Christain be Schizophrenic?

[PeterJ]

Can a Christain be schizophrenic? How can you explain how a christain can became like that?
What does it mean if a christain is schizophrenic?
Is it the mind failing for them?

[Moxie]

Schizophrenia does have a biological basis. However, there are other mental conditions that people will mistake as schizophrenia because the person has delusions or is psychotic. There are other reasons for "hearing voices" such as multiple personality disorder, now known as Dissociative Identity Disorder and is very very rare and must meet a strict criteria for diagnosis. Other reasons for hearing voices can be demonic. I feel Christians can be demon controlled, but not demon possessed.

[EagleWatch]

Can a Christain be schizophrenic? How can you explain how a christain can became like that?
What does it mean if a christain is schizophrenic?
Is it the mind failing for them?

We are not exempt just because we're Christians. It's a serious illness


Schizophrenics are often withdrawn and somewhat frightening. Many years ago, societies reacted to their behavior by locking them up miles from their friends and loved ones. Today we are able to keep them with us, but we still need all the patience we can muster to cope with them.
If schizophrenia develops swiftly after age 30, without a family history of the problem, there is a fairly good chance of recovery. Over the last two or three decades, tremendous strides have been made in drug treatment for schizophrenia, and the number of people who need to be institutionalized has dropped steadily. If the disorder develops slowly, with onset during your adulthood, and the suffering person is chronically unable to fend for himself or herself in society, the chances of recovery are not as good. Many sufferers become increasingly withdrawn, they express less emotion, and their thought patterns spin off further and further into unreality as years pass.
One out of every one hundred people in the world will be hospitalized for schizophrenia at some point in his or her life. Six hundred thousand people in the United States are currently being treated for the problem. Schizophrenia occurs more frequently in city dwellers and people of lower income groups. Most schizophrenics suffer chronically, with the problem becoming acute only for a small part of their lives. Most of the time they are able to function marginally in society, although they have difficulty holding jobs and making friends, and people think them a bit odd because their thinking doesn't fit into normal patterns.
There are five types of schizophrenia:

• Disorganized. The patient is aimlessly active, non-responsive, silly, or incoherent.
• Catatonic. The sufferer is usually unresponsive; he or she may assume strange poses, or occasionally become extremely active to the point of exhaustion.
• Paranoid. The sufferer has well-constructed and completely fictitious delusions of persecution. He is often fairly well adjusted in other aspects of life.
• Undifferentiated. Hallucinations, delusions, and confusion.
• Residual. The patient is not suffering acutely, but is withdrawn, unresponsive, eccentric, and has disjointed thought patterns.

To be classified as a schizophrenic, a patient must have the following symptoms:

• Six months of deterioration in his occupation, interpersonal relationships, or ability to support himself.
• This deterioration must occur before age 45.
• The patient must have severe psychotic problems during at least part of the six months.
• He must show some signs of illness currently.
• None of the symptoms should fit into these other categories: Major Affective Disorder, Organic Brain Disorder, or Mental Retardation.

The World Health Organization studied schizophrenia extensively some years ago and discovered that hearing voices was a very important criteria for diagnosing schizophrenia. Many sufferers think they hear voices from God or the devil - sometimes speaking about them rather than to them. Suspiciousness, delusions of persecution, inadequate descriptions of problems, and hopelessness are other common signs of various types of schizophrenia.
As the years pass, people who suffer from schizophrenia have more reason to be hopeful. Modern drugs, when used carefully, are able to alleviate many of the symptoms of the problem. Antipsychotic drugs such as chlorpromazine are useful in alleviating acute symptoms. Fluphenazine is useful for long-term control. More than drug therapy is needed, however. It is also necessary to work with the patient to strengthen the personality and provide him with psychological tools to cope with subsequent attacks. Individual, group and family therapy, or a combination of the three, are very effective in helping a sufferer cope with life.
Schizophrenia, as much as any other psychological problem, demands total commitment from a psychiatrist. There are times, I admit, when I almost despair of helping some schizophrenic patients, and I simply have to look at the man or woman as a suffering person that Jesus loves. Human love is stretched too far by the massive problems - divine love must take over.
I pray often when I work with a schizophrenic patient. Hope is sometimes so dim, and I know that so much depends on the psychiatrist. Sometimes I feel like leaving a therapy session and going to work on someone who will be more responsive. When a patient seems to be the type who will never re-enter society as a functioning human being, there is a great temptation to put forth less effort to find solutions. But one must remember that love can be a powerful treatment tool. It influences attitudes toward the patient, the amount of time spent with him or her, the quality of the time and the overall effort that is put into the treatment. (A Christian therapist ultimately answers to God, not just a family, supervisor, or a review board). Christians are directed to love their fellowmen and serve God by working with the poor and downtrodden, so they are uniquely able to help suffering schizophrenics.
I know Jesus would have been a committed, understanding therapist, if that had been His life's work. He would have had the patience to become a brother to suffering schizophrenics, and He would have been concerned about the victim's entire family unit - even if the family was at the bottom of the social scale (as many schizophrenic families are). He would have walked up and down the streets of inner cities, alleyways, or parks in rundown neighborhoods, helping suffering schizophrenic "bag ladies" and wandering, hallucinatory "bums" that no one else in our society is able to reach.

http://www.rasalam.com/www.prayer-mi...zophrenia.html

[PeterJ]

Thanks for taking your time with your input EagleWatch; Would they have side effects for taking drugs? Is the side effects temp?

[EagleWatch]

Thanks for taking your time with your input EagleWatch; Would they have side effects for taking drugs? Is the side effects temp?

YW..here's some information God Bless!

What About Medication Side Effects?
Antipsychotic drugs, like virtually all medications, have unwanted effects along with their beneficial effects. During the early phases of drug treatment, patients may be troubled by side effects such as drowsiness, restlessness, muscle spasms, tremor, dry mouth, or blurring of vision. Most of these can be corrected by lowering the dosage or can be controlled by other medications. Different patients have different treatment responses and side effects to various antipsychotic drugs. A patient may do better with one drug than another.

The long-term side effects of antipsychotic drugs may pose a considerably more serious problem. Tardive dyskinesia (TD) is a disorder characterized by involuntary movements most often affecting the mouth, lips, and tongue, and sometimes the trunk or other parts of the body such as arms and legs. It occurs in about 15 to 20 percent of patients who have been receiving the older, “typical” antipsychotic drugs for many years, but TD can also develop in patients who have been treated with these drugs for shorter periods of time. In most cases, the symptoms of TD are mild, and the patient may be unaware of the movements.medications developed in recent years all appear to have a much lower risk of producing TD than the older, traditional antipsychotics. The risk is not zero, however, and they can produce side effects of their own such as weight gain. In addition, if given at too high of a dose, the newer medications may lead to problems such as social withdrawal and symptoms resembling Parkinson’s disease, a disorder that affects movement. Nevertheless, the newer antipsychotics are a significant advance in treatment, and their optimal use in people with schizophrenia is a subject of much current research.


http://psychcentral.com/disorders/sc...treatment2.htm

[Prufrock]

Christians, in our fallen condition, can suffer from the same diseases, physical or mental, that afflict unbelievers. But, in addition to compassionate physicians, God has given us His blessed Holy Spirit to carry us through our moments of darkness. In addition, He has given us, not the spirit of fear, but of power, and love, and a sound mind (2 Tim. 1:7).

[TrophyofGrace]

Christians can suffer from any number of mental illnesses, no differently than unsaved people do. But for the Christian the origin can be physical, mental or spiritual. Medication helps with the physical causes, various forms of counselling are intended to help with the mental causes (the same with an unbeliever) and I've known some spiritual causes to become nasty skirmishes of spiritual warfare.

[Prufrock]

Christians can suffer from any number of mental illnesses, no differently than unsaved people do. But for the Christian the origin can be physical, mental or spiritual. Medication helps with the physical causes, various forms of counselling are intended to help with the mental causes (the same with an unbeliever) and I've known some spiritual causes to become nasty skirmishes of spiritual warfare.

That's exactly right. And there is often a spiritual component to emotional or mental illness, because the Enemy delights in exploiting any weakness, be it mental, emotional, or physical. Sadly, there has long been an element of mutual distrust between the psychiatric community and the Christian church: too many psychiatrists, following Freud's example (but not Jung's) see "religion" as a great evil, and too many Christians say, "Well, just come to Christ, and He'll solve all your problems." My own experience has been blessedly different. I have been treated for Major Depression, with both medication and counseling; and every therapist I've known, without exception, has said that my faith was my greatest asset. I have even had the great blessing of being briefly treated by a born-again psychiatrist.

For centuries, the Catholic Church (and others) taught that all mental or emotional diseases were the results of demonic possession. But the Bible doesn't make that mistake, and makes a clear differentiation between the two: And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them (Matthew 4:24). God knows the difference, even if some of His people do not.

[KJo]

My ex husband and father of my 23 year old daughter was a schizophrenic and yes he was a Christian. He truely loved the Lord even though he lived in his own world a lot after the disease began to take over.

David had been somewhat sick before we married and had recovered or so it was thought. He was driving a 18 wheeler cross country when we met and had been for several years.

He was doing really well for a long time and then the disease began to kind of sneak back in and then worsen. He passed away in 2004 from a heart attack. I still miss him. Though we were divorced we remained friends until his death. He was a fine Christian man.

[daughter]

God is good, and He loves us, no matter what our problems. I've known schizophrenic Christians, and have no doubt that they were saved.