It’s about time, that mental disorders are to be discussed in the open and need to be normalized. While some mental disorders had been known to have a mild or no effect on the lifestyle, Schizophrenia is known to have disrupted our daily lives and tasks in a way like none. They are known to have adverse effects on our daily tasks, our problem-solving capabilities, and critical thinking as well.
Like many other illnesses, we haven’t found a permanent cure for it. However, with treatment, most symptoms of Schizophrenia can be improved. It isn’t a disorder that cannot be treated.
What is Schizophrenia?
Schizophrenia is a disorder that affects a person’s thinking ability. A person with this disorder can neither behave nor feel things clearly. People with this disorder interpret the real things abnormally.
It is a serious mental disorder that can result in delusional thinking or hallucinations. On the severe side, it may even lead to suicidal tendencies in people. It disrupts our routine activities by disordering a person’s thinking.
“Acknowledging the problem is the first key to solve the problem!”
Symptoms of Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is known to have three kinds of symptoms such as psychotic symptoms, negative symptoms, and cognitive symptoms as well. Bipolar schizophrenia is considered the most fatal disorder, leading to manic depression, changes in personality, and even leads to self-harming thought process as well.
- Psychotic Symptoms
These paranoid schizophrenia symptoms widely include
- Delusions (believing in a paranoid situation or belief),
- Hallucinations (Hearing voices, feeling strange kind of smells and tastes, which are imaginary and self-built) and
- Catatonia (complete state of being still for a long time, accompanied by no moments or even facial expressions).
- Negative Symptoms
Psychologists and counsellors identify these behaviors to have a negative impact on a person’s lifestyle or daily lives.
- It can include their slow decision-making capability, speaking in deformed and abrupt sentences.
- A person also finds themselves making pacing in the same path or walking in circles, even without their knowledge.
- They suffer excessively due to forgetting things and unable to make proper decisions in life.
- Cognitive Symptoms
- The individual can face trouble implementing their learnings into daily lives, face a lot of difficulties maintaining a social equilibrium with family and friends.
- They face disinterest in living their lives and are always disappointed.
- They maintain poor hygiene, are devoid of energy all the time, and develop various eating disorders as well.
“There is no hurdle too big for a man to achieve!”
Causes of Schizophrenia
There are various factors that lead to this disorder, and, as we have all learned, acknowledging the problem is the first key to solve the problem!
It is a prerequisite for us to know what factors cause schizophrenia in a person. Here are to list a few:
- Heredity– It is one of the most common, prevalent, and incurable cause of most diseases. While genetic schizophrenia always has a sleek chance of getting cured, there are always ways to control and manipulate the symptoms, as there is no hurdle too big for a man to achieve.
- Disrupted brain functioning– Researchers find that a person having an abnormal brain structure or functioning mostly falls into the trap of schizophrenia and experiences odd symptoms as well. But it is not always the case, people not suffering from any abnormalities are also vulnerable to the disorder equally.
- Environment– External factors like excessive drug and alcohol abuse, infections, and prolonged illness are also the causes that trigger schizophrenia. The prime cause of schizophrenia is the imbalance of hormonal and physical changes like those which happen during puberty- only to have more fatal effects.
- Age and Gender– while the factors are minute, but they also contribute to the onset of this disease. Schizophrenia usually hits at an adolescent age, but even small children are diagnosed with schizophrenia, and hence it’s a contradictory statement. In some researches, men are likely to develop symptoms earlier than women, but again, they are hypothetical situations.
Diagnosis
The disease is best diagnosed under proper medical supervision who performs various kinds of physical and mental challenging tests and draws out conclusions. Psychologists use various designed interviews and assessments to diagnose this disorder, as there is no proper medical procedure to detect them. People suffering from mild symptoms should seek supervision at the earliest, as the disorders tend to deteriorate exponentially as time passes.
Schizophrenia Treatment
Seeking a professional is always advisable, but there are also innumerable changes and improvisations you can make in your daily lives to reduce the intensity of schizophrenia and to mild its effects.
How to overcome schizophrenia still remains a large mystery to several people, who think it’s almost incurable and makes a person inaccessible or mentally challenged permanently. Bursting this myth can be the first step to overcome this hurdle, as schizophrenia is curable or at least controllable.
Here are a few tips as to how to avert schizophrenia:
- Medication: Medications along with a healthy lifestyle can be very effective in the treatment of Schizophrenia. If you feel any symptoms or signs matching your condition, you should consult a doctor. Your doctor will then prescribe you medication depending upon your condition.
Antipsychotics are generally prescribed for Schizophrenia. Second-generation antipsychotics are preferred for schizophrenia due to the low risk of side effects.
Sometimes, if symptoms are severe, hospitalization may be necessary to ensure safety, proper sleep, food, and hygiene.
How to overcome Schizophrenia without Medication?
- Finding the positivity– Research reveals that people actually get treated for this disorder if they find a positive outlook to recover from this disease. Never refer a person suffering from this kind of disorder as ill or sick, as it makes the person go into a state of denial of the disease in a negative way, which disrupts their health further.
- Creating a happy lifestyle– Creating a comfortable and positive lifestyle around you can lead to the discontinuation of delusions and hallucinations as well. When you feel protected and happy, it is less likely that you will find yourself going away to places and feeling vulnerable.
- Building relationships– It is found that a person suffering from schizophrenia likes to be self-isolated and feel detached from the world. We all have to struggle and find a way to overcome this feeling, try making healthy relationships, volunteer for animal shelters and old age homes. They tend to build a long-lasting feeling of content in your mind where you feel secure and protected.
- Healthy lifestyle– Meditation, yoga, jogging, eating vitamins and mineral-rich foods are always a prerequisite to a healthy mind as well. The nutrients often act as electrodes inside our brains which helps in the production of essential hormones for its smooth functioning.
A healthy and happy life is the right of every living being. While people have always hushed about mental illness and its remedies, you have to find it yourself to ward off the evils in your society, open up about your disease and find proper help or medication to attend it.
