Mental illness is not common knowledge for anyone. Majority of us have been misinformed, fed with little or no knowledge about the various mental illnesses that threaten human existence. This limits our understanding to just the commonly discussed mental illnesses that are often wrong, and consequentially makes us wallow in various myths that surrounds mental illness. This also has been unknowingly keeping us trapped in some day-to-day struggles we thought to be normal.
Studies show that, the following fascinating dynamics that often keep us from being ourselves have been fully diagnosed and listed as some of the mental illnesses that waste life:
Trichotillomania.
Trich (irresistible hair-pulling-disorder), is the recurrent pulling of one’s hair out. This under-diagnosed impulsive control disorder occurs in up to 3.4% of adults. Trichotillomania (pronounced trick-o-till-o-mania), a manifestation of anxiety that causes hair-pulling; involving head hair, eyebrows, eye lashes and hair at any other part of the body.
According to Douglas Woods, PhD, Professor of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Trichotillomania is a “poorly understood disorder” that affects “lots of people,” primarily females.
The estimated lifetime prevalence in adults ranges between 0.6% and 3.4%. TTM seems to have a bimodal age of onset, Wood added.
A close acquaintance of mine has it, says Dan Knight, top writer on quora. She’s had it for as long as I’ve known her and now has a fairly substantial bald patch on her head.
When she was six she lost her mother and ever since she’s battled with her weight and confidence. It’s not limited to her head, she will also pull her eyelashes, added Dan.
Treatment elements for Trichotillomania, according to Martin Franklin, PhD, Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania., include psychoeducation, stimulus control, and competing response training.
Munchausen by proxy syndrome (MBPS).
This mental illness is a rare form of child abuse that compels mothers to harm their child in order to feel self worth.
Munchausen-By-Proxy Syndrome which belongs to a group of mental disorders known as fictitious disorders, is characterized by pattern of behavior in which someone, usually a mother, inflicts harm on her child in an attempt to gain attention and recognition for herself. The mother uses injuries on her child to garner attention or pity for herself.
According to
Mother with Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome is always in a constant effort to mask the life endangering child abuse she commits behind closed doors – A process Schreier and Libow call “mother imposturing.”
Boanthropy.
Those who surfer from the psychological disorder “Boanthropy” attempt to live and behave like cow or ox. It may only require hypnosis to set this disorder that have been linked to dream, in motion.
This unusual disorder can come suddenly, and gradually operate on you until you are down on all fours like a grazing bovine. Boanthropy has been around for quite some time; the most famous sufferer of this condition was Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire from 605BC to 562BC. According to the Christians’ holy book: he was humbled by God, driven from men and did eat grass as oxen; all these are as result of being boastful about his achievements – read Daniel chapter 4.
Body integrity identity disorder (BIID).
This is a psychological disorder wherein sufferers have oppressive feeling that one or more limbs of their body do not belong to them; they think they would be happier if one or more of their body parts are removed or disabled. The obsessive desire for a limb amputation.
‘The chair gives me psychological relief, instead of physical.’ ‘I know it can be difficult for people without BIID to understand, but it’s what we feel,’ said Chloe Jennings-White, a Cambridge graduate who reports say has made several attempts at injuring herself so she can climb into wheelchair.
BIID which is also known as Apotemnophilia or amputee identity disorder, is an extremely rare neurologic disorder in which a person has an overwhelming interest in being an amputee.
“This is so completely beyond the realm of normal behavior,” Dr. First, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University, said.
According to Dr. David Spiegel of Stanford, people with B.I.I.D. have a clearly mistaken belief about their bodies.
“It reminds me a little of anorexia nervosa,” Dr. Spiegel added, “where people think they’re fat when it’s obvious they’re not.
Pica.
Pica as an eating disorder is defined as the repetitive ingestion of nonnutritive substances; sufferers have appetite for things that are not normal to eat. Materials consumed by patients with pica includes chalk, soap, paper, feces, soil, nails, uncooked yam and many other substances.
A diagnosis of this disorder requires that patient persist in the abnormal way for at least a month.
References:
Woods DW, Flessner CA, Franklin ME; Trichotillomania Learning Center-Scientific Advisory Board. The Trichotillomania Impact Project (TIP): J Clin Psychiatry. 2006;67:1877-1888.
Blom, R., Hennekam, R., & Denys, D. (2012, April 13). Body Integrity Identity Disorder. – http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3326051.
Encyclopedia of mental disorders. Pica – http://www.minddisorders.com/Ob-Ps/Pica.html
Schreier, H.A., & Libow, J.A. (1993). Hurting for Love: Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome. New York: The Guilford Press.
