Suzanne O'sullivan When The Body Speaks Analysis

When people think of an “illness” they typically don’t automatically think of mental illness. They think about HIV, cancer, or even a cold or flu. However when it comes to mental illness it is a whole different idea. But is mental illness even real? Addressed in the book, The Myth of Mental Illness (1961), a psychiatrist Thomas Szasz argues that the idea of classifying psychological and emotional difficulties as “illnesses” takes away sense of control. Instead of holding people personally and morally responsible for their actions, he states, doctors attempt to “treat” the person, often with medications. Diagnosing mental illness, on the other hand, argue that mental disorders are as real as physical diseases and diagnosing them allows people

When the human body falls ill will disease, sickness, or an injury a person’s automatic response is to seek out a professional to uncover the root of the problem to then treat the said illness. A sick body will show physical symptoms of distress when trying to restore its homeostasis, but what if the mind, not the body, is ill? Recovering from a broken bone would simply call for a cast and time to allow the body to heal itself. Now instead of a broken bone, imagine a person has traumatizing daily nightmares, physical weakness, the loss of appetite and even energy. To treat said problems one must first realize this is a mental illness. These symptoms will be diagnosed as Ghost Sickness, which is a type of mental illness called a culture bound syndrome. This illness is said to be culturally bound because, instead of like most mental illnesses that can be generalized to anyone around the world, it only affects individuals found in a specific culture and/or geographic location.

She gives her account to how the help of clergy, friends, and family. Seeking help from clergy members it helped her differentiate visions from hallucinations. In her words she describes hallucinations as lacking sense. Visions are a message from God. Friends play a crucial role in someone with mental illnesses, because they can observe the patients to see if any changes happen that are too swift or too angry or too violent. Also keep constant contact with the individual, the constant presence of someone either through email or phone call really helps. Family can also play the same role of a loving

Sense or nonsense, many different views can come from reading the Szasz article on mental illness. According to Szasz mental illness is “merely a convenient myth” (91, Szasz). In the article Szasz compares what it looks to have physical illness compared to mental illness, as well as the concept of what mental illness really consists of. By comparing physical and mental illnesses Szasz makes it evident to the readers that there are clearly more symptoms visible to the eye with physical illnesses, then there are with mental illnesses. Szasz explains that he does not believe in such concepts as mental illness, but he agrees that some factors of mental illness are evident in people’s everyday life. Szasz has some valid points and arguments in his article but overall, there is more to mental illness then just was Szasz sees.

Susannah Cahalan, a 24 year old, healthy and successful journalist for the New York post, experienced an acute onset of psychosis. Symptoms ranged from paranoia to seizures, which eventually led to a catatonic state. The onset of the female’s symptoms occurred when she became paranoid of a bed bug infestation in her home, yet after having her home exterminated there was no indication of bedbugs. Concern arose from her nonexistent appetite and severe insomniac behaviors. She began noticing her own erratic behaviors and shortly after experienced her first seizure episode. In search of an answer to reoccurring seizures she went to a physician who put her on Keppra (an antiseizure medication) and warned her the symptoms were due to stress and heavy drinking. The increasing paranoia developed into hallucinations, people plotting against her or speaking poorly of her. EEG and MRI results exhibited normal results; further indicating stress and alcohol withdraw. After being admitted to the NYU medical school EEG monitoring floor, examination showed tangential, disorganized, and temperamental behaviors. Several escape attempts later, placed Susannah in the more difficult patients category. Doctors suggested conditions such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and cancer. She exhibited abnormally high blood pressure pointing to extreme concern.

The memoir Brain on Fire, written by author Susannah Cahalan, describes the journey she lived through with an undiagnosed disease. Susannah goes from being a New York Times journalist to being a person who couldn’t control herself and had to be strapped down to the hospital bed, in other words she was becoming psychotic. She did not choose to become the person she was in the hospital, someone who had no control over her body, someone who was lost. This got to a the point to where nurses no longer wanted to treat her and lost their patience because she was not being cooperative and was becoming more violent.The reason as to why she became this person was due to the misdiagnosing, doctors not taking time to do further test and family not thinking her symptoms were serious enough to have an actual disease. The signs were there but no one thought anything about it, as they thought she was over exaggerating. It wasn’t until she had her first seizure and the fact that she was hospitalized that her family, friends and even the doctors finally realized there was something wrong.

Another model of health that evolved over time is the physical-mind model. This model purports that a person’s overall state of health or ability to heal can be affected on how or what they think. For instance, that depression or anxiety can negatively impact a critically ill patient’s ability to heal. It also recognized that feelings or emotions can physically manifest as illness. For example, someone who is extremely anxious can give themselves an ulcer, without doing something to physically harm themselves. Simply being under significant stress can cause a physiological response to stimulate the creation of more stomach acid and wears a hole in the lining of the stomach, creating an ulcer. When using this model of health, doctor and nurses can treat a person, mind and body, when they have an illness.

body and ignoring the mind, heart and soul can be deadly. When faced with sickness and the

Salzman (2000) describes the journey of Sister John, a nun at the Carmelite convent in Los Angeles. She experiences headaches that develop into deep spiritual episodes, which her doctor later informs her, are the symptoms of her recurring seizures. Sister John has temporal-lobe epilepsy and her doctor explains that it, “tend[s] to be more psychological” (Salzman, 2000, p.68). Sister John’s spiritual episodes were presumably caused by her medical condition.

The ‘medical model’ (Beecher, 2009), also called the ‘biomedical model’ (Germov, 2009), basis its beliefs on the theory that there is not a connection between the mind and the body (Sarafino & Smith, 2014) and illness is caused by ‘biological’ (Germov, 2009) factors that can be diagnosed and treated with medications (Germov, 2009). The biomedical model becomes problematic when applied to the treatment of mental health illness due to the cause being widely unknown and so how can mental illness be successfully treated using this model? Social factors that may have a contributory effect or allowance for preventative measures to be implemented are also not taken into consideration with the ‘medical model’ (Germov,

illness has the potential to take full control over a person’s life, creating many obstacles from

The biopsychosocial model of health is a multidimensional approach to health (Lecture 1, 2014). It focuses not only on the biology or physiology of a person, but also includes the psychology of a person and the manner in which society and culture influence health as well (Gurung, 2014). It was developed in the 21st century as an important theoretical framework to approaching health and medicine (Richtig, Trapp, Kapfhamer, Jenull, Richtig & Trapp, 2016).This approach makes the assumption that the mind and body connection is not only relevant but also vital to a person’s entire well being. It takes a holistic approach when treating an individual and can improve health in the

Imagine a world where a third of the human population suffered from the same type of illness. Imagine a world where the government does little to help those who suffer from this terrible illness. Imagine a world where nobody acknowledged the pain and suffering that comes along with this illness. This is, unfortunately, the world we live in today. The illness is not one that others notice, but it can have terrible consequences to those who suffer from it. The type of illness are the ones that plague people mentally.

I chose this term due to the fact that psychosomatic illnesses refer to illnesses that affect the mind and the body. So I think choosing the term Mind & Body simplifies/clarifies, and also makes the definition more easily for people to understand. Every disease comes with some sort of mental aspect attached to it, and then with some mental disorders that manifest physical system such as anorexia. So when treating psychosomatic diseases the health workers or mental health workers must look at a patient overall status when treating diseases. For example if a patient has been diagnosed with cancer the health provider might prescribe drugs that ease stress and anxiety for the

Typically, it is thought that doctors and the rest of the staff at health care facilities are trustworthy. However, Robbie’s neurologist, Dr. Abbasac, proves this thought wrong. Robbie’s condition got worse while being under her supervision, because she kept changing the treatment and increasing the dose of the medications. Due to the doctor’s actions, Robbie’s seizures became more frequent and lasted longer. He also started getting skin rashes, and his behavior was dramatically changed.