Benign Stupors: A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction TypeHoch, August
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Benign Stupors: A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type
Hoch, August
Manic-depressive illness; Stupor
We see, therefore, that most of the ideas which she thus spoke of
retrospectively as having been in her mind during this stupor, and which
belonged both to the death and the rebirth motifs were formulated as
facts (as in the cases of Henrietta H. and Mary F. above mentioned). It
was, moreover, a condition which was accepted without protest. Here
again an affect was not associated with these ideas, and when the
patient was asked whether she had not been frightened, she said herself,
“No, I just lay there.” The idea that God told her she would have to die
on the cross like Christ, is, in the religious form, like the beckoning
of the father with Henrietta H. The only exception to the claim that the
ideas were formulated as facts and accepted as inevitable seems to be
the statement that she held up her arms to save the ship. This would
seem to be, in contradistinction to the rest, a formulation as a more
dangerous situation. However, this was isolated and we can do no more
than to determine main tendencies. We must expect, especially in such
variable conditions as we see in this patient, to find occasional
inconsistencies.
In summing up we may say, therefore, that so far as the stupor itself
is concerned, the ideas are formulated as a rule:--
1. As accepted facts (being dead, being in a ship, etc.).
2. As accepted prospects (going to die).
3. As the wish to die.
In the first two types the ideas are not associated with affect; in the
third, though not associated with affect, they are combined with
“impulsive” suicidal attempts.
In order not to tear apart the analysis of Charlotte W. (Case 12) too
much, we may begin our study of the intervals and the conditions
preceding the stupors with the ideas which this patient produced when
the stupor lifted somewhat. We shall see that the ideas are closely
related to those mentioned above but formulated differently.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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