Schizophrenia

What’s it like having this disease? It does not bother me most of the time. Only when the stigma comes out and now that I moved from a low-income housing my neighbors do not know. To me it is just something I have to take medicine for the rest of my life. It is not like type 2 diabetes where if you eat right and exercise you can beat that disease. No this one sticks with you for life. It is the only disease I want to have for the rest of my life. I always hope and pray that nothing else goes wrong as I get older.
I just want to take my Geodon and my vitamins for the rest of my life. I do not want to be a burden on my family. I hope that I can always take care of myself. That is what I mostly think of not the stigma that goes with this mental illness. The only time I am affected by stigma is if I tell someone I have a mental illness. Because otherwise you cannot tell that I do. I do hate it when people think I am crazy. Like when my fridge was freezing my stuff on the bottom of my fridge. I kept telling them at my new apartment and they kept treating me like I was crazy. I had to prove I was not by taking a bottle of water that had frozen from the bottom of my fridge.
I believe if they knew I had a mental illness I would have never received a new fridge. It can hurt you in a lot of ways stigma. People can be frustrating. Which in turn frustrates me even though I know that is just part of life. Through all this and listening to the news you just hope things will get better. They always do there are good times and bad times. Although I have to say there are more good times then bad. I did a decade locked up and I have had way longer being free.
I was able to see my grandchildren born and grow up without being locked up during all those years. They still have a way to go. I want to be there when they are fully grown. I am a lucky one in this illness did not rob me of anything in fact if it wasn’t for the fact that I was locked up in the state hospital, I would not have been able to change my life around for the better. I only hope that they can find medicine that works for other schizophrenics that have negative symptoms and do not get the chance I had to make their life better.
I believe they are making a start with Obama’s new brain initiative  . If they can understand the brain better and make drugs that work it would be great. A person just has to keep having hope. I do feel for the people who cannot make the changes to see that you can have a better life. I left a friend back at the state hospital that could not quit smoking weed. I used to tell just do it to see your dad out on the streets. Nothing could make him change. I think of him because he was a good friend. Just was to set in his ways. The last time I went up there to get my conditional release I asked and he was still there and that was after seven years. I would never want to die being locked up.