Mental anesthesia is depressive depersonalization, which is accompanied by a painful experience of an incomplete emotional response. At the same time, related feelings may disappear, there is a lack of empathy along with a lack of emotional response to everything around. Patients recorded a loss of emotional attitude to work and the aesthetic side of the perceived.
Basic concepts
Mental anesthesia is a personality disorder in which the patient loses all depth with the colorfulness of emotional experience, becomes absolutely indifferent to everything. He can not please, interest or surprise. Gifts and successes of children do not touch a person who is in such a state. Another name for this disorder is anesthetic depression. It is worth saying that this phenomenon is similar to local anesthesia, when patients see, hear, understand what is happening around, but do not experience any sensations from all this, since those are muffled or absent altogether.
Causes
Experts associate the occurrence of causes of mental anesthesia with the growth of busy schedules, the rhythm of life and the endless flow of information. Thus, we can say that anesthesia, and in simple terms, a banal depression, becomes a disease of our century. Stressful situations in combination with mental injuries and illnesses provoke a condition whose harmful effects cannot be underestimated, since it is very dangerous.
Symptoms
In each specific situation, there may be a set of indicators, moreover, varying in severity. Typical depressive symptoms of mental anesthesia are:
- The occurrence of hypotension or persistent decline in mood for two weeks or longer.
- Anhedonia, along with a loss of interest in activities and communication, which previously brought joy.
- The appearance of astenergy (increased fatigue) in the form of lethargy, lack of strength to perform standard work or any household chores.
Atypical depressive symptoms in mental anesthesia
These signs are:
- Loss of confidence along with reduced self-esteem.
- Inhibition of the thought process, combined with difficulties in concentration and timidity in decision making.
- The presence of unwarranted guilt along with constant self-criticism for no reason.
- The appearance of thoughts of death and suicide attempts.
- The appearance of a sudden and sharp change in appetite in any direction, combined with a decrease or gain in body weight by five percent in just one month.
- Sleep disturbance in the form of early awakening, insomnia, lack of need for night rest.
In the case of a combination of two main signs with two additional symptoms, we can talk about the presence of mild depression, and with four - about the development of its moderate form. When all three main manifestations and five additional manifestations are observed, then the disease is considered severe.
Classic signs
Mental anesthesia is based on standard manifestations, but may have specific features, for example:
- Emotional dullness up to the development of complete insensibility.
- Awareness of the condition with its painful living.
- Loss of sex drive.
- The person has a short, intermittent sleep with severe awakening.
- Aversion to food.
- Own thoughts with sensations can be seen as unnatural, alien.
The last point differs from a similar manifestation in schizophrenia in that people do not think that someone else puts thoughts into their heads. Individuals simply feel them to be unusual, but the authorship of thought remains in the mind of a person.
This depression can be easily distinguished from asthenia. In the second situation, people wake up with a certain reserve of power, which is depleted very quickly. With mental anesthesia, the picture can be directly the opposite: morning begins with weakness and only in the evening the face becomes active. The core of the symptomatic complex is the loss of emotional reactions to the signal from the outside world, as well as feelings towards others. Mental anesthesia seriously torments patients, bringing them severe suffering.
Treatment
Depression can turn into a chronic course, which makes its process difficult to reverse. It can facilitate access to various diseases, complicates their course, and can lead to alcoholism or drug addiction. The agonizing devastation along with the loss of colors and the meaning of the world, self-flagellation - all this sometimes leads people to commit suicide.
Anesthetic depression needs to be eliminated as soon as possible. Moderate and mild mental anesthesia is treated by family doctors, psychotherapists, psychologists with special training. With the development of a severe stage (especially with suicidal intentions), mandatory observation by a psychiatrist will be required. A specialist will certainly help to accurately determine the severity of the disorder and prescribe all the necessary supportive measures and drugs.
Directions of therapy
As part of the treatment of mental anesthesia, the following is done:
- Attracting patients to actively participate in the healing process.
- The implementation of the prevention of possible countermeasures.
- Conversation on exciting issues and hypnotherapy.
- Performing cognitive therapy.
- Streamlining the regime in the form of hard work, good rest with a regular change of such periods.
- A healthy lifestyle in the form of rejection of any bad habits in combination with physical exercises, walks in the air and auto-training.
Medications
They are prescribed exclusively by doctors. The type and dosage of the drug is selected individually. Typically used are antidepressants:
- Monoamine oxidase inhibitors, for example, Nialamide or Phenalzine.
- Use of selective serotonin inhibitors in the form of “Fluvoxamine”, “Fluoxetine”, “Sertraline”, “Paroxetine” and “Citalopram”.
It is worth noting that the use of MAO inhibitors will require a special diet because of their incompatibility with certain foods. Non-compliance with this condition can cause a sharp increase in intraocular pressure, along with angina pectoris and hypertensive crisis. Red wine is subject to exclusion from a nutritious diet along with beer, products made with the use of yeast, chocolate, smoked meats, legumes, cheese and cream.
After the abolition of antipsychotics
The withdrawal of antipsychotics often occurs in situations where pharmacotherapy lasts less than six months. The maximum severity of withdrawal symptoms usually occurs within four days, followed by a resolution of two weeks.
Negative manifestations of mental anesthesia after the cancellation of antipsychotics are most pronounced against the background of a sharp break in therapy, as well as in the transfer of a patient from a low-grade antipsychotic to an analogue and in the case of simultaneous discontinuation of correctors.
The mechanisms of withdrawal are based on the development of pharmacodynamic stress due to the adaptation of mediator systems, mainly cholinergic. In addition, a certain role is played by the cessation of the sedative effect of antipsychotics.