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Schizophrenia: a difficult land to be in and to deal with

Saurabh Dogra
Salt Lake Community College

Introduction
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder in which the patients reality is distorted from
the actual reality. Although there are different kinds of symptoms of this disorder, the
paper focuses on the positive symptoms of schizophrenia for they can be easily
diagnosed and can take a more severe form of the disorder. Positive symptoms of
schizophrenia such as hallucinations and delusions can generally be used together to
define the patient having a split mind. Patients showing these positive symptoms of
schizophrenia can harm themselves and their care takers. Schizophrenia is not only
difficult for the patients who are suffering from it, the lives of their friends and family are
also far away from normal.
Literature Review
Schizophrenia, a mental disorder in which a broad spectrum of psychological
processes are distorted. From emotions, speech, thoughts, visual reality, hearing, to
behavior, a wide range of functions can be affected. The diagnosis of this disorder can
be classified into a few categories and sub categories (Schacter, Gilbert, Wegner, and
Nock, 2014).

Positive symptoms (p. 608)

Hallucinations: to experience real external stimulation which is not there in reality,
mainly auditory.
Delusions: false beliefs due to irrational thinking.
Disorganized speech: an unmeaning speech with grammatical errors and run on
sentences.
Grossly disorganized behavior: reactions and behaviors not relating to the situation.
Catatonic behavior: a highly increased or decreased muscular movement, or
unresponsiveness due to complete unawareness (p. 609).
Negative symptoms: distortion in normal emotions and behaviors (p. 609).
Cognitive symptoms: deficits in frontal lobe functions such as memory, cognitive
thinking, organization, and memory (p. 609).
From the above mentioned symptoms, only positive symptoms are the ones that
are only seen in person with the disorder of schizophrenia, especially delusions and
hallucinations. Although two or more of any of these symptoms can be used to diagnose
the disorder, hallucinations and delusions are a giveaway for the disorder of
schizophrenia. Patients with these symptoms of the disorder can be completely
dependent on their families. According to studies, family members of schizophrenic
patients have a higher level of burden in taking care when compared to family members
of a person with depressive disorder (Koujalgi & Patil, 2013)

It is difficult for a patient with hallucination/delusions to work, cook, and be in

relationships. This family burden can also be passed along to generations. According to
research, especially twin studies, there is a high genetic factor for schizophrenia
(Salleh, 2004). Since there is a high genetic link of this disorder, it can lead to the notion
that there may be families dealing with a schizophrenic patients over many generations.
Application
Most of what the general public learns of schizophrenia is from the social media.
Movies show a psychotic person having hallucinations and delusions but otherwise
properly functioning in the world. It almost portrays the person as a villain rather than
one who is helpless and needs medical attention. The misunderstanding of
schizophrenia or showing it in negative light not only makes it difficult for the patient but
the stigma of it also affects their family. Besides having the physical and financial
burden of a schizophrenic person, the family also has to deal with the negativity from
their communities.
My friends brother is a patient of schizophrenia. I interviewed my friend and her
family to gain more knowledge on the topic of how the family of a schizophrenic person
deals with everything (S. Pal, personal communication, February 10, 2016). The mom is
the main care taker of her son. When the son was diagnosed with schizophrenia in his
early teens, the mom had to leave her job and be with him full time. He has delusions,
hallucinations, and grossly disorganized behavior, which is hard to handle. Due to mom
leaving her job, there was a financial burden on the whole family. The familys gross
income went down but their medical bills became higher due to their sons medications
and therapy. The family is scared to leave the son by himself because he has tried to

harm people around him before. He gets this high energy in his body, starts hearing
things, and attacks anyone around him saying you cant kill me because I will kill you
before that, said by patients sister during the interview. It can be easily understood that
living with and taking care of someone with schizophrenia is not only mentally disturbing
but also physically draining. The family is hardly social which has affected them
emotionally as well.
Conclusion
The more research I do on schizophrenia, the more evident it becomes that the
burden of having this disorder is not suffered by the patients alone but also by their
families. There is no cure for schizophrenia and the strong genetic factor of it only
makes the disorder more unavoidable. It can be very unfortunate for the families if the
disorder carries over to their next generation. People need to be educated about mental
disorders and consider it a medical condition rather than other negative connotation
they attach to it. It will not only make us a more educated society but also ease the lives
of families whose loved ones are dealing with such disorders.

References
Schacter DL, Gilbert DT, Wegner DM, Nock MK. Psychology (3rd Edition). New York:
Worth; 2014.

Koujalgi, S. R., & Patil, S. R. (2013). Family Burden in Patient with Schizophrenia and
Depressive Disorder: A Comparative Study. Indian Journal of Psychological
Medicine, 35(3), 251255. http://doi.org/10.4103/0253-7176.119475

Salleh, M. R. (2004). The Genetics of Schizophrenia. The Malaysian Journal of Medical

Sciences: MJMS, 11(2), 311.