For What If It Is Not Real?

Imagination has a very strong connection to our mental health. Living a life surrounded with hallucinations and delusion is quite alarming. At times I often feel as if something just passed by or whispered in my silent room. It depends on how much control do we have over our imagination. Like I just ignore and divert my attention focusing back to my work. But if our mind starts believing those hallucinations and delusions we are at risk of Paranoid Schizophrenia.

In the case of paranoid schizophrenia, a person is surrounded by hallucinations and delusions that is they listen to sounds which nobody else hears and believe what is not real.

Paranoid schizophrenia is a mental illness in which a person remains suspicious all the time and is hardly in a conscious state of mind. People with Paranoid schizophrenia seem to be lost in their self-created imaginary world. They are not concerned about the feelings of family or friends rather suspect them for any cause.

Negative or positive thoughts and belief can be a part of their imagination. A person with paranoid schizophrenia encounters severe mood swings either full energetic or totally depressing. The following are examples to explain the psychotic mood during this mental disorder.

• I am a celebrity:

  A person who has no background of stardom at all pretends to be a famous celebrity. Smiling and waving to the standing walls but for them, they are surrounded by their fans. Posing and smiling to the flickering camera. Their imagination becomes so powerful that it destroys the ability to realize what is real.

• They Are Trying To Kill Me:

  The victims of paranoid schizophrenia think that people are trying to kill him/her. It can be anyone under any circumstances. If a person is looking at his/her neighbor talking on the phone their mind makes up that they are plotting against his/her murder. From government authorities to loved ones anyone can be a threat to their living.

• In The Case Of Severe Depression:

  When their psychotic mood goes under severe depression they often plan to end up their lives. Committing suicide or high intake of doses becomes the option. They believe that the world does not need them anymore. The mind becomes very much sensitive to the surroundings. Even if you show your concern and adore such a person to overcome their depression their mind hardly surrenders to all these emotions. They may act fine for a short period but after a few weeks or so you find them going through the same phase of depression.

  
  

Schizophrenia itself is a single disease. It is classified according to its factors. According to research, the following factors can contribute to the onset of schizophrenia.

Psychological Stress

The psychological stress can cause a psychotic effect. The recent studies, do not show much evidence that psychological traumas as natural disasters or a war can contribute to developing schizophrenia. Primarily it depends on the psychotic episodes in life for example:

• it can be due to the death of your loved one.
• being jobless for a longer period
• having marital issues or getting a divorce
• a torturous school-life incident
• severe accidents

There can be several other reasons to stress sometimes, even social issues can make life stressful we need to control our emotions and not let it overcome our real senses.

Genetic Disorder:

According to the research, genes alone do not contribute to this mental disorder although there is a very strong genetic component involved which is still under discussion. As there is not much evidence of inheriting this disease due to genetical disorders, therefore, research is still ongoing.

Improper Brain Development:

During the early stages of fetal development, the malfunction in the brain due to any cause be it genetic encoding error, hormonal imbalance, viral infection or any other kind of stress can relate to the onset of schizophrenia in adulthood. The researchers still don't find this factor to be a valid cause for schizophrenia.

Viral Infections:

Recently a study has shown that when the two viruses namely HSV (Herpes Simplex Virus) and CMV (cytomegalovirus) infect the human genes set they are at a high risk to develop schizophrenia. Similarly, a parasite called toxoplasmosis gondii carried by cats can also infect humans and risk them for such illness.

Drugs Abuse:

Extreme intake of drugs affects not just a part but the entire body. Therefore the abuse of drugs such as Marijuana and LSD can be a cause to schizophrenia. According to scientists, even prescribed drugs like steroids and stimulants can make a person psychotic.

Neurotransmitters:

The imbalances in chemical messengers of the brain named as dopamine, serotonin, and, glutamate can cause schizophrenic symptoms. Research says that chemical imbalances of the brain have turned out to cause schizophrenic symptoms.

A person with schizophrenia faces difficulty in memory and cognitive tasks. It happens because of the abnormalities observed in different brain regions using MRI, CT, and, PET scans. According to the findings, grey matter volume reduction in frontal and temporal lobes which controls our memory and auditory information causes schizophrenic symptoms. Also, the reduction in the volume of white matter contributes to the early stage of such mental disorders. Grey matter and white matter are tissues of the central nervous system. The brain scans make scientist predict that schizophrenic patients have a disrupted neuronal connection due to which the person is unable to control the imagination power.

Furthermore, neurotransmitters are the messengers of brain cells that help the brain signals pass from one cell to another. According to recent studies, Glutamate, Dopamine, and Serotonin are suspected to be involved in the pathology of the brain.

Dopamine:

The neurotransmitter dopamine is responsible for movement, addiction, pleasure-seeking, behavioral cognition and, memory, etc. Dopamine has been a prime suspect in Schizophrenia and many other mental disorders as it is linked to addiction. In the case of Schizophrenia dopamine causes hallucinations and delusions. After these theories, antipsychotic drugs were tested to inhibit the activity of dopamine which resulted in controlling the Schizophrenic symptoms.

Glutamate

The chemical messenger glutamate plays a vital role in memory and learning of the human brain. Glutamate is a part of most of the brain cells and helps in cellular communication. In 1980 the theory proposed that glutamate due to its interaction with other neurotransmitters like dopamine or gamma-aminobutyric (GABA) can cause schizophrenic symptoms and is still believed.

The scientists are exploring various regions of the brain as this pathology has given them a wide range to discover changes. Recently there has been a lot of understanding of the structural and physical changes of the brain during schizophrenia. Researchers are further investigating of the molecular changes happening in the brain. The only difficulty is that neuronal study is quite a challenging task as all the neurons are interlinked to each other. Therefore there is hope to find a cure after examining the structural changes of the brain through various MRI scans.

According to research, about 80% of the population mostly of age group 16-30 are becoming a victim of paranoid schizophrenia due to its common factors. Schizophrenia is a chronic disease however its symptom can be controlled using anti-psychotic drugs and mental health therapies.