Most symptoms develop in men around the age of sixteen and twenty-five years old, and around twenty-five to thirty years old in women. Schizophrenia rarely develops in children and most schizophrenics appear to have a normal childhood.

A delusion, which is a false belief that defies logic and common sense, is a common symptom of schizophrenia. The person thinks someone is watching them constantly or they think people can read their mind. Hallucinations, hearing, seeing or sensing something that isn't there, are another common symptom of schizophrenia. Some people experience heightened senses, which is hypersensitivity of sense that leads to visual distortions. Others experience auditory hallucinations. They sometimes carry on conversations or are told to do things by one or may voices that are not there. Very rarely, but still as de

vastating, some experience visual hallucinations or smell odd smells coming from themselves. (Young, 67-68) More that 300,000 adults in this country are unable to distinguish their imaginations from reality (Cookson).

Janet was 15 in the late 1960's. Her parents assumed she was rebelling like the rest of the kids were during that time. They took Janet to an adolescent specialist and were told there was no need to worry. In 1972, after changing schools for the third time, she lived at home and became a born-again Christian. She would lie on her bedroom floor and would scream, "I'm damned to hell and my family is damned to hell." She would slam her sister against the wall. She tells them "You're not my family." She left home and moved in with a cult leader in downtown Boston, collecting donations on the street and ate from open carts in the North End. At nineteen, she asked her parents to meet her outside a counseling center. She runs to the car, screaming, and she hit her father on the shoulder. She was taken to the emergency room where she was put on the psychiatric ward. This was Janet's first hospitalization. (Goode)

balance and causes these horrible symptoms. Environmental factors also affect the disease and can irritate the symptoms. Negative experiences with family or friends can cause schizophrenia to develop more versus positive experiences that can keep the schizophrenic gene down so that it can never bother a person.

Chelsea House Publishers New York and Philadelphia 1988 pg. 13-111

Financial Times April 30, 1996 pg. 12

California Journal Oct. 97 pg. 12-17

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Approximate Word count = 2352
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)