Despite the fact that medicine has been studying the anatomy and psyche of humans for many centuries, some reactions of the body are still difficult to explain. Such mysterious reactions include dissociative conversion disorders.
Illness or pretense?
What is usually the attitude of those who complain about the disease, but upon examination it turns out that he is healthy? Many will say that this person is a simulator, but they will be wrong. Doctors know that sometimes a physically healthy person has disorders of various body functions. This phenomenon is called "conversion disorder."
The human psyche is very complicated. In some cases, social conflicts, internal contradictions, stressful situations or psychological traumas lead to the fact that a person feels overwhelmed and sick. He experiences pain and symptoms of the disease, sometimes even paralysis occurs. Imaginary sensations and signs have long been called hysteria and treated them like pretense. Only at the end of the 19th century did Jean Martin Charcot prove that patients really experience symptoms of non-existent diseases. Since that time, official medicine has recognized that hysterical conversion disorders are a disease.
Sigmund Freud, who had an internship with J. M. Charcot, contributed to the study of the disease. The young psychologist was looking for connections between conscious and unconscious, "closed" memories. In the process of communicating with patients, Freud developed a special method called psychoanalysis, which allows you to release "closed" memories and eliminate the causes of the disease.
Why is this happening
Conversion disorder is most often observed in children, young people and the elderly. The reason is that people in this period of life are most emotionally susceptible. At the same time, girls and women are more susceptible to disease than boys and men.
As a result of a strong psychological shock, an internal conflict occurs, and the patient cannot correctly assess the current situation. Conversion disorder can be caused by an underestimation of one's own significance, an attempt to “shield” oneself from complex problems, the need to make important decisions or take responsibility. All this happens against the background of stress, and the psyche “turns on” the disease.
Initially, symptoms were reduced to fainting, hysterical seizures, paralysis, and mental illness. However, during a study of a complex mental illness called “conversion disorder,” the symptoms were more extensive. It was determined that the effects of the disease can be felt by any organ. A deeper analysis made it possible to divide the symptoms into four separate groups.
Motor group of symptoms
The first and most extensive group of symptoms affects or restricts motor function. The complexity of the symptoms can vary from gait disturbances to paralysis. Conversion disorder is often associated with uncontrolled seizures that suddenly manifest with external irritation. The patient may fall, raise a scream, tug with his arms or legs, bend unnaturally and roll on the floor. Such motor disorders last from several hours to several minutes, and the cause may be a sharp loud sound, the appearance of a new person, a light flash and other irritants.
Sensory group of symptoms of dissociative disorders
This group includes all the symptoms associated with a person’s sensitivity. Sensory disturbances can occur in different ways:
- violation of the sensitivity threshold at which the pain threshold may increase or decrease . Numbness may occur in which sensitivity to pain disappears altogether;
- violation of temperature perception, in which a person ceases to feel hotter;
- deafness;
- taste change;
- manifestations of blindness;
- violation of smell.
All these symptoms can be more or less pronounced and felt for different times.
Autonomic symptoms
Symptoms of this group cause spasms of smooth muscles and blood vessels. In this case, the conversion disorder may look like any other disease. Initially, a person is tested through many tests and analyzes until it is suspected that this is a dissociative disorder.
Mental Symptom Group
In this group there can be harmless fantasies and painful delirium. Hallucinations may occur or imaginary memory loss may begin, so-called amnesia. However, symptoms cause tension and anxiety, and in more complex cases can even cause a split personality.
Dissociative Identity Disorder
Despite the frequent mention in detective novels and action films, a split personality, the symptoms and signs of which are used by the authors, is a rather rare disease. Even an experienced psychiatrist can find it difficult to pinpoint a diagnosis without confusing it with the manifestations of schizophrenia or a person’s attempt to act out a disease in order to avoid responsibility or punishment for the crime.
Earlier in the diagnosis, the name "multiple personality disorder" was used. But today they refused this diagnosis. The name "Dissociative Identity Disorder" is officially used. But most often this subspecies of the disorder is called precisely "split personality." Symptoms and signs of the disease are diagnosed by four criteria:
- A patient has two or more personality conditions. Each person has his own model of behavior, a separate worldview and his own attitude to the world.
- Internal personalities alternately gain control over patient behavior.
- The patient has no memories of important events in his life, does not remember important facts.
- The patient's condition is not caused by the effects of alcohol or drugs. The patient did not experience the effects of toxic substances, he was not diagnosed with other mental illnesses.
When diagnosing a split personality in children, psychiatrists often encounter violent fantasies, protracted games, and fictional friends.
How is the treatment
If a patient is diagnosed with a conversion disorder, treatment should be started immediately. The first stage is the elimination of the traumatic factor. No matter how hard the doctor tries to influence the symptoms of the disease, but if the main cause is not identified, then there will be no lasting effect.
For a patient, a change of scenery is useful. The main treatment is psychotherapy sessions. In addition, the patient must be convinced that his illness is psychological. This will help to properly tune in to treatment and accelerate recovery.
A good psychoanalyst can establish a conversion personality disorder and determine the optimal course of treatment. The use of drugs is often not required. Drug therapy is necessary only in the case of a depressed patient. To relieve anxiety and depression, the doctor may prescribe a course of tranquilizers or antidepressants.
The likelihood of a full recovery is high enough. It all depends on the professionalism of the doctor and the timeliness of care. However, in some cases there are relapses, and sometimes conversion disorders are observed throughout a person’s life.