I HAVE...

I have schizophrenia. Not as a punchline. Not as a rumor. Not as a gotcha you get to throw across a room like you discovered something clever. It’s not your trivia fact. It’s not your warning label. It’s not a microphone you’re entitled to grab. It lives in my head, yes—but so do thoughts, clocks, echoes, grocery lists, and entire conversations you were never invited to. None of that makes me an exhibit. Calling me out for it like it’s a flaw you uncovered is rude. Full stop. It’s rude the way interrupting someone mid-sentence is rude. It’s rude the way pointing at a scar and announcing it is rude. It’s rude in a way that says more about your lack of manners than about my mind. My reality already bends. It doesn’t need your commentary. My brain already remixes signals. It doesn’t need your remix of judgment layered on top, like noise on noise on noise until you pretend it’s concern. You don’t get points for noticing. You don’t get authority for naming. You don’t get to decide that my diagnosis is suddenly the loudest thing in the room. Sometimes my thoughts zig when yours zag. Sometimes sentences wobble. Sometimes meaning leaks out the sides and comes back wearing a different hat. That doesn’t mean I’m broken—it means I’m navigating a maze while you’re standing outside yelling directions you made up. So no, don’t call me out. Call yourself in. Lower your voice. Adjust your assumptions. Sit with the fact that not everything strange is wrong and not everything different is yours to explain. I am not my symptoms. I am not your discomfort. And I am definitely not obligated to make sense just to make you comfortable.