I have a mental health condition: Schizophrenia.

It gets a bad rap. We don’t hear about it on television unless we are seeing the crazies on Law & Order.

Think how many times you hear about medication for it—though we all know about depression and bipolar disorder.

I like to think my life has been unusual for a variety of reasons, this condition just being one.

To be diagnosed with this you have to suffer from acute psychosis: that experience was terrifying. We all fear losing our mind. And if you ever have been there, you understand.

Listen to this Ted Talk. My experience in healing was different than the speaker’s but the psychosis was just as vivid and just as awful as hers.

I was hospitalized three times. I was psychotic on and off for five years. I heard voices. I felt things that weren’t real. I saw things that weren’t real. I suffered from delusional thinking. I had no handle on reality as you know it.

This talk will deepen your understanding and heighten your awareness.

And like the speaker, I have not been sick since 1997. I work full time as a yoga teacher. I am one of the most resilient people I know. I can lose everything I know and did last summer, and come out standing.

Love elephant and want to go steady?

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Editor: Catherine Monkman

Photo: Flickr Creative Commons