sCHIZoPHReNIa diARiES
TRUE STORIES BY REAL SCHIZOPHRENICS
Psychologist Overcomes Paranoid Schizophrenia
DR. FRED FRESE'S STORY
But Frese had several classic symptoms, notably his inability to separate fantasy from reality and his hearing of inner voices. Contrary to popular belief, schizophrenia is not a split personality. Rather, people are apathetic, withdrawn, delusional and can't think logically. Though people are more likely to develop schizophrenia if it runs in their family, substance abuse, stress and other factors may trigger it. It typically develops between the ages of 17 and 25.
New research shows that viral infections in the second trimester of pregnancy also may cause the disease, though it may not develop for years.
Frese's second breakdown came about a year later in a Milwaukee church. He pictured himself changing from man to monkey, then dog, snake, fish and, finally, an atom.
He saw himself inside an atom bomb being loaded for use. He thought he was "the instrument to usher in Armageddon.'' He was hospitalized for a few weeks, then released. He wandered streets for the next year. In the summer of 1968, when he was 27, he was picked up, jailed, taken to court and declared insane by the state of Ohio. He spent three days in a maximum-security mental hospital cell.
The story he tells of that stay depicts him at utter rock bottom, screaming for water, trapped in a room with no toilet, guarded by attendants who wouldn't let him out to go to the bathroom.
Then, transferred to a Veterans Administration hospital, Frese was put on a medicine that began to control his delusions. Over time, though he was in and out of the hospital 10 times, he was able to hold jobs, including a management position with a major corporation. He earned a degree in international business management from the American Graduate School of International Management in Phoenix, Ariz., and a master's degree and doctorate in psychology from Ohio University. For 15 years, he served as director of psychology for the Western Reserve Psychiatric Hospital in Sagamore Hills, Ohio, the system where he had once been a patient.
Frese benefited from luck, persistence, his college degrees and health insurance at the time of his first breakdown. In addition, he recovers more quickly once he's on medicine.
Once, he was hired into a management position at a major corporation without even being asked for his health history. Another time, an administrator recommended him for a job over the objections of people who questioned whether someone with psychiatric problems should work in the mental-health system. Discrimination like that remains a serious problem for mentally ill people even today; as a result, many can get only menial jobs.
At Ohio University, Frese met his wife, Penny, a former nun, while they were both graduate students.
In "A Love Story: Living with Someone with Schizoprehenia,'' the last half of a two-part video she produced with her husband, Penny Frese describes how her husband confided in her about his mental illness only after they had been friends for a while. Curious about the disease, she devoured books on the subject and spent hours talking to Frese about his illness.
He opened up his life to her. She saw a man who was charming, funny and intelligent. They became close, but her growing affection for him scared her. She left for Colorado, but soon realized her life held little without him. "Life without him was unthinkable, but I was terrified,'' she explains in the video.
They married and had three children. Frese has a fourth child from a previous brief marriage.
All four children, now ages 15 to 24, have been diagnosed with depression and take drugs for the conditions. Frese had a cousin with schizophrenia, offering more evidence of a genetic link
