Being treated for schizophrenia

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shanyin
Posts: 243
Joined: Mon May 14, 2018 4:49 am

Being treated for schizophrenia

Post by shanyin »

Hello. I am being treated for schizophrenia.

Is there any practices that can help me cut people out of my life that make me angry and frustrated? When practicing meditation as a teen, I found myself very peaceful and calm and happy and blissful. I tried to study the eightfold path but never studied dependant origination. Now, over the past 8 years I find myself not calm or happy at all. And my family really makes me upset. I think that they are stubborn and passive aggressive.

I find most people in my community to be disrespectful and I'd rather stay away from them. I rely on my parents for groceries and rides and company. I think what I really want deep down is to say sorry, I don't like you and would rather stay away from you for good. It would be hard to buy my own groceries as I am poor.

Is there any practices I could be doing to be alone for a long time? I am going on a retreat in August so I could practice being alone then.
Vasana
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Joined: Thu Aug 22, 2013 11:22 am

Re: Being treated for schizophrenia

Post by Vasana »

shanyin wrote: Tue Jul 03, 2018 2:17 am Hello. I am being treated for schizophrenia.

Is there any practices that can help me cut people out of my life that make me angry and frustrated? When practicing meditation as a teen, I found myself very peaceful and calm and happy and blissful. I tried to study the eightfold path but never studied dependant origination. Now, over the past 8 years I find myself not calm or happy at all. And my family really makes me upset. I think that they are stubborn and passive aggressive.

I find most people in my community to be disrespectful and I'd rather stay away from them. I rely on my parents for groceries and rides and company. I think what I really want deep down is to say sorry, I don't like you and would rather stay away from you for good. It would be hard to buy my own groceries as I am poor.

Is there any practices I could be doing to be alone for a long time? I am going on a retreat in August so I could practice being alone then.
Hi!

Rather than looking for practices to achieve being alone, you could find ways to express to these people that you are finding alone-time beneficial for your well-being at the moment and that it's nothing personal. It may seem difficult to tell people or family that to begin with but most people should understand fairly quickly.

When alone, you could dedicate some of that time to learning about patience from a Buddhist perspective and this should help you when dealing with problematic people at other times. When these people see a positive change in you they may also then recognize that your alone time has been beneficial and this should cause them to be more respectful to your boundaries.

As for going on retreat: will there be guidance from a teacher on this retreat and do they know about your treatment for schizophrenia? You may or may not know that there have been many cases of people going on retreat with underlying mental-health conditions only to have their symptons and episodes increase. This is usually down to inadequate training and preparation on both the teacher's and retreatants part. I don't say this to put you off retreat but just to ensure that you are fully aware of what retreats can actually be like. Even people who have no obvious mental health condition can find that the intensity of retreat can bring up difficult experiences so bear that all in mind and have an honest assessment of the situation so as to avoid any unnecessary stress.
'When thoughts arise, recognise them clearly as your teacher'— Gampopa
'When alone, examine your mind, when among others, examine your speech'.— Atisha
shanyin
Posts: 243
Joined: Mon May 14, 2018 4:49 am

Re: Being treated for schizophrenia

Post by shanyin »

The monk is aware of my medical condition. I have been there before and what you described as my illness getting worse seemed to happen. I could go for maybe 7 days or 14 days to minimize the possibility of having an episode.
Vasana
Posts: 2231
Joined: Thu Aug 22, 2013 11:22 am

Re: Being treated for schizophrenia

Post by Vasana »

shanyin wrote: Tue Jul 03, 2018 11:08 pm The monk is aware of my medical condition. I have been there before and what you described as my illness getting worse seemed to happen. I could go for maybe 7 days or 14 days to minimize the possibility of having an episode.
Ok. You should discuss this all with the monk leading the retreat then. Its best not to push yourself too much and too soon. Be caring and gentle wirh yourself! It may also be useful for you to both discuss which (if any) physical, mental and emotional indications arose for you last time at both the early onset and increase of challenging symptoms. This can help you both identify which kinds of remedial and soothing actions you have the possibility to apply and when to apply them.

Generally this sort of reccomendation also applies to other more common and everyday conditions like stress, panic, anxiety, depression, anger, compulsivenes or any disturbing emotion or pattern of thought. Usually before we are fully immersed in those experiences, certain emotions, thoughts and sensations may act as pre-indicators, almost like how weather forecasters can look at things like temperature, air pressure, direction of wind and so on to determine what kind of weather conditions are on the horizon.
'When thoughts arise, recognise them clearly as your teacher'— Gampopa
'When alone, examine your mind, when among others, examine your speech'.— Atisha
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Grigoris
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Re: Being treated for schizophrenia

Post by Grigoris »

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