Plain-language, educational articles on schizophrenia, psychosis, antipsychotic medications, and lived experience — by ColdAI.
Most antipsychotics are compatible with breastfeeding to some degree. Here is what's known, what to watch for, and how the decision usually gets made.
SleepDisrupted circadian rhythms — shifted sleep timing, flattened daily activity, altered melatonin — are common in schizophrenia and predict worse symptoms. Most are treatable with light, structure, and sometimes melatonin.
Crisis modelsIf 988 is the ambulance, a warm line is the friend who picks up at 10pm to help you talk through your week. Both are useful — for very different things.
Peer supportNAMI is the largest grassroots mental health organisation in the United States. Its HelpLine, family programs, and local affiliates are some of the most widely used non-clinical resources in the country.
TransitionsThe first weeks after release from prison or jail carry an extraordinarily high risk of overdose, suicide, and rehospitalisation for people with schizophrenia. A planned reentry into mental health care can change that trajectory.
State guidesMichigan's mental-health system runs through Community Mental Health Services Programs and PIHPs, with Medicaid behavioural health carved out and a unique AOT statute called Kevin's Law.
DisparitiesCities have more psychiatrists per capita — and also more fragmented care, more emergency-department reliance, and worse outcomes for many of the most vulnerable patients. Density does not automatically equal access.
Substance useWhen schizophrenia and a substance use disorder co-occur, integrated treatment — one team treating both — produces dramatically better outcomes than parallel referrals. Here is why.
MedicationOlanzapine works exceptionally well for many people but is one of the heaviest weight-gain antipsychotics. Lybalvi combines it with an opioid receptor blocker designed to soften that side effect.
Physical healthKidneys do quiet work and rarely complain until late. Routine monitoring on lithium and clozapine is one of the most worthwhile habits in long-term psychiatric care.
HallucinationsBrief hallucinations at the edge of sleep are common in the general population. Knowing what they are — and aren't — can save a lot of unnecessary worry.
DelusionsCapgras delusion is the haunting conviction that a familiar person — often a spouse or parent — has been replaced by an identical impostor. Here's what we know.
StoryI came out of psychosis with a diagnosis, two new medications, and forty-two thousand dollars in credit card debt. Five years later it is paid off. Here is exactly how.
StoryI adopted Murray two months before my first hospitalisation. He has, in the years since, been the steadiest thing in my life — and the reason I get out of bed.
NutritionInositol is well studied in OCD and panic disorder but has minimal direct evidence in schizophrenia. Here's an honest summary of where the science actually stands.
LifestyleMost people with schizophrenia want to work, and supported employment programs help them do it. A practical guide to IPS, disclosure decisions, and reasonable accommodations.
Side EffectDry mouth from antipsychotics seems minor but can damage teeth, disrupt sleep, and worsen quality of life. Active management — and dental care — make a big difference.
Side EffectPeople with schizophrenia die 15–20 years earlier than average — mostly from heart disease. Antipsychotic-related metabolic effects are the biggest modifiable cause.
LAIInjection-site soreness is the most common everyday side effect of long-acting injectable antipsychotics. Here's a practical guide to managing pain, what's normal, and what to flag.
MedicationAmantadine sidesteps the cognitive and bowel costs of anticholinergics, making it a useful option for some patients with antipsychotic-induced parkinsonism — but it has its own set of trade-offs.
MedicationRisperdal Consta was the first long-acting injectable atypical antipsychotic — given every two weeks. It still has a role, though newer LAIs have largely replaced it for new starts.
ProfileMary Todd Lincoln was committed to an Illinois asylum by her son Robert in 1875 in a public trial. Modern historians have re-examined her case, the diagnostic standards of her era, and the gendered assumptions that shaped both.
PsychosisRecovery after a first episode of psychosis is more than the absence of symptoms. It is clinical, functional, and personal — and it unfolds over months and years.
StoryI had been with the same clinic for six years. Then I moved across state lines for a job. The four months between losing my old team and trusting my new one were some of the hardest of my recovery.
MindfulnessThe body scan is a simple but powerful practice — sweeping attention slowly through the body. Adapted carefully, it can be one of the safest mindfulness entry points in schizophrenia.
DelusionsThought insertion is one of the strangest experiences in psychiatry — a thought arrives in the mind and is recognised as a thought, but is felt to belong to someone else. It is a hallmark first-rank symptom.
Caregiver scenariosBurnout is not weakness. It is the predictable end-state of doing too much for too long with too little support. The good news is that burnout has a known shape — and so does recovery.
Lab monitoringSeveral antipsychotics raise the risk of type 2 diabetes — sometimes within weeks. Routine glucose and A1c monitoring catches the changes early, while interventions still work well.
MedicationFluphenazine is one of the original high-potency phenothiazines and one of the first antipsychotics formulated as a long-acting depot injection. Both forms remain in use.
TherapyCognitive Behavioural Therapy for psychosis (CBTp) is the most evidence-based talk therapy for schizophrenia. Unlike traditional CBT, it works directly with hallucinations and delusions.