Sunday 22 January 2012

SCHIZOPHRENIA IS / SCHIZOPHRENIA ARE....


SCHIZOPHRENIA IS –

NO!  ALTHOUGH COMPLETELY
UNGRAMMATICAL
IT IS FAR MORE ACCURATE
TO WRITE

“SCHIZOPHRENIA ARE –


WHY?  WELL JUST ASK DR. JOHN W. PERRY, HARVARD MEDICAL GRADUATE AND FORMER PROFESSOR OF PSYCHIATRY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

HE WROTE: “Let me specify at the outset exactly which condition I am speaking of here: this is only one of the many syndromes that pass under the name ‘schizophrenia’…”

In the preface to his scholarly, but very readable, and certainly beautifully written book, Schizophrenia Genesis, Dr. Irving I. Gottesman writes that  “A heritage of distortions, stagnant certainty, and self-serving territoriality characterises the fields of knowledge about this dreaded disorder - aptly called ‘the cancer of the mind’ ”, and offers his book  “...to help fill the information gap between the ‘ivory towers of academia’, with its research ‘factories’ and private language, and the idiosyncratic narratives glorifying or obfuscating disorders of the mind”.
Is it any wonder that there could be such uncertainty, when there is such a choice as in the following list – which is very far from complete:

Some schizophrenics have a thicker than normal corpus callosum
       
        Some schizophrenics have high levels of ‘sulphite’ in the urine…

Some schizophrenics exhibit high levels of copper in serum and hair analysis…

Some schizophrenics have nutrient deficiencies, especially of B vitamins, zinc, magnesium, chromium, manganese and vitamin C, while food intolerances are common in many…

         Some schizophrenics have a greater than normal susceptibility to arthritis…

Babies born in cities during the winter are at greater risk of developing schizophrenia in later life than those born in country
areas, or in summer, (possibly because of damage in the womb caused by influenza in the expectant mother)…

Some schizophrenics have a larger than normal left lateral
 ventricle…

And so on, and so on….

In his book, Dr. Gottesman continued –

 “Schizophrenia is a complex disorder of human functioning.  The absence so far of a solution to its origins compels me to be skeptical about received wisdom from all participants, however noble and well-intended.  I am, however, optimistic about finding solutions via the energies of scientists and the canons of science within a decade.”

Well.  In fact, two decades have passed since those words were published, and the ‘received wisdom’ appears to be no wiser.

One wonders whether anyone still bothers to consider or use the elements in this list of ‘first rank’ symptoms of schizophrenia?  They certainly add yet further choice to the seeker after truth.

1    Voices speak one’s thoughts aloud.
                2    Two or more voices (in the mind) discuss one in the
                      third person.
                3    Voices describe one’s actions as they happen.
                4    Bodily sensations are imposed by an external force.
                5    Thoughts stop, and one feels that they are extracted
                      by an external force.
                6    Thoughts, not “really” one’s own, are inserted among
                      one’s own thoughts.
                7    Thoughts are broadcast onto the outside world and
                      heard by all.
                8    Alien feelings are imposed by an external force.
                9    Alien impulses are imposed by an external force.
                10   “Volitional” actions are imposed by an external force.
                11   Perceptions are “delusional” and un-understandable

I first began to ‘hear voices’ and experience a whole range of other phenomena in 1980 – without in fact become ill, although I was subjected to considerable intrusion and disturbance within my mind and within my body, experiences that continue to this very day.  For a number of years, I contented myself with keeping notes of all that happened as it happened.  Then, finally, I settled down and began to write the book which I have subsequently published.

I had analysed my notes and written quite a lot of my book before I came across the above list, and when I did so, I realised that I had written in detail of my experience of each one of these ‘symptoms’, albeit in my own words, yet never (I repeat) had I become ill.  And still I continue to hear voices and frequently have experiences that might even add to the list.  And still I know without the remotest shadow of doubt that what I experience results from spiritual intrusion into my mind, body and senses.

Undoubtedly, as my quotes above indicate, there are many sincere researchers trying to identify the causes of the ‘cancers of the mind’, but unfortunately they are not themselves voice hearers.  Consequently, they experience no problem and accept without question such diagnoses as – “Schizophrenia is caused by – a chemical imbalance in the brain – one side of the brain talking to the other – the ‘bicameral mind’ – and so on…”

So why not ask ‘Ruth’ who was ‘invaded’ by a very strong presence in both her mind and her body.  The presence declared itself to be ‘God’, and step by step, ‘God’ took over Ruth and dominated her in every possible way.  In time, ‘He’ convinced her that she was utterly despicable, no better than a turd, and the sooner she removed herself from the planet, so much the better – SO!  You are on the bridge – there’s the river – JUMP.   And Ruth jumped….

Fortunately, she survived, struggled to the shore, and completely covered in mud, naked from the waist down, she found refuge in the home nearby of someone she knew.  And still people try to tell her that she has a ‘chemical imbalance in the brain’…

I write more fully about Ruth and others in “Living with Inner Voices and Physical Presences”, which is posted on my Blog (www.roycvincent.blogspot.com) , together with other relevant articles.  Additionally, within my book (www.royvincent.net) , there is a compilation of well over thirty different ‘ploys’ that have been used by intruding ‘entities’ (intelligent entities) in their attempts to undermine me and make me ill.

Every voice-hearer who reads this will have his or her own experiences that are probably vastly different from mine or from Ruth’s.  They are experiences that many others will want to read.  So why not write about them and send them in?  A couple of paragraphs – anything

After all, you are the ones who know what it is like…

So why not tell it as it is?


TAILPIECE

“UNLUCKY FOR SOME – 13”

Psychiatrist, Dr. Richard Mackarness, opens his book Not All in the Mind with a case study – in fact, a ‘presentation’ at Park Prewett Hospital.  The ‘case’ was ‘Joanna’, and her psychiatric history that he relates is frankly frightening – especially if you had been Joanna!
        She had been admitted thirteen times, often compulsorily, because the psychiatrists called by the general practitioner to see her at home had considered her to be a danger to her children and herself.  In her most disturbed phases, she would slash her forearms with any nearby sharp object; had done some bizarre things to her children, including throwing one through a closed window (fortunately on the ground floor)… and so on for several paragraphs.  Most of the psychiatrists at the Hospital had had Joanna under their care, and almost every diagnostic label in the book had been attached to her illness: schizophrenia, schizo-affective psychosis, pre-senile dementia, temporal lobe epilepsy, neurotic depression and anxiety hysteria.
        As the presentation proceeded, the majority opinion was that the only solution was leucotomy, as in her thirteen admissions Joanna had failed to respond to every known combination of psychotropic drugs as well as several courses of E.C.T.  Mackarness used all of his persuasive powers to be allowed to try his experimental methods as a last shot before the drastic action of leucotomy, and his colleagues agreed – more or less on the lines that ‘well at least it will do no harm!’  He had been influenced by work in other countries that had found that in many instances, mental health problems originated in food intolerance or allergy.
        The procedure was simple, and began with a five-day spring water fast followed by test doses of suspected foods.  In the event, Joanna was found to have strong reactions to chocolate, bacon, coffee, egg, and one or two other lesser items.  Three months after discharge Joanna was ‘happy, euphoric, sometimes almost hypo manic in her hearty enjoyment of life.  She goes out to work, cares for her children without harming them and seems almost back to her old self…’

Another book that opens with a case study, thirteen referrals and multiple diagnoses, is Understanding Dissociative Disorders.  Author Dr. Marlene Hunter ‘is world renowned for her work with medical hypnosis and Dissociative Disorders.’  She is also a determined advocate of ‘Dissociation’ as opposed to the earlier ‘Multiple Personality Disorder’, principally, it seems, because she wants to distance herself from any possible association with the presumed ‘spiritual’ connotation of ‘multiple-personality’. 
In the opening pages, Dr Hunter introduces a patient whom she names ‘Jayere’, and begins, “As our doctor-patient relationship became established and grew, I became more and more confused.  She had had, from previous family doctors, twelve psychiatric referrals.  These resulted in twelve diagnoses.  I made the thirteenth referral, and thus she received the thirteenth diagnosis – that she had a neurological disorder, not a psychiatric problem.  The neurologist, however, said in no uncertain terms that she had a psychiatric problem, not a neurological disorder, although he could not account for the fact that on two separate occasions she had two distinctly different EEGs.”
Jayere sat with Dr. Hunter and prepared to be hypnotised.  Dr. Hunter, much against her own instinct and entrenched beliefs, had decided to explore a suggestion made by an older colleague who had said, “Have you ever thought of multiple personality disorder?”  Thus, she writes, “So, with gritted teeth and feeling scared stiff, I gathered all my courage together at one of my next meetings with Jayere and asked while she was under hypnosis (we were working on relieving the headaches), ‘Is there any other part of you who would like to come and speak with me’?”
        And this entirely different gruff voice said, “Of course!  What took you so long?”

        With my own more than thirty years of direct experience of voice hearing and physical presence, I have no problem in understanding the existence of this ‘other’ within Jayere, nor have I any problem with the fact that she had had two distinctly different EEGs.  What else would you expect?

         
ROY VINCENT  JAN 2012