Schizophrenia

Here is the failed, former "Mental Horrors" that I mentioned in 8000 Tons. I failed hard at making it work the way I wanted, but as I explain in the intro, I went about it the wrong way and wasted many, many hours trying to write a story within this discussion. I decided to scrap it, and release this as-is.

The Book Kate mentions in the conversation: "Flowers for Algernon" https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36576608-flowers-for-algernon

Thank you for your patience, and I'm charging headlong into the next episode, which is a story that few podcasters are brave enough to tell in detail.

Featuring the expert knowledge of Kate Wallinga from the podcast, Ignorance Was Bliss: https://iwbpodcast.com/

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Episode Transcript

(00:31):
So this episode ended up turning outcompletely differently than I initially wanted it to.
It was at first going to bea trilogy of stories of various medical
conditions, apotem nephelia, a worstcase scenario of drug induced fatal insomnia,

(00:53):
and finally the story of Clive Waring, who has the worst case of a
nisia ever documented. But it quicklymorphed from that into an episode about schizophrenia,
and what I wanted to do.I met a young woman named Kate
wallinga from ignorance was bliss, andshe's very schooled in schizophrenia. So what

(01:18):
I wanted to do was use herexpertise, and we've a story into that
into an interview with her. It'smuch harder than it sounds to do that,
and what I should have done wasright the story first. Then talked
to Kate in relation to the story, but I did it backwards, so

(01:42):
I scrapped the narrative and what wehave today is our discussion about schizophrenia and
a couple of related illnesses, andI think it stands on its own.
This doesn't need a story woven intoit. It's an interesting conversation. Nonetheless,

(02:04):
so I'm moving on from this.I've spent enough time on it and
I'm going to dig deep into thenext episode quick and it should be done
a lot faster than this one was. I apologize for this taking so long.
So without further ado, enjoy.You have experience with schizophrenia, Well,

(02:29):
not personally, but yeah, Ido, sure, I do.
So. I am a former forensicand clinical psychologist as well as crisis clinician,
and that means I've worked in boththe criminal justice and the mental health
field, kind of from entry,you know, at the emergency room point

(02:51):
all the way through to locked psychiatricfacilities and prisons, and we lock up
a lot of our mentally out.Okay, okay, So in your experience,
how often does schizophrenia occur? Roughly, the theory is that it's one

(03:13):
percent of the population. I thinkit's probably higher than that, and that
you know, a lot of peopledon't rise to the level of necessarily needing
clinical treatment, or more likely,a lot of times people with schizophrenia come
off as weird, they come acrossas different, they have a harder time
making money, they have a hardertime pursuing treatment, and so as long

(03:38):
as they can maintain basic functioning,they never get seen. So I think
it's probably more on the three tofive percent. So maybe so it would
probably be safe to say that twoto three percent of the population has it,
but either they don't know they haveit, or they go undiagnosed and

(04:01):
they they're able to function well enoughwithout treatment. Yeah, I mean,
you probably know you have something.Sure you may not know the name for
it, but you know you've gotsomething not quite right. Basically, if
you know twenty people, you knowsomebody with schizophrenia in the milder cases of
what are these people generally experiencing?Do you think is it? A lot

(04:28):
of us are familiar with schizophrenia onsome level. We know that generally it
is either or both audio or videovideo. It is either audio or visual
hallucinations, and sometimes a combination ofboth. And in your experience talking with

(04:55):
these people and and and working withthem, how many experience low level symptoms
versus the real scary stuff. Well, okay, let me back out just
a little bit. First, peopleI think don't know what schizophrenia is.

(05:16):
They often sort of confabulate, Theymix it up with multiple personality disorder,
which may or may not be real. There's there's a lot of clinical debate
in the community about that, butregardless, that's an entirely separate diagnosis.
Yeah, so schizophrenia I used toteach as well as working in clinically,

(05:43):
and the way I would teach myIntro to cy class on schizophrenia, it
was one of my favorite classes toteach every semester was too. I would
come into the classroom and I wouldbring like a radio, you know,
a handheld radio kids, that's whatwe used to use before we had,
you know, bluetooth speakers. SoI would bring in that. I would

(06:08):
bring in. I would have theTV in the classroom. I used to
teach in downtown Boston on Beacon Street, and so I would open the windows,
which was especially good if it wascold out, and then I would
turn the radio on, but Iwould turn it on low volume, and
I would try to set it notquite to a station, you know,

(06:30):
but like like a decimal off soit's static and the sound at the same
time. Then I would turn theTV on to a different station, and
I would put a computer open toplaying something else entirely, and I would
pull a couple of students in tohelp me out where I would ask one
of them to randomly flip through thetextbook and read a sentence at a time,

(06:56):
every so often out loud. AndI would ask another one to repeat
after me every so often, notevery sentence, but just every once in
a while, repeat the thing thatI had just said. And I would
move around a lot more than Inormally do. And I would like physically,

(07:18):
like would walk over to a studentand ask them to rotate their desk,
or I would shove a kid's chairover by three inches or whatever.
Like I'm just generally trying to floodtheir senses completely. Okay, so you're
creating this kind of overwhelming oral soundscapeeverything it's hard to physical and because that

(07:41):
is what schizophrenia is in a fundamentalway, schizophrenia is a lot more like
ADHD than people realize their processed similarlyin the right frontal lobe. And it
has to do with you know thatyou hear about that concept. So so
let me let me finish first withwhat I would do in the classroom is

(08:05):
I would either maybe have a Tshirt and I would put a sweatshirt on
over top of it, or whenI was teaching at the same school,
as my husband. I would askhim to come in to the room in
the middle of the class, takea book off the desk, and walk
away without saying a word to anybody. And then at the end of the
session I would get quiet. Iwould close the windows, turn off the

(08:30):
TV, schurn off the radio,let everybody fix their desks, calm everybody
down for a second, and thenI would say, okay, so your
test for the schizophrenia unit for thechapter, what color was my husband's tie?
Oh? I probably wouldn't be ableto tell you myself, right,

(08:54):
I mean, and that kind ofget the crux of it is what schizophrenia
is is that there's sort of abreak in the ability of the person to
figure out what is important in theenvironment around them. They're sort of flooded
all the time. So you knowthe cocktail party synd your own experience where

(09:18):
somebody says your name and you sortof perk up, And they don't exactly
have that in that same way,Like they may have that one experience,
but in general like they don't theydon't have that sense of these are the
important things I have to pay attentionto. You know, if somebody shouts
fire, if someone says my name, if someone says mom, if it's

(09:39):
too hot, you know, thingslike that, like they don't necessarily know.
And after time goes by and you'reso used to being flooded all the
time and you get it wrong,you get it wrong all the time where
you pay attention to the wrong thingbecause you basically you just have to guess
which thing in my environment am Igoing to pay attention to And a lot

(10:00):
of times you're going to get strongright because like my students would figure out
that something weird is going on here, and I have to pay attention to
something. Yeah, Well, andthen it turns out they paid attention to
the wrong thing. Yeah. Andthen maybe when it comes to a student,
you're asking them and they may learnyour style and they'll be like,
Okay, we have to pay attentionto fucking everything. But the schizophrenic patient

(10:26):
probably isn't going to do that naturallyat all, Boyan, but you try
to. And one of the bigdifferences is in a classroom, you know
for the most part that if youget it wrong, it's not that I
don't care, but I don't care, do you know what I mean?
Like I'm not going to berate youor try to make you feel bad for

(10:48):
getting it wrong or for being wrongall the time. Whereas a person of
schizophrenia, there becomes this emotional elementas well, because their family gets frustrated,
why can't you just get this right? Yeah, well, and the
family and and we'll probably get intothis in a little while, and it's

(11:11):
it's probably more I would guess.This is my uneducated assumption, is that
the family probably doesn't know that theirloved one is suffering from this. No,
absolutely not. They don't understand whythis person is overwhelmed or they're withdrawn,
or they're whatever the case is.Uh, they don't know what's going

(11:35):
on with them, So they they'relike, what's you know, Hey,
why aren't you getting this? Whyare you know? And it's not that
they're not getting it, it's thatmaybe there's something going on there that you
can't see. Well exactly, itis that they're not getting it. And
it is totally normal for a parentto get frustrated, but parents of children

(11:56):
or young adults who developed schizophrenia often, not always, but often it shows
up in the late teens, whichis a time when a lot of people
go undergo sort of a personality changein a style shift anyway, sure,
from child to adult, and sothere's a certain degree of like, oh,

(12:16):
well, maybe you're just not asas outgoing as you used to be,
or maybe you just don't like thesame things you used to like or
whatever, and we sort of explainthat away to ourselves in that way.
Yeah, you and I both wereteenagers. I'm I'm not much younger than
you. I'm thirty seven, andhey, I remember all of that I

(12:41):
used to be. You know,I've always been kind of introverted and reserved,
but less so in my preteen years, and as I developed as a
teenager, it became more noticeable andmore I was more self aware about it,
about like how I just it's notthat I don't like you, I

(13:05):
just don't want to be around youright now kind of thing, you know
what I mean, Like, I'msure you understand that. So, yeah,
I get that that change entirely.And perhaps that could be confused as
oh, it's just just normal teenagerstuff, like they're changing, but in
some cases it could be something verydifferent and perhaps scary. Absolutely, it's

(13:33):
got to be terrifying. It oughtsto be terrifying because I believe. Like
often if you ask a person ofschizophrenia, like, what are they talk
about auditory hallucinations? What is thislike? Because I was always curious,
like does it really sound like someoneelse is in the room with you?

(13:54):
Or does it sound like your ownthoughts but they're not You're not charge bunch
of them, or like, youknow, does it sound like the sound
is coming from inside your head oroutside your head? Or do the thoughts
make sense to you or not?Or whatever? And you get a variety
of answers, but all of itlike, for the most part, we
have a certain degree of control overwhat we pay attention to and how we

(14:16):
think about things, you know,and anxiety or depression can alter that.
But we can learn, okay,I'm I'm I'm over you know, I'm
rabbiting myself up over a social interactionand it's not going to be that bad.
And here's some techniques on how Ican cope with an anxiety inducing situation,

(14:39):
whereas with somebody with schizophrenia there's notat all. Through the part of
the fault of the family, there'sthis sense of there's an emotional component that
that why can't you get this?And a lot of times, the parents
will either personalize it, you know, what am I doing wrong? Or

(15:00):
they look at the can't like,look, just get it together. And
we don't do that as bad parents. We do it because it's natural to
do as parents. It's just howsort of how life happens. But over
time, the person of schizophrenia tendsto sort of internalize that more and more

(15:22):
and they really start to feel like, yeah, something must be wrong with
me. They know it, theyknow they're different, they know they're perceiving
the world differently, but they don'tnecessarily have the vocabulary and the tools to
express what they know. Okay,and well, and I would have to
imagine that they probably know something.It is something is profoundly wrong with them,

(15:46):
but they may want to hide ita little bit so that mom and
dad or whoever they they're best friendsdon't think they're crazy. Well yeah,
absolutely, and from to degree fromthemselves, I think nobody, nobody wants

(16:06):
to be crazy. Like, howlong does any on average people, even
with sort of garden variety depression oranxiety, they spend like a solid two
to five years suffering with these symptomsthat are potentially life threatening before they seek
help and so amp that up forsomething like schizophrenia, where it's not just

(16:30):
about mood and I say just withvisual quotes that you can't see, but
they're there. But with schizophrenia,it's got a mood element, but it's
more about your actual perceptions of theworld. What you know. It's like
somebody coming up to you saying,the sky is not the color that you

(16:52):
always thought it was. And Iwould imagine that they they actually hear that.
Well, you said, they giveyou ext answers, but I would
imagine that a great deal of schizophreniapatients probably actually perceive that as coming from
outside their body, so they hearit with their ear drums on some level,

(17:17):
not really mostly they know. Mostlythey can recognize that, you know,
you know, it's sort of howyou get a song stuck in your
head. Yeah, it's sort oflike that, a little bit that they
get like a running or like ifyou have anxiety, you get sort of
that running. I call it thebrain weasels, the sort of running commentary
and your voice and everything on yourlife and everything that you're doing wrong and

(17:38):
every way that you're screwing up andevery you know, and oh my god,
this is the you know, andworking up to this catastrophe at the
end of everything. Schizophrenia isn't necessarilythat high strung and anxious, but it's
that sort of back and forth thatthey have can develop different tones of voice
sort of but they're aware that it'shappened, and they're aware that there's not

(18:00):
another person in the room. Sosometimes they'll talk out loud to respond to
the voice, but that's more oftento sort of reassure themselves that there's still
a difference between their thoughts and theirvoice. Okay, well, and that
makes me think that like perhaps theysay something out loud so that they can

(18:22):
feel the vibration. Yeah, yeah, so it's more it's more of a
physical experience than just in their head. And that's that's Uh, that's interesting
to think about. And I'm oneof those people who and fuck I just
learned this, uh not too longago. Not everyone has an internal monologue.

(18:45):
I do. Not I do.I have an internal monologue that is
running twenty four well while I'm consciousfrom the time I wake up till the
time I go to bed. AndI think the difference between those of us
who have that and the schizophrenic patientis I have some degree of control over

(19:07):
that, and it's my own voicethat I hear inside my head, and
I can change subjects anytime I wantto. So with the schizophrenic, they
probably don't have the ability to dothat. Well, maybe if they had
gotten treatment early on, because thereare some skills, you know, there's

(19:30):
in the same way that you cantame anxiety, there are ways that you
can control thoughts and recognize like whatis your thought versus what just as a
passing thought? You know, sometimesyou have a weird moment, you know,
you think about a frog and thenyou're like, wait, why the
hell did I just think about afrog? Yeah, like why did that

(19:51):
just happen? And most of usare able to sort of brush that off,
it's like, that's not a bigdeal, whereas people with schizophrenia have
already lost that sense of perspective ofwhat is truly important and what is worth
paying attention to and what is relevantto this situation because they've become so used
to trying to pay attention to everythingall the time that you lose perspective.

(20:17):
And so if the disorder is caughtearly and they're given some techniques on how
to sort of figure out what isimportant is and what is not. You
can get people that are not asimpacted by it. But when people the
longer they struggle on their own,the more they fall into certain patterns of

(20:40):
thinking and being, And so youend up getting somebody who really has a
very difficult time discerning was this mythought or was this you know, spoken
out elsewhere, or it reaches apoint of is this a thought that's coming
to me from the TV or fromthe radio waves or from the WiFi.
Now, And you did mention thatmost often schizophrenia starts showing in what mid

(21:07):
to late teens on average early twenties. It's called bimodal Okay, So if
you picture a normal curve, right, A lot of people are familiar with
what a normal curve is, right, and that's like it's it's a lump.
Sure, it starts low, andit quickly ramps up and then then
it ramps back down. So schizophrenaanything that is bimodal mode just means most

(21:30):
common, like the most common number. And so a normal curve, the
most common number is the where wherethe curve is the highest. In a
bimodal graph, it's got two peaks. Okay, and so schizophrenia has two.
So this doesn't mean that everybody developsit at these ages. It just

(21:51):
means that the most frequent cases areeither from about eighteen to twenty two or
from about For men it's like lateforties, and for women it's a little
bit later, like early fifties.There's a second peak. Yeah, that's
something I never knew. Is likeeverything I've learned about it is that you

(22:15):
either get it. You either areafflicted with it by the time you're twenty
five ish, or you're good.Yeah, no, sorry, okay,
so I have something to something Ilook forward to. Yeah, it's and
so. But that if you thinkabout it, those are two points in

(22:36):
time where we often undergo pretty significantlife changes. Yes, yes, and
so Again it's a case of likewhether how well you adjust to those life
changes, and how well you're ableto communicate the differences, and how well
you know. With most mental illness, the most important thing that we can
have is a support system that's willingto step up and say I'm worried about

(23:00):
you well, and you know,the people around you have to be able
to recognize that something's wrong, anda lot of people may come off as
a chameleon that, as you knowsaid earlier, they may try to hide
that, I would think because theydon't want to. You know, hey,
I'm there's no way I can bementally ill. There has to be

(23:23):
some and it's probably significant a significantnumber of people who are diagnosed with maybe
not even schizophrenia, but any kindof serious mental condition that just try to
hide it until they can't control itanymore, so when they may not even

(23:45):
be trying to hide it on purpose. Like I'm a very very strong believer
that any symptom we have is adaptivein its way. We do things for
reason, right, So anxiety,for instance, I bring anxiety up a
lot because people understand anxiety, youknow, they're they're more familiar with whatever

(24:10):
that concept is. Even if theydon't experience anxiety, they know what it
looks like or they know what itfeels like to be nervous, so they
can imagine that anxiety is kind oflike nerves amplified, which it sort of
is. Yeah, and it cansometimes be irrational anxiety. You may be
really nervous about something that to someonewho doesn't suffer anxiety, they're like,

(24:33):
what the fuck is the problem?Like well, that's the difference between That's
the difference between anxiety and nerves,right, is that nerves are generally contextually
appropriate and proportionate to the situation,and anxiety is generally a way of life.
Yeah, yeah, I'll see mymom. My mother, she's been

(24:53):
committed to a mental institution before.She had anxieties so severely that I remember
a few times when I was probablyseven eight years old. I remember it
clearly. It's one of those memoriesthat is significant enough to stick with you

(25:14):
for the rest of your damn life. We would leave the house because maybe
we needed to go get a gallonof milk, or maybe we needed to
go do whatever it's business, there'ssomething that needs to be taken care of.
She would leave, We would getin the car, and we would
get to the end of the driveway. And by the time we were at

(25:36):
the end of the driveway, shewould be in tears, and she would
stop the car and she would sitand she would cry, and her anxiety
was so severe that she could literallynot actually drive the car onto the road.
And so I have some understanding ofjust how bad anxiety can be,

(26:00):
and I it's for some period oftime people with anxiety, don't seek help,
and she didn't until my dad waslike, you, you got to
do something here. Well, Andthat's exactly my point about having a support
system that is both willing and ableto step up and say something's not right

(26:21):
here. And that's really super hardto do. But so even for stopping
something that doesn't carry a deep socialstigma such as depression, such as anxiety,
we tend to suffer with it forquite a while because in our society
we tell ourselves that just get overit, that mental difficulties are really a

(26:47):
case of just not having a strongenough willpower. Yeah, it's mind over
matter, Just get over it.Just smile more, yeah, you know,
just breathe slower, not how itworks, pay more attention, just
sit still. Like there's a lotof just and should and I hate those
words because of that. And soif that's what we do to things in

(27:10):
our society that generally we accept,you know, we for the most part
now especially, we don't look atsomebody who has anxiety and be like,
okay, well just get over it. But amp that up now to something
like schistophrenia, where a lot ofpeople immediately associate that with oh, do
you have multiple personalities? Are youa serial killer? How crazy are you?

(27:33):
Do you see little green men runningaround the room like they think of
it in like these cartoonish, disrespectfulways, and they they don't realize like
this person is doing the best theycan and so want like. Schizophrenia has
both positive and negative symptoms. They'recalled and it doesn't mean symptoms you want

(27:53):
and symptoms you don't want. It, it's not that kind of positive.
But the positive symptoms schizophrenia are theones that people do know about, if
they know about them at all,things like visual and auditory hallucinations, things
like what's called a sort of aflat affect or difficult you know, sort

(28:15):
of flat facial expression that that distantstare that is often associated with it.
Yes, um, they're those sortof interpersonal difficulties, mood swings. Those
those are what's called the positive symptoms. Those are the things that you see

(28:37):
in in schizophrenia. The negative symptomsare the things that you don't see but
are still there. For instance,one of the things that happens when you
are flooded all of the time withall of this information that you are trying
to pay attention to at all times, you know, just in case somebody's
going to test you on it andyou don't want to get the answer wrong.

(29:02):
Is that the signals start to getcrossed and you start to literally lose
touch with your own body sense ofhot and cold. Oh, that would
be so weird, and so alot of times you see people who have
schizophrenia in the middle of the summerwearing a winter coat, and that's totally
adaptive. The fact that they're doingthat is like, it's such a smart

(29:26):
thing to do. It's not thehealthiest thing to do, you know.
The healthier thing to do is toobserve other people around you and dress the
way that they are ye to matchthe weather. But sometimes you can't do
that because you're having a hard timeobserving other people around you in an accurate
way. And so instead they learnthat, Well, if I go out

(29:52):
in the middle of winter and notwearing a winter coat, I can get
frostbite, and I can get reallyreally hurt and even hospitalized, even if
I don't feel it. Even ifI don't feel it, That's what I'm
saying. But if I go outin the middle of the summer, I'm
going to get sweaty maybe you know, or or whatever, but I'm not.

(30:12):
You know, heat stroke is alittle bit harder to achieve than frostbite,
and so by wearing a winter coatyear round, that's actually pretty smart,
it's pretty adaptive and possibly a redflag. I would imagine if I
want to, you know, ifyou have a loved one, a family

(30:33):
member, a friend, whatever,and they're suddenly overdressed, you might want
to talk to him about it orask him a question, Hey, how
are you feeling well? Absolutely absolutely, And that's the thing is to start
talking about it early on and topoint out that there's a variety of potential
causes. For instance, to notbeing able to accurately gauge the temperature.

(31:00):
It could be that could be asign of diabetes. That could be a
sign that your endocrine system is offin some way. It could be a
sign that you're getting sick physically ill. It could be a sign of schizophrenia,
it could be a sign of certainlike sometimes depression, people get cold,
and so just presenting it as Idon't know what it is, because

(31:23):
you're not supposed to, like,that's not your job as the support system
is to do. You're not supposedto do the diagnosing. You're just supposed
to be the support system and tosay the hard things. So there is
something I want to ask you alittle bit, or I want to ask
you about in a little bit,But first I want to take a couple

(31:45):
steps back, and I want tosay they're not saying. I want to
ask if the majority of cases arediagnosed in mid lateeen years, maybe early
twenties or or even older, whatdo you think is the average onset age

(32:07):
for schizophrenia. Is this something thatcan potentially come on when someone is four
or five, six years old?It could usually, so age of onset
is different from symptoms. So ageof onset is when you sort of reach
that critical mass of you have enoughdifferent symptoms to earn a full diagnosis.

(32:31):
But usually what happens is in retrospectyou're like, yeah, you know,
now that I think about it,I did notice other things in the past,
or you know, so like forADHD, you're supposed to notice symptoms

(32:52):
prior to age three, but you'renot supposed to diagnose somebody with ADHD until
they've had symptoms for a couple ofyears. Because sometimes it is a personality
quirk. Sometimes it is a differentdisorder, and sometimes they do learn how
to compensate and grow out of it. So it's possible to have, you
know, to be a schizophrenic wellbefore you get diagnosed, possibly ten fifteen

(33:16):
years. Maybe it's quite likely.It's like I said, it takes people
quite a while to seek help.It is not visual quotes allowed for accredited
psychologist to diagnose someone as schizophrenic beforeage eighteen. It's not a childhood diagnosis.

(33:39):
We can make exceptions if we canmake a strong clinical case for it,
but a lot of that goes downto what end, What are you
going to do with this? Becausethe medications for schizophrenia are hardcore, and
you don't want to give those toa child for the most part unless you
really really have to. Yeah,well, and I understand that, and

(34:01):
it makes sense, but I also, you know, hey, what's the
difference between seventeen and eighteen one day? Possibly, so maybe it could be
a little more dynamic than that.I think, well, that's that's why
I'm saying. That's why it's avisual quote. I'm not supposed to like

(34:22):
I absolutely, you know, andthere are times where I could look at
somebody who was ten twelve and belike, oh, one hundred, this
feels like being in the room withsomeone of schizophrenia. This seems like schizophrenia.
I can't give them that label.And that's a lot of what it's

(34:44):
about is being very, very carefuland delicate with labeling children because you want
to give them space to grow outof things or to compensate. But at
the same time, like I wouldlook at it and be like, oh,
totally, because that is absolutely whatis going on here. How can
I word this in a way thatalerts other professionals and the parents to what

(35:08):
my concerns are without putting a bigrubber stamp on this kid's forehead. Right,
Hey, pay attention here. Ihave some suspicions. Pay attention this
could be going on if this particularsymptom gets worse. And also, at
the same time, other symptoms arenot a big deal, like kids who

(35:30):
have imaginary friends. I was goingto talk. I was gonna say,
like, and it's probably difficult.I'm sorry to interrupt you, but it's
probably you were talking about that,like, Hey, when they're young,
it's it's difficult. And I wasputting two and two together in my head
and I'm thinking, yeah, okay, So when I was young, yes,

(35:50):
I had a very active imagination.Perhaps I talked to things that weren't
there, but most kids do soit's probably hard to define that line between
normal imagination and there's potentially something wronghere. Well, I mean, if

(36:12):
anything with younger, because kids havea hard time parsing out their own imagination.
They like that's a lot of whatchildhood is about is learning the difference
between your thoughts and reality. Oftenthe range is more concerning when you don't
see it than when you do.And so a kid with it, like
with an imaginary friend or who seesghosts or here's ghosts or whatever, like

(36:37):
a lot of kids do. Yeah, yeah, And you know, making
that into a clinical thing or pushingsometimes if you push to try to probe,
like do you know this is notreal? Or do you know that
they're not in the room right now, sometimes you're just gonna get a kid
who's kind of oppositional or being kindof a pain in the ass, and
they're gonna be like, no,they're totally real. I totally see them.

(36:59):
They're best fucking fram bro. Yeah, and they're just they're just pressing
your buttons is what they're doing,you know what I mean. And so
there comes a point, like withchildren, you don't want to push it
too hard. You want to letthem be who they are, because that's
how they will more honestly communicate withyou. I feel it's important to give

(37:24):
a shout out to the support networkin the parents of people with schizophrenia.
How hard it is. I havea podcast promo for a true crime podcast

(37:52):
that I want to play for you. It's called British Murders and it's done
by a fellow named Stuart from theUK. It's a sort of bite sized
true crime podcast. The episodes areabout twenty minutes in length. Stewart has
a wonderful voice. He crams asmuch info as he can and to the

(38:14):
twentysh minute episodes, and it's verywell done. I highly recommend it.
So here's Stewart to tell you abouthis show. Thanks last Hi everyone.
I'm Stuart Blues, the host ofBritish Murders, a new true crime podcast
which focuses exclusively on British murder casesand serial killers. If you enjoy worse

(38:35):
than fiction as much as I do, then you may also enjoy my show
British Murders. The premise of BritishMurders is simple. Every Thursday, I
cover the story of a British murdercase or a British serial killer. Yes,
we have serial killers here too.Each season of the show is ten
episodes, typically focusing on lesser knownBritish murderers, with a two part special

(38:59):
at the end of each season focusingon one of Britain's more notorious murderers.
The format of British Murders is whatI like to call bite sized, as
each episode strictly lasts between fifteen andthirty minutes. If you're interested in learning
about some of the UK's worst criminals, or you're looking to hear about some
new cases that you haven't heard before, please check out British Murders, hosted

(39:22):
by me Stuart Blues, available tostream now wherever you listen to podcasts.
Unfortunately, if you're not impoverished orotherwise disadvantaged what's the word I'm looking for,
disenfranchised in our society. If youhave access to treatment and it's consistent,

(39:46):
then yes, the prognosis is excellent. A lot of people with schizophrenia
hold down full time jobs. Theycan live independently. They do really well
if you are those things, ifyou don't have a family that supports you
and says the hard things when theysee a little bit of change happening,

(40:07):
and they don't, you know,a family doesn't necessarily, Like I said,
family should not be the diagnostician,but a family should be able to
say, hey, I've noticed thatyou've been turning up the heat a lot
lately in the house. Are youcold or did you just not notice?
Or seeming distant or you seem likeyou're listening to something that I can't hear.

(40:29):
Are you hearing are you? Areyou hearing voices again? What are
they saying? Are they talking toyou? Are they talking at you?
Like knowing what's normal for this person, because some people just learn how to
live with your invoices all the time, but knowing how to ask like is
it what you typically hear? Oris there something different about this? Those

(40:50):
are the sorts of things that familyneeds to be able to do. And
it's really hard sometimes because you're askingvery personal questions and you're asking questions could
be interpreted as critical. Well andyou and now that I think about it,
you also have to make an assumptionbefore you ask those questions. I
would think you have to have anassumption that, hey, this maybe schizophrenia

(41:15):
before you ask questions that are directedor maybe not directed but are related to
that. Well. I don't thinkyou need to and I don't think you
need to necessary. I think whatyou need to be what you need to
know as your kid. Yes,as a parent, you are the expert
in your kid, and so youneed to have a sense of what your

(41:36):
kid's baseline is. And if yourkid's baseline has either been different from other
kids from day one, that's onething. Yeah, that's just normal.
You know, that's how that kidis well. But that's helpful to know
because that's how we diagnose things likeautism and ADHD and sometimes schizophrenia. You

(41:59):
know, we call it different thingswhen they're children, but you know,
tendencies towards schizophrenia or whatever. Ifthe kid has always been different from other
kids, if they don't do thingsthat are age appropriate. Being able to
say that to the pediatrician, beingable to demand more than fifteen minutes from

(42:20):
a pediatrician's time during the kid's annualphysical to say, should I get this
kid more thoroughly evaluated like, that'sreally important to speak up, even when
it's uncomfortable. And then as adults, as they get older, you learn
what their baseline is for this child, and so if you notice a difference,

(42:40):
you can speak up and say hey, you know, and and it
takes a lot of reassurance, Ithink, and we'll always take reassurance to
say like, look, I couldbe wrong. That's why I'm asking,
not telling you. Is there adifference here? Is there a problem?
Is there any way I can help? So I want to shift a little

(43:01):
bit now and I we now knowwhat the average experience of schizophrenia probably is.
What are the extreme cases, like, what are these people experiencing them?
I know they're they're different types.And sometimes you'll hear people say paranoid

(43:25):
schizophrenic. Is that like a differentlevel? Is this the extreme? Because
you know you brought up that,you know, not all schizophrenics become murderers
or terrorists or whatnot. But quiteoften we will hear that this murderer or

(43:46):
terrorist was a paranoid schizophrenic. Well, which is complete bullshit and it's a
lazy journalism. Is okay? Peoplewith mental illness are at far greater likelihood
of being hurt than hurting. Theyhave approximately normal rates of violence. Okay,

(44:06):
so no different than than than meor my wife, who totally do
not suffer from mental issues, bythe way, as far as anyone knows,
but so so they're on par orwith average. If if you had
schizophrenia, the media would make abig deal of it. So that's why

(44:29):
we associate it. Um, theyact weird, you know, like and
when somebody is having a full schizophrenicbreak, you'll often see behaviors that rise
to the attention of other people,going, that's not normal. Yeah,
so well, and I think ofthe Aurora Theater shooter Adam Lanza. Was

(44:52):
that was that that? No,Adam Lanza was stony? Uh that was
Sandy hook Sa Sorry James Holmes,James, Yeah, first thing you hear
about him paranoid schizophrenic, which hewas not what he I think he was
an actor. He researched it extensively. Yeah, yeah, he had that.

(45:15):
Yeah, he researched that distant stareand uh acted. I think he's
an actor, but I think hewas stoned possibly, and hey, nothing
wrong with being stoned. Well,I don't mean stoned like in a fun
way necessarily like stoned, being onthis on some sort of substance. So

(45:37):
often if you take h into depressantswhen you're not depressed, you can develop
that that gaze, the wide eyedstare that doesn't actually see what's in front
of you. Yeah. I donot believe James Holmes was a full um.
I think. I think other diagnosesmay may apply, but I do

(46:00):
if somebody is in the middle ofa full blown schizophrenic attack, they can't
distinguish reality from hallucination as far asI understand. Well, even if they
can, they can't plan to thedegree that he planned. No, and

(46:22):
they're not going to go into atheater and have an exit strategy and all
of that. Like, so,I don't you know, I called bullshit
from the first manage. Yeah.No, they're more likely to call attention
to themselves, not to avoid it, but not on purpose. Necessarily,
they lose track of you know,because all of us, for the most

(46:44):
part, try to act normal tothe degree that we're able, and you
know that somebody is experiencing sort ofa full psychotic break when they just they've
lost track of the fact that otherpeople are looking at them sideways. Yeah,
see, so he doesn't he orhe or the person who is suffering

(47:05):
from an extreme break like this,they're not going to give a shit about
anyone else around them right right now. They'll they'll they'll behave impulsively in the
moment, and then they don't reallytry to get away. This is you
know, the case that most peoplehave heard about is James Lee, whose
name has not been changed, buthe was the gentleman in Canada. Yeah

(47:30):
yeah, the Greyhound bus yeah yeah, who killed the other bus passenger.
And he, you know, peoplenoticed he was weird. He'd been kicked
off another bus already that day.He was People noticed he was weird on
the bus itself. Tim McLean washis victim, by yes, And but

(47:50):
everybody, you know, everybody saidthey didn't notice any interaction between him and
Tim McClean. He seemed just tobe a weird guy, and all of
a sudden he burst into violence,which is very unusual, but it would
be unusual for anybody. Right.Oh, then he didn't try to get
away. No, he didn't havean exit strategy here. He didn't have

(48:12):
a like That's what fascinates us aboutserial killers is that they're not crazy.
No, no, they're not atall, especially the there are a few
that are crazy. Richard Chase comesto mind. He was not a serial
killer, and and he didn't havea good exit strategy. He was a

(48:32):
spree killer. He was a spreekiller technically speaking. And he also he
didn't have an exit like he didn'ttry to hide any of the evidence exactly.
And yeah, that's why I saidhe comes to mind because he was
obviously batshit and I mean he thatwas the what nineteen seventy three something,

(48:54):
So, I mean that's that's oneof the things that kills me, is
that his comes up all the timewhen people talk about schizophrenia and violence,
and I'm like, it was fiftyyears ago. Yeah, like that's how
people were schizophrenia. Yes, sometimesthey are absolutely violent, but it's not

(49:15):
coming You look at the number ofpeople that are in prison for one or
multiple murders who don't have any diagnosisbecause they don't rise to the to the
level of needing that diagnosis. Whydon't we pay attention to those as much?
Well they have I think, andthis is just my completely uneducated,

(49:37):
unprofessional opinion, they have a differentmental condition that we probably understand less than
something like schizophrenia. They're psychopaths,and there's it's it's a very special thing
and that the psychopath knows they're apsychopath and they play on it and they

(50:00):
use the I hate to say,advantages of that to benefit them. They
are master manipulators, often narcissistic,and they will try to play everyone and
sometimes that they'll even try to playa victim that will try to act like
they are the true victim and theywere failed somehow by everyone else in their

(50:27):
life. Meanwhile, they're actually whatthey're doing is trying to manipulate them or
manipulate you or whoever they're talking to, and to seeing it from their perspective
to yeah, I couldn't have donethis, or either I did do this
and it wasn't my fault, orI don't know. It's it's very weird.

(50:50):
And this brings me to another extreme. And while I have you here,
I have something else, and Iknow it's getting late now. Psycho
effective disorder is related to schiffective disorderis literally the worst thing that anyone could
possibly be diagnosed with mentally. Soas I understand it, this is basically

(51:17):
correct me. If I'm wrong,this is basically schizophrenia multiplied by a fucking
thousand. Well, it's schizophrenia andbipolar disorder at the same time. And
schizophrenia is real, hard to livewith, and bipolar disorder is real hard
to live with, and combining thetwo of them is a nightmare. So

(51:40):
I watched this, and I'd neverheard of this until the last few months,
and it was well before I plannedthis episode. I watch a YouTube
channel called Special Books by Special Kids. I don't know if you've ever watched
it. It's a young man andhis wife and they interview people with various

(52:00):
disabilities. It could be anything fromcerebral palsy to bipolar to schizophrenia to the
There are others and I forget thenames of all of them. Um.
He's actually extensively covered this guy whohas schizo effective disorder, and he this

(52:23):
man was a marine who served inAfghanistan. He was a normal guy,
a good soldier. He served ashis tour, came home, retired from
the military. A few years later. He's hugging stuffed animals. He is

(52:46):
rocking back and forth in his chair. Diagnosed with schizo effective disorder, and
he gets involuntarily institutionalized fairly often becausehe has severe breaks with reality. It's
so hard, it's so hard,So bipolar disorder people think manic, depressive,

(53:09):
and then they think happy, sad, and I don't like that.
No, that's not what it isa better way to look at bipolar disorder
is that depression is when your enginerevs really low and you can't rev it
up on your own, and maniais when your engine revs really high and

(53:30):
you can't rev it down by yourself. It's not happy. It may be
more sort of sensational, do youlike literally? Sense intensive. It may
feel better to the person and itmay look like they're having fun, but
they're out of control and they knowthey're out of control, and so it's

(53:54):
not happy. Hey everyone, you'reinvited to Harpy Hour. I'm Tracy,
I'm Liz, I'm Steph. Weare the Harpies and Harpy Hour is our
new podcast featuring ridiculous stories in history, science, and entertainment. Were you

(54:15):
ever suspicious that pigeons were secretly spyingon you? How do you know who
to eat first? If you survivea shipwreck, do problematic musicals send you
into an uncontrollable rage? If so, then Harpy Hour might be your new
favorite podcast. That's h A rp Y for Harpy and new episodes are
every Tuesday wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also find us on all

(54:37):
social media at Harpy Hour Pod andcheck us out on Harpy Hour podcast dot
com. Okay, bye, Well, And that's one of the things that
the always bothered me a lot asa diagnostician, because I was never a
good therapist on not patients enough.For therapy, you just have to have

(54:58):
a different style to the wor world. And I tend to be very pragmatic
and very direct, and so thatworks well for diagnosing, and it works
well for working in a prison,and that kind of thing doesn't work as
well in a therapy office, youknow, and you want your therapists to
be sort of a lot more gentleand patient than I am. He can

(55:19):
only tolerate so much bullshit. Well, it's just it's just who I am.
And like, I don't feel badabout that. That's just who I
am. But one of the thingsthat always bothered me is the idea of
intelligence is very specifically verbal and mathbased, and there are so many other
forms of intelligence out there, andI look at some of these people that

(55:40):
are incredibly you know, Valdectorians ofthe class. I would love you can't
do this ethically, but I wouldlove to see some sort of psychological experiment
where you could somehow artificially make somebodywho you know, take a group of
Valdectorians of their high school or collegeclasses and artificially make them feel the symptoms

(56:05):
of schizophrenia for a week and seehow well they cope. Because my guess
is they wouldn't cope very well.Probably not because they know how to cope
with a certain range of things,but the symptoms of schizophrenia are hardcore,
and these people know how to looknormal for a long time. What you're

(56:25):
seeing when you finally see symptoms iswhen the system starts to break down and
when the symptom stops working. Okay, so well, that leads me into
what are the worst symptoms of eitherschizophrenia or schizoeffective disorder, which apparently is

(56:49):
the worst form. It's God modewhen it comes to this, is it
as I understand it now? I'mgoing to give you my lab's understanding of
it. It is so extreme thatthe hallucinations both auditory and visual can literally

(57:12):
obscure your vision to the point whereyou really don't know what's real and what's
not. Well, yeah, butthat may not be a problem for somebody
if they've learned how to tolerate that. Likewise, with auditory, like there
are you learn tips and tricks tolearn what's real and what's not. And

(57:35):
so visual hallucinations by themselves, auditoryhallucinations by themselves. I don't think like
those are things that people can learncoping skills four, you know, they
can learn ways to reality tests.It's called to figure out whether your perceptions
are matching what is actual reality,which can include turning and looking to the

(57:59):
person next to you and say canyou hear that? Can you see that?
And that's part of what having asafe and supportive support system is all
about, right, is not justhaving the parents be willing to look at
the child, at the kid theadult and say I think something may be
wrong, but also having the personbe able to look at the people around

(58:21):
them and say, can you backme up on this? Can you help
me out? And they have tobe it. That takes out. That
takes just an absolute metric fuckload oftrust to look at somebody else and be
like, I don't know what's realityright now? Hey, do you hear
that? Yeah? Shit, thathit hard? Like I, like I
said, I don't. I don'tknow a whole lot. I've done my

(58:44):
own research over the years, butI never thought of it being as simple
as just Hey, if I wasthinking that I was hearing something, just
looking over at my wife and beinglike, do you hear that? And
if she says no, I maybe like, oh, okay, so

(59:04):
I'll pay closer attention. Maybe there'ssomething wrong, maybe not, but it
may be worth paying attention to rightand being able to at least bounce that
off somebody and check in with somebody, and you know, because like like
I myself, I'm part of hearingand so all the time things happened in
the world. So one of myfavorite anecdotes from when when I was working

(59:28):
a crisis job was I was ina staff meeting and we were just talking
about, you know, business forthe week. Working as a crisis clinician,
that's the person where when you goto the emergency room with any sort
of psychotic break, suicidal ideation,homicidal ideation, other sort of mental symptoms

(59:50):
for the most part, sometimes dependingon the state, sometimes substance abuse as
well, and you go to theer and they decide do you need to
be admit or you go home orwhat happens next. That's what a crisis
clinician does. So it's a veryisolated job. You work alone a lot
of the time, Like a lotof time you're in the emergency room.
But I'm the only employee from myagency working inside this hospital, and I'm

(01:00:17):
the only one doing my job,and so having a staff meeting was kind
of the only time when I'm aroundthese other people that kind of get what
I'm going through. And so wewere talking about some case or whatever,
and all of a sudden, theother whatever it was eight people in the
room in unison start dancing, sortof bopping in their states, and I'm

(01:00:42):
sitting there like, what the fuckjust happened? What are you doing?
What are you doing? What iswrong with you? Oh? My god?
You know, like in my head, because most of us, when
something's weird starts to go on inour world, we spend a little bit
of time and sometimes I said,sometimes it's years and sometimes it's minutes,
but we spend a little bit oftime trying to internalize or trying to figure

(01:01:06):
out like what's going wrong with me? Or double checking like is this really
happening? You know? Are theyall just shifting? Because no, they're
dancing. What is going And finallyI was like, what are you doing?
And it turns out someone's phone ringingand I couldn't hear it. Wow,

(01:01:27):
that sucks, right, And sofor me, everybody in the room
was having a simultaneous schizophrenic break asfar as I was concerned, Like,
you're all just you all just lostit, right, And meanwhile they're looking
at me, going, why aren'tyou dancing? Well? First and foremost,
I don't dance, thank you verymuch. Right, even if I
heard the music, if it wasme, I don't fucking dance. Well,

(01:01:52):
there is that, but you know, but that's what I'm saying.
So that sort of sense of realitytesting asking, like I'm constantly asking do
you hear's like if the cat'll beacting weird, I'll I'll ask my husband
you hear something? And does heever fuck with you? And he's like,
nah, I don't hear that.What are you talking about? Of
course, and married for twenty years, he focks with the other like all

(01:02:13):
the time. He's like, doyou mean you can't hear that? What
do you mean? Oh, Idon't know where you're talking about, Kate.
I don't know how to train themto somehow not sneak up on me,
because I still like, literally lastnight he scared the Bejesus side of
me and wasn't even on purpose.Like the reason I'm still married after twenty

(01:02:35):
years is because it's not on purposemost of the time. But you know,
we kind of walked. I walkedaround the corner and he was standing
there, and I just I hadno idea he was even on like I
thought he was literally two floors awayfrom me, and so the fact that
he was standing right outside my officewas creepy in the first place. But
I'm sure he also makes sure there'sno knife anywhere around you when he does

(01:02:58):
that, so that you can't reactivelystab him. I mean, I'm a
knitter, and so I normally havepointy sticks. Yeah, those those are
quite sure. So that's part ofwhy he doesn't do it on purpose all
that often, you know what I'msaying. But um, but but so
you have a flashlight that I wouldlike flick on and all something you know,

(01:03:19):
or like walk heavily. But inmy basement it's we're directly on bedrock,
and so you can't you're not goingto In the living room, I
can at least feel the vibrations ifsomebody's walking towards me, um, But
down in the basement, I can'tfeel you walking around. And if I
expect you to be two floors upand you're standing right outside but the door,

(01:03:43):
we're gonna have a moment, We'rejust we're all I'm saying. But
but so those sorts of moment werelike you confirm with somebody else. You
know how as a parent it happenson the regular where it's it's do you
hear a kid crying? Somebody crying? Are they arguing? Do I care?
Is that blood floiling down all theway? Can we ignore it?

(01:04:05):
I ask? I ask myself thosequestions at least once you know, but
you'll ask your partner, you know, is can you hear them? Or
you know? Where are the childrenthat you know? I I when when
I am out with my older three, which rarely really happens. Usually it's
all four or just one or twoat a time, but once in a

(01:04:28):
while, I'll go somewhere, andthe little one we'll be doing something else,
and I'll be out with the olderthree. And I realized, I
don't count when I'm out with justthe older three, but when I'm out
with all four, I count tofour obsessively to make sure where are they?
Where are they? Where are they? Where are they? And because
you have one that requires special attackexactly, and so my husband and I

(01:04:49):
will will check in with do youknow where she is? Have you seen
her? Is that her? Whereyou know where? And so it's that
sort of that concept of like beingable to bounce things off somebody else,
and so the concept of somebody havingvisual or auditory hallucinations. Those are the
things that other people imagine are horrifying. They aren't usually all that distressing to

(01:05:15):
the person because it's just normal tothem. And so it becomes that,
like you know, I was sayingearlier about my daughter not having friends,
it doesn't bother her that she doesn'thave friends bothers me because I feel bad
for her, and I've had tolearn to separate that out. That is
my problem, that is my grief. But I have to not feel sympathy

(01:05:35):
for her because she is basically happyon her own for whatever happy means in
her world. I have to stopapplying a normal childhood experience to a kid
who can't experience normal, right,well, and your own experiences as well,
what you think is a normal childhoodexperience, because it's very different for

(01:05:58):
all of most of us, know, most of us have a sense,
you know, to a degree oflike, you know, when a kid
is basically behaving like other kids,and when a kid is not is behaving
out of the out of the norm, and and so yeah, you know,
well you, you and I canapply blanket terms that probably are very
common to your childhood and mind youknow, hey, I grew up in

(01:06:19):
a loving family. I grew upwith everything I needed. You know,
these are blanket terms that uh youyou want her to have those? And
if she has those, you're like, well, why is she not this
and that? Why is uh?Oh, I don't know. It's hard

(01:06:43):
to imagine, it's hard to wordstoo, but yeah, So a lot
of people they think about this concept, this concept of auditorial visual hallucinations,
and they think, like that mustbe terrifying, And the answer is yes,
not really, Like for the mostpart, the people that I talked
to and like, one of myvery first jobs as an intern, you

(01:07:08):
know, as an undergrad, wasto go to spend time working in a
psychiatric hospital locked psych facility for adultsin northern New York. And obviously,
as a twenty year old or howeverold it was at the time, I
didn't have any clinical power, norshould I have, and so I spent
a lot of time either doing chartslike writing notes, you know, or

(01:07:31):
I would go sit in the dayroomwith people, and I got to the
point where I would just sit downand be like, talk to me about
what schizophrenia is like for you.And it turns out that was one of
the most powerful experiences I had clinically, was that chance to really get to
talk to the human beings and hearthe differences and hear the range of people

(01:07:54):
who carry the same diagnosis but hadthese totally different subset of symptoms. Because
the way it works is that usuallythere's like five from this, here's ten
possible symptoms of these, and tenpossible symptoms of those, and if you
have five from the first column andsix from the second column, then you
can diagnose them with schizophrenia. Butthat means you can have two people with

(01:08:16):
two totally different presentations, they getthe same diagnosis, And so just talking
to them about like what is thislike and asking the questions about like when
you hear voices, do you knowyou're hearing voices? Like are you aware
well? And that and that's alsoit's a much more casual experience, I

(01:08:38):
would think, and you're likely toget casual answers. It felt genuine and
felt it felt real. Yeah,and it didn't feel like they knew that
I wasn't looking for an answer.Like when you when you meet with your
psychiatrist once a month and the psychiatristsays, do you have any more voices
than you did last month? Youwant to say no because you don't want

(01:08:59):
them to up your meds anymore,or you don't want to you don't want
to admit that you're getting sicker orwhatever. But if you're just sitting with
somebody on the couch and they're nottaking notes, it's a little more easy.
And as well when when I lookat them and I'm like, look,
you are the expert here. Idon't know shit about shit, So
tell me what it feels like.And asking those questions and learning and we're

(01:09:21):
not in this Yeah, we're notin this sterile fucking room. We're right
here out in a common area orwhatnot, Like, hey, just just
talk to me. We're not recordingthis where I'm not taking notes. I
just want to I just want tochat you. And so one of the
things that I learned then is thatthey were like, yeah, I hear

(01:09:43):
voices. It doesn't bother me.Like, I know when it's getting out
of hand. Sometimes maybe if thevoices say certain things, or if they
have a certain tone to them,or if I can't tell whether it's coming
from inside my head or somebody else, then I know it's a problem.
Like but for the most part,it's fine, and I'm used to it.
It's sort of like having that innerdialogue versus not like you just get

(01:10:05):
used to it your normal is that. By the way, it's not schizophrenia.
It's a it's an inner monologue basicallythat I that runs in my head.
But I can't turn it off,you know, and it's and it's
intrusive. That's the difference between anauditory hallucination versus running thoughts, right,
is that you can't stop it.I have I have synesthesia which is a

(01:10:28):
whole other thing. But it's basicallywhen your your signals get crossed in your
brain, and so like I sortof you smell tastes and you hear colors.
Yeah, exactly, No, Ido. I see songs and things
like that, and so it's sortof it's impressions rather than words. I
don't think in words that often.I used to. And then I developed
epilepsy when I was thirty eight,and it's the the lesion that is on

(01:10:55):
my brain from that is right inmy right frontal lobe. And so because
because of that, I developed ADHDand also synesthesia. So I've kind of
experienced both, Like I kind ofremember what it was like to not have
it and now I do. It'sit's exciting you. You really are medically
interesting. Yeah, fascinating. Yeah, it's great. It's I don't recommend
it. But so anyways, whenwhen I would sit and talk with these

(01:11:18):
with people and ask them just whatsymptoms do you have and what what do
you hate? And they would say, like, what we hate is that
I don't know how to react interactwith other people. I don't know how
to make other people happy. Andthat was like one of the most profound
things like I still get chills thinkingabout what that is like to know that

(01:11:39):
it's possible for one human being tomake another human being happy, and to
want to do it, but tonot be able to. Well me who
obviously, as far as I know, doesn't suffer from that. That's not
a desire of mine to make otherpeople. Sure it is, you're married,

(01:12:01):
you got kids. Well, it'snot to make everybody. That's not
what they're saying. They're not sayingI want one. I'm saying I want
to make everybody happy all the time. They're just saying I literally can't ever
reliably make someone happy. I can'thave a simple three sentence interaction without feeling
like I've screwed it up and madethem unhappy. Is that just a problem

(01:12:25):
of their perception or is that reality? What's the difference? Well, their
reality is perhaps, well it mayperhaps they did make someone happy. I
mean, shit, it don't takemuch to make someone happy. Get shit
when when you go when you goto the store, bring bring me a

(01:12:46):
coffee back, and shit, I'mhappy as a fun. But if they
fundamentally believe that their mere existence pollutesthe environment around them, then that's that's
heavy, and that's their reality.That's not And that's what I say,
is that's there. It's their reality. It doesn't have to be independent,

(01:13:06):
objective reality. It's not really it'snot really important whether they make anybody else
happy. What's important is that theydon't feel they can, and that disconnectedness,
but being aware that they are disconnected. Whereas I look at my kid
who is disconnected profoundly from other people, and she doesn't know she is,

(01:13:28):
And so who's worse off? LikeI? Legitimately who's worse off? I
don't know like you? If?Are you familiar with the book Flowers for
Algernon, No, it's a it'sexcellent, first of all, and it's
a quick read. Um. Idon't remember the name of the author,
but it's it's been out for Idon't know, three thousand years or something
like that, and it's about aguy who has a uh, it's not

(01:13:57):
it's not named, but has somesore of cognitive disability. It's pretty profound,
so it's sort of it's it's prettyclear that it's not down syndrome,
one of those cognitive disabilities that peoplecan't look at him and tell something's wrong.
But he just doesn't understand the world. And the whole book is written
in the first person, and I'mgonna spoil it here, so if you're

(01:14:24):
listeners haven't read it yet, skipahead. But so the thing is,
it's written in the first person.And what happens is so earlier. His
name is Charlie and he's just supersimple, and he's writing at this like
elementary level if that, and livesthis simple life and doesn't really realize that

(01:14:44):
the people around him notice that he'snot doing well, you know, or
notice that he's not that he's cognitivelydelayed, and you know, he thinks
that any attention is positive attention,so he doesn't realize that other kids in
the neighborhood are teasing him, youknow, necessarily all he knows that they're
paying attention to him, and itmakes them happy. And then they find
they whoever they is, find somesort of experimental procedure that's supposed to fix

(01:15:10):
this problem, and it does.It works, it's a success, so
that he is suddenly like this megagenius, right, and it's still in
first person, and he's writing aboutall of these things he's learning and he
knows about and whatever, and thenthe procedure doesn't last. Something about it
slowly degrades, and he's aware thathe's losing abilities. He's aware suddenly now

(01:15:39):
of the people around him looking athim funny, and of the losses he's
experiencing. And it's such a heartbreakingbook because it brings around that idea of
what's worse being cognitively delayed but notknowing it, or being higher functioning and
knowing what you're miss what's that bookcalled again, Flowers for Algernon. I'll

(01:16:02):
have to look that up and probablylength that in this episode. It's amazing.
It's absolutely worth it. Like Isaid, it's a short book,
it's not it's not a it's nota huge time commitment. I've read some
heartbreaking shit, but that sounds fuckingit's it's intense. It's intense, And
so talking to these people it withschizophrenia, they are aware enough to know

(01:16:30):
that they're not connecting with other people, Whereas I've worked with people with like
profound autism who had no friends butwere perfectly happy because they didn't realize that
they didn't have friends, and theydidn't realize that that's expected. I mean,
the normal human brain doesn't really stopdeveloping until it's twenty five. Eighteen

(01:16:50):
is just an arbitrary number that wepicked when people died younger, right,
so right when you can put agun in someone's hand, and so I
mean eighteen is not adult anyway.Like realistically, if we're talking about when
is somebody in an adult that's morelike twenty five. Now, that's that's
really when the brain kind of reacheswhatever place it's going to reach, And

(01:17:11):
if somebody is neurodivergent, it maytake them even longer. So that that
was the most disturbing symptoms were thelack of ability to reliably connect with other
people, you know, uh,the with with schizoeffective disorder. It's also
and schizophrenia to a degree, butwith schizophrenia it's a it's a slower ramping

(01:17:33):
up, and so we're better moreoften heading off the really intense breaks.
Um And I've seen more outrageous behaviorout of people with bipolar disorder them with
schizophrenia. As a rule, likesomebody in a manic episode is a lot
less predictable than somebody with schizophrenia becausethat that their their motor is just revving

(01:17:59):
so that the slightest change in theirenvironment can turn into a one eighty spin
out. Right, So add nowyou know, take bipolar and now add
active hallucinations and inability to connect yourbody with the world, you know,
physical sensation with the world outside,and inability to read social cues. I

(01:18:24):
didn't talk about that much here,but that's a big thing that is in
common. It's difficult, not unable, but difficult for people with schizophrenia,
with ADHD, and with autism allto read social cues make all of those
exacerbated and completely unpredictable when somebody goesinto a manic episode and they get dangerous,

(01:18:49):
and they get scary to themselves andothers, and often they go into
such overdrive that then later they don'tremember. And so I mean, your
memories are who you are, likeyour memory is what forms your personality.
You are who you think you are. Yes, And I have experienced myself

(01:19:09):
with amnesia because of the I almostI died in childbirth in twenty ten,
and the epileptic seizures as well,or are about those are short? Those
are short? Yeah, I justhave amnesia for like the you know,
for a short period of time.So far, you know, an hour
or two. But with the whenI so, I was after I had

(01:19:31):
my third kido, my ten yearold. I had sixteen surgeries and I
was in a coma for a weekand a half. And when I came
out of the coma, I didn'tremember the year leading up, so I
don't I still don't remember his pregnancyat all. I went to Paris that
year. I don't remember that.And you don't remember traveling to Paris at

(01:19:56):
all at all. Like I've seenphotos, it looks like it's fun.
Okay that it looks like you hadfun, then you must have had fun.
Yeah, well I was with mymother and sisters, so well you
had fun. Yeah. Fact.But so one of the things that they
did while I was still in thecomma was you know how when a kid
is in um like preschool, theydo like an all about me poster.

(01:20:21):
You know, my name is suchand such, an I'm X number of
years old, and here's my favoritecolor, and here's my favorite music and
blah blah blah. Well they dothat. It's some hospitals for patients who
are in commas are similar, andit's partly it's a way for the families
to feel like they can do something, you know, because you feel so

(01:20:41):
helpless, and so it's partly forthat, but it's also to remind the
doctors and nurses that there's a personin the bed. This is not just
a lump, this is not justa set of vitals, but this is
a person with a family and hopesand dreams and favorites and things like that.
And so I used to when Icame out of the comma, I

(01:21:02):
had initially complete amnesia, like didn'trecognize my husband when he walked in the
room, and had no idea whatI was doing in a hospital bed.
I had no idea where I was. I was. I was restrained to
the bed because I kept trying topull out my ivs because I didn't know

(01:21:23):
why they were there. I didn'tknow what was going on. And so
once I kind of learned the basicsand started, you know, you got
sick, you're you know, andI started to recognize my husband again,
and I could remember, because Icould remember more than a year prior to
the event, but it was justbasically the year two thousand and nine is

(01:21:45):
gone for me. I don't Idon't have what I would consider natural memories
of it. My memories are allfrom having read my old blog or having
talked to other people or seen photos. But I don't have genuine memory,
right. And I would lay thereat night, especially one of the meds

(01:22:05):
I was on gave me wicked vertigo, and so I would just lay there
at night and sort of hold ontothe bed and wait for the spinning to
stop. And I would read thisposter over and over and over again to
memorize it, to try to learnwho I was because I didn't know my
favorite color, that's insane. Ididn't know my favorite band. I didn't

(01:22:28):
know my children's names, things likethat, and so think about coming out
of a manic episode. So forat least at least luckily question mark for
me, I was in a coma. I wasn't doing anything right during the
during the worst of it. SoI during my time of relearning, it

(01:22:54):
was learning the things that I couldn'tremember, but I hadn't added anything onto
it. Okay, do you knowwhat I'm saying? Like, like this
year is missing, and there wastime missing prior to that that took me
some time to build up. Butduring the like during the very worst of

(01:23:15):
it, I wasn't adding any newinformation that I had to memorize. So
if you have skizzu effective disorder,you flip into a manic episode and often
you know, therefore a psychotic break, and you start doing things that don't
make sense, that are not rational, even by your own measure when you're

(01:23:36):
when you're at baseline, but definitelyby other people's measure. And then you
come down and you don't fully remember. Wow, and even what you do
remember, you're not sure whether it'sreal or not. How do you form
a personality? Well? And likeI said, I was watching videos about

(01:23:58):
this guy and this was this wasa a marine, a US marine.
You know, this guy was focused, he was disciplined, and he's now
reduced because of schizo effective disorder.He's reduced to hugging stuffed animals and he
has that blank, wide eyed stareand he rocks back and forth in his

(01:24:21):
chair and he he has a toughtime knowing what's real and what isn't and
he gets institutionalized. And he's agreat poet by the way. Also he
writes, and he's really fucking goodat it. I'll have to look his
name up. But man, watchingwatching this guy who is essentially like,

(01:24:46):
you know, this big, bad, tough guy that ain't scared of nothing,
you know, reduced to basically achild. You can't tell. The
difference between reality and not reality isit's fucking scary. It's fucking scary.

(01:25:12):
And that's a case of losing literallylosing yourself. It's terrifying, you know,
or not being able to develop developa sense of self in the first
place. That's that's all terrifying stuff. And that's the stuff that people don't
think about when they think about schizophrenia. They think about, Oh, it

(01:25:35):
must be terrifying to hear voices thataren't there, you know. But everybody
knows what it's like to have asong stuck in your head, right,
Maybe that's not the worst of it, though, Well, that's what I'm
saying. You know what it's liketo have a song stuck in your head.
Yeah, you've had voices in yourhead that weren't there. My monologue
is always there, you know,And and and that's that's not scary.

(01:25:56):
That's just how your brain works,and you kind of get used to that.
So it's the other things. AndI think part of the reason that
it's the other things that are scarieris because people don't understand them. And
when you don't feel understood, you'remore alone, and you're more vulnerable,
and you feel crazier the more aloneyou get. Well, Kate, I

(01:26:18):
have to tell you. It's lateas fuck and I've been awake since six
twenty this morning. I'm tired ofshit, as much as I want to
talk to you for three more hours, and I totally would No, I
get it. It's fair. Doyou think that you've said everything that you

(01:26:39):
need to say about this? Isthere anything else that comes to mind that
you want to say about schizophrenia,schetso effective disorder, whatever? I mean?
I think it's just the sort ofthe bottom line is first of all,
that there's no such It's not athing, you know in a way

(01:27:01):
that anxiety or depression are not inherentlythe same thing for everybody. That some
people have like a physical sort ofanxiety or a physical sort of depression,
other people have it more mental,you know. And so knowing that someone
has this diagnosis really doesn't mean awhole lot, because they can still have
such a range within their symptoms.So, for one, is not assuming

(01:27:25):
that you know what they're living throughjust because you know their diagnosis. But
for another, if their symptoms areserious enough for them to reach this diagnosis
and they're out in public in anysort of way, or out you know,
in the world in any sort ofway, they're so much stronger than
we give them credit for. They'reliving through so much more than than you

(01:27:47):
or I would know how to handle. And they're doing a really good job,
like they're doing the best job theyknow how to do. And so
whenever I see people make jokes about, oh, I mean, I mean,
I mean, I mean, youknow, a different mood every day,
I must be schizophrenic, or makingjokes about multiple personality disorder or you

(01:28:10):
know, all those sorts of thingslike they you know, or they when
as well, when people equate schizophreniawith violence, I struggle so much with
that because I'm like, these peopleare so much stronger than I am.
Yeah, I'm like you said,they're more likely to be victims than perpetrators.
Well, because you know, peoplewho are likely to hurt other people

(01:28:34):
are good at profiling what would makea good victim. Bullies know who to
tease and who not to right,and people with profound mental illness are are
easy targets because they're used to sufferingand not saying anything. They're used to
trying to act normal even when everythingis not normal, and so they make

(01:28:59):
an easy target. And so ifyou instead of crossing the street to avoid
somebody who's wearing a winter coat inthe middle of the summer, you know,
if you are sitting next to somebodyon the bus and they're rocking and
talking to themselves, instead of lookingaway, if you can just make eye

(01:29:19):
contact and say hello and give themthat moment of normal, Like, that's
an act for strength for you,and it acknowledges their strength. So I've
been asked to do some promo forthese two lads, Run and Pull,
for their podcast Goat Callers Comedy.Quite honestly, I've never listened to it

(01:29:44):
because it sounds like but what Ican't tell you is that my show artis
Artist. That is one of thesegments, and that is an absolute peaky
blinder. You can't miss out onWHOA what the hell? Tom? You
meant to promote our show? Notslag it off? I couldn't care less
my who you should? You're onthe podcast? Yeah, how about a
little gratitude Bane Sharon Olcreat before weare your businous podcast gratefully accepted? We're

(01:30:12):
not giving it to you. Whatthe misty? So yeah. Listen to
my show Cold Callers Comedy on amalpodcast, Spotify, Amazon, and all
the other podcast platforms. The podcastracis