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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 8 of 8. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 19:04:03
This isn't anti-medication. I take 3 daily meds and 1 prn. That's not the issue.
The issue is...does the complex of cognitive, social, etc. deficits known as "schizophrenia" resolve, in some cases? Maybe get a downgrade to residual schizophrenia or something?
Posted by alexandra_k on February 3, 2014, at 19:20:25
In reply to Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 19:04:03
> This isn't anti-medication. I take 3 daily meds and 1 prn. That's not the issue.
> The issue is...does the complex of cognitive, social, etc. deficits known as "schizophrenia" resolve, in some cases? Maybe get a downgrade to residual schizophrenia or something?At some point in history there was this test for witches. What you did, was you threw them into a large body of water. If they floated - they were a witch! If they sank - they weren't a witch! Of course if they sank they tended to drown and if they floated they tended to burn...
Relatedly...
Some theorists say that people with schizophrenia cannot recover because schizophrenia is a degenerative neurodevelopmental disorder. degenerative. that means... people get worse, not better.
So... If a person (you, lets say) with a dx of schizophrenia... Starts to get better... Then here's what those theorists would say:
'Oh! You don't have schizophrenia after all! When they dx'd you with that they were wrong! You CAN'T have schizophrenia because you don't get better if you have schizophrenia!'
One man's modus ponens is another man's modus tollens...
Alternatively... One could go 'oh, I have a dx of schizophrenia so I may as well just curl up and die right now'. Or certainly not expect / hope / work towards getting better. No point, you see. No point at all.
Posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 21:27:38
In reply to Re: Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by alexandra_k on February 3, 2014, at 19:20:25
That's already happened to me. You're...charming (ever tell you about the time I talked my way out of a pscyh evaluation?), your IQ has been underestimated, you write well, you...you...
YOU HAVE BIPOLAR!
Maybe they're right. Maybe they're wrong. Maybe I'd like to be a queer "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden."
Posted by Phillipa on February 3, 2014, at 22:08:44
In reply to Re: Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 21:27:38
So what do you feel your diagnosis is? Phillipa
Posted by alexandra_k on February 4, 2014, at 1:27:58
In reply to Re: Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 21:27:38
sometimes people say they find... some kind of peace in a diagnosis. validation of suffering. feelings of acceptance by being part of a group of people who share the diagnosis. that kind of thing.
othertimes people say they find... prejudice and stigma. and sometimes the worst of this isn't the way that other people (often including psychiatrists and mental health practitioners) but the way we come to view ourselves.
perhaps especially if we start to want to understand... and we follow the path of what the supposed world leaders have to say about this and that and the next thing.
like how wealthy white men used to advocate for womans rights... or for black people to be treated as just as good as white people or... disability rights or...
uh huh.
for sure.
on with the march of science, ho! that's where the solution lies...
i mean... that's what sorted out all the issues we have with women... with race... the advance of biological science has resulted in the advance of things like disability rights...
or... things like the advance of disability rights... have encouraged us to be a little more critical? circumspect? about what it is that the scientific data actually does support...
sigh.
perhaps i have something to say (a thesis to write) after all. only... when am i going to write it? and what support am i going to get? because whatever i've had so far... hasn't been enough. sigh.
annual report is due. oh. i thought they woulda just cut me by now...
i need to say something... sigh.
Posted by phidippus on February 4, 2014, at 19:49:55
In reply to Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 19:04:03
No. Its a lifelong illness.
Eric
Posted by bleauberry on February 5, 2014, at 19:18:07
In reply to Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 19:04:03
I have seen it resolve almost completely in two different people.
Both of them had long histories of psychiatric medicines and both discovered remarkable recovery from different approaches, neither of which had anything to do with psychiatry. One was the power of Jesus and the other was antibiotics. Both were pretty much blind faith, not enough evidence to be sure, but enough suspicion or conviction to justify going ahead with it.
I think the symptoms of schizophrenia wax and wane up and down a bit over time, some periods of worsening and some periods of improvement. I have never seen, however, spontaneous remarkable improvement. There was always a specific strategy being applied.
I think in fact that if nothing is done to attack generalized disease at its core, the symptoms of schizophrenia worsen over time.
They can and do resolve but as far as I have seen it requires a purposeful effort and in my journeys I do not see evidence those results will come from psychiatry. Psychiatry can be extremely helpful in the meantime to manage symptoms in the near term, but it is not going to stop disease progression. It doesn't do much of anything to diagnose physiological problems that could be causing the symptoms.
> This isn't anti-medication. I take 3 daily meds and 1 prn. That's not the issue.
>
> The issue is...does the complex of cognitive, social, etc. deficits known as "schizophrenia" resolve, in some cases? Maybe get a downgrade to residual schizophrenia or something?
>
Posted by Phil on February 12, 2014, at 19:35:08
In reply to Does schizophrenia resolve?, posted by Christ_empowered on February 3, 2014, at 19:04:03
this is an amazing talk by evlyn saks. 15 minutes schizophrenia
http://www.ted.com/talks/elyn_saks_seeing_mental_illness.html
This is the end of the thread.
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