I’m new to this forum. Someone very special to me has started. We’ve been very close for 4 years. He has been med compliant for the past 15 years. I don’t know all of his moods but he is on an injection once every 3 months, takes a daily antipsy, and a daily mood stabilizer. Lately I have found his negative symptoms have worsened. He rarely wants to talk ad doesn’t seem to care if we see each other or not. Ive asked him if this friendship is important and if he wants to continue and he said yes. Is this typical for people with sza? Do negative symptoms become better and worse and better again? I should mention that while he used to smoke a small joint in the evening he sometimes smokes twice a day now, I’m not sure if that has anything to do with it. I have talked to him about it, but he will do whatever he wants anyway. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
Agree with @naturallycured
This illness is 500% more likely to get schizophrenia in the first place
I’ve had a 6 week long near paranoia episode of obsessive paranoia after relapse with one joint!
Thanks for the reply…I really wish he would quit. Especially since he’s also on all these meds and doesn’t disclose his marijuana use to his psychiatrist
I have to agree with the others. I had a son who smoked massive amounts of pot before he was in treatment. The pot will always make the disease worse and lessen the effectiveness of any medication. His doctor said to him, I can’t treat you if you continue to smoke pot. He didn’t care at first but I made it a no win situation for him when I got his legal guardianship and became his rep payee. Then he has no money at all unless it was for something I approved. He couldn’t buy pot then and nobody was giving it away for free.
After 10 years of being sane and sober and on the meds he takes he can be trusted with money and always makes good decisions and has his own credit card. As for “negative” symptoms that I see in my son, they are his refusal to engage with friends old or new, he claims he is happy how he is and he is often not very motivated to do things unless I am doing them too. He also refuses to do anything involving continuing education. I keep trying though on all counts. I have learned over all of these many years, “never say never” and what takes most people maybe a year to accomplish, might take my son 8-10 years to accomplish. I’ve seen it. Good luck.