Up to 80% of patients who come to see a doctor call fictitious symptoms. It seems to them that they are ill, but in fact they are healthy, said psychiatrist Andrei Berezantsev. There are similar figures in scientific research. For example, in the work of the Norwegian scientist Holger Ursin it is said that 25-60% of the symptoms reported by patients "do not have a sufficient biological and physiological basis."
Most often they invent diseases for themselves hypochondriacs. This is the name for those who are constantly worried about the possibility of contracting one or more diseases, as well as those who are sure that they have some kind of disease.
“When I was 16 years old, they found a tumor in my chest,” says Elena Golovanova from Moscow. - The doctor said it was most likely cancer. When the biopsy was done, it turned out that the tumor was benign. But for 10 days, while I was waiting for the results of the biopsy, I lived with the thought that I was about to die. It was absolute despair, because I had not had time to do anything yet - even to go to college. I never expected that life would end.
The tumor was removed, and after the operation, Elena went to the hospital for dressings.
- This was really scary. The fact is that patients who really had oncology went with me, says Elena. - They had scars: someone on the neck, someone on the chest, someone did not have nipples. They showed each other what they cut off and talked about it. One elderly patient was really scared. She said: “You young people think that your benign tumor has been removed. But wait until the results of histology (that is, examination of the tumor after surgery) come. They will find cancer in you anyway and they will cut everything out for you."
After such words, Elena could not sleep at night.
“I was scared to go to bed,” she says. - It seemed to me that something was hurting me or that I had something solid in my body. I was very afraid that I had cancer. It got to the point that I often had a feeling that the temperature was rising, I felt weakness throughout my body. Then my hands began to be taken away: I wake up at night and understand that I cannot move my hands. I was gasping for breath, I had a rapid heartbeat. It seemed to me that now my heart would burst from my chest. There were pains in all organs. Sometimes it all calmed down for a week, but then it started again. I got up, woke up my parents, said that I felt bad, and asked to call an ambulance.
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However, after checking it turned out that there were no problems in the body.
- That is, it was all nonsense, it all just seemed to me. And it was impossible to manage it, - says Elena. - Then I decided to go to a therapist, passed all the tests that can be passed, and all the results were good. Then I felt that I had a tumor in my chest again and went to the oncologist. But he said there was nothing. I didn’t believe it, paid the money for the X-ray, and after 15 minutes I stood with the image in my hands and could not believe that there was really no tumor. How so - I feel it? The period of hypochondria ended in me only at 22 years old. But even now, when I'm 24, it sometimes finds me.
Hypochondria usually occurs in people who are prone to anxiety, suspiciousness, depression, long-term experience of traumatic events.
When doctors do not believe such a patient, he directs all his efforts to find as much evidence as possible that he is really sick, so it is difficult for him to help.
Can a person, having convinced himself that he is sick, get sick in reality?
“Experiments with suggested burns are known,” says Andrei Berezantsev. - When a person under hypnosis is told that something hot has been applied to his body, he has blisters, as if it were really a burn. But these mechanisms have not been studied.
The first experiment with induced burns was carried out in France in 1885. The subject was 47-year-old Eliza. Psychiatrist Gaston Focachon suggested to her that she had burnt skin on her back between her shoulder blades. A few hours after the hypnosis session, she developed a burning sensation and itching in this place. The next day there was already inflammation with purulent fluid. Later, a bubble appeared, which happens precisely with burns.
In addition, according to Andrey Berezantsev, depression and anxiety undermine the mechanism of somatic regulation. As a result, existing diseases can really worsen.
A person with this syndrome also imagines a disease for himself and believes in it. But he does this not out of fear of getting sick, but out of a desire to attract attention to himself.
Valentina Ivanovna is 62 years old. She lives in a small village. Home alone. Both her sons have grown up long ago, they have their own families. The grandchildren come to visit from time to time. But she has pressure, osteochondrosis, allergies, gastritis, periodontitis and a whole list of diseases - she made these diagnoses to herself. It's a long way to get to the clinic in the regional center, but she went there every day. The doctors could not understand her and said that she was healthy.
But one day Valentina Ivanovna met Vasily Petrovich. They went to a disco for those over 50. And since then they have not parted for three months. They live together, go for walks and happily babysit their grandchildren - both her and him. During this time, Valentina Ivanovna never went to the doctor. Because now Vasily Petrovich is taking care of her.
“A person plays the role of a sick person, and at the same time he sincerely believes that he is sick,” says Andrey Berezantsev.
According to him, Munchausen syndrome is more common in people with a demonstrative personality type. They need to be in the spotlight, and they do it in all sorts of ways. First, they try to evoke feelings of sympathy or respect, and if this does not work out, they seek compassion and empathy. Sometimes they deliberately violate discipline and clown around so as not to go unnoticed.
Maria is 25 years old, she constantly has a headache. Painkillers don't help, doctors don't prescribe any medication. She passed many tests, but no illnesses were found in her. The pressure is fine, all organs are working as they should. Masha has irregular working hours, constant deadlines, she has no time to eat and sleep.
She has not been on vacation for two years, there is absolutely no time for her personal life, and at home her parents remind her every day that they are expecting a wedding and grandchildren.
After each important project at work, Maria's condition deteriorates so much that she asks the doctors to give her sick leave. After a few days at home, the girl gets better and the symptoms disappear.
- I once worked as a psychotherapist in a polyclinic. And now such patients constantly went to the therapist, to the endocrinologist, to the gynecologist, - says Andrey Berezantsev. - There are a lot of them. But they themselves will not go to a psychiatrist. Colleagues sent to me. Patients began to resent: "What am I - abnormal?" But at the reception, it turned out that they had clear signs of depression. After a course of antidepressants, they began to feel much better, all pains and other symptoms disappeared.
And such a depressive state, according to him, can develop, among other things, due to chronic stress at work.
It is also believed that psychosomatic illnesses arise from relationship problems or difficult decisions.
According to the American psychologist Leslie Lecron, when there is a struggle between opposing desires in a person, the defeated desire can declare a "guerrilla war." Pain in the body will be its sign.
Sometimes a psychological state is reflected on the body, which can be expressed by the phrases: "this is a continuous headache", "I cannot digest it", "because of this my heart is out of place."
Sometimes a person punishes himself, getting sick: he is tormented by a feeling of guilt, and punishment helps to survive this feeling.
Or the patient may associate himself with a person to whom he is emotionally attached and who has become ill or died. As a result, he himself also “gets sick”.
It is not always possible for doctors to distinguish when the body hurts and when the soul hurts. According to the calculations of the already mentioned scientist Holger Ursin, doctors in more than half of the cases make a diagnosis and issue sick leave only on the basis of complaints voiced by patients.
Alexandra Rykova
