Schizophrenia Noir

Life in Blade Runner

It may warrant explanation as to why exactly I have been so candid over the years, and particularly since I became a content creator, as to my underlying psychological abnormalities. It was not an easy decision and it was/is multifaceted. First and foremost, I may prove to be a fool (though I am not persuaded of this) but I refuse to hide - I am of a minority of people who CAN stand by his statements without circumstances forcing him to adopt a shield of splendid anonymity. What accompanies such a decision is that it forces one to be prepared for the inevitability that aspects of one’s personal life, existence will in fact be discovered.

I preferred to deflect and disarm any campaign mounted by those aggrieved or professional slanderers who would (and I am certain HAVE) undoubtedly learned of my medical history by way of various means - it is impossible to control data of this sort in any truly meaningful way. More intimately, I realized when I turned 40 years old that I had been fleeing for my entire life - since I was a very small boy - from the FACT of this matter.

Schizophrenia is more than just a ‘‘state’’ of mind - its a structural feature. And frankly, the only reason I can express myself lucidly as I do and retain information in the manner in which I am able is because of this unusual structure of mind. Its important not to view such things one dimensionally - the structure of my mind fuels both my dreams AND my nightmares.

Finally, the most frightening thing about schizophrenia is the ‘‘shattering’’ effect. Ones mind feels at times that it is quite literally dis-integrating - ceasing to be a WHOLE, ceasing to be ones OWN personality and rather is fracturing into component elements, each only a very fragmentary piece of a true human being/personality. This is highly AGGRAVATED by the profound disconnectedness of modern life - where true and authentic, enduring ties that ‘‘bind’’ are cruelly abrogated, elusively ephemeral or non-existent altogether.

The schizophrenic is two things: he is a man who lives in a ‘‘dream’’ - as his subconscious mind has asserted itself AGAINST his rational, waking intellect in a kind of hostile occupation. He is also a man who has no past - unable as he is to meaningfully tie events together, equally unable to rely upon ordinary metrics of consistency and regularity as his world is a constantly shifting mass of permutations, possibilities, terrifying potentialities, and shape-shifting forms (human, inanimate and otherwise).

Part of the reason I must write is because otherwise I cannot sleep - having not purged my mind of the elements that fuel compulsion I am victimized by nightmares. The other primary component is that by documenting the process of thought - often seemingly disconnected - as it occurs, and ‘‘at speed’’ allows me to feel that I am in control of it in some basic way…and the forced structuring of words, their confining nature, their limiting function somehow allows me to apprehend the world around me in a way that is not rendered hopelessly confusing as a hall of mirrors stalked by light, shadow, and phantasmagoric creatures. - T