*DISCLAIMER: I am not a doctor, therapist, or health professional of any kind. I’m sharing things that I have been taught that have helped me (or not). This is my experience.

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Sunday, November 20, 2011

"Normal"

The idea of meeting anyone new, actually the idea of being around anyone, has become unbearable. I am so irritable and easily annoyed.  I know part of it is my headache problem because as soon as I am annoyed my head starts to ache.  My physical problems are worsening along with my psychiatric problems.  I can't help but think that both problems are really physical problems.  I have to think that my psychiatric problems are caused by physiological problems, they just happen to be in the place that controls my view of the world.  How can I think anything else, really?  I'm not saying it's not possible that I'm wrong, I'm saying that if I were to tell myself anything else I don't think I could handle it.  I have struggled with it in the past, like when I finally came to the realization that I was having psychotic symptoms.  Was this a psychiatric problem being caused by problems with my brain, or with my mind?

It's hard to separate the two sometimes, the mind and the brain.  And really, where do you draw the line between personality, the "soul" of a person, and biological traits?  Are you are who you are because you are that person, or are you the result of physiological processes that result in you behaving the way you do?  Of course, I want to believe that we are all some sort of a mixture.  That people can change without their actual physical person changing.  I like to think that the experience of having these psychiatric problems, and witnessing my family struggle with them as well, has shaped me as a person as much as all of the brain chemistry being fiddled with to "fix" me.

I admit that I am not normal and am always either annoyed or amused by people who say the ever-so-popular, "What is normal?"  The word "normal" seems to be such a loaded word for some people (much like crazy).  I will tell you what is normal:  The people who do not suffer from uncommon traits.  Being normal is simply being like the majority, and (as I said) my being in the 1% that suffer from schizophrenia makes me not normal.  While we all wish to be slightly better than normal, I am upset by stories of people being berated because they fall just outside the limits. 

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