PART ONE
It may seem odd to ask how we should behave toward someone with schizophrenia but we really didn’t know. We soon learned what it was that made itndifficult for people with schizophrenia to communicate. We discovered that the general public are frightened as well as embarrassed to hold a conversation with a person who has a mental illness or an allied disorder.
We learned the importance of speaking slowly and clearly to individuals with schizophrenia.
We learned to make our sentences short and as simple as possible.
My son often said; ‘I don’t always hear a whole sentence because my concentration seems to float in and out.NAnd if there is background noise or a crowd, it makes me very tense and nervous.My dad saw how I was feeling and took me to a quiet place and sat me down until I felt less threatened.’
We understood that our son needed routine and some kind of structure to his lifenso we did our best to help guide him there.
i have to admit that there were times when I felt as if I were walking on shattered glass and that was when I found it hard to maintain equilibrium in our home.j
- I had to force myself to keep a smile on my face.
- I found it difficult to remain accepting.
- It was hard for me to remain encouraging.
- I had to make time to listen to him as he could talk about his problems for hours.
- I tried at all times to treat him with the utmost respect.
- BUT, I did not always succeed.
- There were times when I was critical, gloomy, or argumentative.
- Yet my late husband on the other hand, showed the utmost patience, understanding and unconditional love at all times. He also used humor to deflect difficult situations which was extremely helpful.
