An interview with therapist Isa Mattei on her relationship with her brother, Artie, who had schizophrenia.  She describes the way her mother’s fierce determination not to have Artie institutionalized may have both protected him, and kept him very integrated with the family, while also subjecting her younger siblings to chaotic and often frightening interactions with him.  Later, as adults, Isa and two of her siblings brought Artie to live near them, and got together every Sunday afternoon for ten years.  She describes the way that despite his ongoing psychosis, he was a beloved member of their family and entire social world.  She reports feeling very seen and supported by him, reversing stereotypes of people with schizophrenia as having very little to give relationally.  She describes the dramatic benefit he received from the drug clozaril, although, he like so many others with major mental illness, died so young of medical problems.

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