Schizophrenia

Is this real?

Schizophrenia

This is Mira. She’s living with shizophrenia.

Mira knows some people think she's "crazy," but she wants you to know that she's a normal person that cannot help the voices she hears.

She has summarized her experience for you below.

What it is:
Schizophrenia is a persistent, severe mental disorder that changes how a person thinks, feels, and behaves. People with this disorder may loose touch with reality.

Key Symptoms:

hallucinations
delusions
unusual ways of thinking
flat emotions

Learn more about how schizophrenia feels

what schizophrenia feels like

Schizophrenia affects the mind and the body.
Hover over parts of Mira's body to see what she’s experiencing.

mouth

It's hard to put my thoughts into words. People have trouble understanding what I'm saying.

mind

I hear, see, and smell things no one else does. Sometimes, I think people are plotting against me.

limbs

Sometimes I can't control my arms. My movements can be jerky or extremely slow.

mouth: It's hard to put my thoughts into words. People have trouble understanding what I'm saying.

mind: I hear, see, and smell things no one else does. Sometimes, I think people are plotting against me.

limbs: Sometimes I can't control my arms. My movements can be jerky or extremely slow.

view all symptoms

Learn about what schizophrenia looks like in the brain

a look inside the schizophrenic brain

Mira hates when people say her hallucinations are "all in her head" because she knows schizophrenia has physical effects on the brain that make the hallucinations feel real to her. Hover over Mira's brain to see how schizophrenia has influenced it.

prefrontal cortex

Disturbances in this area cause Mira to have difficulty planning ahead and organizing her thoughts.

basal ganglia

Abnormal functioning here causes Mira to experience paranoia and hallucinations.

occipital lobe

Disturbances in this brain area cause Mira to see things that aren't there.

wernicke's area

More active than normal. Causes Mira to hear things that aren't there.

prefrontal cortex: Disturbances in this area cause Mira to have difficulty planning ahead and organizing her thoughts.

basal ganglia: Abnormal functioning causes Mira to experience paranoia and hallucinations.

occipital lobe: Disturbances in this brain area cause Mira to see things that aren't there.

wernicke's area: More active than normal. Causes Mira to hear things that aren't there.

view all brain regions

Learn about schizophrenia in the real world

real people. real struggles with schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is relatively rare, but over 3 million people in the U.S. are living with it. Click through the carousel below to see real accounts of struggles with schizophrenia.

1.2%
of the adult population has struggled with schizophrenia at some point in their lives.

20%
of the US homeless population is estimated to have schizophrenia.

40%
of people who have schizophrenia will attempt suicide at least once.

“I thought of the voices as… something a little different from aliens. I thought of them more like angels … It’s really my subconscious talking, it was really that… I know that now.”

— John Forbes Nash, Jr. (Nobel Prize winning mathematician and subject of the award-winning book and movie A Beautiful Mind)

“But explaining what I’ve come to call “disorganization” is a different challenge altogether. Consciousness gradually loses its coherence. One’s center gives way. The center cannot hold. The “me” becomes a haze, and the solid center from which one experiences reality breaks up like a bad radio signal.”

— Elyn R. Saks, The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness.

“As well as being one of the worst things that can happen to a human being, schizophrenia can also be one of the richest learning and humanizing experiences life offers.”

— Mark Vonnegut (American pediatrician and author of The Eden Express: A Memoir of Insanity)

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