“It’s hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head”
I didn’t say this, and the quoter was an anonymous person on a different website. But it describes my situation quite well.
I have a disease known as Schizoaffective disorder. It’s a psychotic disease that is so well known that spellcheck underlines it.
That point aside, Schizoaffective disorder causes psychotic symptoms (tactile, visual and audio hallucinations, as well as delusions) as well as mood symptoms such as depression. It’s not an easy disease to live with and it directly impacts everything I do.
My greatest fear is not suicide, death or psychotic symptoms even but fear. This sounds like a platitude. But on top of my disability, my fear of its affects, of the embarrassment and social rejection and pain it causes me is what truly drives me. It is intractably difficult to describe that. I refuse to live a life where I am either suffering or afraid of suffering. Such a life is not worth living. Honestly, I believe something that Rabbi Nachman of Breslov once said: “Life is a very narrow bridge everyone must cross, the key is not to be afraid”.
It’s hard to go to my work, which is in a pretty active and social environment. I’m fairly quiet there, usually. It’s hard to interact with other people in many ways. Sometime someone will talk to me at the same time as I’m hearing a voice (audio hallucination) and it can be difficult to even distinguish between what is real and what is not. Friendships suffer, relationships die, dreams die with this illness. That is what I am trying to fight. Fear is my greatest enemy, I believe.
My voices, the Watchers (and I capitalize them because I hear them) often hound me. I will not be defeated by them – or by my fear of them, or by my fear of other people.
