What is in a brain?

Published on Tumblr December 30, 2015

I have known most of my life that my brain works differently than other people’s. I look at things differently. I analyse things differently. I find some things funny that others don’t and vice versa. 

But, of course, I couldn’t let anyone know. My early therapy - first when I was diagnosed with depression at age 11 and then again when I was diagnosed with schizophrenia at 19 - was all about learning how to blend in to “normal” society, not how to deal with the mental illness. If you looked and acted OK on the outside, then everything would somehow fall into place on the inside. 

Well, that was a bunch of bullshit. Over the years I learned the roles and wore the masks and slowly but surely the inside was falling apart, not coming together. It is probably no surprise, then, that when it finally fell completely apart I was unable to put it back together again. At least not yet. At age 43 I am on disability and living with my parents. I am a virtual shut-in because of my anxiety and physical limitations. And even with a wonderful therapist and a life-saving psychiatrist, I am still having trouble opening up about what really goes on in this brain of mine. 

I am hoping this blog will be a start.