Colorado Shooting - How horrible!

[Minchi]

Just one case of a handful of cases....
http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2008/feb/29/schizophrenic-professor-speaks/

Bipolar is a tricky one but I think if we could discover some of the blocks in our mind that prevent a person from being off medicine, and create a careful balance of behavioral checks we could seriously reduce the amount of medicines that we prescribe to these patients. Going completely off med may not ever be an option but finding a balance between could be. Doctors are so quick to prescribe medicines when sometimes that is not required. I am just thinking along the better quality of life, if you have to be so drugged that you can't think clearly then yes you will go off the medicines. Trust me the mind is capable of so much more then we give it credit for.

A case of Autism, I watched the documentary on this woman and early on they though she was rather low functioning, until she found her own way to help herself calm down and focus....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Grandin

There are more cases like this then I know of but I know we don't know the brain as well as we could.

 

[mom'sfolly]

I worked with someone with active schizophrenia. He was scary, but he held down his job, as an accountant for a public alcohol and drug abuse agency. He would talk to people who weren't there, and when asked about it, would say he was sorry, and go back to what he was doing.

People with mental illness can function, some function very well, even without medication. I find the people who can do this admirable. Many bi-polar people are wildly creative, and very efficient when they are manic. They can get so much done. A guy I know wrote a novel in 10 weeks, I think he was in a manic phase, but undiagnosed.

 

[thaiturkey]

Can't they arrest the bad one?

Misunderstanding of Schizophrenia is very common. It's not about behaving differently at home from the way one behaves at work.

Here is some information about the illness:

http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Schizophrenia/Pages/Symptoms.aspx

 

[thaiturkey]

If anyone thinks he or she might be schizophrenic, here's a handy test. No-one's out the get you, honest!

http://psychcentral.com/quizzes/schizophrenia.htm

 

[chickened]

Most mass murders when asked why they did it they said they enjoyed it and wanted to. Now which person is reponsible is where all the doctors make thier living.

 

[mom'sfolly]

Really....I haven't seen anyone say they did it because they enjoyed, with the possible exceptions of Manson. Since most of them end up dead before anyone can talk to them, this also seems a strange statement from that point of view.

Maybe your confusing spree/rampage killers with serial killers. These are two very different sorts of animals.

 

[chickened]

Really....I haven't seen anyone say they did it because they enjoyed, with the possible exceptions of Manson. Since most of them end up dead before anyone can talk to them, this also seems a strange statement from that point of view.

Maybe your confusing spree/rampage killers with serial killers. These are two very different sorts of animals.

The one that comes to mind is Ward Weaver, the guy Ann Coulter wrote about, cannot remember his name... maybe Dodd? and several others. They find this stuff from letters and by interviewing cell mates or retired prison workers. You also hear about this stuff however true it is on the re-enacted crime solving shows.

I may be confusing all the sub-categories of killers but as far as what they think I am going by what they say.

 

[hemet dennis]

Really....I haven't seen anyone say they did it because they enjoyed, with the possible exceptions of Manson. Since most of them end up dead before anyone can talk to them, this also seems a strange statement from that point of view.

Maybe your confusing spree/rampage killers with serial killers. These are two very different sorts of animals.

Manson never killed anyone.

 

[bakerjw]

My cousin is a schizophrenic and he "snapped", so to speak, when he and my aunt came for a visit. He went from being my cousin Jim, normal in every way, to someone who was absolutely terrified that the mafia was out to kill him. It was very frightening to see the transformation that took place over a couple of days. Eventually my aunt had to have the police come and arrest him which got him detained and committed until he could be diagnosed. When medicated, he is like a zombie, and he needs to be medicated or the paranoia comes back and he is liable to do anything.

My doctor felt that I was dealing with a lot of anxiety, so he prescribed Zoloft. I agreed to try it and within a week I was a zombie. He convinced me to cut the dose in half and it wasn't that bad, but after a month or so, when it had taken full effect, I found that I couldn't do my usual word games on my Kindle. I was missing words like cat and dog and I was on a very light dose. My point is that when people with a mental illness are medicated, their quality of life can be diminished so greatly that they will often stop the medicine because it is better to deal with the symptoms rather than the cure. All too often, the medical community is more concerned with curing the symptoms rather than finding the cause.

 

[chickened]

My cousin is a schizophrenic and he "snapped", so to speak, when he and my aunt came for a visit. He went from being my cousin Jim, normal in every way, to someone who was absolutely terrified that the mafia was out to kill him. It was very frightening to see the transformation that took place over a couple of days. Eventually my aunt had to have the police come and arrest him which got him detained and committed until he could be diagnosed. When medicated, he is like a zombie, and he needs to be medicated or the paranoia comes back and he is liable to do anything.

My doctor felt that I was dealing with a lot of anxiety, so he prescribed Zoloft. I agreed to try it and within a week I was a zombie. He convinced me to cut the dose in half and it wasn't that bad, but after a month or so, when it had taken full effect, I found that I couldn't do my usual word games on my Kindle. I was missing words like cat and dog and I was on a very light dose. My point is that when people with a mental illness are medicated, their quality of life can be diminished so greatly that they will often stop the medicine because it is better to deal with the symptoms rather than the cure. All too often, the medical community is more concerned with curing the symptoms rather than finding the cause.

I think they deep down know the cause and know it cannot be "cured" but prefer to manage it. This approach to mental illness reminds me of the folks that will go out of their way to prove they are not a racist by doing unseemly counterproductive actions.