Introduction
Hello Everyone,
My name is Kate and I'm new to LiveJournal. I am 47 years old and I am an artist/writer/songwriter who suffers from schizophrenia and some depression. I decided to join this online journal because I found a lot of groups listed for those suffering from mental illness and I would like to reach out to people and offer my story and some hope that recovery is possible. I especially want to offer encouragement to young people just starting out. I am not fully recovered, but I have been in recovery since 2002 when I began taking the anti-psychotic medication zyprexa. I went on to earn my BFA in painting and photography. You can see my artwork at this address www.artid.com/SecondSight After I graduated I started a blog on Blogger called Yin And Yang. The address is wanderer62.blogspot.com/ I am currently beginning work on a memoir of my experience with mental illness from my childhood/youth onwards.
I began showing some signs of mental illness in my adolescence, but didn't begin hearing voices until my mid 20s after I read a book called COMMUNION by writer named Whitley Strieber. The book was promoted as a true account of his encounters with aliens and it made a deep impression on me. It was soon after I finished reading that book that I began identifying a voice or voices that sort of felt like me and yet didn't feel like me. These voices were mostly benevolent. I saw them as friends and teachers, but at the same time I didn't have any friends and I didn't go to work; instead I lived at home and went to a couple of art schools in Manhattan.
Then my parents retired and moved to Florida and I moved 6 hours away from NYC to live near my brother. My self esteem was poor and I was lonely, so I got involved with a young, abusive alcoholic. I stayed with him for 5 very traumatic years, I still had voices, but no delusions or paranoia. After I left him, I began writing songs seriously and then taking art classes. The voices were very supportive and I gradually started to heal. I applied to a local art school and was accepted and began going to school. I was very productive that year, but by the end of the 2nd semester I began delusional and paranoid. The voices turned on me.
Just before I became psychotic, I sent a tape of me talking and singing some of my songs to the lead singer/songwriter of Pearl Jam, Eddie Vedder. After that I became paranoid that he was having me followed because he was eccentric and very attracted to me. The truth was that he never contacted me and had nothing to do with me, but I was convinced otherwise. Eventually I thought we were telepathically linked by these aliens. Gradually Ed in my head morphed into a serial killer who wanted to torment me and eventually kill me.
I was diagnosed after I checked myself into a local hospital psyche ward as suffering from schizophrenia, but it would take me three years and three breakdowns before I would agree to take the medications daily/nightly. I returned to school (because I had taken a leave of absence). Soon my main delusion about Mr. Vedder dissolved and I pretty much stopped being paranoid, but for a while I was suicidally depressed. I almost left school, but then didn't. Gradually I began to get better and within 3-4 years I graduated.
I continued to have voices and to struggle with depression. I found an online organization called NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) and joined the schizophrenia message board which was very active. I also began reading memoirs about schizophrenia. I read a book called DIVIDED MINDS: TWIN SISTERS AND THEIR JOURNEY THROUGH SCHIZOPHRENIA. Somehow I found the author's blog and began an email correspondence. Then I started my own blog. Then I began focusing on painting. I have since become friends with a group of women who suffer or have suffered from schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder and major depression. Most of them have blogs, some of them have written memoirs, some of them are mental health advocates. The have given me hope and guidance and I'm hoping that people here will go to my blog, check out my blog list and started reading and connecting with some of those people.
As I said earlier, I am still not recovered. I hear voices and I go through cycles of depression, but compared to before I am in a much, much better place due to medications, therapy, online support groups and my own determination to remain creative. So never give up: get help, give help, stay creative, cultivate hope in yourself and others, and set yourself some achievable goals. There is life after acute psychosis and you can get better.
My name is Kate and I'm new to LiveJournal. I am 47 years old and I am an artist/writer/songwriter who suffers from schizophrenia and some depression. I decided to join this online journal because I found a lot of groups listed for those suffering from mental illness and I would like to reach out to people and offer my story and some hope that recovery is possible. I especially want to offer encouragement to young people just starting out. I am not fully recovered, but I have been in recovery since 2002 when I began taking the anti-psychotic medication zyprexa. I went on to earn my BFA in painting and photography. You can see my artwork at this address www.artid.com/SecondSight After I graduated I started a blog on Blogger called Yin And Yang. The address is wanderer62.blogspot.com/ I am currently beginning work on a memoir of my experience with mental illness from my childhood/youth onwards.
I began showing some signs of mental illness in my adolescence, but didn't begin hearing voices until my mid 20s after I read a book called COMMUNION by writer named Whitley Strieber. The book was promoted as a true account of his encounters with aliens and it made a deep impression on me. It was soon after I finished reading that book that I began identifying a voice or voices that sort of felt like me and yet didn't feel like me. These voices were mostly benevolent. I saw them as friends and teachers, but at the same time I didn't have any friends and I didn't go to work; instead I lived at home and went to a couple of art schools in Manhattan.
Then my parents retired and moved to Florida and I moved 6 hours away from NYC to live near my brother. My self esteem was poor and I was lonely, so I got involved with a young, abusive alcoholic. I stayed with him for 5 very traumatic years, I still had voices, but no delusions or paranoia. After I left him, I began writing songs seriously and then taking art classes. The voices were very supportive and I gradually started to heal. I applied to a local art school and was accepted and began going to school. I was very productive that year, but by the end of the 2nd semester I began delusional and paranoid. The voices turned on me.
Just before I became psychotic, I sent a tape of me talking and singing some of my songs to the lead singer/songwriter of Pearl Jam, Eddie Vedder. After that I became paranoid that he was having me followed because he was eccentric and very attracted to me. The truth was that he never contacted me and had nothing to do with me, but I was convinced otherwise. Eventually I thought we were telepathically linked by these aliens. Gradually Ed in my head morphed into a serial killer who wanted to torment me and eventually kill me.
I was diagnosed after I checked myself into a local hospital psyche ward as suffering from schizophrenia, but it would take me three years and three breakdowns before I would agree to take the medications daily/nightly. I returned to school (because I had taken a leave of absence). Soon my main delusion about Mr. Vedder dissolved and I pretty much stopped being paranoid, but for a while I was suicidally depressed. I almost left school, but then didn't. Gradually I began to get better and within 3-4 years I graduated.
I continued to have voices and to struggle with depression. I found an online organization called NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) and joined the schizophrenia message board which was very active. I also began reading memoirs about schizophrenia. I read a book called DIVIDED MINDS: TWIN SISTERS AND THEIR JOURNEY THROUGH SCHIZOPHRENIA. Somehow I found the author's blog and began an email correspondence. Then I started my own blog. Then I began focusing on painting. I have since become friends with a group of women who suffer or have suffered from schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder and major depression. Most of them have blogs, some of them have written memoirs, some of them are mental health advocates. The have given me hope and guidance and I'm hoping that people here will go to my blog, check out my blog list and started reading and connecting with some of those people.
As I said earlier, I am still not recovered. I hear voices and I go through cycles of depression, but compared to before I am in a much, much better place due to medications, therapy, online support groups and my own determination to remain creative. So never give up: get help, give help, stay creative, cultivate hope in yourself and others, and set yourself some achievable goals. There is life after acute psychosis and you can get better.