Disclaimer: The following post is from the perspective of working in the mental health field at RCF Facilities over the last 6 years. These are my own personal experiences and thoughts. This post is not meant to generalize or critique any individual with a mental illness. I have based the following on research I have done on the credited sources cited below. Enjoy!
Introduction
We have all heard horror stories when it comes to schizophrenia and how it affects the human mind as well as behavior. Stories of individuals who kept hearing the “voices” telling them to “Kill..kill..” and finally losing every sense of sanity they have left which leads them to give in to do exactly what the “voices” are suggesting.
Personally, having worked with individuals who live with schizophrenia, I have heard these types of claims of what horrible things these “voices” say to them countless amount of times. Horrible ideations of how they perceive their reality and the people around them.
Hearing all of these stories has always sent my mind to the same question: Is there such a thing as happy voices for schizophrenics? This question has always sent me down the deepest of rabbit holes on the internet, mainly because there is not much conversation about this topic which causes me to dig to find my answers.
This post will cover finding key evidence of schizophrenics who experience voices of encouragement rather than evil to answer this rarely discussed question. I will also be sharing my own personal experiences of what schizophrenics who hear the “bad voices” have told me. And the pleasure of meeting only one man in my 6 years of experience who truly had a happy voice.
What is Schizophrenia and What are Voices?
So, to fully understand the evidence we uncover, let’s start with the basics. Schizophrenia: What’s that all about? Well, to sum up this extremely complicated mental illness, schizophrenia is persistent and can be both severe and disabling. It is characterized by disruptions in thought processes, which cause warped perceptions, inappropriate emotional responses, and social interactions.
Side note: It always fascinates me every time I start this research and look up the definition of schizophrenia. It has already been made very clear on the official websites such as The DSM5 and NIHM how these types of individuals suffer. Not once it is mentioned if there is a chance for someone to hear happy voices. I pulled the words “severe and disabling” straight from the definition. Not to say this mental illness isn’t debilitating, but could you imagine having this illness and trying to educate yourself to find that definition? Would scare the crap out of me! Like, there’s no chance for a happy mindset if you are diagnosed with schizophrenia? None??
You may have noticed in my introduction I put “voices” in quotations. This was done purposely because of where my research has led me. Turns out the “voice” schizophrenics hear is truly their own. This term is called sub-vocal speech. One of the many phenomena of schizophrenia is during the development of the brain, schizophrenics have a disruption that causes them to believe their own subconscious thoughts are “different voices” when in reality it is truly their own, which most of us experience in a slightly different way. Have you ever thought so intently about something that you subconsciously said it out loud?
You may be asking yourself: Well then, if it’s their own thoughts why does it always come out so bad or disturbed? I had the same question. When most people mutter something out loud accidentally it usually comes out like “take out the trash” or answering your own question out loud you asked yourself in your head. But never phrases like “kill yourself” or “That’s a secret sentence about you. They know.”
The truth is, when this “voice” happens and the individual already has a disruption in their circuit, it scares them. Where is this voice coming from?! They often times think. The fact is, the part of the brain that is supposed to light up to let their brains know it’s their own subconscious voice, doesn’t. They then reach for any concocted reason to explain this “voice” they do not recognize. Most popularly used explanations usually fall under the category of the government spying on them in some way shape or form.
The FBI must be spying on me. Who else would have this type of high-tech to beam thoughts in my head like this?
In my research, I have discovered that it is fear that drives schizophrenics to have these negative voices. The fear that generates from the “logical reasons” they have concocted to explain the “voices”. It is rarely from a positive perspective. The reasons such as the FBI or the CIA are out to get them continue to influence their subconscious in a negative way, resulting in a negative voice that continues to validate their fears. That “voice” being their own of course.
Supporting Cluster:
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/schizophrenia
https://www.mentalhelp.net/blogs/decoding-the-voices-of-schizophrenia
The History of Schizophrenia: Are There Records of Happy Voices?
So now that we have the basics down, let us travel back in time. To a time in Egypt all the way back in the year 1550 BC. It was in this year that schizophrenia was mentioned in the Ebers Papyrus, a book that the ancient Egyptians used to document mental and physical health conditions. It doesn’t get crazy specific about what exactly the Ebers Papyrus says about schizophrenia, but the reason for bringing up this book is to point out that back in the BC times, the Egyptians noted behavior of madness and disorganized speech to be a medical condition rather than supernatural forces.
Schizophrenia was referred to as early dementia due to doctors who observed the patients diagnosed with this disease seemed to worsen as the years progressed. It wasn’t until 1896, dawning on the 19th century, when German Dr. Emil Karapelin recognized this illness as a biological illness caused by toxins in the body. The illness was still called ‘dementia praecox’ (early dementia) but Karapelin did make an important distinction, he attributed schizophrenia to organic changes in the brain and to be incurable. He further distinguished at least three varieties of the disease: catatonia, in which motor functions are disrupted, hebephrenia, characterized by inappropriate emotional reactions and behavior; and paranoia, described by delusions of grandeur and of persecution.
It is truly safe to say that schizophrenics have been through hell and back to be perfectly frank with you. Especially when glimpsing into the history of how they were viewed and treated. The best example to give is in the twentieth century, parts of the USA and Nazi Germany utilized Eugenics and or sterilization as justification for extreme measures against the mentally ill. That’s right. They would put them into gas chambers to “eliminate them” from the gene pool. Winston Churchill signed off on this order as recently as 1910.
If you were schizophrenic in the ancient Roman or Greek times, you had a better chance of people believing you were possessed. Which, honestly is not much of a better conclusion once you read about it. These people would drill holes into the back of the heads of the “possessed” to hopefully release the spirit out of the body they believed it was controlling. It is mind-boggling to read that in the 1930’s they were still drilling holes into patients’ heads but not for supernatural reasons. Unfortunately, Lobotomy became the popular go-to treatment for schizophrenics at the time to help lessen their symptoms. And I really didn’t need further research to tell me, that didn’t go so well.
Finally, we get the the 1950s when the game-changer antipsychotics was introduced. The biggest accomplishment of antipsychotics was the freeing of schizophrenic patients who had been secluded in institutions and asylums. Deinstitutionalization spread like wildfire and schizophrenics were finally able to lead a life where they could function outside of the psych wards without relying on the institutions they had been sanctioned to. Of course, just like any good thing, there’s got to be cons. The side effects were another problem that the medication presented. Side effects included involuntary movements, lowered libido, low blood pressure, weight gain, and tiredness. Even with this new issue that the medication presented, psychiatrists were certain patients would be able to thrive with the right combination of outpatient therapy and medication. It was certainly a better problem than an individual being completely impaired after the hole-drilling sessions.
When I say I dug throughout the internet to find one case, just one of a schizophrenic patient that had happy voices back in the 1950s in America, I mean I pulled out my biggest investigator shovel and DUG to come up empty-handed. Still no mention of a schizophrenic who was happily talking to their voices. But to be honest, with all the horrors I’ve read about while doing my research, it is no surprise that even at the beginning this mental illness has been stained with negativity causing a chain reaction of the schizophrenics themselves to have a negative outlook on their voices. I mean from the start they have only been told they are possessed or not good enough to even be alive. I had to keep searching.
Let’s dive into some modern times.
Supporting Cluster:
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/07/when-hearing-voices-is-a-good-thing
https://livingwithschizophreniauk.org/information-sheets/schizophrenia-a-brief-history/
https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Emil-Kraepelin
Happy Voices and the Schizophrenic’s Cultural Background
The most compelling research on individuals who experience “happy voices” comes from Stanford anthropologist Tanya Luhrmann who in July 2014, conducted an experiment involving the questioning of around 30 patients who were all diagnosed with schizophrenia, and were from all over the world.
Luhrmann concluded that not one single American participant heard “happy voices”. All of the American participants described their voices as “intrusive” and “violating their privacy” which again, fuels that fear that I mentioned earlier. Luhrmann would then talk to participants from Africa and India, who would describe their voices as “playful” and “entertaining”. It had been discovered, that these participants had it in their cultural background to accept the inability to control these voices. They would often describe personal relationships they had with their voices. Telling Luhrmann the name they had for their voices or that they believed it was a family member. One participant is quoted stating “It is as if the voice is an elder guiding me and telling me what to do.”
Reading this research article certainly blew me away and opened up so much more understanding as to why negative voices are the go-to response for schizophrenics in America. As we covered in the history of schizophrenia, it is made very clear that there has been nothing but negative condensations surrounding schizophrenia from the start. The negativity (especially for Americans) comes from our privacy being violated and how much the American culture values privacy overall. Let’s get something straight, privacy isn’t just violated by the voices, it is further violated by the treatment the schizophrenic’s endure. In the countries of Africa and India, they are more open to accepting what they can’t control, which as a result, leads to less mental stress on the voices they are hearing. They make the decision to utilize their voices and make it a part of them, even developing personal relationships with their voices that the participants stated they leaned on for comfort. The African participants believed God was speaking to them to help them through their lives. As in America, the stigma continues to be fear-fueled which damages their own subconscious causing them to hate their illness and their voices, which as we have learned, are their own.
Supporting Cluster Post:
https://news.stanford.edu/2014/07/16/voices-culture-luhrmann
Meeting The Happy Schizophrenic
As I mentioned in my intro, I have had the pleasure of meeting one of these very rare Americans with “happy voices”. I was 21 at the time I started working in the mental health field at an RCF (Residential Care Facility) I took care of this man for the entire 5 years I worked at this facility. To sum up, the type of work I completed, so you have a better idea, I would talk to residents into taking their medications who had increased paranoia and tried to refuse, making sure they were showering regularly due to their increased mental health symptoms preventing them from doing this on their own, making sure they ate (voices would tell them not to a lot of the time) and just being in the moment with them which was by far my favorite part of the job.
What being in the moment with these individuals meant to me was finally giving them a chance to talk about what they have been trained to hide for so long. Giving them an avenue to tell me the messed up things rolling around in their brains so they can be walked back to reality. Schizophrenics are written off so quickly as scary that it was nice to be able to provide a friendly smile and of course, get to ask my investigative questions.
The first encounter I had with the “happy voices” resident, we’ll call him Matt, was confusing, to say the least. I spotted him in the dining room as I was passing out mail to the residents. To describe to you what I saw, was an older man in his late 50s to early 60s. He wore a dark navy blue suit with a matching coat and overalls every day. He was sitting in the back corner of the room grinning from ear to ear with his eyes closed as he swayed his head back and forth in a whimsical motion. I was relieved to see a smile as most of the residents were walking around with the deepest frowns I had ever seen, which intimidated me when I first started my work. I approached him and stated “Here’s your mail, Matt!” greeting him with a smile to match his energy. As soon as I said this, Matt’s expressions and energy completely shifted. He was no longer smiling but was flat and expressionless as he stared at me. His eyes snapped open and his smile faded as he took the mail I was delivering to him. After he took the mail I began to walk away, I decided to take one more glance over my shoulder to see him smiling as he swayed his head once more.
Did I do something wrong? I thought to myself as I scurried out of the dining room.
After some time had passed, I became more comfortable in my position at the RCF. I began asking my inquisitive questions to the residents around me about their diagnosis. I would listen intently to what every resident had to say. However, my curiosity was always wondering about the man who constantly smiled and laughed alone.
What was he hearing? And would he tell me? I incessantly asked myself.
Matt approached the medication window one night while I was working. He had the same big smile on his face with his eyes closed. Matt would begin to quietly laugh to himself as he was taking his medication from me. It was then that I asked him, “What do your voices say to you to make you smile so much?”
Matt would slowly look up at me to answer, “They sing to me. They tell me jokes.”
Well, that was not the answer I was expecting.
I asked Matt if he would share one of the jokes they tell him. He would give me the same blank expression as before as he slowly said, “No no no..you wouldn’t get it.” And just as quickly as he came to the med window he left, leisurely making his way down the hallway continuing to laugh and chuckle.
Turns out, Matt would give off this flat blank stare when someone would interrupt him from talking to his voice. You see, Matt was so happy with what his voices were saying to him, that reality was the bummer. Matt loved being lost in his world of laughing quietly to himself wherever he was. It didn’t matter if he was sitting in his room on his bed alone or outside smoking with his peers, Matt always had a smile on his face when it came to the voices he attended to.
Matt was able to maintain this baseline of being happy when it came to attending to his voices for the entire 5 years I took care of him. Which was so vastly different from what I was used to when it came to the schizophrenic community. Instead of needing reassurance from staff when his voice would act up like so many of his peers needed, he would lean into it and be lost. Eyes closed and smiling for hours.
How Residents With the “Bad Voices” Compare
Unfortunately, most of the residents I’ve encountered with this diagnosis are very much suffering from the voices in their lives. These types of residents were more prone to self-isolation, paranoia, depression, and violent tendencies. Have I been attacked by a schizophrenic before? Sure have. But that’s a post for another day!
The main difference I recognized between Matt and his peers was the ways they would attend to their voices. When Matt was attending, it was all eyes closed laughing and smiling happy good time. When one of the sicker patients would attend it was completely different. One particular resident who suffered greatly from his voice, we’ll call him Paul, did not get to have the same experiences as Matt. When Paul would hear his voices, he would sit catatonic for hours on end arming a flat and broad expression on his face intently trying to understand the “instructions” his voices were trying to tell him. Oftentimes, Paul would confide in me and would say: “I get visited by aliens every night. They come in my room, and just stand at the foot of my bed. There is a big flash and then aliens are in my room. I can’t breathe while they’re in there” he would tell me in an exhausted tone as if he were begging me to solve his problem for him.
Using problem-solving skills mixed with common sense, I knew the “light” Paul was referring to was from the headlights of the passing cars outside his window at night as Paul’s room faced the highway. There was no convincing him that it could be something positive due to what his brain concocted to be the absolute answer. No matter how hard I tried to explain it to him. But why didn’t he believe that? Surely headlights from a passing car would be a much better explanation for his brain to accept rather than thinking aliens are breaking into your room at night. Right?
In Conclusion
It is kind of daunting to say, but I have never met a happy schizophrenic since meeting Matt. I still think about him, knowing he is smiling out there while dealing with his mental illness. What I always conclude when I come to the end of my research, especially as a mental health professional, is the need to teach schizophrenics how to be nice to themselves so in return the “voice” in their head reflects that. Seems an impossible feat sometimes knowing what they have been through and are currently struggling with.
There are still many questions to be answered when it comes to the mystery of unavailing schizophrenia. But one thing is for certain, more pain will not solve pain. Locking someone up never teaches them how to be free. And self-shame and hate for having a mental illness do not teach self-love. These are the key points to my mission to help improve the lives of the mentally ill and to finally and definitely be a part of changing the cultural background for schizophrenics to create a generation with “happy voices”.
Thumbnail Credit: Rawpixel
My name is Bailey, I am 26 and I just became a first-time mom to a beautiful baby girl. I am a freelance mental health blogger who’s most interested in asking questions in the field that are rarely investigated and diving DEEP into my research. I have worked as a mental health professional for the last 6 years and am very passionate about the work I complete and about what I write! I am currently a working Certified Medication Aide at an RCF Facility helping people with mental illnesses in the Direct Care Support Department.
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