Dear 14-Year-Old Me, 

You are a fighter. Always remember that! You have several hard years ahead of you. Keep FIGHTING! You have a fighting spirit. Never give up. You have a support system. Your parents aren’t as stupid as you think they are; rely on them. 

You will face many things in the years to come. You will be diagnosed with a mental illness. You will visit many doctors. Most of them will have no clue what’s wrong with you. They will be pill pushers. Listen to your instincts. Don’t try to please them.  You know yourself best. TRUST YOURSELF!

You will be very hard on yourself through all of this. Remember, you are very much worth loving. You may not care now, but you are God’s child. You are made in His image. He loves you more than anyone else does and He understands what you are going through and will go through. Just keep in mind that He is in control.

I know you are stuck in a place where you aren’t happy. You are so obsessed with certain books that you can’t separate reality from fiction. It will all be okay. One of them will become a joke to you. You will soon stop trying to sneak and watch the other; you won’t care about it anymore. You won’t even watch the last two movies and you won’t mind. 

You are headed to a very dark place. I have no advice on how to avoid it. I refuse to allow you to avoid it. It will make you, not break you. You will become a much better person - a very caring person - because of this. Remain strong. You can do this. 

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Hello, my name Daniel and I struggle with Schizophrenia. It really all started with me being to scared to get near under my bed, in which I would jump to my bed from as far from my bed as I could, occasionally making me hit my arm or knee of the bed frame. Next, I’d look up to a figure staring at me or going to another room and someone is staring at something. Finally, the delusions were the worst part. I’d think if the full moon was full, I would be unsafe, I thought my limbs were turning purple or that someone was after me. My friends would tell me nobody is where I’m saying one of my hallucinations would be or would say that the moon or something would hurt me. I didn’t believe I had Schizophrenia or any other mental illness but finally, I believed my friends after the first psychotic episode. I was stressed over school and decided to go on a walk and sit down for a while. I constantly got worried someone was behind me and would look behind me often. Finally, i looked behind me and a figure was staring at me and started walking towards me. I kept saying, ”Please leave me alone,” or “Please dont hurt me.”

Anyway, now I’m with friends that help me through it and understand. 

Do you ever feel your emotions physically? It might be a pit in your stomach or a tension in your back. It calls out to you, like a siren blaring, “something is wrong”. A month or so ago, I had this pit in my stomach that would not go away. It felt like a sustained, subtle panic attack that lasted several days, perhaps even a week. I couldn’t understand what it was telling me. To run? To stay? Which thoughts should I follow? Which were trying to be helpful and which were feeding this feeling in my stomach? I tried many of my usual coping skills to make it go away: running, meditation, sleep, talking it out. Nothing was working, which indicated that it was something deeper.

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