The Center Can Not Hold My Journey Through Madness

For her, everyday acts seem much more enjoyable when on drugs. She goes out of their way to experience something new and exciting. She is a creative writer and uses drugs as a way to get back to her child-like imaginative state. Suddenly, with the drugs back in her life, she seems to have much more insight and a wilder imagination. "And the afternoon was absinthe yellow and almond, burnt orange and chrysanthemum. And in the abstract sky, a litany of kites"(93). She longs to feel this way all of the time, but she knows the consequences. She sees doing drugs like going to a carnival. It is an escape from the boring life she is leading now. Even though she has a daughter, she still feels like there is something she is missing out on. The idea of motherhood takes backseat to her lust for drugs.

I chose to write my research paper over Schizophrenia. It is a psychological disorder that I have always found fascinating. It is a serious disorder that consumes a person's life and is nearly impossible to control. In this paper, I will talk about the definition of Schizophrenia, the diagnosis of Schizophrenia, Schizophrenia in children, suicide, sexually related characteristics of the disease, sleep disorders caused by the disease, differences in the disease on different ethnicities, and insensitivity to pain.

The book “The center cannot hold: My Journey Through Madness” written by Elyn Saks is a gripping and eye opening story about her personal battle with the lifetime sentence of Schizophrenia. The book starts out by telling about her childhood in Miami Florida. She lived a normal life, for the most part, with a normal family who loved and supported her. Though even from an early age she knew something was off. She was a quirky, paranoid girl who almost seemed at times to have obsessive-compulsive disorder. She often thought people were outside her house waiting to come in and abduct her.

Before I continue with Saks story let me take a moment to try and explain what this mental disorder is call chronic schizophrenia. First of all let’s see what the difference between schizophrenia and chronic schizophrenia is.

The prevalence of schizophrenia is thought to be about 1% of the population around the world. The disorder is considered to be one of the top ten causes of long-term disability worldwide. Late adolescence and early adulthood are periods for the onset of schizophrenia. In 40% of men and 23% of women diagnosed with schizophrenia, the condition manifested before the age of 19 (Addington, Cadenhead, Cannon, 2007).These are critical years in a young adult’s social and vocational development.

Attention-getter: When you hear the word schizophrenia what comes to mind? Maybe someone that is psychotic with 20 different personalities. Such as in the movie split where the main character goes from a 9-Year-old boy named Hedwig to an Old woman named Patricia.

Schizophrenia is a mental ailment in which the person inflicted is taunted by uncontrollable voices heard inside their heads and very vivid, realistic hallucinations. The voices and hallucinations can be benevolent, but they can also be violent. Many cases constitute of people being told by such voices to hurt themselves or others. People who suffer from Schizophrenia are often isolated from society and admitted into psychiatric wards and mental institutions for the majority of their lives. The general public does not understand the torment that these people go through on a day-to-day basis. In order to give readers insight into the mind of a schizophrenic, the poet Jim Stevens uses the depleting condition and turmoil taking place inside

These words are the description of schizophrenia, written by a woman who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, Elyn Saks. Her

In this week’s readings chapter twelve is about schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a psychotic disorder in which personal, social, and occupational functioning deteriorate as a result of strange perceptions, unusual emotions, and motor abnormalities. This disorder is very interesting, but also kind of scary to me. They literally end up in their own world, losing contact with reality. With that, they also experience hallucinations or delusions, which can cause them to do abnormal, possibly dangerous actions. These symptoms must last six months or more before the person can be diagnosed with schizophrenia. It will affect 1 out of 100 people in the world during ones lifetime. This disorder, unlike many others, is just as common among men and women,

Once this girl started with the drugs, she could not stop. As soon as she tried the first drug, it lead to all of the other drugs and things that she did. Her first time doing the drug was an accident, and she did not know, but she made the wrong choice in continuing to do them. She said it gave her a feeling of belonging and love that she had never felt before. If her parents or her close friends had paid more attention to her, then some of the events that happened would not have happened. Her heavy drug use lead to her runaway from home to the streets, involvement in crime, her prostitution, and her visit to the insane asylum. She found a "best friend" (Chris) - one that would give her drugs - and they decided to runaway and leave their family and friends to start their own shop in San Francisco. They thought they could not handle their parents telling them what is right and what is wrong, but that is what they needed to hear. They were naive in thinking they could live their lives alone without any rules or any authority.

Schizophrenia is a psychiatric disorder that is characterized by a variety of symptoms and the disorganization of feeling and thought. It is an incurable disease whose causes are unknown, yet whose effects are mind and body crippling. (Young, 1988, p.13-14) This topic was chosen because it is interesting to study a disorder that worldwide, is viewed as a classic example of madness and insanity. Another reason of interest is because unlike many illnesses, schizophrenia doesn't have a noticeable pattern and its difficulty to be diagnosed as a disease makes the collection of statistics difficult. It is important to learn more about schizophrenia because a significant numbr of people are affected everyday

Approximately 22% of the American population suffers from some kind of mental disorder at any given time. (Passer and Smith, 2004) Schizophrenia is one of the most serious of these mental disorders, and there are many different kinds of treatment. While all mental disorders offer diagnosis and treatment challenges, few are more challenging than schizophrenia. It is both bizarre and puzzling, and has been described as “one of the most challenging disorders to treat effectively.” (Passer and Smith, 2004, 534)

Schizophrenia is a universal mental illness which is both complex and devastating. Schizophrenia generally begins in the early stages of life and may lead to lifelong disabilities (Moritz, 2010). The context of this paper shall include an introduction on schizophrenia as well as the reasoning this discipline was chosen. It will include a critiqued research study that will explain how the research was presented. The primary focus on the research study will be a literature review, the methods used, the results found, and a presented discussion.

Just like in reality, this movie does not identify any causal factors associated with schizophrenia, but its treatment and management are portrayed to work effectively with antipsychotic/ psychotropic medications and Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) that makes the affected individual “to understand and appreciate his condition” (A beautiful Mind). Several inaccurate characterizations of schizophrenia in this movie relates to the fact that this condition does not affect males only but also females are affected, and apart from the positive symptoms of schizophrenia that are highlighted, the patient may also exhibit negative symptoms. It is also not advisable to keep or incarcerate the affected individuals in the hospital since the condition can easily be managed at home with adequate contribution of the family members (A beautiful Mind).

What is the first thing you think of when you hear the word “Schizophrenia” ? Sadly, most people react with “they’re going to hurt me” or “they’re not normal”. The main cause behind schizophrenia is believed to be that there is two neurotransmitters that have a change in their levels. This causes the person to generally have memory problems, makes them easily agitated, might make them very anxious and they also might not have good emotional responses. The symptoms caused by it are different for everyone, which I will explain later. So today I am going to tell you about Schizophrenia and what it does to people. In my paper, I will enlighten you on the causes of it, the symptoms and the people it affects. I will also tell you how the families