What is it like growing up with a mother who has Schizophrenia? Podcast on Mental Illness

So happy there’s others like me who want to publicly talk about growing up with a schizophrenic mother! It’s such a lonely, lonely way to grow up.

Thank you for this. I can relate to this story. My mother was diagnosed with psychotic depression which was triggered by my birth. But I am pretty sure she was not well balanced before that. Funny about the mosaic trays - we had mosaic ash trays around the house that she had made while hospitalized. I too can't look at mosaic art the same as most people.

My story is almost identical to hers. Thank you for sharing.

Wow, every now and then I’ve searched for others who grew up with a schizophrenic mother. My story is similar as far as my mom being diagnosed first with manic depression which was what they used to call bipolar disorder but, shortly after that she was diagnosed with schizophrenia. My mom had my sister at 20 years old, then me & my brothers who are triplets at 23. She had started displaying symptoms before me and my brothers were born but it was after our birth that she became severely ill. I was born in 1969 and it was at that time schizophrenics were hospitalized for a month or more with each episode which were very often. She had shock therapy as well.. but I don’t know much about it, but all the different meds she was on that would often get changed when they’d come out with something new. I remember one medication would make her eyes uncontrollably look upward, so they had a pill for that eye symptom as well. She would get debilitating migraines for several days in a row. I hated seeing her suffer and that’s so hard to grow up that way. My mom would often become mute and catatonic. It was very scary witnessing that as a child. My mother would also function great when stabilized but sadly it was too few and far between. When it was mentioned about the cooking and making clothes, that’s amazing because my mom made a lot of clothes, stuffed animals, pillows for us kids when she was managing ok, she was talented with that, and did all the hospital crafts as well.. very artsy and creative. She also was very religious, and I believe the religion thing was a bit over the top. One thing that would upset all of us was that she would go on these “throwing things out” rampages, and throw out belongings, furniture, you name it. It got to the point my father had to make sure he was around on garbage day because even if he took things out she’d put them back when the garbage truck would come that day. We were mostly raised by my father and grandmother, which was unfortunate because they were both extremely abusive. They both blamed me and my brothers for my mom’s illness and so us three were abused and suffered multiple traumas. My father was physically, emotionally, and sexually abusive, and my grandmother was emotionally and psychologically abusive. As you can probably imagine, our lives were permanently altered horribly. Somehow all 4 of us siblings are functioning in society but not without great difficulty. I am the only one of us 4 kids that have been working on myself in therapy for almost 9 years now. I was diagnosed with PTSD, depression & anxiety, and last year a dissociative disorder was added to my list. I thank god for therapy because I was headed down a path that I surely would not have come out of had I not seen the importance of working through all the tremendous amount of trauma. We each struggle with our own things but I am the only one that has not turned abusive myself. Unfortunately all 3 siblings are abusive to their families, and I’ve had to break contact with them as they were abusive to me as well. My mother passed away tragically in a house fire in February 2001, when she was 54, and I was about 28 years old. She was home alone and there was an investigation into her death. It is known that the house fire was caused by an oil lamp she was running, but as far as the events leading to her death we will never know as it was never determined what exactly took place. All of my life so far has been spent in survival, and these days I’m just trying my best to recover and be able to live my life doing the things I enjoy, learning how to make myself happy, and being something other than traumatized. Thanks so much for sharing your story, and just hope you know that you’re not alone. ❤

Thanks for sharing your experience. It resonates with me. Felt better just listening to this.

I just found out my daughter who is I her twenties is suffering from this and am trying to get all the information as possible 🙏🏾

Very interesting interview :)