Sad update: my wife has blocked my calls and now I feel really bad. Will it ever get any better and will she return?
@Gwynn. The answers to your two questions are yes and yes. It is going to take time and will no doubt be a rocky road. Keep on your mind that it is the illness that is creating the problems and not you or your wife. The first step is to get her medication sorted. When that is done, and that is likely to involve a lot of experimentation over an indeterminate period, things will normalise a bit. The next stage will be to get her to accept that she needs to take her medication and that could be the hardest part. Don't think about her coming home until those things are done. It is hard, I know, but it can be done.
A couple of projects to get stuck into might help to give you some sort of distraction. I redecorated half the house - my wife was in hospital for six months - and I did it my way. Loads of decision making without the need for consultation. Loads of mess, tidied up when I wanted, not having to work around somebody else, excellent. Some of the photographic art you have posted is quite good - any way of taking that forward?
Also an anecdote. We had a paranoid schizophrenic working in our department when I had a proper job. He finished up being sectioned when he had a major crisis and decided that everything in his house should be freed. All tins and bottles in the house were emptied on the floor and this included a load of chemicals (he was an industrial chemist) taken home from the nuclear lab he worked in. All this was found (and you can imagine the panic it caused) after a neighbour called the police because he was on his roof removing the tiles in order to liberate the evil beings in the house.
All this happened best part of 30 years ago but I bumped into him in town a few years back. His recall of me was far better than mine of him. He was still a bit of a strange cove. He seemed a bit manic and clearly anxious to tell me his story, so we sat by the war memorial and I listened. He told me all about what it was like being schizophrenic, the ups, the downs, the strange ideas. He listed all the medications being used at the time and their effects - he had so he said written a technical paper on the subject. He was also a visiting lecturer at UCLan medical department where he lectured on what having schizophrenia was all about to medical students. That must have been an odd experience for them, quite unlike any other lecturer. He was even back riding his powerful motorcycle which perhaps was not wise.
He will never again be a research chemist but he has found a way of coping with his illness and lead an odd, but quite liveable, life.
I relate this anecdote to suggest that given time, good medical intervention and support from yourself, like this fellow, your wife will find ways of understanding and coping with her illness and you will get back to a life you both can cope with.
Be patient and take care.