognosis indicated that my affliction would last a lifetime and therefore the use of medication would necessarily last a lifetime as well. Without medication I would be unable to function and further, I could be construed a danger to myself or others. So sayeth the medical model. Halleluiah. Amen.
June 28, 2014
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June 14, 2014
Don’t Kid yourself. There Is Always Another Voice Telling Me What To Do.
My analytics on the blog indicate that the most popular of my posts to date is the Die!Die!Die! post in which I discussed the die command, a pernicious voice in my head that persistently and over the years periodically commands me to die. As the discussion of the experience of being in the head of someone who hears voices seems to be a popular one, I would like to return to it and discuss further the experience of voice commands in an effort to give my readership more of what they seem to find interesting.
March 15, 2014
Coping With Hearing Voices Part 3 of 3
In this third and final part of a three part series of posts on strategies for coping with hearing voices I share a final four strategies that I employ to keep functioning at a high level.
7. Keeping occupied. While I am a strong proponent of having down time to think and reflect or pursue pleasing hobbies, I am a firm believer that a person needs meaningful occupation to be well balanced. I know I do. Consequently, I have chosen to remain employed instead of going on disability when it was offered and having nothing purposeful to apply myself too. It is my belief that without something purposeful to apply oneself to on a regular basis one goes into decline and the condition that caused the disability worsens. This has been true for me. And for me, much of my sense of self-worth comes from the fact that I work full time and am financially independent, especially of the state. My experience has taught me that I do better with my condition when I am working than when I am unemployed and left with nothing but time on my hands. While I do believe that there are times when it is necessary to take a step back from employment when one is in crisis because of a condition, it is essential to return to steady employment, or, as an alternative, possibly volunteer work, on a full time basis as soon as possible. In my last episode 2.5 years ago I was back to work in 6 weeks after persuading my doctor(a general practitioner) that I was ready even though she prescribed at least a four month recovery period. The mind that is occupied with a worthy undertaking has no time to occupy itself with lesser things, particularly the unending chatter of idle voices in my head.
March 11, 2014
Coping With Hearing Voices Part 2 of 3
Last week I shared three strategies for coping with hearing voices: detachment, acceptance, and self-restraint. In this the second part of a series of three I discuss three more strategies I employ to cope with hearing voices.
4. Support Network. Having people who I trust and respect to talk too about what goes on inside with the voices and other matters is a more recent strategy. After some failed attempts to communicate my experiences to professionals and some friends leading up too 1994 and beyond, because of the negative responses I learned to keep my troubles to myself. However, in recent years I have discovered, or rediscovered, a psychological benefit in being able to enter into open discussions with select trusted peoples I can create an environment of emotional safety and support where I am not judged, medicated, or ‘fixed.’ When the voices are at their worst I find a release in talking with trusted people instead of bottling it up inside and becoming overwhelmed. I attend a weekly men’s support group and have a small group of trusted confidants of which one is a licensed therapist. These exchanges help me stay grounded and keep life in perspective, which lessens the impact of the voices. As well, I keep in regular contact with friends and family on a daily basis, which helps me avoid becoming isolated with the voices and my issues. In my experience, psychiatrists have proven untrustworthy and my exchanges with them have been largely unproductive if not injurious. Beyond writing prescriptions they seem to have little else to offer. Besides target practice I have little use for them. I use a General Practitioner to prescribe any medications I might need and help me manage the condition from a medical perspective. At present, there are no psychiatrists in my support network and I figure that I do just fine without them.