i have a friend that has been diagnosed as a schizophrenic, i was wondering what exactly it is, and was wondering if you all could give me a good explanation.
i would also like to know if there is a way to “cure” it beyond drugs?
i’m going to do some research online, but if you could give me a good place to go that would also be helpfull, thank you. 
lol, that was the first place i looked, before starting this thread, i was just hoping for a little from you’s guy’ses
To be brutally honest:
You hear voices because you are fucked up in the head.
Only drugs work, shock therapy is ineffective.
lame, i was hoping i could help
I feel for you man 
. Let me ask you a few questions now; How old is he, are they taking him to an institution, are the symptoms obvious?
he’s 25ish. he’s going to a dr., i think. and it’s not really obvious, he’s just a pain to deal with sometimes, also i think he’s borderline not full
is it more or less when you can’t seperate the “crazy” thoughts from the" normal" ones? or do they actually percieve the world as different. i mean everyone has a crazy thought pass through now and again, but sane people understand the difference.
for example, sometimes i might be driving in the car , see a hitchhiker, and say to my friend “pull over so i can get out and bootfuck that person” if my friend did pull over i wouldn’t actually do it.
a schizophrenic person may see a person waving a gun at them(dilusion) and think they have to kill that person in self-defense(when in reality , the poor fucker was trying to pull him over for a drive)
or they might think they are possesed by a deamon and the only way the deamon will leave is if the do what the "deamon " tells them too(also delusion) schizophrenia is so loosely defined even in medical text that it could just be a combonation of 2 psychosis.
Well… I did once, an essay about schizophernia, and for what I understood, it means: “Split Mind” … so you get the idea, right? And I thought this disease was incurable, though it can be treated. But probably they’ve found someway to cure it, after all, the books which I used to do the essay were like 20 years old or so.
And the reasons are that it could be genetics? Does any of your friend’s family members have Schizophrenia?.. like his mom or dad, or something. There are also environmental factors that trigger the development of this disease in the individual: such as stress.
Anyway, I’m sorry to hear that… I hope he gets better =)
A friend of mine got this diagnosis several years ago. He had become progresively moodier and hostile. One day his ex-girlfriend came to my door asking me to go to the hospital to see him, he had aparently snapped on his parents and they had called the police which led to his being commited. At the hospital he was very odd. He claimed to be Jesus, wanted us all to hold hands, take off our shoes and touch feet. Previous to this he had been using LSD and had taken to living in his closet and smoking dope all day every day. When the doctors let him out he was on meds and half asleep. He went to Europe and ended up being detained at some point and sent back home and re-committed. When I met him again later he was still on meds and semi-normal, though a bit eccentric, he told me that the whole time he had been in the hospital he believed he was in the devil’s house. I met him again sever months later on the street and he was acting like a typical crazy person. That was the last I saw of him. Hope he is doing better; however you ought to be aware that if your friend has really been diagnosed as such, he could have some bad times ahead. I wish him luck.
my friend isn’t that bad at all, he just kinda lives in his own world, and has a hard time letting go of everything, even things he cares nothing for, he also takes things (that shouldn’t be) way too seriously
I see things in black and white (not literally though…), so I only label people ‘good’ or ‘bad.’ So long as he doesn’t hurt anybody, then he might as well be fine. If he hurts himself, well there are people that can prevent him from doing so. Self-harming isn’t such a bad thing anyway, people smoke and drink all the time. Meh.
Maybe we’re all the insane ones, and he is ‘normal.’ I mean, normal is just a perception isn’t it.
I thought it meant multiple personalities. Not voices. because I would think all of us hear voices in our heads. It just makes you ill if these voices are deemed real by you and you act upon them.
see my schizophrenia post, more of a joke than a post but it have a lot of information about the symptoms of Schizophrenia in the Pjilosophy section;
Trevor i don’t think of this as a joke.
Kriswest; i ment that my comments about “the philosopher” seeming to exhibit symptoms of schizophrenia, is a joke, not the disorder or the person who is worried about thier friend, judging by the symptoms associated with the disorder i wouold be worried too.
I’ve cured myself of schizofrenia without drugs - under the motto of rather schizofrenic or dead than have my life clinically removed. I had to become a shaman to do it and it took me eight years but it worked, eventually. Two of my friends were schizofrenic as well, one died, another one took pills and became flat.
Shamanism uses fear and madness as means - make a remedy of the poison.
I’m not sure where you should look on the net because there are millions of sites about shamanism and most of them are likely to be of no use except to evoke laughter. But laughter is the first step in healing madness.
I see shamanism in the widest sense - it’s accessing the subconscious consciously. As most schyzofrenia begins with overdoses of raw subconscious input, damaging (deforming) the connection between conscious and subconscious, the only way out is to get in there. Be brave, be bold. As noted in another thread, bravery is not the opposite of fear but doing something despite the fact that you’re afraid to do it.
“A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war: wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it might never live to regret it.â€
“A warrior considers himself already dead, so there is nothing to lose. The worst has already happened to him, therefore he’s clear and calm; judging him by his acts or by his words, one would never suspect that he has witnessed everything.â€
-Carlos Castaneda
thank you jm, this doesn’t help me at all, but it does confirm that i can do nothing for my friend, but hope he’ll do it him self. saddly he is not a brave person, and to face him self, when he’s lived for so long not doing so is going to be impossable. thank you though 
Maybe he’s just a neurotic person?
JM - are you fucking kidding me? You cured yourself of schizophrenia? It’s not that I think this impossible - not at all. I just never heard of anyone actually doing it before. Would you care to share any of this with the class?
I mean, I think I’m a hot shit because I can talk myself out of a cold. But schizophrenia? I can hardly imagine a more interesting thread than “How I Cured Myself of Schizophrenia”.
I am not doubting you, to be clear. I am just intensely curious.