My Schizophrenia Checklist

 

My Schizophrenia Checklist

Schizophrenia Bulletin, volume 52, issue 1, January 2026, sbac 207

https://doi.org/10.1093/schbul/sbac207

published : 19 January 2023

 

            One important milestone in my schizophrenia recovery story happened when I was staying in a homeless respite. I had been hospitalized, and this was the next step to my beginning to live on my own again. I was beginning to feel clearer, and the medication I had been prescribed started to take hold. Gradually my symptoms started to subside. I accepted that I did, in fact, have schizophrenia and all the doctors I had talked to were right. I understood schizophrenia was a severe mental illness, and its symptoms of delusions and hearing voices might not ever fully go away. I wanted to understand the general symptoms of my brain disease. I began to make a checklist of my symptoms that I took to my therapy sessions with my psychiatrist. I could sometimes be forgetful, so writing down the different challenges I experience in between appointments helped me tell my doctor exactly what was going on in my everyday life with schizophrenia. I described the voices that were constantly running through my mind.

            “They are like ‘he is watching tv,’ or ‘he’s getting his mail.’

            I could see that my therapist understood perfectly.

            “That is commentary.”

            My delusions, hallucinations, and voices were spread out on the table, but I had no idea of the specifics. I thought the voices just blew around in my head like a twister. It was a good therapy session and I walked back to my car smiling. I knew now that if I hear voices saying what I am doing it is commentary and a part of my schizophrenia. It was like a checklist, and I understood myself a little bit better.

            Through my own research, I learned there was a name for one of my other symptoms, and it was called ‘thought broadcasting.’ I was astounded at how this symptom related to me. I remembered my time in the Mojave Desert where I was stationed in the Army. I thought my special power happened when my fellow soldiers or others made eye contact with me. Making eye contact allowed us to communicate with our minds, and they could be a part of my thoughts. I thought they could see and feel my thoughts. I learned there was a name for this symptom. This was “thought broadcasting.”

            Now when I experience thought broadcasting in a public place like a restaurant or grocery store, I am positive this symptom is not really going on. I do my best to ignore these thoughts. When an actual specific symptom is brought to my attention, I add it to my schizophrenia checklist in my mind.

            Another symptom I was experiencing in the Mojave Desert, and the early stages of schizophrenia was thinking women instantly fell in love with me when we made eye contact. I could feel a warmness in my chest, and I thought it was their heart. I thought women would follow me to look in my eyes to see if I had fallen in love with them too. This was another sign of severe mental illness to add to my checklist.

            Sometimes when I look out into the parking lot of my apartment, I might see a car I do not recognize. Are they there for me? In the moment it is real, and they are stalking me. The car is there parked. “What do they want?” Do they want me to come out and talk to them?” I have to work hard to distract myself, so I do not react to these delusions of paranoia. I usually go back to watching television. I try to distract myself and block it out. This is a delusion that is also on my checklist of symptoms.

            So why do I experience these symptoms? I experience these symptoms because I have schizophrenia which is a brain disease. There are recognizable symptoms of this severe mental illness that form a checklist to use in determining what is real or unreal. Sometimes I mentally check my symptoms off my schizophrenia checklist. Sometimes it may be the next day before I realize that something I felt happened was really just one of my symptoms. Schizophrenia can alter my perception of what is going on around me, but my prescribed medication helps me manage those symptoms. It does, however, help me to know that learning about the symptoms of my illness, whether through my own research or talking to my psychiatrist, gives me a more complete understanding of what is going on around me. I will always have my diagnosis, but I am now in a place of recovery where I can manage my checklist of symptoms.

           

             

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