Would your life be different if half your the family was Schizophrenic?

@Adoniah (7512)
United States
January 2, 2008 4:55pm CST
I was raised by a woman that was a Schizophrenic. And my half brother was a Schizophrenic. Our Father was OK except his wife liked to beat him up sometimes when she drank too much. By the time I was 10 I could outrun her so I did a lot of running. In fact, I was great in track all through school and as an adult I ran a few marathons! My brother was the one who actually suffered the most even though she never laid a hand on him. He lived in his own hell inside his head. When he was a kid he was brilliant. He built a color TV from bits and pieces he found in trash by the side of the road. We built it in his room. I did all the soldering under his expert direction. He built a hand held synthesizer in the form of a wooden ball with little metal pins sticking out of it. This was before synthesizers were really on the market. He could roll this little ball around in his hand and play music with it. He could play any musical instrument you put in front of him even if he had never seen it before, But he never learned to read music. He wrote music by playing it and recording it on various types of recording devices and then I hade do transcribe it for him. He was a wizz at math and science too. In school, he went to all the State Fairs. I did too but he always came in 1st. I rarely that. As he got older, the Schizophrenia took away his ability to think. He still wrote music almost until the end but he deteriorated healthwise so much that he couldn't play music anymore. He became more and more dificult to deal with because his thought processes were so odd. He became violent for no reason, but I knew the reasons. I grew up with him. The reasons were deep inside. They were there even if he could not name them. David was 49 when he died. I would be very different if I had not known him. I miss him.
6 people like this
4 responses
@deebomb (15304)
• United States
3 Jan 08
Many people with Schizophrenia are put in group homes with other people with this same condition. As lonf as they take their medication they can function pretty well in the world. But because of the side effects some won't stay on the medication. Because of the voices inside their head some become violint. I worked in a group home with some of these people. It has to be very difficult to love someone and not be able to help them so the families give up after years of trying to help. Some of the laws that are to protect those with mental illness can also keep them from getting help. I admire you for sticking with your brother.
3 people like this
@Adoniah (7512)
• United States
3 Jan 08
I tried to get my brother to take the meds. He tried it once and they made him fat. He had and abhorrance for fat people and he would never try again. So we dealt with his illness as it was. Shalom~Adoniah
2 people like this
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
3 Jan 08
I can hear all the people on here saying "What does she mean IF!?" I don't know the statistics on Schizophrenia, but it is pretty certain that most families have a certain level of disfunctionality. Wow, my brother taught me how to solder, too. It was a skill that came in really handy quite a few times, especially when one of my singing teddy bears gets a short in the wiring. They say it is not what happens to us that is important but how we react. Sometimes that is much easier to know than others. Hang in there, kiddo.
3 people like this
@Adoniah (7512)
• United States
3 Jan 08
Hanging in like Gunga Dinn!
2 people like this
@lucy02 (5015)
• United States
19 Mar 08
My mom is bipolar with paranoid schizoid affective disorder (which means she has some of the criteria for schizophrenia). Yes my life would have definitely been different if she had not been sick. We didn't realize she was sick until I was about 17 though, but looking back there were so many signs. We just thought she had a nerve problem or something then things got really out of hand...a nightmare. You can't really understand it unless you've lived in that environment.
@Adoniah (7512)
• United States
14 Apr 08
It definitely makes life more difficult. I am sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I have been moving and I broke a rib. I am a clutz.. I hope that your Mother is getting the help that she needs and I hope you have someone to talk to! Shalom~Adoniah
@ltmoon (1008)
• United States
12 Jan 08
It is great that you have such wonderful memories of your brother. It must be hard to have lost him so early and to have watched as the schizophrenia engulfed him.
2 people like this
@Adoniah (7512)
• United States
12 Jan 08
He was a very interesting fellow. Even if he had not been my brother, I would have wanted to know him. Those who met him never forgot him. I do not think he made many enemies in his life.
1 person likes this