"Whoever told you you're schizophrenic was an idiot," --disability evaluator

I saw a disability evaluator last week. She was a stocky African American lady with a polished, clipped voice and a skeptical look to her.

“Whoever told you you were schizophrenic was an IDIOT,” she said, “There is NO chance you are schizophrenic. I know schizophrenia, I evaluate it all the time, and you are NOT a schizophrenic.”

I started to cry. She just glared at me. Having shattered my identity she went on to tell me how I was not entitled to disability, that I was not schizophrenic, blah blah blah. I sat there for 30 minutes listening to her wail on me. I hated her. I hated her from the deepest part of my soul. It is not nice to try to dismantle somebody’s identity. Schizophrenia is part of my identity. It is part of what defines me, and I don’t like people trying to wrestle out my soul with brittle disgust, like she did.

Two days later was my doctor’s appointment. I told her my Master’s program was going well. Then I asked her what my official diagnosis was.

“Schizoaffective,” she said, double checking with the computer’s information. My mind was restored, in a sad way. I knew I was different, sick, ill, not normal. Now, it was re-confirmed. I had spent two days wondering what I was, why had I hallucinated and heard voices if I was not schizophrenic? But everything was okay, or rather, it was back to being not okay--I was schizophrenic. It made me feel happy, in a weird way.

Note to self: Don't trust anyone. DTA.

I hope you have a nice day! Thanks for reading!

Condition: Grave

"Grave," he said, his face attempting some semblance of empathy. He was my social worker who had been assigned to me during my stay in the psychiatric facility. He was in the process of telling me I had paranoid schizo-affective disorder and that I should go on disability. I remember slowly hunching over until my hair fell in front of my face, hiding my dazed expression. Grave. That was the only thing I could think: I have a Grave condition.


I wish I could say the schizophrenia miraculously went away, or that I Found Jesus Christ and learned to bear my burden---neither is the truth. Currently, I am not religious, nor am I completely sane. Too bad. Sanity and Jesus Christ seem to make life more bearable for the general population.
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I made friends with a grad student who I have in two classes. I just met her this month. She has a major disability in that she is blind. She asked to be my study buddy and I agreed. She does not know that I am also disabled; though in a different sense. I am cognitively disabled due to the schizophrenia. She does not know.

Today she mentioned she used to attend a private Christian college. I decided to steer the conversation away from religion but it was too late---she went off on how great a theocracy would be. Now I love the concept of Jesus very much, but I am not keen on any government that is religious. I like the separation between church and state. It is a brilliant idea; one that should be respected and maintained forever.

As a mentally disabled person, the United States constitution is the only thing that protects my rights and freedoms. It decrees I am your equal. I am writing this only because I don't know how to address my new friend. I like her, I just hold the idea of checks and balances and separation of church and state to be the core values of America. They are my core values, at least.

Then it kind of dawned on me that people with a mental handicap are either made to appear like evil wicked people or like "touched-by-God" people when in fact we are neither--we're just people. It has occurred to me that, due to ignorance, the majority of the population does not see disability as a genetic accident; they see it as some sort of God-inferred state, and this scares me because there is no science behind this.

Anyways, I just wanted to say that I am somebody who believes strongly in a scientific approach to understanding mental illness and disabilities in general.

Confessions of a Closet Schizophrenic

I'm a returning University student, a senior with just 1 and a half semesters left to achieve a B.A. I made the dean's list last semester and I also got straight A's taking 13 units during the summer. I'm well-dressed, well-groomed, well-read, and well, crazy.

I'm a decent person with a clean legal record. Unless you count my 5150's where the police came to the house to capture the girl who was cowering in a corner, afraid of assassins barging in at 3 in the morning. Even then, in the midst of my mental illness, I wasn't a threat to other people. Myself, perhaps, but not you, not my family, not anybody else. Like a parasite, the schizophrenia preys on its host until its host is but a shell of her former self.

But that was 2 years ago. I've been in recovery through medication and cognitive behavioral therapy for about that long and I haven't had an episode since. I have a long-term care provider, a counselor at a state disability program, and good grades despite recent deaths in the family. I'm what a professional would call "stable."

But in the long run, what chances do I have of living a successful life? Can I expect real employment after I graduate, or will my future be an endless series of single job interviews with unsympathetic employers wearily eying their health insurance packets? This problem isn't mine, it's yours. If I can't find work I'll go seek state disability. That's tax payer money. I'd RATHER work. I CAN work. I CAN critically think. I CAN be productive. I CAN maintain high levels of stress with appropriate coping skills. Does this really matter as soon as I drop the S-word (schizo-affective disorder) with somebody?

According to the Americans with Disabilities Act, I am guaranteed equality under the federal government and in all aspects of employment, education, and social treatment. But this area is an area where a lot of people break the law and get away with it. Many people discriminate against persons with a mental diagnosis. They fear them. They hate them. They mock them. They ostracize them. I'm not talking about the thug at the end of the block. I'm talking about people in high positions. Employers, CEO's, supervisors, professors, publishers, agents, and many, many corporations.

To a corporation the mental diagnosed are just unnecessary burdens. We "drain" their health care resources. We "slow down" their productivity. We "can't get along" with other coworkers.

They apparently never got the news that Pulitzer Prize winner Sylvia Plath was mad, or that Nobel Prize winner John Nash was a schizophrenic. Indeed, many talented people can have a diagnosis while being productive.

But back to the title of this post: I'm a closet schizophrenic. I tried one semester of partially disclosing my medical needs to my professors. I am under the Students with Disabilities Services program and as part of it, we may choose to hand out letters requesting specific accommodations. Mine was infrequent absences due to doctor's appointments. I got 2 letters out to 2 different professors. They were both kind. However, when it came to handing the letters out to my major's professors, I chickened out. I couldn't face them knowing they knew there was something behind my shy demeanor.

I had turned in a scholarship application and applied as a disabled student. I submitted physician's proof of this. I wrote honestly about having an average GPA because a lot of my college time coincided with periods where I couldn't get treatment, be it because the county refused to treat me or because I was in denial of my illness. I was clear, honest, sincere. I was then soundly rejected. I didn't even receive a hundred dollar scholarship. Nothing. I had a sufficient GPA to transfer to a major University despite being chronically disabled, but I wasn't deemed worthy of a hundred dollar scholarship. Maybe I'm being bitter, but why would they ask if you're disabled if they are not going to take that fact into consideration?

This time around, when I apply for grad school, I might not disclose that I'm mentally disabled. I might pretend to just be a lazy pothead who didn't take school seriously the first couple of years. Maybe they'd be more sympathetic if I just sugar-coated my entire existence.

When friends ask why I'm going to the doctor, even close friends I trust dearly, I still say, "check-up." Maybe I should start saying I have a chronic heart condition. Maybe then I'd be accepted as "an acceptable disabled person" and not a "risk" or an unwanted type of person.

I'm perfectly willing to work my ass off at a job with high stress. I'm willing to continue my treatment program. I'm willing to be open to criticism and new ideas. The question is: are the rest of you willing to accept me as a disabled worker?