When Neurons Tell Stories : A Layman's Guide to the Neuroscience of Mental Illness and Health

Table of Contents

• If you did peer 6
• Between my ears 6
• What would appear 6
• Are lush valleys 6
• Where I pick the words 6
• That you see here 6
• There are tall trees 6
• Filled with ideas 6
• And clouds that float dreams 6
• Snow covered mountain peaks 6
• Supplying creeks that flow with thoughts 6
• Through caves which store them all 6
• Until I recall 6
• The chosen ones 6
• From in my head 6
• Put them on paper 6
• So they can be read 6
• Brainwaves wash up on my minds shore 6
• I never quite know whats in store 6
• Maybe they will bring good thoughts 6
• Like so many times before 6
• If they can make others happy 6
• Please then bring me more 6
• I will write them out 6
• Perhaps creating folklore 6
• They all come from my heart 6
• Right from my inner core 6
• Some tell stories 6
• About the many costumes 6
• I have wore 6
• Introduction Part 1 7
• The Neuroscience I Love 7
• For the love of a synapse 9
• Introducing the moat swimmers 13
• The psychiatric perspective 18
• Introduction Part 2 20
• The Work I Love What is ACT 20
• Drugs both ours and theirs 22
• Being assertive and supportive 23
• Schizophrenia by commiee 25
• Chapter 1 27
• Can I Trust You Oxytocin May Help 27
• The sirens are not for you 31
• Would oxytocin help 32
• Trust 36
• Trust Games 40
• Chapter 2 45
• Paying Aention to Salience 45
• Making meaning 47
• Glutamate is so exciting 52
• Then theres GABA 56
• Leaving the old learning the new 58
• NMDA habits 58
• The meaning of pain 60
• That salience network finally 64
• DMN it 66
• Chapter 3 70
• When the Voices are Outside 70
• The neuroscience of Voices 73
• 39 years of Voices 77
• Waves and lighting up 79
• Back to the Voices 82
• Chapter 4 90
• But I Know It Delusions Paranoia and 90
• Memory of the Future 90
• I know it. 92
• Listening to your gut following your heart 95
• I wished I could see it 98
• Co-incidents 101
• The challenges of challenge 102
• Making meaning 103
• That doesnt remind me of 104
• Chapter 5 112
• I Dont Like What I Want Addictions 112
• I am not sick 118
• When you no longer like 121
• Sugar sugar and baby neurons 124
• If and when 126
• The futility of treatment 127
• Reasons but no excuse 128
• Chapter 6 132
• Coffee and a Cigaree 132
• The caffeinated schizophrenic brain - 135
• Self-medication 136
• Jumpy 141
• Ethical bean 142
• The nicotinic schizophrenic brain 143
• A shared vulnerability 153
• The caffeinated nicotinic brain 155
• Chapter 7 158
• Why Weight The Ethics of Clozapine 158
• Antihistamines for schizophrenia 164
• 1 2 3 - histamine 167
• When fat cells yell at the brain 169
• Chapter 8 172
• Shaking Hands with the Lonely 172
• Alone Lonely Lonely Alone 179
• Spiing image of cortisol 181
• Lonely homes 183
• When others make us lonely 186
• Lonely people groups 189
• Voices against loneliness 192
• Loneliness and spirituality 194
• Chapter 9 195
• God or Not Schizophrenia and 195
• Spirituality 195
• Oxytocin again 201
• Back to the beginning 204
• But what do these structures do in us 206
• God in a hat 209
• The God molecule then 210
• Coping 212
• Chapter 10 217
• Resilient Rebuilding 217
• Trauma and resilience 220
• Suicidality I failed to hear 223
• The suicidal brain 227
• The photo that made Miguel speechless 230
• Walking proof 231
• Chapter 11 234
• How We Are Peers 234
• Philadelphia 237
• A mirror to empathy 238
• Risk of elopement the psych ward 241
• Drowning in psychosis 245
• My discovery thinking about thinking 247
• The ills of psychiatry the ills of 250
• References 257