Essay On Mental Illness

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A mental illness is any of various conditions characterized by impairment of an individual normal cognitive, emotional, or behavioral functioning, and caused by racial, psychological, biochemical, genetic, or other factors, such as infection or head trauma. The history of mental illnesses dates back to 5000 BCE, and the way our thinking process and knowledge is how are very different. Back then they didn’t have the knowledge on the illnesses that we do now. When you think of a mental illness you may be thinking something totally different than what the word actually means, there are several disorders that people have that fall under a mental illness. Though back then if you did not seem completely normal or you were different, you were diagnosed as having mental illness. Attempt to treat mental illness date back as early as 5000 BCE (before Common Era). Early man strongly believed that mental illness was associated with the supernatural phenomena such as spiritual or demonic possession, sorcery, the evil eye, or an angry deity and so responded with equally mystical and sometime brutal treatments. The word trephining also known as trepanning first occurred in the Neolithic times. What they did during this procedure was they chipped into the skull using crude stone instruments. They believed that through this opening the evil spirits thought to be in one’s head and causing their psychopathology would be released and the person with the illness would suddenly be cured. Some people that underwent this harsh procedure lived for many years, but some died very suddenly, afterward as trephined skulls of primitive humans having signs of healing. Today we have medications that will relieve our pain, so for someone to undergo a procedure s... ... middle of paper ... ... Mentally ill were said to have “bad fate” and that they were a negative influence, this is why the family would abandoned them. People actually thought that mentally illness was contagious. Things did change over time in history some for the good and some for the bad, but we do have to think if someone didn’t start somewhere in trying to cure where would we be today, you have to start somewhere. It’s interesting to me how long ago people were being diagnosed or classified as mentally ill. Yes, the things done to the mentally ill was wrong, but we have to say to ourselves they didn’t have the education or knowledge we have today. We today are very lucky for the education we are capable of receiving, because they didn’t have the opportunities we have now. So I hope I gave you an insight on the history of mental illnesses. Things really have changed over time.

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