A Comparison and Contrast Essay about Psychosis vs Neurosis

Brain disorders are commonly misunderstood due to the actions of the person living with it. Knowledge about brain disorders or mental illness should lessen the misunderstanding of the disorder, and increase the support for the people suffering with the disorder. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a mental disorder is a mental or behavioural pattern or anomaly that causes distress or disability, and which is not developmentally or socially normative. Mental disorders are generally defined by how a person feel, acts, thinks or perceives. I will be discussing two mental disorders in which, they are often misunderstood as the same. This essay is about Psychosis vs. Neurosis. Both mental disorders cause the person suffering from it some distress and their behaviour is not socially acceptable. Both disorders are mostly diagnosed based on the harm they caused. When these disorders become severe, it is difficult for people with these mental disorders or illness to carry out daily activities and do some social interaction. Psychosis however is a mental condition which is referred to as â€Å"a loss of contact with reality. † People suffering from this type of mental illness are called Psychotic. The symptoms of people with psychosis are suffering from hallucinations, delusions, catatonia or thought disorder. The psychosis of a person is usually triggered by a history of a traumatic event, and stress. Stress triggers a short-lived psychosis called brief reactive psychosis and people suffering from this usually recovers to their normal state within two weeks. In some cases, a full-blown psychosis could last a long time, and maybe have attenuated psychotic symptom (such as low intensity hallucinations) present at most times. Brief hallucinations are triggered by falling asleep and then waking, bereavement (hallucinations of a dead loved one) severe sleep deprivation, caffeine intoxication, and an extremely stressful event. There are also subtypes of psychosis. These are menstrual psychosis (in rhythm with menstrual cycle), postpartum psychosis (which happens after childbirth), monothematic delusions, occupational psychosis, stimulant psychosis and shared psychosis. Neurosis, on the other hand, is a mental disorder involving distress, but people who are neurotic are not suffering from hallucinations or delusions. Signs of people suffering from neurosis have anxiety, sadness or depression, anger, irritability , mental confusion, and low sense of self-worth. There are also behavioural symptoms such as phobic avoidance, vigilance, impulsive and compulsive acts. There are cognitive problems such as obsession, disturbing thoughts, habitual fantasizing, negativity, cynicism, etc. There are many forms of neurosis. These are: obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety neurosis, personality disorders, hysteria, and an endless variety of phobias. Neurosis is simply defined as a â€Å"poor ability to adapt to one’s environment, an inability to change one’s life patterns, and the inability to develop a richer, more complex, more satisfying personality. † According to Carl Jung, â€Å"people became neurotic when they content themselves with inadequate or wrong answers to the questions of life. † He said that the unconscious finds expression primarily through an individual’s inferior psychological function, whether it is feeling, thinking, sensing, or intuition. For me, psychosis and neurosis are very different yet similar. The behaviour of psychotic and neurotic people are both not accepted or understood by the society. People with less knowledge about these illnesses often has a negative perception on people suffering with psychosis and neurosis.