Plain-language, educational articles on schizophrenia, psychosis, antipsychotic medications, and lived experience — by ColdAI.
Depression in schizophrenia is common, often distinct from negative symptoms, and worth treating directly. Post-psychotic depression in particular deserves attention.
LifestyleJournaling can be a quietly powerful tool in schizophrenia recovery — for tracking warning signs, processing experience, and giving your care team better information. Here is how to do it usefully.
CrisisFor people who can't talk on the phone — because they are at work, in a quiet house, or simply paralysed at the thought of speaking — texting a crisis counsellor changes what help is available.
HospitalThe transition home from a psychiatric unit is the most fragile moment in the entire treatment cycle. The right discharge plan can prevent the next admission.
TreatmentCBD is the non-intoxicating component of cannabis. Small trials suggest possible antipsychotic activity, but the evidence is far from conclusive and it is not a replacement for established treatment.
MedicationFluphenazine is a high-potency typical antipsychotic with both oral tablets and a long-acting injection — a combination that made it a workhorse of community psychiatry for decades.
MedicationLurasidone is among the most metabolically friendly atypicals — particularly useful in bipolar depression — but absorption depends on a meal of at least 350 calories.
PsychosisBrief psychotic disorder involves sudden psychotic symptoms that resolve within a month. Most people recover fully — but the episode still deserves serious attention.
OverviewSchizophrenia can begin after 40 — and even after 60. These late-onset presentations are different from textbook young-adult cases and are easily missed. A practical overview.
EngineeringAn engineering and product story about how Frida — a calm, evidence-informed schizophrenia stability app — is being built at ColdAI LLC.
Practical lifeSupermarkets are designed to maximize what shoppers see, hear, and consider. For a schizophrenia-affected nervous system, that design is exhausting. Here is how to shop without getting wrecked.
Side effectsSome antipsychotics lengthen the QT interval on ECG enough to raise the risk of dangerous arrhythmias. Here is which agents matter, and what monitoring looks like.
Medication managementStewardship is borrowed from antibiotics — but the idea applies to antipsychotics too. Right drug, right dose, right duration, right monitoring, with regular reconsideration.
FAQThere is no single best antipsychotic for everyone. Clozapine is the most effective overall but is reserved for treatment-resistant cases due to monitoring requirements. The right medication depends on individual response and side-effect tolerability.
Brain circuitsBrain rhythms coordinate the orchestra of cognition. In schizophrenia, gamma and theta oscillations are altered in ways that link parvalbumin interneuron dysfunction to symptoms.
StoryThree years after my second hospitalization, I started writing letters to the people I had frightened, lashed out at, or pushed away during the episode. Some answered. Some did not. The writing changed me either way.
HousingSection 8 housing vouchers are the cornerstone of affordable housing for adults with schizophrenia in the US. Here is how to apply, what to expect, and how to actually use one.
DelusionsCapgras syndrome is the rare but striking belief that a loved one has been replaced by an identical-looking impostor. It bridges psychiatry and neurology and offers a fascinating window into how the brain constructs familiarity.
Crisis modelsA peer respite is a small home where people in mental-health crisis can stay for a few days, supported entirely by peers — people who have been through psychosis themselves. The model is small, rare, and surprisingly powerful.
Medical comorbidityTooth decay and gum disease are several times more common in people with schizophrenia than in the general population — and the reasons go beyond just remembering to brush.
StoryMy grandparents grew up in a generation where schizophrenia was something whispered about and hidden. It took five years for them to come around. The thing that worked surprised me.
Peer supportFounded in 2002 by two writers who had been hospitalised, the Icarus Project — now Fireweed Collective — has spent two decades reframing extreme mental states as 'dangerous gifts' to be navigated, not just suppressed.
Lab monitoringLithium changes thyroid function in a meaningful subset of patients. Some antipsychotics also have small effects. Routine TSH catches the changes long before they cause symptoms.
Rare presentationsCycloid psychosis describes brief, intense psychotic episodes that recover fully between attacks. The label is European and historical, but the clinical picture is recognisable worldwide.
StoryI had told myself for ten years that I needed Bartholomew to stay stable. When he died, I learned something different about myself.
Early onsetAdolescents with schizophrenia often need real changes to how school works — quieter spaces, flexible deadlines, reduced course loads. Most of these are protected under federal law.
TherapyMost people with psychosis have a trauma history, and many also meet criteria for PTSD. For decades, clinicians worried trauma therapy might destabilise. The newer evidence is reassuring.
StoryDisrupted sleep, full houses, alcohol, and questions from relatives — the holidays used to land me in the hospital almost every other year. Here is what changed.
CaregiverYou cannot caregive without breaks. Respite care is a recognised, often-funded service that gives families room to breathe — and improves outcomes on both sides.
CaregiverBoundaries are not the opposite of love. In serious mental illness they are often the precondition for it. Here's how to think about, set, and hold them.