Good day, I'm Dr BLT.  I'd like to introduce you to another "Psycho" Drama and Music Production, this one entitled, "I am Schizophrenia."  I've posted the script here, for those who have passed the auditions for the various acting parts.  I've posted the lyrics to the theme song of the script.  There may be other songs added to the soundtrack.  Without further ado, here is the skit, followed by the song lyrics. 

Schizophrenia Skit

Authored by Dr BLT:

 

Dr. Hal Dall:  Good evening.  I’m Dr. Dall, Dr. Hal Dall.  Welcome to the Briefer than Brief Brief Therapy Clinic, where you don’t have to be patient to be a patient.  At the Briefer than Brief Brief Therapy Center, our motto is simply, “Get ‘er done.”  How can I help you today?

 

Ms. Melanie Quad: Well, this is my son, Kilroy Quad.  Kilroy has nutting up, or as you shrinks put it, responding to internal stimuli.  Kilroy hears four distinct voices—voices that none of the rest of us hear, I believe you shrinks call them auditory hallucinations.  Kilroy, why don’t you tell the good Dr. what you’ve been hearing these days?

 

Kilroy: Wait a minute, let me say something before we proceed.  Doc, if I share these voices with you, the ones they think are not real and I know are real, will you execute me? 

 

Dr. Hal Dall:  Please, Ms. Quad, try to refrain from using terms like crazy, nut, or nutting up.  Save those terms for when you’re doing your Christmas baking.  Now, let me turn to you, Kilroy. 

 

I understand how difficult it must be to trust me, Kil…(if I may call you Kil for short), so please take your time in revealing these deeply personal aspects of your experience.  I’ll give you 20 seconds.

 

Kilroy:  (looks at mother)  He’s got that soothing, reassuring voice that I can trust.  (Looks at doctor).  I think the best way for you to understand my hallucinations is to listen directly to them.  This is what I here on a daily basis, four crowds, each telling me to do different things.  Please, listen to this:

 

Crowd One:  You go boy!  You can do anything.  You are king of the world and all the people are your servants!  Your queen is Lady Ga Ga.  Put on your best Poker Face because you run this game. 

 

Dr. Hal: Did you all hear that?  That’s the voice of grandiose euphoria.  We’ll call that voice number one. 

 

Mr. William Quad: I don’t here a thing, Dr. Dall, and you shouldn’t use terms like “Kil,” it brings out the killer in Kilroy.  Now let’s get back to your diagnostic take on him.  We want him diagnosed to rule out schizophrenia.  I understand that schizophrenia is the most crippling of all psychiatric disorder

 

Crowd Two: Don’t trust the masses.  They will stab you in the back with their freshly sharpened steak knives.  They will steal everything that you’ve amassed, kidnap your queen, and behead you at the drop of a hat.  They engage in diurnal, deleterious machinations against you.

 

Dr. Hal : There goes another shared hallucination.  We’ll call that voice number two, the voice of paranoid delusions.  

 

Melanie: What is the good doctor talking about?  I didn’t hear a thing.

 

Dr. Hal Dall:  You’re all in denial.  Now, going back to your question, Mr. William Quad.

 

William Quad: Please, call me Bill.

 

Dr. Hal: I will, Bill, just like I will call Kil Kil. 

 

Yes, Bill, schizophrenia is probably the most crippling of all the mental health disorders, but one never wants to confuse Schizophrenia with something like Bipolar Disorder with Psychotic features.  They are distinctly different.  Bipolar I Disorder involves abrupt shifts in mood and concomitant behavior, with psychotic activity occurring primarily at the higher mood levels. 

 

Melanie:  Please, both of you, don’t use the term crippling.  Speak of it as being among the most able-bodying conditions.

 

William Quad: Please, Melanie, must you always wear rose-colored glasses?

 

Melanie: Never mind, that was the prozac talking.   

 

Crowd three: We’re the voice of reason.  You must find another clinic, where they can really take the time to give you the intensive, comprehensive care you so desperately need.  We’re so faint you can hardly hear us, but you must try. 

 

Dr. Hal: Wait, what was that? 

 

Killroy: Oh, that’s the voice of reason.  They don’t visit me very often any more, and when they do, I can rarely make out what they are trying to say.  I’m going to a place where they pay more attention to that one, and not so much to the other ones, where they try to find a way to magnify the voice of reason so that it drowns out the other voices—the perilous, deleterious ones. 

 

Crowd four: Don’t listen to that quite voice.  Do as we say.  Kill Roy.  No, on second thought, go find Lady Ga Ga right now and destroy all of her recordings before the Axis of Evil get to them first. 

 

Dr. Hal: Aha!  I was wondering where that voice was hiding.  I hope the voices aren’t implying that the 5 Axes of the DSM are evil.  No, they are Kilroy’s salvation.  How can we cure something we haven’t labeled?  What, you didn’t hear the voices talking about the Axes of Evil? 

 

Melanie: What voice, Dr Hal?  He’s not sharing his hallucinations with us, Dr. Hal Dall, you and him are literally sharing them, as in both having them at the same time. 

 

Dr Hal:  Don’t be silly.  We all heard that one.  Who is Roy, by the way, oh never mind.  That was the voice of the command hallucination.  It tells the patient what to do.  Often the commands involve direct orders to engage in self-injurious, suicidal or murderous acts.  In this case, the voice of reason may be intervening to lessen the intensity and severity of the commands. 

 

Mr. Quad: Doctor Dall, are we to blame, is it something we did to cause this?

 

Dr. Hal: Not necessarily.  Among all of the myriad mental health conditions, schizophrenia shows itself in studies to be the most likely to have a predominantly genetic origin. 

 

Melanie: What a relief! 

 

Dr.  Hal: Not so fast, Melanie.  You may be thinking “physician heal thyself,” but I am overtly stating, “Parents blame thyself!” or at least blame thyself in part.  Don’t take artificial comfort in the genetic antecedents etiologically related to the condition.  You see, just because a person is genetically predisposed to developing the condition, doesn’t mean that he or she will develop it. 

 

Schizophrenia is often caused by a confluence of multiple factors, some genetic, some environmental, and some, the natural consequence of self-directed behavior.  Think of the perfect storm.  Anything can cause a genetic predisposition to become realized to its full extent.  Excessive and prolonged methamphetamine abuse, for example can contribute to or cause psychosis. 

 

Voice of reason: We wish this session, and the concomitant shared hallucinations would end, so that we could hear the new Dr BLT song, performed by The Axis III, featuring Amy and Sarah.

 

Mr. Quad: Where did that voice come from?  This session can’t be over yet!

 

Dr. Hal: What voice?  Why of course the session is over.  This is the age of brief therapy, and we at the Briefer than Brief Brief Therapy Center, take the meaning of that approach quite literally.  Yes, the therapy session is up, but the recording session has just begun.  Amy, Sarah, Dr. BLT, step up to the mic and deliver us the new Dr BLTune, I am Schizophrenia.

 

Amy, Sarah, and Dr BLT in unison: With pleasure!  Hit it!

 

 

 

 

I am Schizophrenia

Words and music by Dr. BLT copyright 2009

 

I am schizophrenia

I will steal your thoughts away

I will take a sunny day

Make it one that’s cold and gray

I love disconnectin’ you

From the world and all that’s true

Give me pills

To shut me up

I am schizophrenia

 

If you’re sane

I’ll make you mad

If you’re happy

Make you sad

Make your doctors

All confused

Give you lots of attitude

If when you, you were abused

Gives me lots of latitude

In my grip you will be stuck

I am schizo

Schizophrenia

 

Chorus:

Call it suffering

Call it pain

Use precision to contain

Something wild

That can’t be tamed

I am schizophrenia

That’s my name

 

We will not give up on you

Though you’re tough to treat

It’s true

Drugs will only go so far

For your psyche has been scarred

Strait jackets and padded rooms

They will only seal your doom

Even though it’s scary stuff

Won’t give up on schizophrenia