Hi again.
Last time I showed you some stories from first part of "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat". Like you probably remember, they were about losses. This time, I'd like to focus on so-called excesses. Oliver Sacks describes this type of disease as an opposite to loss. There is hypermnesia, which is an antitype for amnesia, there's hyperkynesia and other hypers. What's interesting psychology and neurology before the release of this book weren't interested much in these type of diseases but it changed afterwards.
I'd like to show you some examples of those.
1.
First story is about Ray. Ray had Tourette's syndrome which you probably know more or less. It's a disease that involves nervous motions like ticks, noises, curses of all sorts. There are different intensities of these. Some people just have ticks once per minute but there are ones who have it second after a second all day long. Ray belonged to the second group. It all started when he was about 4 years old. In spite of those problems, he graduated from college and had a wife and 2 kids. Real problems arose when hetried to get a job. He was thrown out of each of them because of his disease. Nonetheless, he had a musical talent for playing drums. Thanks to his syndrome, he was able to make great drum solos. It was his way to earn some money. Other thing that he was great at was ping-pong. No one was able to have that reflex and make so fast and sudden shots.
But all that wasn't enough, because his wife couldn't live like this. That's why he got to the book's author. The doctor gave him Haldol, which lowered his dopamine level. After a week of receiving this drug, he came back. He was angry, because he couldn't cope with what was happening to him. Before that, he was able to jump in and jump out of revolving door and unfortunately this changed after Haldol. He just couldn't catch the right moment. He didn't want to do that anymore. Despite of that, Mr Sacks offered him 3 months of some kind of psychoanalysis after which, they would try Haldol once more. It turned out that Ray liked many things that he just wasn't able to do because of his sickness. After this preparation and realizing that he might live without Tourette's syndrome, Ray tried Haldol once more.
It turned out that with preparation, he was able to live more or less normally. He started a normal job, he started to have friends etc. But he wasn't all that happy, because on Haldol he was boring and anything but spontaneous. Now he lives all week on Haldol to be able to work, but at weekends he leaves his medication and plays drums like he used to. What I like about this story is that you can be sick, cope with that and leave something worthy for yourself.
I recommend you to watch this movie about Tourette's syndrome:
2.
Another form of excesses is what you may call Cupid's disease. Oliver Sacks was once visited by Natasha K. who was a woman in her mid 60s. She started to become more and more vigorous but also interested in men much younger than her. Before that she was kind of shy, but she started to flirt and tell jokes. Her friends started to worry, so she went to the neurologist. It turned out that about 50 years earlier, she had syphilis and it had left spirochaetes in her brain. What's even more interesting, she didn't want to go back to her self before these changes. She wanted to stay so alive, but she was afraid that this might get worse than that. Happily, penicillin did kill the spirochaetes but changes in the brain weren't reversible. She stayed vigorous and it wasn't getting worse. That's my favourite story from that part.
Have you seen anyone with Tourette's syndrome? It is estimated that there's about 1 to ten people per 1000 with that syndrome. Do you find it odd?
Do you think that an old lady behaving like Natasha K is odd even though it's just a disease?
I’ve seen people with Tourette's syndrome only on TV. Disease itself is odd and kind of scary if you don’t know that a person has it, but I think it’s more sad, because it must be hard to for example find a job or even friends.. I’ve heard of Natasha K. before. I don’t think it’s odd, I regret that there aren’t more people behaving like her;) More people would be happier I guess. She’s happy with her disease and that’s the most important.
ReplyDeleteProbably I've met people with Tourette's syndrome but it hasn't been so pronounced so I didn't even realized that this is that sickness. Every one of us has something whirled in his/her self. I don't find it is odd, but it makes life of those people more difficult for sure...
ReplyDeleteIt is a little bit odd but in good and funny way as far as it it not uncomfortable for her:)
s4505, kniaz: Book describes a story of Georges Albert Édouard Brutus Gilles de la Tourette who is best known for discovering a syndrome named after him. When he has found an example of a person with such disorder, he started to find them all over his city. Each time he walked somewhere, he has seen someone with ticks, cursing and other symptoms of this disease. It's really amazing to know how common it is.
ReplyDeleteI have seen people with Tourette's syndrome only in TV, I haven't met anyone with that disease. I think it is hard for their family to live with that kind of people, it can be odd for people who don't understand that disease. I think that old lady behaving like Natasha K is odd but in a good way, even though it is just a disease
ReplyDeleteI have never met before anyone with Tourette's syndrome. I heard of it only in television. For those people it must be very embarrassing illness. BTW do you remember the Twix commercial “Caramel, biscuit, chocolate” :)
ReplyDeleteHave you seen anyone with Tourette's syndrome?
ReplyDeleteI'm not to proud of it, but the first time that I have heard about Tourette's syndrome was in one of the South Park series episodes. At first I wasn't sure if such an illness really exists. I did a quick search and the answer came to me as shock.
It is estimated that there's about 1 to ten people per 1000 with that syndrome. Do you find it odd?
Not really. Why would that be odd? It's really uncommon that's for sure :) The tragic thing about such an uncommon illness is that scientists have no significant knowledge about it. Therefore there is no undoubtful treatment to undergo.
Do you think that an old lady behaving like Natasha K is odd even though it's just a disease?
Well, it may come as a shock to people who don't know about her illness, that's for sure!
Tourette syndrome is a terrible disease. I have seen people with the disease on TV. Their unpredictable behavior is really shocking for people that don't know anything about the syndrome. I think that those patients can be considered as strange and scary but all they need is a litlle bit of compassion and tolerance.
ReplyDelete