The danger of labeling myself…
I did notice that my discussion about my illness changes a bit when I tell people that…
I’m a man dealing with Sz and not that I’m “a schizophrenic”.
Once you accept a label, you sort of accept the all baggage that goes with the label.
My youngest brother has been called a “danger boy” for a very long time. He likes it. Keeping his danger boy title has meant over the years he has tried to do more and more dangerous stuff. The thing is… this past 18 months of pure out of control manic fury… and everyone just shrugged and said, “Well, you know, John is the danger boy, the wild one. It’s just how he is.”
When he started acting out even more and getting even more out there as far as the behavior, would we have seen this as a warning sign sooner, and gotten him help sooner if we didn’t just think he was being the danger boy?