Not PMS at all... How to recognize the first signs of schizophrenia in a woman?

The term “psychosis” is used quite rarely in modern psychiatry. Currently, such pathology is considered in the form of separate syndromes (manic, bipolar, depressive disorder, etc.). However, many patients (and doctors) prefer outdated terminology, as it is more familiar and understandable. According to statistics, this disease predominantly affects the fairer sex, and female psychosis is quite difficult to treat, since not only external causes play a role in its pathogenesis, but also physiological characteristics and constant changes in hormonal levels.

Symptoms of a mental disorder

The World Health Organization divides the symptoms of mental disorders in humans into 4 main groups:

1. Sensory-perceptual symptoms in which a person has a distortion of reality and can hear, feel or see things that others cannot sense.
2. A common neurological symptom is cognitive impairment. The patient is increasingly experiencing a disorder of clear speech, memory lapses occur, and pathological beliefs about an event are established.
3. Symptoms of a behavioral nature, when the patient may show unreasonable aggression towards relatives or stop performing daily functions.
4. Emotional disorders most often occur as the main symptom; the patient may constantly feel a feeling of fear or sadness.

Symptoms of catatonic schizophrenia

Symptoms of catatonic schizophrenia include specific conditions and behavior that complicate the diagnosis by the reluctance of such people to contact the doctor, or anyone else. In addition to the general criteria of the disease (F20.0–F20.3), any of the following signs of catatonic schizophrenia must be observed over a period of at least two weeks:

• waxy flexibility;
• stupor or mutism;
• aimless motor activity;
• freezing in unusual positions;
• automatic obedience;
• “negative” motor activity;
• rigid posture.

Signs of a mental disorder

Every second person with a mental disorder, starting from the early stages of the disease, experiences characteristic symptoms. They can appear with different intensities and frequency, but they are easy to notice with constant observation of a person. If one of the signs appears, you cannot leave it unnoticed and you should seek professional help.

Signs of a mental disorder most often go beyond certain cultural norms or beliefs in modern society. It is customary to identify the main signs of the course of the disease, which are most common among people with this diagnosis - memory impairment and sound thinking, sudden changes in a person’s behavior and mood for no known reason.

Symptoms of neurosis-like schizophrenia

Outpatient observation for signs of neurosis-like schizophrenia lasts at least two years. At this distance, at least four symptoms of neurosis-like schizophrenia should be clearly observed, supplemented by apathy, decreased activity, emotional dullness and judgments of a paradoxical nature:

• detachment;
• unusual appearance and behavior;
• social isolation;
• magical thinking;
• paranoid ideas;
• obsessions;
• disturbances of perception such as depersonalization-derealization;
• imaginative, overly detailed or stereotypical thinking;
• rare episodes with severe hallucinations;
• smoothed delusional symptoms.

Causes of mental disorders

Scientists have found that the reasons for changes in a person’s mental state can be external factors such as psychological or social. Biological factors include a genetic predisposition to constant depression or nervous breakdowns, especially if, while a person was growing up, there were complex relationships between parents that left a certain imprint on the child’s psyche.

The results of many years of research have shown that the causes of mental disorders most often come from the patient’s unfavorable childhood. Drugs and alcoholism, temporary restriction of a person’s freedom in a confined space, frequent depression, difficult life situations and incidents can also lead to the development of the disease.

Types of mental disorders

Currently, the most common diseases include some types of human mental disorders. These data can always be tracked in the reports of the World Health Organization, where schizophrenia is among the top five most common diseases among the entire world population. It can originate during early human development, but in the transition period its signs will begin to increase.

In second place in popularity are types of disorders associated with the abolition of dependence on psychotropic or narcotic substances, including alcohol. Depression, as a type of mental disorder, occurs in every fifth inhabitant of the planet and is accompanied by pessimistic views of life and an apathetic mood.

Psychological mental disorders

According to the International Classification of Diseases, psychological mental disorders belong to groups F10 – F19 and are associated with human behavior disorder due to excessive use of psychoactive substances.

Most often, this type of disorder occurs against the background of addiction to a certain type of psychotropic drug. A person is convinced on a subconscious level that it is psychotropic substances that give him a dose of pleasure and without them he cannot exist normally. Over time, addiction occurs, which cannot be eliminated without professional help and treatment.

Mania

The following clinical signs are characteristic:

• excited state;
• constant, often completely inappropriate emotional upsurge;
• motor excitement;
• talkativeness;
• irritability and anger;
• sleep disturbances, and the patient does not experience fatigue even after a short rest;
• increased appetite;
• increased sexuality, promiscuity in sexual relations.

But against the background of a general physical and emotional upsurge, they pay attention to absent-mindedness and impatience. Patients are full of plans, but extremely rarely implement them to the end, being distracted by something else. Delicacy and tactfulness are lost in communication.

Due to inadequately high self-esteem, patients are very jealous of the results of their activities, cannot tolerate criticism at all, and react very aggressively to any comments.

Organic mental disorder

Organic and symptomatic disorders manifest themselves in patients at the cerebral level; they can manifest themselves against the background of brain injuries, after a severe stroke, or against the background of abuse of alcohol, narcotic and psychotropic substances.

Organic mental disorder can be diagnosed based on two main characteristics. The first include cognitive dysfunction, when a person has problems with memory or habitual learning. Impairments may be associated with loss of alertness, concentration and awareness. The second group includes vivid manifestations of hallucinations, anxiety and depression, as well as disturbances in emotional behavior.

Symptoms and signs

At the initial stage, schizophrenia is often clinically similar to psychosis and anxiety disorders.
Therefore, when making a diagnosis, the pathogenesis and symptoms are carefully studied. Social and behavioral disorders appear as mental illness progresses. A woman from the outside may seem too conflicted, or, conversely, withdrawn. Gradually there is a distance from the family, and a severance of all social contacts.

Psychiatrists have combined the signs of schizophrenia into separate symptom complexes:

• Productive – delusions and hallucinatory symptoms are present;
• Negative – depression, apathy, lack of will;
• Impaired mental performance - decreased attention and perception, disorder of thought processes.

If there are productive symptoms, a woman becomes dangerous not only to herself, but also to others. Delusional symptoms often lead to suicide or severe injury to a person who happens to be nearby.

Schizophrenia is characterized by mannerisms in gestures and facial expressions. Postures become unnatural (frozen posture, lack of plasticity). But there are cases when, on the contrary, hypermotor agitation is noted.

Schizophrenia has similar symptoms to many mental disorders. Therefore, a single clinical symptom does not indicate schizophrenia.

The symptom complex in schizophrenia lasts at least a month. But all the signs appear against the backdrop of a deterioration in overall functionality in various areas of life, which lasts for six months.

Schizophrenia is a slowly progressive mental illness. Therefore, symptoms increase gradually. Each stage of the disease has its own characteristic signs. But there is a so-called prodrome of the disease, which lasts 2.5 years before the appearance of clear clinical signs. The woman becomes withdrawn, gradually moving away from family and friends. Emotional coldness and mood swings appear.

Without timely treatment, schizophrenia inevitably leads to irreversible changes in personality.

Many scientists are inclined to believe that the manifestation of the disease begins in adolescence. But the latent period of the disease can last for many years. Active symptoms may appear in women during the postpartum period. The body and central nervous system are under severe stress. Even for mentally healthy women, childbirth and motherhood are stressful. Therefore, if the psyche cannot cope with the load, then no woman can be immune from the development of schizophrenia.

Mood swings and behavioral disorders occur in women even during the period of declining sexual function. Menopausal syndrome provokes neurovegetative, psychoemotional and metabolic changes. According to WHO, the number of patients who develop mental disorders due to estrogen deficiency increases every year.

But there are also factors that can trigger schizophrenia even in old age. These factors were designated as psychosocial. Internal and external changes in a woman (aging) require the body to activate adaptation mechanisms. But this doesn't always happen.

Late manifestation of the disease (55–60 years) has an atypical course. Therefore, it is more often called paraphrenia. In this case, hallucinatory-delusional psychoses do not have a pronounced destructive effect on the personality. Paraphrenia has its own ICD code. It is considered as a separate diagnostic category.

Scientists have come to the conclusion that the manifestation of the disease at a later age (after 45 years) is more common in women who are prosperous and have realized themselves in all areas of life. They had negative symptoms, but disorganization was only slightly expressed. Paranoia and hallucinatory symptoms are pronounced.

Age gradation was applied to schizophrenia. Thus, it was divided into subtypes, but only for convenience. Because the clinical features are not different.

Subtypes:

• Late-onset disease – from 40 to 60 years;
• A very late-onset disease - from 60 years of age (schizophrenia-like psychoses).

Late schizophrenia also occurs in various forms and has a different prognosis for life.

Acute mental disorders

Transient and acute psychotic personality disorders are characterized by the most rapid development of diseases. The condition of a sick person can deteriorate significantly in just a few days, with several main signs observed - depression and passive mood, accompanied by intense hallucinations, states of seizures and delirium.

Acute mental disorders are conventionally divided into two categories - polymorphic state and schizophrenia. The latter occurs most often, the true causes of which have not yet been established. The risk group may include people who have been subjected to severe violence (not necessarily of an intimate nature), as well as those who have experienced severe emotional stress.

Symptoms of hebephrenic schizophrenia

To make a diagnosis, it is necessary to have general criteria (F20.0–F20.3) and at least one of the specific symptoms of hebephrenic schizophrenia:

• emotional dullness
• or inappropriate emotional reactions;
• aimless, strange behavior
• or a disorder of thinking (for example, expressed by broken speech).

Characteristic signs of hebephrenic schizophrenia do not include hallucinations and delusions. However, they can be expressed to a fairly mild degree.

Chronic mental disorder

In medicine, chronic disorders are usually understood as a condition of a sick person when it occurs over a long period of time and with characteristic attacks. Types of such disorders include paranoia, epilepsy, manic or depressive psychosis.

Chronic mental disorder, like most diseases of this type, is characterized by periods of improvement and sharp deterioration in a person’s condition. Even after all signs of the disease have been suppressed, the patient is left with a persistent mental defect that is difficult to treat.

Temporary mental disorder

Unlike a chronic disorder, a temporary one involves understanding such conditions of a sick person in which short-term mental abnormalities are observed, ultimately amenable to complete recovery.

A temporary mental disorder can manifest itself in a person in the form of delirium tremens. This pathological condition is most often caused by prolonged alcohol consumption. Temporary disorders also include severe mental states, experiences and nervous conditions caused by external environmental factors.

What to do if your loved one is mentally ill?

You need to prepare for the fact that your life can change greatly and learn how to behave correctly. A mentally ill person often becomes the center of attention for the entire family. Personal interests of household members fade into the background. We have to put up with the patient’s inappropriate behavior. You also need to prepare for the fact that the treatment may not work immediately. Sometimes the drugs prescribed initially do not help, and new ones have to be selected.

Yes, if a person has a mental illness, his relatives have a hard time. Some tips will help you withstand these stresses and maintain your own health:

• Control your emotions. Don't take what the patient says and does personally. Remember: he has no control over himself.
• Take breaks and find time to rest. You need to take turns sitting with the patient. If you don't have relatives who can help, hire a caregiver and have them come at least sometimes.
• If you feel emotionally damaged, see a psychologist or therapist. Don't wait for the problem to get worse.
• You must eat well and get enough sleep. Otherwise, you will not be able to cope with the load.

If you notice the symptoms described in this article in a loved one and think that they may be mentally ill, contact the specialists at the Cordia Clinic for help. Our experienced doctors will definitely try to help.

Treatment of mental disorders

To treat a mental disorder or reduce a person’s suffering during an exacerbation of the disease in modern medicine, there are effective methods that can be practically successfully used only with professional supervision or while in an inpatient hospital.

Treatment of mental disorders should only take place in combination with the use of psychotropic medications and professional psychotherapy. For patients, the use of pills alone is not enough; it is important to regularly conduct conversations or exercises to get rid of the symptoms and causes of a serious mental illness.

Treatment of mental disorders in men

Among men, acute and organic types of mental disorders are most common, which require a more serious and long-term approach to treatment. Psychosis, schizophrenia, addiction to illegal drugs and manic episodes – these diseases affect more than 40% of the male population. According to WHO statistics, men are much less likely to admit that they have mental disorders than women.

Treatment of mental disorders in men occurs under constant supervision by a professional psychotherapist. The most effective treatment is achieved only if it is comprehensive, that is, a combination of medications with techniques and exercises that are based on a direct conversation between the patient and the doctor.

Preventive maintenance therapy

To prolong the remission achieved during active treatment, use:

• tablet antidepressants: preference is given to safe, latest-generation drugs suitable for long-term use; they are selected individually depending on the symptoms prevailing in the picture of a psychotic disorder;
• mood stabilizers: psychotropic drugs intended to stabilize mood;
• lithium salts.

Psychotherapy plays a huge role in preventing exacerbations. The purpose of sessions with a psychologist is the social adaptation of patients, improving self-control, increasing performance, normalizing relationships in the family, team, and with friends.

It is recommended to avoid excessive mental and physical stress, a balanced diet (alcohol and drinks that stimulate the functions of the central nervous system are strictly prohibited). Doctors at the Leto mental health center also select psychoeducational and rehabilitation programs that will help the patient overcome and cope with traumatic situations. To call a doctor or make an appointment, call us 24/7 8(969)060-93-93.

Treatment of mental disorders in women

Most often, women experience mental disorders associated with depression or constant anxiety. These species are the most resistant to drug treatment. Any treatment is based only on an individual approach, based on the woman’s condition, her age and previous injuries to the disease.

Treatment of mental disorders in women is based on a specific scheme, which includes the use of antidepressants, a combination of other pharmacological agents and mandatory psychotherapeutic techniques.

Mental disorders in adolescents

One in six people affected by a mental disorder are in the 10-19 age group, one of the most difficult transition periods of adulthood. The main reason for the mental disorder of a teenager is the process of personality formation, which can be negatively influenced by the people around him, as well as a manic desire to try prohibitive drugs for the first time in his life.

Mental disorders in adolescents can only be treated in a comprehensive manner by professionals together with parents. During this period, it is important to create a safe atmosphere for the life of a teenager, to protect him from possible risks and negative factors from others.

Schizophrenia and menopause

The level of hormones in the female body can manifest a mental disorder - because of this, the disease often begins in puberty (hormonal changes in adolescents), during pregnancy and after childbirth, and can begin in perimenopause (before and after menopause).

A woman who experiences hormonal involution (hormone production decreases, menstrual function disappears) experiences anxiety, irritability, and vegetative symptoms that dramatically affect her well-being.

Important

Only if real problems are observed - depression, strange ideas (they allegedly threaten a woman, want to rob her, conduct experiments on her), “obsession” with health, inappropriate behavior, should you consult a psychiatrist.

Neuroses (neurasthenia, generalized anxiety disorder), affective disorders (depression), and schizophrenia of various courses can be hidden behind similar symptoms. An accurate diagnosis requires consultation with a psychiatrist and modern instrumental and laboratory diagnostics.

Mental disorders in children

Mental disorders in children under 10 years of age may be indicated by symptoms such as impaired attention and hyperreactivity, which manifests itself in the form of extreme mobility or fussiness. Starting from the very birth of a child, it is very important not to miss the moment of the onset of pathological deviations in his behavior.

The doctor is faced with the task of promptly and correctly dividing mental disorders due to improper pedagogical upbringing of parents or genetic predisposition. The initial signs of the disease in children include decreased appetite, which occurs repeatedly in the form of vomiting or complete refusal to eat.

Symptoms of low-grade schizophrenia

The striking signs of sluggish schizophrenia include features of a “style” that runs counter to generally accepted norms and norms of recognized subcultures. Such a person can create the impression of being emotionally cold and detached from reality. His appearance may contain eccentric details that emphasize flashes of non-standard behavior.

The most noticeable symptoms of sluggish schizophrenia, which manifest themselves episodically from the people around them, include:

• pretentious speech;
• obsessive rumination;
• quasi-psychotic seizures with hallucinations;
• delusional ideas.

Often such people are committed to strange beliefs of a magical nature, which determine their behavior in society; it can be a unique picture of the world, different from existing ones, or individually complementing them.