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In 1996 I experienced my most recent psychotic episode, a relapse of acute psychosis, caused by stopping medication against medical advice. I hope to never have another episode of full psychosis. I've had a total of four episodes in my life, caused by "noncompliance." Although it is poorly chosen terminology, stopping medication if you need it can ruin one's life, it can end one's life, or it can be a massive setback at the very least.

The untreated condition was bad enough that it made me gravely disabled, with the potential to be a danger to myself. (Any episode of acute psychosis, of anyone, brings substantial risk to lives. I know of no exceptions.)

When my mind gained some semblance of being able to track reality, I made a lifetime commitment to compliance. At the time, my parents were getting too old to deal with me as a psychotic person, and I was starting to get old enough that I might very well not survive future episodes if they happened. 

I am kept stabilized by a daily regimen, primarily consisting of antipsychotic medication, but also a mood stabilizer and pills for anxiety. Now that I am making more progress in my life, people view me with suspicion. They may not have been around twenty-six years ago when it was clear that I suffered from "Schizophrenia: Paranoid-Type." Take away the medication and you will see the Werewolf. I'm not willing to try that, because it would ruin me for the remainder of my lifespan. 

People do not understand that a lot of effort goes into managing my symptoms, and on top of that, into functioning in society as a competent adult. And, on top of that, I've had a great deal of luck with published writing--it is not actually luck; it is work. I do not get the respect I believe I should have. Instead, many people seem to view me as some kind of criminal. 

Furthermore, the Social Security Administration is trying to bump me off direly needed benefits. It is not just the meagre amount of money I'm given, it is the Medicare and Medicaid that I need to keep, since the medications to treat my primary disorder don't come cheap, and, I'm getting older, so more things are starting to go wrong. 

People should realize that I'm an asset to the community. I decided a very long time ago that I wasn't going to accept the clear implication of treatment practitioners and others, that says, I'm schizophrenic and therefore I can't do anything that requires intelligence. 

I'm mis-perceived in two ways. First, not that much intelligence is attributed. Secondly, people I deal with today didn't know me when I was in my twenties and thirties--and they have no concept of how bad off I was every few years when I went off medication. Instead, they see someone who is able to think and behave normally. Yet, thinking normally has required a massive amount of internal work, a great deal of reality checking, and remaining properly medicated. And people don't see that. 

In my twenties I worked in electronic repair, and I was good at it. I wasn't good at showing up or at sustaining long hours of work. And I wasn't good at dealing with people in the workplace. I'm still not good with any of that. But I was good at diagnostics on analog circuits, and this made me able to repair some earlier televisions that many would have considered hopeless. 

I was reading and understanding a college level electronics textbook at the age of twelve. I was reading Tarzan novels, H. G. Wells novels, Sherlock Holmes novels, and much more, as a teenager. It was never just electronics, I loved to read. And I loved to learn. And I never lost that. 

A lot of things I do just for the heck of it, and later they turn out to be valuable. No one helps me with my writing other than some editors. Not all editors change the text of what I write. 

But I need to tell you, once and for all: I lead a respectable life. Do not accuse me of anything unless it has been proven. Do not call me on my phone and ask why I was at a particular location at a particular time and date. I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. Work.