Blog Post #12 - Psychological Disorders

1) Deciding whether something is or is not a psychological disorder can be very difficult because there are many grey areas to consider, such as whether the patient is telling the truth, or simply trying to cover up something he or she did. Although one thing is for certain. According to the book, to be a psychological disorder the person must exhibit “Deviant and distressful behaviors . . . when also judged to be a harmful dysfunction.” This means that the behavior(s) a person exhibits must be different from most other people in one’s culture, must cause the person distress, and must interfere in an obstructive and bad way in all of the person’s daily activities in order to be considered a psychological disorder. The book gives a clear example of a behavior that is dysfunctional, “An intense fear of spiders may be deviant, but if it doesn’t impair your life it is not a disorder.” If someone merely acts “abnormally” they do not have a psychological disorder (unless they exhibit all of the above criteria) because what may be abnormal to some people, cultures, and/or societies, may be quite common and normal to others. This is why more than just deviance is accounted for when it comes to deciding whether someone has a psychological disorder.

#2 & #3 (Together)

The most interesting thing I learned in this section is definitely the part in our book about schizophrenia. My dad's mother died when he was only 18 years old from cardiac arrest. When Dad turned about 12 years old, his mother developed schizophrenia. Dad's memories of the last six years with his mother were not very good. Therefore, he doesn't talk about her very much. If you ask, he usually tells you a little bit, but his answers are short and he barely ever goes into detail.

When I realized that this chapter had a part about schizophrenia, I waited to read it until I went up north hunting with Dad (this is my time with Dad and the boys on his side of the family). The hunting shack up north is only a two room, 500 square foot house with no electricity (except when we run the generator) and no plumbing. (We use an outhouse.) Therefore, Dad and I get a lot of quality time together to talk and have fun.

I would read it at the table in the evening and when I would learn a little more about the disease, I would ask Dad if his mom ever showed these signs and acted in certain ways. Dad became very open with me and explained a lot. He told me that the first sign he remembered when she was beginning to get the disease was when one of their kittens ran underneath the fridge. The kitten would be able to get out on its own, but his mom was determined to get the kitten out. She even tried so hard that she cut her arm all up from reaching under the fridge. Dad thought that her actions were quite weird. His mom also had hallucinations (visual and sound) and she was hard to follow when she spoke. In later years, Dad told me that his mom was so drugged up on medications from the disease, that she was very unresponsive and lethargic. I also learned that she was the one who "invented" corn and rice (mixed together). (This is a popular dinner side at my house.)

Learning this information about the grandma I never knew was the most important thing to me. I hardly know anything about Dad's family history and it's nice to find out.