Impact of schizophrenia on family

-When a family member becomes ill with schizophrenia, it has a significant impact on the whole family: Ill member needs constant help, sometimes even in the  care of everyday things, often becomes ineffective at work and is not able to contribute to the family. In addition, he/ she  is often very sensitive to family relationships, but on the other hand,  often withdraws from everyday family life. Family members have to find new ways of relation and communication. Often, the inactivity of schizophrenic patients is taken as laziness, which can be an additional burden in communication. 

-Family members can have guilt feeling  for various reasons like  feeling  of not being good enough parent/ partner  or not being able to tolerate  symptoms.

-The constant care of taking medication regularly and going to group therapy often becomes a daily routine for the person who cares for the patient.

-Caregiver  sometimes have to take all responsibilities over the patient and make all decisions for her/him.

-In a case of  reoccurrence of symptoms ,the caretaker sometimes has to  persuade patient to  go to the   psychiatrist , hospital  or even  need to decide to take some difficult additional measures like  contacting services ,GPs or police without permission of the  ill person.