Mental illness and kids: one mom's story

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2013/12/health/mentally-ill-son/

I'll be honest, I couldn't bear to read the whole thing. I was a mentally ill kid too. Except in the 1980s, there was about zero help. I was taken to many different psychiatrists by my mom; it was either "he'll grow out of it" or "he's hopeless, if there were still institutions he'd be in one". In addition, my dad was mentally ill too, and there was little help for him as an adult as well.

I wonder if this kid's problem isn't related to schizophrenia-he hears voices, after all. I didn't start hearing voices until I was about 25 or 26, then they were suppressed for a few years by an antipsychotic I was taking for irrational fears, then I was taken off that drug and the voices ramped up. One thing normal people don't realize is that outside the voices are quiet. That may be why so many schizos choose lives of homeless wandering-it calms the voices.

Most schizos don't or can't realize that the voices have no power over them. They don't know how to fight back against the voices. It takes medication, yes, but it also takes determination when the voices are saying "we're real!" to say back at them "no, you're not, and I can prove it". The voices don't want you to take your medication, this is almost universal in schizophrenia, for some reason the voices are afraid of the meds.

The voices are bullies, but like every bully they're weak at heart, and they put on the tough guy act to make you THINK that they're authoritative, but once you start fighting them they back down. I want to say to everybody who hears the voices, fight them tooth and nail, tell them they're not real, google everything they tell you to prove they're lying. And, take your meds, even though they will tell you not to, set your alarms in the morning and take the meds.