Working and Schizophrenia
While dealing with schizophrenia can be a difficult process, perhaps the most difficult part is what to do after an acute episode. Utilizing psychosocial rehabilitation can be useful to provide you with the tools and training that you need in order to solve problems and to manage your illness and how you wish to treat it. This type of therapy usually involves teaching a person social skills as well as job skills that will greatly benefit society.
It is important to remember that schizophrenia drugs are not a panacea and they will not completely eliminate all of your symptoms, even if you respond well to them. Many people with schizophrenia hear voices if their illnesses are quite severe, for example, and medications will not fully eliminate these problems.
Speaking of schizophrenia medications, these drugs themselves can cause other side effects thatyou need therapies to deal with such as depression, insomnia, weight gain, and loss of sexual desire. So what steps can you take in order to rehabilitate yourself?
The first step is to build occupational skills which will allow you to cope with life and hopefully hold down a normal job. For people with mental illness, it can be difficult to secure regular employment due to problems with illness symptoms and a lack of being able to deal with the regular nine to five job, and they may have other problems such as not having access to adequate transportation.
An interruption during college is common and it can be difficult to finish off your education in order to get your desired method of employment, and people who are older also have difficulties obtaining normal employment due to work gaps in their history. It can also be difficult for people who have weak social skills to have an successful interview with a potential employer.
A number of different employment programs exist which can help individuals who are suffering from schizophrenia find employment, and these are typically very short term jobs in order to teach someone with this ilness how to cope in a normal job setting. Of course, some of these jobs are actually fulltime and are especially designed for individuals who have problems securing normal employment.
The government also runs numerous counseling and job training programs for individuals who suffer from mental illness, and these programs are frequently conducted by the Rehabilitation Services Administration, which is underneath the Department of Education.
Another form of therapy that is quite helpful for people with schizophrenia is known as cognitive behavioral therapy, and what this does is it tries to identify problem behaviors and to teach people how to correct them. Using these methods in order to learn to control negative behaviors is very effective in combination with medications in order to treat this illness.
Public anxiety is common with this illness, due to various quirks which can make the schizophrenic seem odd to other people such as acting inappropriately in certain social situations. Specialized therapists can help schizophrenics work through their anxiety by teaching them the right actions to take in social situations.
Remember that there are a number of different psychosocial therapies out there that can help individuals with schizophrenia, so is a good idea to take advantage of many of them as possible.
To learn more about Schizophrenia Parents check out my What is Schizophrenia site.
