Schizophrenia is described by the American psychiatric association as a chronic brain disorder that is characterized by delusion, hallucinations, trouble with thinking and concentration and lack of motivation. People suffering from this disease tend to turn to alcoholism in bid to eliminate these symptoms. The Schizophrenia patients eventually become addicts and dependent of alcohol. This paper aims to highlight the Christian perspective of alcoholic Schizophrenia and the best treatment procedures that can be used.
Schizophrenia and Alcohol
Schizophrenia is a multilateral condition that has various forms of symptoms that may be positive, negative or cognitive. Some positive of this chronic disorder includes the psych tic symptoms such as paranoid delusions, hallucinations, and hearing voices. The negative symptoms re absence of basic and complex emotions, inability to experience pleasure, lack of motivation, lack of speech absence of desire or arousal. These patients turn alcohol use in bid to overcome most of these disturbing symptoms.
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Schizophrenia patients also suffer cognitive impairment that might include dementia, poor working memory, impaired analytical and interpretive ability in relation to new information, with inability use it and attention deficit. For this reason these people are difficult to interact or work with. However Christians can be able to relate with them by applying bible teachings and other educated beliefs. The first aspect of Christian that would be utilized in handling and dealing people with schizophrenia is the fact that humans are emotional and intellectual beings (Shah, Kulhara, & Grover, 2014. This might be useful in understanding the emotional delusions and hallucinations that are shown by schizophrenia patients.
To efficiently understand the nature of human beings the best approach would be to examine if man is basically good or basically evil. The worldview on this issue is that man is basically good and that he can save himself. The world perception of human saving himself involves mechanisms such as enlightenment, and social reform. In this regard the world is applying an ideology in which they don’t utilize spirituality to hand issues like alcoholic and schizophrenia. The world believes people are naturally good, and considering they don’t consider the spiritual issues, they are surprised by the negative and unfavorable portrayed by people with schizophrenia and alcohol addiction.
The world is surprised by alcoholic schizophrenics and the way they tend to cope with the alcohol dependency problem. Worldview on this is that the patients are incapable of saving themselves. According to pantheisms, which is a famous worldview, is of the ideology that claims “not only is man good, but is god” (Corrington, 2014). In this regard, the world expects alcoholic schizophrenics to save themselves. They believe in spirituality but man has the capability to influence what happens in or around them. In this regard pantheism believes man and women has universal mind and have the capability to the continuation of material evolution. Therefore they believe that man is the creation which has an impersonal force to influence their nature (Corrington, 2014).
The world thinks that men as emotional and intellectual beings sometimes fail to appreciate spatiality. In this context man has forgotten its oneness with the universe. Consequently, man has become separatist and they no longer understand the true nature of things. The suffering and complications that people are facing is making it hard to make a reality of life. These are some of the reasons why there are alcoholic schizophrenics in the world; people fail to appreciate spirituality and nature of man and therefore resort in using alcohol in belief that it will offer solution to their psychological and spiritual problems (Corrington, 2014).
Alcoholic schizophrenics have an issue with understanding spirituality and human nature. If they understood that humans are naturally emotional beings with intellectual capabilities, this could serve as a solution to the problems they are facing today. There are numerous bible verses that can be used to understand or shed some light about the nature of man. The bible says “the human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?”(Jeremiah 17: 9, New Living Translation). This verse would be used by the alcoholic schizophrenics to understand that they cannot follow their heart by consuming alcohol to escape symptoms brought about by schizophrenics. The human heart according to this verse is described as being deceitful and capable of misleading person. Therefore understanding the sophistication in human nature would be useful in dealing with symptoms of popular disorders rather that turning to alcohol as a means to escape the negative impacts that it brings (Shah, Kulhara, & Grover, 2014).
The Bible in Psalms 51:5 says “ for I was born a sinner- yes, form the moment my mother conceived me” this biblical teaching is contrary to a common world view that claims that men are naturally god and have the capability to save themselves. The Bible confirms that people are naturally evil despite being made in God’s image. Genesis 1 verse 27(New translation version) says “So God created human beings (man) in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them”. With this it is logical to expect that men would be good by nature and free form evil. The bible clarifies this by saying all of us used to live that way, following the passionate desires and inclinations of our sinful nature. “By our very nature we were subject to God anger, just like everyone else” ( Ephesians 2:3 , New Living Translation). This bible verse serves to confirm that human nature is evil and crooked. In this regard people with schizophrenics might find it easy to find human solutions to symptoms and suffering that they go through. It is inclined in human nature that humans go for readily available solutions to problems such us engaging in substance abuse and alcoholism.
Best model for Christians in treatment of Alcoholic Schizophrenics
Matthew 6: 13 to 30 are the key scripture reading that can be used to formulate the best treatment approach for Alcoholic Schizophrenics. The bible says
“ And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from evil… that is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life- whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food and your body more than clothing… can all your worries add a single moment to your life? And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Matthew 6: 13, 25-28, 30)
People, especially Christians should turn into spirituality in order to overcome the symptoms of common disorders such schizophrenics. Spirituality can offer answers to the reality of life (Jeste & Maglione, 2013). In this regard, people with schizophrenia can use spiritual knowledge to understand their nature and be able to control their emotions. People should be moderate and rational on how they handled their experiences with schizophrenia. Some patients who are undergoing delusions have had this notion that makes them believe that they are sent by God to become a great prophet (Jones, 2014). This might be the human nature that is deceiving the patients of schizophrenia disorder.
Spirituality can be used by the patients of schizophrenia disorder in the recovery process. Such patients may find that their spiritual beliefs and practices help them to make sense of the world in a way that they could not when they were suffering from psychotic delusions (Jones, 2014). Being a member of a supportive community would be necessary in providing vital fellowship when faced with everyday problems including the schizophrenic symptoms and other mental health conditions.
Spirituality is an aspect that has been utilized by Christians to acquire cognitive control over human shortcomings including mental health conditions. Spirituality allows people to stand as intellectual and emotional being who can be able to achieve harmonious balance in their life, intellect and emotions. Therefore, people suffering from schizophrenics can use this aspect to evade falling into alcoholism and substances abuse and try to control their cognitive powers as well as emotions or hallucinations.
Schizophrenics are a mental condition that breaks down the aspects of human existence and consciousness. Some of its symptoms are known to deconstruct or impair the intellect. Other patients tend to experience higher reasoning, sensory data- quality, reliability and functions of memory. In this regard people suffering for schizophrenia lack the ability to have a clear perception of being human.
Spirituality is simply the ability to perceive a God like presence in ones daily life; this can be utilized in having a feeling of oneness with the universe. Subsequently people will stop depending on their own minds to find solutions to things that affect their life because they will stop focusing on self and they will begin depending on God for solutions. Some common practices that are associated to spirituality that Christians can utilize in treatment of schizophrenia include prayer and meditation. They are useful in achieving greater cognitive power and they can be used to improve control over emotions, mood, imagination, intrinsictive feelings and rational judgments.
It is detrimental for people with schizophrenia to abuse alcohol; science research shows that people who have schizophrenia and are abusing alcohol will tend to have more frequent relapses. The alcohol abuse progresses it will be a source of conflict with family members, friends and other close acquaintances (Pitschel-Walz et al., 2015) Alcoholics are prone to violence and this may land them in criminal justice systems. When they are sentenced for violence they may have their reputation ruined and their physical health deteriorate; they may suffer complications such as high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke and stomach ulcers.
Alcohol is not a solution to schizophrenic symptoms; it is a great threat and distraction in the sense that it provides a temporary feeling of well being. This feeling distracts people from the real necessity of dealing with the complex problems that affect their lives such as the symptoms of mental conditions affecting them (Shah, Kulhara, & Grover, 2014). Finding an escape route rather than facing the disorder by all its perspectives will make the patients to lose focus on the strengths and efforts needed in order to persevere through the recovery program (Shah, Kulhara, & Grover, 2014).
Alcoholism and substance abuse may lead to dangerous behavior for people suffering from schizophrenia. The major risks include suicide and violence. Alcohol is not only harmful to people with schizophrenics but it also makes ordinary people act dangerously. However people with schizophrenics have higher probability of exhibiting violent behavior (Shah, Kulhara, & Grover, 2014). Most of the schizophrenic patients who engage in alcohol abuse die of suicide.
Conclusion
This research paper has discovered that people suffering from mental illnesses have a higher risk of engaging in violent behaviors and suicide. Alcohol abuse will make them fail t achieve the objectives of the recovery program in that they cannot take the prescribed drugs as recommended by the physician. The solution to schizophrenic symptoms and alcohol would be spirituality practices such as prayer and meditation this makes people to be in control of their emotions and cognitive power.
References
Corrington, R. S. (2014). Guest Editor’s Introduction: Ecstatic Naturalism and Deep Pantheism. Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture , 8 (2), 139-155. doi:10.1558/jsrnc.v8i2.139
Jeste, D. V., & Maglione, J. E. (2013). Treating Older Adults With Schizophrenia: Challenges and Opportunities. Schizophrenia Bulletin , 39 (5), 966-968. doi:10.1093/schbul/sbt043
Jones, J. (2014). Spirituality as attachment: The psychotherapy treatment of a lesbian woman suffering from schizophrenia. Spirituality in Clinical Practice , 1 (4), 307-312. doi:10.1037/scp0000036
Pitschel-Walz, G., Leucht, S., Bäuml, J., Kissling, W., & Engel, R. R. (2015). The effect of family interventions on relapse and rehospitalization in schizophrenia: a meta- analysis. Focus.
Shah, R., Kulhara, P., & Grover, S. (2014). Spirituality and Coping in Patients with Schizophrenia. Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research , 6281-6285. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_3815
