Character Disorders |
||
|
|
||
|
The forms of mental illness that most people find it most difficult to accept as illness belong to the group called character disorders." These occur in individuals who persistently show abnormal personality disturbances. They include those who seem merely inadequate and ineffectual, those who are abnormally angry and aggressive, those who deviate from normal sexual patterns, those who are unsocial, those who use alcohol excessively or become addicted to drugs, and those who commit crimes. Such people in general are characterized by a repetitive sort of self-defeating behavior, by an inability to learn from experience, and by being incapable of conforming to the ordinary rules of society. We find it hard to accept them as ill because we see them as lacking in will-power, moral judgment, and strength of character. They are, however, ill, unable to live in such a way as to let them get along with their fellow human beings. Their psychological problems have shaped their ways of doing things, their characters, their personalities. Therefore we call their symptoms "character disorders," "personality disturbances," "character neuroses." You will also hear such persons called by an older term, "psychopathic personality." It must be remembered that these people are sick. It should be noted, finally, that some experts believe that there is no hard and fast dividing line between the psychoses, neuroses, and character disorders. Rather they feel that many people facing stresses of living that cause anxiety to develop, retreat into some kind of behavior that solves their problems, however inadequate the particular solution may appear to the outsider. Each of these persons has developed a certain kind of defense against the impact of the strains of the world. What kind of defense this is spells out the special illness from which he suffers. Thus the anxious man, the psychopath, the schizophrenic may turn to the solutions of alcohol or narcotics. Much of modern psychiatry is devoted to understanding the nature and purpose of these defenses. Most of all, it must be understood that these mental illnesses are not willful, not rationally chosen, not deliberate falsifications. Rather they are the result of forces that are truly unconscious, forces the patient is not aware of or able to control until he has had treatment. Mental illness is the result of unconscious—not conscious—motivations within the patient. The simulation of disease, the faking of illness, known technically as malingering, is rare. When it does occur, it is itself a sign of mental illness. |
||