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Quote by Jonathan Harnisch

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Sex, Drugs, and Schizophrenia

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Jonathan Harnisch

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“Anyhow, tired to the point of collapse was a default state. The expectation was simply that, through some combination of strong coffee and Lembas Bread, one pushed through until all deadlines were met and one could collapse into an indefinite coma without consequence. Alice had spent most of graduate school in this state, and it was not so bad.”

“Many of us are in a place where we know the bottom is falling out, but we can't put a name on it. We don't know how much we can take before the bottom falls out, so we just find coping mechanisms. Instead of speaking clearly about my emotions, what I found was a collection of coping mechanisms to numb myself from the need to express what I was feeling. This is where I found myself in the middle of this cycle of depression. Most of us don't know that we're coping. We can't recognize that our obsessive behaviors are actually addictions that empower us to avoid our deeper issues. Then we ignore how serious they are to justify ourselves. We make it through our hardships by any means necessary.”

“Often, what we call 'anxiety' is a coping mechanism we lean on, a disguise for the deeper, unexplored fears that truly drive our emotions.”

“She wished she had cancer instead. She'd trade Alzheimer's for cancer in a heartbeat. She felt ashamed for wishing this, and it was certainly a pointless bargaining, but she permitted herself the fantasy anyway. With cancer, she'd have something to fight. There was surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. There was the chance that she could win. Her family and the community at Harvard would rally behind her battle and consider it noble. And even if it defeated her in the end, she'd be able to look them knowingly in the eye and say good-bye before she left.”