“Do
I Need to Go to a Mental Hospital?"
We first met Irene, “just sixty-three,” seven years ago. A German
woman “from the old country,” we liked her the moment we met her.
Vibrant and friendly, she had been treated by various holistic physicians
for nearly fifteen years. Irene complained of fatigue, weakness of
the lower limbs, depression, allergies, tension headaches, gas, and
recurrent colds “even though she was healthy as a horse.”
Irene described herself as “high-strung, intense, and emotional. I
get too emotional and tend to baby people. I used to hate yearly good-byes
after I visited my mother in Germany. I’m an idealist. I feel things
deeply. I never feel like I do enough. I seem to worry about everything.
About my family, getting skin cancer, hospitals, death. When I feel
afraid, I get a nervous stomach and I stutter. Lately I’ve felt a
sitting-on-the-edge-of- my-chair impatience, like nothing’s going
fast enough. And lately I feel confused and absentminded, as if I
were in a fog.
“The past two months have been especially stressful for me. I’ve been
feeling panicky, helpless, not in control of my health or my body.
I wake at three in the morning with a dry mouth and a racing heart,
worrying if I’m going to get sick and who’s going to help me. Who
will manage my life? What doctor should I see? Who should I call?
Do I need to go to a mental hospital? Is it a heart attack? A stroke?”
This was the first time Irene had ever known panic attacks. Before
she had just plain worried.
“I’m afraid to go to work or to be alone. It’s an anxiety unlike any
I’ve ever had before. I’ve started to get hot, needlelike sensations
when I feel this way, or after dinner. I feel jittery. My brain is
just going. My stools are loose and I have a nervous stomach and nervous
chills. I feel touchy, irritable, and I can’t stand noise. I feel
so hungry. Am I going to have a nervous breakdown? Am I going nuts?”
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