Neurosis is a group of diseases caused by psychological causes (psychotrauma, chronic conflict). They are accompanied by a violation of general well-being, mood instability and passing bodily disorders.
Initially, a person develops pre-neurotic conditions: anxiety, restlessness, hypersensitivity to standard stimuli, insomnia, manifestations of lethargy or fussiness in behavior. Then a neurotic reaction develops - a short-term appearance of some neurotic symptom, which usually disappears on its own after a few days. If the neurotic reaction lasts more than 2 weeks, doctors diagnose the actual neurosis.
The general decline in the sense of vitality (vigor vitalis) is one of the most significant components of the neurotic state.
Usually, the following main forms of neurosis are distinguished:
– Neurasthenia - a state of irritable weakness, i.e. a combination of increased excitability and irritability with rapid fatigue and exhaustion, poor tolerance of emotional and physical stress, external stimuli. Often there are sleep disturbances and various autonomic reactions: palpitations, sweating, cold extremities.
- hysterical neurosis arises in connection with the increased suggestion and self-hypnosis of the patient and manifests itself more often in persons with a hysterical and demonstrative character. In earlier times, the most characteristic manifestation of this neurosis was hysterical convulsive seizures. Reversible paralysis of the arms and legs, loss of sensation in the form of “gloves”, “socks”, and gait disturbances may occur. Hysterical blindness, deafness, dumbness occur less frequently. Such a reaction for patients is a kind of protective behavior in the current conflict situation.
- obsessive compulsive disorder (now called obsessive-compulsive disorder, also referred to as anxiety disorders) is the involuntary occurrence of obsessive thoughts, fears, movements. They are perceived by the sick as unwanted, they fight with them, but cannot get rid of them. Most often there are obsessive fears (phobias), therefore, a phobic neurosis is diagnosed, usually associated with an obsessive fear of death or the fear of getting serious illnesses.
– Hypochondriacal neurosis - a condition with unreasonably increased attention to one's health and a pathological belief in the presence of a serious incurable disease. This form of neurosis can develop from other forms of neurosis, such as phobic neurosis, or it can arise independently in psychotraumatic situations.
– Depressive neurosis (neurotic depression) is a psychogenic depressive state in which low mood is combined with functional somatic disorders (vegetative-vascular dystonia). Unlike classical depression, patients lack ideas of self-blame, hopelessness and hopelessness of the future, suicidality, activity and initiative are slightly reduced, perhaps even “flight to work”.
The eminent psychologist Carl Jung believed that “The lack of meaning in life plays a critical role in the etiology of neurosis. Ultimately, neurosis should be understood as the suffering of a soul that does not find its meaning ... About a third of my cases are suffering not from some clinically definable neurosis, but from the meaninglessness and aimlessness of one's own life.
Neurosis often precedes the development of psychosomatic diseases. One of the founders of psychosomatics, Franz Alexander, argued that the manifestation of somatic disorders is caused by autonomic neuroses - neurotic complexes forced into the subconscious. The Viennese psychoanalyst Felix Deutsch said that "in every organic disease, a neurosis is played out on a small scale." A prominent Soviet physiologist and student of IP Pavlov, academician K. M. Bykov, wrote that neurosis is the beginning of any disease, whatever its cause.
We have developed an effective program for the complex treatment of neurosis, including psychotherapy and transcranial magnetic stimulation.