Schizophrenia is a disease, but that doesn’t mean we’re the dead walking. Last Summer, I played the 2022 epic zombie RPG “Dying Light 2: Stay Human,” from Techland. Broadcasting this game live on Twitch was fantastic. A game full of heavy, difficult choices, the one at the end achieved something profound in a video game: it made me question myself. My decision to save my friend, Lawan, instead of the last human city of Villedor forced me to question what kind of leader I am. In the end, it all comes down to mortality.

Being schizophrenic is weird, nobody knows what it is, so they often have questions. Questions that I’ve found even other schizophrenics are afraid to ask. One of the biggest questions is, “how does schizophrenia affect mortality?” An interesting question, that does not have a super simple answer unfortunately, but there is plenty of hope, as well as room for improvement for us all.

In Dying Light 2, you’re infected with the grim zombie virus that has turned the whole world into mindless monsters. The solution is not a simple one, see a parallel starting to weave? Wherein the game you need to regularly douse yourself in any UV light you can find or make to suppress the growth of the virus. With schizophrenia, you need to pay extra attention to self-care habits. That’s one of the largest contributors to get us; we come up short when it comes to taking care of ourselves. But there is also danger in the care we receive.

According to Mark Olfson, MD of Columbia University Psychiatry, there needs to be work not only on the part of schizophrenics in the care they receive, but also medical professionals. Schizophrenics are less likely to receive life-saving interventional care for cardiac issues, for example. Which is crucial because the antipsychotics we take increase the occurrence of cardiac issues. Communities can help us find ways to work and live, be accepted, be understood and respected, all things that everybody deserves, but are privileges.

The inhibitors you hunt in Dying Light 2 are like real-life antipsychotics in some ways. While antipsychotics increase risk of heart disease, schizos who do not take them are MORE likely to have heart issues! Why? Because they can’t begin to take care of themselves in any other meaningful way. Like the inhibitors in Dying Light 2, they MIGHT be slowly killing you, but without them you’ll never live to find out. The medicine makes you stronger. You live to fight another day.

Any given day, a schizo is 3.5 times more likely to die, and on average we live 15 years shorter than normal. There are various reasons, heart disease, lung disease is huge, suicide, there are many contributing factors to this number. However, I promised hope. The hope is that schizophrenics who are more well managed live longer. Schizos who are taken regular, proper care of can endure. Another hopeful place in society is education; highly intelligent schizophrenics tend to manage negative symptoms better.

Here is why my choice at the end of the game matters. I had done everything up to that point for the Survivor faction. I didn’t hate the Peacekeepers, I thought if you have an opportunity to start civilization over, put the people first this time. So, why did I throw it all away saving somebody who was trying to sacrifice themselves for that same city? It seems like the right thing to do would be save the city, I would lose Lawan, but she knew what she was doing. The people of Villedor had no idea what was coming. This is so out of character for me to make such a selfish choice.

The answer lies in twelve years of cognitive behavioral therapy, just becoming a normal-ish person. I have done, well, almost everything my doctors have told me since I lost my mind in 2012. It has been a titan of difficulty, but you must also know, a bit boring. I haven’t experienced psychosis in about seven years, but I’ve still been inching my way along like I did when I was psychotic. It can be incredibly frustrating when you’re disabled, but not only can nobody else see it, you often don’t see it yourself.

How can I have made it so far, but still have so far to go? It is extra upsetting when you learn you may not have as much time left as other people. In that moment live on Twitch, faced with the fate of a city that tried to lynch me the minute they saw me, or a future with the one I love, I took the last inhibitor and ran for Lawan. I can’t describe what was going through my mind at that moment. This was finally my moment where what I wanted, and what I could do mattered. No more watching the world go by without me.

I’m currently on my second playthrough of the game, so I can see the true ending where you save the city. The decision I know is best. Myself, I inject my inhibitor—I mean—antipsychotics every three months, so I’m never without. I work part-time, create content part-time, and am in graduate school. Paying close attention to self-care, my blog gives me a place to intellectualize my feelings. At 34 years of age, I have no plans on kicking the bucket anytime soon, and hope to defy the trend of schizophrenic life expectancy.

Interested in my journey? Go to my Contact page, or follow me across social media via my Linktree! Live on Twitch about midnight, (North America,) any night that I can.