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Listening to Brooke Katz discuss the challenges of living with schizoaffective disorder can leave you with a host of overwhelming feelings. The first is extreme compassion after hearing that her mental illness began with hearing voices when she was only 9 years old. But most importantly, you’ll be impressed with this 27-year-old Boston nurse’s stunning resolve to not let her illness get in the way of living a fulfilled life.

Schizoaffective disorder affects approximately 1 in 200 people, with its sufferers unable to tell the difference between reality and fantasy. Its effects can permeate all aspects of life, having a profound consequence on interpersonal relationships, self-care and the ability to concentrate and think clearly.

Brooke suffers from the bipolar subtype of schizoaffective disorder, where she has experienced hallucinations, paranoia and disordered speech and behavior – all primary symptoms of schizophrenia. She has also suffered from severe shifts in mood and energy levels, experiencing manic episodes and depressive mood swings.

When she was 9, Brooke began hearing voices that threatened to kill her if she didn’t hurt her classmates. She never followed through and hurt anyone, but the voices constantly harassed her. Over the next seven years, she would hide her illness from her parents while her symptoms got worse: she had paranoid delusions of people attempting to harm her; and she began cutting herself when in a depressive state. In high school, she began experiencing alternating catatonic periods and destructive rages.

But even as a teen, Brooke’s determination to hold onto reality led to her becoming a three-sport varsity athlete in the 10th grade, taking advanced placement courses, serving as the features editor of the school newspaper, and even coaching a young girl’s soccer team.

In December 1997, at age 16, Brooke’s secret was exposed after a failed suicide attempt resulted in her being hospitalized for four weeks unable to speak or perform simple tasks such as feeding herself or showering unassisted. She would later be hospitalized 25 times over a period of five years.

Finally, with the support of her family, Brooke moved to Boston seeking treatment at “The Child and Adolescent Program” of McLean Hospital, an affiliate of Harvard Medical School. At McLean, the long road to recovery had just begun.

“I was sleeping 14 to 16 hours a day and gained 70 pounds in six months because of the medications. I had also developed diabetes, liver disease and high cholesterol,” said Brooke. “Finally, September 2003 is when things really turned around for me. I found a medication that seemed to help. My hallucinations lessened, the delusions were fading and I went from getting ‘C’s’ in school to ‘A’s.’”

Riding on a momentum driven by hope and determination, Brooke enrolled in nursing school and earned her Bachelor’s degree in Nursing Science from Simmons College in December 2006. During her transformation, she lost 100 pounds and resolved all of her obesity-related illnesses.

“I decided I was going to get healthier and I feel incredibly well since I graduated from nursing school,” she said. “I don’t really think anybody thought that I would succeed and that I would actually graduate. I do a lot of public speaking trying to tell people, ‘You can get through this. I have been in the darkest psychosis and I’ve come out on the other end.’”

Today, Brooke has dedicated her life to helping people. As a nurse, she’s been working successfully in the field for one year and is also scheduled to begin taking courses this fall to become a psychiatric nurse practitioner. Brooke also works advocating for greater mental health awareness: “I take part in any research that I can because I think research is what we need to figure out why illnesses like mine are happening.”

Recognizing that her most compelling tool was her very own life story, Brooke published a book in September 2004 titled, “I Think I Scared Her: Growing Up with Psychosis,” with all proceeds from sales designated to benefit NARSAD.

Brooke hopes that her life experience will serve as an inspiration for individuals diagnosed with a mental illness, as well as their families.

“I believe recovery is always possible…To me recovery is working a full-time job and living independently, socializing, playing sports and exercising. To somebody else, recovery might be working a volunteer job two hours a week, or doing their own grocery shopping and laundry. Recovery is different for every person, but I think it’s definitely possible.”

Click here to hear Brooke’s story on our new video “To Find a Cure.” To order “I Think I Scared Her,” visit Amazon.com.

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