Benign Stupors: A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction TypeHoch, August
Science
Benign Stupors: A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type
Hoch, August
Manic-depressive illness; Stupor
_Nov. 2._ Free from muscular tension and more responsive.
When asked whether she felt like talking, she said in a
whining tone, “No, go away--I have to go through enough.”
Then she spoke of not knowing how long the nights and days
were, of not having known which way she was going. When
asked who the physician was she whimpered and said, “You
came to tell me what was right.” She called him “Christ”
and another physician “Jim” (husband’s name), though, later
in the interview, she gave their correct names. When asked
about the name of another physician, she said: “He looks
like my cousin, he was here, they all came the first night.
I did not take notice who it was till I went through these
spirits, then I knew it was right.”--She paused and added:
“My God--mother it was; she is here on Earth, somewhere in
a convent--Sister C. (who actually is in a convent) she was
here, too, I could hear her.” She said they all came to try
to save her. When asked whether she had been asleep, she
said: “No, I wasn’t asleep, I was mesmerized, but I am
awake now--sometimes I thought I was dead.” (When?) “The
time I was going to Heaven.” Again: “I went to Heaven in
spirit, I came back again--the wedding ring kept me on
Earth--I will have to be crucified now.” (Tell me about
it.) “Jim will have to pick my eyes out--I think it is him.
Oh, it is my little girl.” (Who told you?) “The spirits
told me.” Again: “Little birds my children--I can’t see
them any more--I must stay here till I die.” (Why?) “The
spirits told me--till I pick every one of my eyes out and
my brains too.” When asked what day it was, she said, “It
must be Good Friday.” (Why?) “Because God told me I must
die on the cross as he did.” When asked why she had not
spoken the day before, she said that “Jesus Christ in
Heaven” had told her she should not tell anything, “till
all of you had gone, then I could go home with him, because
that is the way we came in and it was Jim too all the
time.” Finally she said crossly, “Go away now, you are all
trying to keep me from Jim” (crying).
_Nov. 3._ Knelt by bed during the night. This morning lies
in bed staring, resistive, again she is markedly
cataleptic. She has to be spoon-fed, and is totally
unresponsive. In the afternoon she was found staring and
resistive. Presently she said with tears: “I am waiting to
be put on the cross.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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