Surviving Schizophrenia

Not the lightest read, and I'm not the fastest reader, but I finally completed it! 

Key takeaways: It is a brain disease. MRIs have shown enlarged posterior ventricles and reduced gray matter in the brain.

The family is not to blame. The person who has it is not to blame. Medications can help a lot, but one common symptom is the patient doesn't think anything is wrong. So releasing patients can be a problem.

Schizoaffective disorder might be in the middle of a spectrum between paranoid schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. About 1% of people have schizophrenia.

It sometimes begins with hypersensitivity to external stimuli. The main symptoms are auditory hallucinations, delusions, mood swings, and disorganized thinking. 

It's as if we all have a switchboard in our minds that we take for granted. People with this condition have difficulty keeping context running in the background, understanding proverbs, or remembering what a TV show was about. People get so deep in thought that they end up talking to themselves.

People tend to get symptoms as young adults. On average it subsides when people get into their 50s and 60s. It is the world's most expensive disease.

Interesting factoid: schizophrenia is mutually exclusive with rheumatoid arthritis.