I desperately need a doctor to talk to. I am not the one with Schizophrenia but I love someone who has it. I need support and someone to talk to about it. Someone who will understand that I love this man and help me cope. Not someone who will tell me to give up and walk away. My friends tell me to walk away, so I can’t talk to them. The way I see it, you wouldn’t tell someone to leave their loved one who was diagnosed with cancer or heart disease or some other illness. Yet people tell those to leave loved ones diagnosed with a mental illness instead of helping them cope. I feel so alone.
What might help you is finding a NAMI chapter in your area… you can sometimes find referrals and crisis lines through them… in your immediate area.
www.nami.org - find support
Also large colleges might also have a psychiatric wing and they would be able to help you too.
You need someone in your home town who you can see and can answer some direct questions.
Good luck.
Thanks but I’m not in America.
I guess that I should add that I’m an American citizen but living in Europe.
Kasia, I saw your other post from earlier today. I’m so sorry you are going through this, and you are a very good person to want to stay and help. Since you aren’t in the U.S. google mental health organizations in your area.
Being calm and realizing that it isn’t the person talking, but the illness talking helps. Below are tips I copied from NAMI:Helping a Family Member or Friend
Learning about psychosis and schizophrenia will help you understand what your friend or family member is experiencing and trying to cope with. Living with schizophrenia is challenging. Here are some ways you can show support:
Respond calmly. To your loved one, the hallucinations seem real, so it doesn’t help to say they are imaginary. Calmly explain that you see things differently. Being respectful without tolerating dangerous or inappropriate behavior.
Pay attention to triggers. You can help your family member or friend understand, and try to avoid, the situations that trigger his or her symptoms or cause a relapse or disrupt normal activities.
Help ensure medications are taken as prescribed. Many people question whether they still need the medication when they’re feeling better, or if they don’t like the side effects. Encourage your loved one to take his or her medication regularly to prevent symptoms from coming back or getting worse.
Understanding lack of awareness (anosognosia). Your family member or friend one may be unable to see that he or she has schizophrenia. Rather than trying to convince the person he or she has schizophrenia, you can show support by helping him or her be safe, get therapy, and take the prescribed medications.
Help avoid drugs or alcohol. These substances are known to worsen schizophrenia symptoms and trigger psychosis. If your loved one develops a substance use disorder, getting help is essential.
- See more at:
What is Schizophrenia? | NAMI: National Alliance on Mental Illness
Also see if you can find a support group for yourself in your area, and lookup LEAP. (sorry I don’t have link for that onhand.)
Best of luck, and check in here regularly, there are many good people here that can help you.
Thank you for the tips.
People with schizophrenia can live meaningful lives. The can have relationships and importantly they can have recovery. Family support, medication and therapy is very important to recovery. There are some really great topics with suggestions and knowledgeable information on schizophrenia here on this forum. Behavioral and psychiatric institutions would help and hospitals that deal with psychiatric illnesses. Browse through Amazon for books on Schizophrenia.
Thanks. I know all this. He refuses to get treatment. Eight months of an untreated psychosis period takes it toll. I need help and support too.
Good luck. It is a mental illness that requires a lot of patients and time from love ones. A group support and therapy will help love ones dealing with a person that is mentally ill. Walks, talking it out with his family and friends to get you through this. Mindfulness meditation, stress management, cardio exercises, calling a crisis center for him. Find out if he is eating properly or taking harmful substances. Substance abuse clinic might be necessary. Emergency contact numbers of relatives.
Thanks. He has no other friends and his parents don’t speak English. So I’m quite alone most of the time. I do take walks, do yoga, workout, and try to do creative things. He is 29 and the law says nothing can be done unless he is a proven threat to himself or others. Some days I can cope and other days are hard, like today.
Maybe, you can encourage him th o call his parents for support. You could easily speak to him about how you feel and see if he will respond. Talk it out with him and encourage him to do the same. Talking cure therapy can make a difference.
There is a person on this site that posted this. I think it might help
I think these links are very useful in getting a good understanding.
http://www.leapinstitute.org/ - under resources are free videos on using LEAP
LEAP is a way of communicating to build trust. Listen-Empathize-Agree-Partner.
http://dramador.com/ - Dr. Xavier Amador is a clinical psychologist whose brother had schizophrenia. He is the founder of the LEAP Institute. Wrote the book: I’m Not Sick I Don’t Need Help! Can buy from his website.
Search Xavier Amador on YouTube for more videos
http://ourhealthyminds.com/family-handbook/communication/Building-a-collaborative-relationship-leap.html
Building A Collaborative Relationship “LEAP”
Treatment Advocacy Center - under problems you will see anosognosia
Anosognosia looks like denial but is different.
Bayes for Schizophrenics: Reasoning in Delusional Disorders - LessWrong - helped my understand delusions
Here is another post from the forum
Need Help? Learn More About Active Listening
We connect you with a compassionate, trained active listener through our secure network. You also have the option of anonymous chat with a therapist for online therapy or free counseling online. Whether you want to chat about life, love, stress or just talk about your problems, we have an active listener or online counselor for you to vent to via anonymous chat.
7 Cups of Tea respects your privacy. Our bridging technology lets you connect one-on-one to a listener while remaining completely anonymous.
Need someone to talk to? Take a look at our community of listeners and online therapists and find the right someone for you to talk to about your problems.
You might try contacting this group - and see if they can recommend any psychiatrists in your area:
I honestly thought that this is a European site.
Lol. I thought it was American because it’s in English without a translator and it didn’t seem British.
Thank you to everyone who replied with links and thoughtful words. Your kindness helps a lot.
Come on… What?.. The European is always smarter than us.
That may be true:)
I went untreated for a year. Trying to get rid of my voices in a very violent way put me in hospital for half a year. I’m in Sweden. Here family can get support too if living with someone with MI. But it’s a long wait. Support groups are better ways to cope, to see others in same situation.