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Invalidation – Silent and Destructive
Invalidation is a silent pandemic. People with conditions, illnesses, and disabilities of all kinds are subject to rampant invalidation, sometimes from all sides. In many cases, even the people who do or claim to care about an individual can invalidate them regularly. And they often don’t realize they are doing it. But we don’t talk about it. Those who feel invalidated often don’t feel comfortable or safe speaking up. Some believe the invalidating statements to be true. But when someone does bring it up to the invalidators, it doesn’t always go well. Over the years I have faced invalidation in many forms and from many people, but the most invalidation…
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A Stereotype, Schizophrenia, and How I Had It All Wrong
Before I was diagnosed with schizophrenia, I believed some of the stereotype. Here's what the stereotype got wrong and how it impacted me.
- Adapting to life with schizoaffective disorder, Cognitive Symptoms, Recovery, Schizoaffective Disorder, Schizophrenia
Adapting to life with schizoaffective disorder (part 4) – cognitive issues
In the beginning of my senior year of high school, I found myself sitting at my desk in AP Calculus staring at the result of my test. D. How did this happen? I studied harder. C-. I broke out the flash cards, had friends help me study, but I could not do it. It felt like it didn’t matter what I did, I couldn’t reliably remember the formulas. For someone who was used to straight A’s, this was like a blow to the gut. No one had told me that schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder came with cognitive deficits. Before then, academics had always come easily to me. At the time…
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Life as a high functioning person with schizoaffective disorder
There are a few different ways to define what high functioning means for someone with schizophrenia – the ability to work full-time or function as a stay-at-home caregiver or as a full-time student, good interpersonal skills and relationships, and just generally being able to function in society the majority of the time. Throughout the course of my life with schizoaffective disorder, I have always been considered high functioning. But high functioning doesn’t mean my life is normal or even symptom-free. There still may be symptoms Residual symptoms are common in people with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder even with medication and can occur frequently. For me, this occurs as disorganized thoughts…
