See also:
Sleep Deprivation
Illness
Dehydration
Hunger
Heat
Cold
Specialized Edition: Fire
Specialized Edition: Phobias
Specialized Edition: Disabilities
Specialized Edition: Developmental Delays/Disorders

So: Mental illness. Does anyone have any experience themselves, or experience with another person, a story you know to be true, or any learnings at all on mental disorders?

The reason I ask is, one of my characters was captured and tortured, and he now is somewhat cracked. It's like he has two sides to his mind, and they argue with each other. He also has panic attacks when a certain person leaves him because the pessimistic side of his mind tells him very convincingly that she's never coming back. It sounds kind of cheesy out of context, but anyway...

Help out if you can! Thanks!

What do you define as a mental illness?

Ah, you started it.

Yeah...I'm asking everyone here: What exactly is a mental illness? You know it can happen, but what is the line between eccentric and unhealthy?

Anything abnormal really, I mean not weirdness or oddness, but actual mental confusion beyond the norm. It can be either a birth thing, an acquired thing, or trauma-induced (which is what I'm mostly looking for, because that's what's happening to my character). Some more extreme examples include schizophrenia, multiple personality disorder, even obsessive compulsive disorder. Anything that might help writers with driving their characters crazy.

In one place in my planned saga, I have a character lose his memory (who and what he is, where he came from, most of his skills, etc.).

I also have a tendency to make my character that are most like myself egregiously melancholic, arguably to the point of borderline depression---but that's not deliberate . And I used to (back in middle and high school, when I wrote---NaNoWriMo-like---hundreds of words most school days during lunch, instead of worldbuilding and planning first like I do now) have my plot (and thus my protagonists) go haring off (arguably hyperactively) in all sorts of tangential directions .

Oh yes, I also had a character lose their memory, but it was "localized retrograde amnesia". It was just the memories after a big event, and the ones concerning the person they met in that event who was pretty much always with them afterwards. O.o

Sometimes sane people can be driven to extremes (like suicide or cutting, anxiety attacks or paranoia), especially when they're hurt or have been hurt emotionally and physically.

I know what it's like to feel taxed physically and emotionally - to the point where it feels like your energy is zapped and you don't have the strength to move or do anything. When that happens you sort of curl into a shell and shut yourself off from the world and if you stay in that shell for too long... well, I imagine it would easily turn to mental illness.

I know what it is like to see people dear to you suffer from depression, a mental illness. It's not easy. The hardest part is that the person you love becomes completely different. They are not the person you knew before they became depressed. You are forced to accept that the person you are looking at is not same person as before. Because if you don't accept it, you hang on to the hope that they will be the same as before. And they're not.

I... I don't think I can yet share further details on the public thread. However, if someone needs more information for writing purposes, they are welcome to contact me in private.

Does anyone know anything about post-traumatic stress disorder? How extreme can it get? What are the symptoms?

I'll give you some background:
A part of the evil army (plural: Vauglim, singular: Vaug) is surrounding the "village"-basically where the good side (Empowered) live, train, etc., and it's surrounded by a thirty-foot tall, four-foot thick wall that the Empowered have to use their power to get through, no one else can get through. The Empowered are under siege in this fortress, as inescapable to them as it is unenterable to the Vauglim. The army goes out to fight them, to draw them away and create an escape route for a messenger to begin his journey to where the main portion army of the Empowered is, fighting the main Vauglim army. That day, during the fight, five hostages are captured, in order to trade for the girl who is prophesied to defeat them all and is in the village at the time.
Hostage names/ages:
Riese, 18
Brade, not mentioned but late teenage, maybe early twenties
Jaina, 16
Connar, 17
Allosyn, 14 (not being of age to fight in the battle-16-she sneaked out, wanting to help, because she's tall and strong for her age)
Skipping a lot of happenings here, this girl rescues the hostages, and learns that they had been tortured, and one of them killed. The methods of torture were strange and outlandish. With Jaina, they told her that people she loves are dead, and when she doesn't believe them, they somehow made her see it, in her head, her family and friends being tortured and killed brutally.
Riese has had a problem with nightmares all his life; he is shot up with some kind of drug or poison that makes him sleep without waking and have worse nightmares than he's ever had.
Anyway, the main problem I have is with Connar. Allosyn is his beloved little sister. He is made to have visions of her turning into a Vaug, doing all these disgusting evil things, attacking him and such. This goes on and gets so bad that he's not exactly himself afterwards. He's been driven out of his head. And so, later, he comes back to himself mostly, but it's like he has another person inside of him, arguing with him uber-pessimistically, making him question everything he knows. It even gets so far as to cause a panic/anxiety attack. I just want to know, basically, if this is at all realistic, and what should happen in his downward spiral (don't read this part if you want to read my books and don't want it to be spoiled). The pessimist in his head eventually turns from pessimism to evil, and convinces him that he has to kill someone for everything to be right again. So yeah... Any thoughts, or info would be welcome

I've never been in contact with real psycopathics (thankfully ), but for some reason I write them somewhat-well. Not sure why that is... but yeah.


Sounds realistic to me. I've read a book where something similar was done; it ended up being a fascinating plot element.

(Don't read this spoiler if you plan on reading her books. ) It sounds like you are going to make the pessimistic voice within Connar well known to the other characters. However, they probably won't realize just how far the voice holds sway over his thinking. The voice probably starts out small in its ambitions, and then grows exponentially. First it will make it question little details that he thinks he sees. Then the questionnable details will grow in size. A little later he's questionning full memories. Perhaps the voice starts to remind Connar of images that he saw when he had been tortured. Before long Connar might begin to wonder if his sister has become a Vaug. Incidentally, it would be really, really cool if the voice goes so far as to make him believe he has to kill his sister before she can betray them to the Vaug/etc. Is that the direction you want to take this?
Anyways, I hope that helped. Insanity is a really fun thing to play with in writing. I wish you good luck!

OMG you are a GENIUS!!! I LOVE YOU OH MY FLIPPING GOSH YES!!! Actually, I was going to make him think he had to kill someone else-the chief, in charge of everyone (Anya), who is a teenage girl because it's an inherited title and her father and grandfather were killed. She's very stubborn and never wants to retreat in battle, because she can't get past seeing it as weakness. Connar's bad side, as it were, is saying how if she had called the retreat when she'd promised to, a lot of the bad stuff wouldn't have happened (and also she does something else really horrible but i'm not going to spoil that in case you want to read my books) and he accidentally overhears someone talking about it, but it's supposed to be a secret and he wasn't supposed to hear it (so you can imagine where that goes in his crazy mind) and his pessimistic side decides that Anya is a bad ruler for their people, and eventually i want to lead him to try and kill her. I was going to kill him off in the process... How can I have him attempt both and only get found out and killed in one situation, whichever he does second? Or he could join the rebellion I'm forming against her... Instead of trying to kill her. And that would leave more room for your idea without being redundant!!! OMG YOU ARE TOTALLY MY NEW BEST FRIEND OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOGMOGMOGMOMGOMG

I'm not sure if I follow. Just to make sure we are on the same track: you want to use both and are asking for my help in figuring out how?

Sorry, i got a little excited. I want to instead of making him try and kill Anya like I was going to make him do, he's going to join the rebellion against her and the voice in his head is going to persuade him to kill his sister instead! YES! haha I get a little nonsensical when i'm excited... lol

Ah, that's fine.

Please feel welcome to comment on any of my topics... anytime... anywhere... You are a most extreme help.

I am nowheres near that degree of helpfulness. However, I promise you I'll comment if I think of something that might prove helpful.

Yay ^-^ But while this has helped me, there's still no information for other writers who need help... haha

Writer's Guide to Psychology by Dr. Karolyn Kaufman

OR her psychology website for writers

http://archetypewriting.com/

That should answer y'alls questions, but they do (The book, at least), tackle Tricky Subjects in a very honest, uncensored way. Keep that in mind.




It sounds like schizophrenia, I'm fairly certain, or psychosis of some sort. (But don't quote me, all my psychology knowledge is from aforementioned book) Multiple Personality is now known as Dissociative Identity Disorder, and the personalities are all fully-formed, individual personalities caused by highly traumatic, sadistic, abuses, so it might be that as well.

Depression, when looking back, is interesting (To me at least, since it's been two or three years). To go Jungian, that's probably what started me on the path to integrating the Shadow with the Self. I faced the very worst inside me during that time.

Mm, okay... I'll check it out later. And is this a term from your book or something? Jungian, integrating the Shadow with the Self... I'm rather discombobulated.

Jungian psychology is based on the work of Carl Jung (Sigmund Freud's protege who rejected Freud's messed up way of analyzing things) and his work on archetypes, collective unconscious, and other things with the psyche.

Oh, right. It sounded familiar.

Well, my grandfather is schizophrenic... but I barely see him because of that, so I don't have much information on the topic...

Ah. That's not fun...

My Mama was a helper at a place where they helped people that needed help (to be very vague – I'm in a vague mood right now ). Several of them had mental disorders, and one in particular caught my interest – multiple personalities. I grilled her on the subject, of course, and so I will tell you all what I found out.

First off, as Varon said, it is a very real physiological problem. She said that no one was told when the lady went to Legacy of Life (the place she was a helper at) that she had the disorder, but it became quickly apparent. The woman had many, unique, separate personalities, and she changed between them on a basis of half a day to several days, if I remember correctly.

Some of the personalities were ashamed of some of the other personalities, some of the personalities didn't care. Mama said one of the personalities was sort of like a biker – rough, bad language, tough, not very caring, at least outwardly. Then she would change to another personality, and would be so sorry for what the last one had said and acted like, apologizing to everyone and so on.

She said it was strange dealing with her. She would make a decision when in one personality, or almost make it, but then change and make an entirely different decision. And she would react quite differently to the same situation depending on the personality. And they would have to have the same conversation with her twice sometimes.

If y'all have anymore questions about it I can ask her.

Wow, that's weird!
I think we'd like all the information you can possibly squeeze out of her, if you two have time to write us a monster post. If not, it's okay.

How exactly would you all categorize "Mental Illness", and what do you want to know about it? How it affects someone emotionally, physically, or mentally? The people around them? What specifically?

Pretty much anything you know. From OCD to schizophrenia. How they act, think, get along with the people around them...

So disorders, as opposed to brain trauma.

No, that too. PTSD, and things like that, would be great.

I was talking about brain trauma as in physical brain trauma, but I could see PTSD as a brain trauma.

Oh. That might belong more with the When Characters Suffer: Injury thread. But I'm not sure. Either place would be great, if you have any information.

I can give you a look at what OCD is like. I had it really, really bad as a teenager. I am mostly over it now, but I still have occasional times where a form of it grips me.
I didn’t even know what was the matter with me then. I thought I was the only person like me. It wasn’t util years later that I found out that there was even a name for my condition.
I basically spent my days in fear and obsessing over things. I would wash my hands over and over and as thoroughly as possible, sometimes even up my arms. I would check locks repeatedly to make sure they were really locked. Even then, I’d often come back later and check again. Washing dishes was a nightmare for me.
I couldn’t sleep at night because I had so many things I felt needed checked. The awful thing was, I knew they were fine, but I had to check them. It was as if I didn’t own my mind. I was constantly in the grip of fear. The worst part was I was also very afraid that God was angry with me, either for being so “faithless” or for any little thing I did that I thought might be sinful. Often I wanted to die, but was too afraid of hell. So, I lived in a living hell. My parents didn’t know what was wrong with me. And I even got in trouble with them for my obsessing, which only added to my overburdened conscience. (Not trying to blame them for anything. It’s just the way things were.)
I became afraid of almost everything.
Then at 22, I got married. My husband was so patient with me. He didn’t know why I worried over the things I did, but he never bothered me about them. It was because of his stable influence that I actually was able to work through things.
I learned that my feelings and conscience lied. I learned not to trust them. (Most people can trust their feelings and conscience.) Rather I had to trust a reality outside of myself and what I did or didn’t do. I learned it was ok to be human and make mistakes. It was ok if I wasn’t perfect. God’s love for me wasn’t based on how I felt or what I did, but on the reality of how He viewed me. I learned that when He looked at me, He didn’t see me or my sin or imperfections, but instead His perfect, sinless Son.

I always feel badly for characters in movies or books that are under the grip of a mental disorder. To be a prisoner in one’s mind is lonely and frightening. No one understands and often people take offence. At best, they think you’re weird.
I still have times where irrational fears overtake me. Often I don’t even know it’s coming. Just all of a sudden, I feel like I’m in danger or something is so wrong that I get queasy and lightheaded. Nothing brings it on. It just happens. Although, lack of rest greatly aggravates things. When your mind is already short circuiting, so to speak, being tired makes it that much worse.
I never had help from a therapist or doctor in dealing with OCD. I had to work through it on my own. I am now 25, still married, and have my own baby girl. I believe most disorders can be dealt with so one can lead a fairly normal life. I’ll probably always have some miswiring in my head, but it’s not more than I can bear, and I am very thankful for my life just as it is.
Hope that helps anyone who needs to understand a bit of what it’s like to have a mental condition (and learn to live with it).
And I’ll happily answer any questions.

Wow. Thank you, Layla, for sharing that with us. It was very enlightening.

Yes...it was very helpful. Thankyou. I'll ask questions if I ever need to – I don't want to portray it wrong.

Mental illnesses are behaviors which have an abnormal root: either psychologically or physiologically.

The most common disorder is depression. This is not feeling sad (or even melancholy which is what I am most of the time), but is feeling depressed to such a degree the your behavior is both unreasonable and unhealthy.

Schizophrenia is a deeply held, irrationally belief in something extremely contrary to reality. Schizophrenics tend to be paranoid, believing that all of their co-workers are spying on them, or that the government has implanted them with a microchip, etc.

Bi-polar disorder is where a person dramatically varies between the negative symptoms of depression and lethargy to the positive symptoms, a "flight of ideas" during which the person becomes high energetic and mentally stimulated. The person swings between two extremes of mental activity, hence bi-polar.

People often confuse both schizophrenia and bi-polar with multiple personality disorder, in which a person actually have several, distinct personalities, which may or may not be aware of each other.

I just thought I'd clarify these illnesses, because they are often poorly portrayed in books and films and we tend to acquire false knowledge about what they actually are.