Quote:
Originally Posted by alice md
What is this based on? Or in other words if they look like another disease, how do you know it is not that disease?
Who are those others and why do you think they are different from you?
what kind of psychological help and how does it alleviate their symptoms?
How do you differentiate between a patient with a "real" illness (even cancer) who does better with emotional support and a patient with a "non-real" illness who does better with emotional support?
How exactly do you rule out everything?
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Those are good questions and I wish I had better answers (I'll try to think of some).
The irony of that post was that I spent a long time trying to convince doctors that I have a real illness and any emotional problems may have stem from that illness, not the other way around.
When I was in college, the health clinic wouldn't see me until I saw a psychologist who put me in a group therapy for loneliness. Looking back I wonder who was more crazy--her for thinking bouts of weakness and tetness-like symptoms were caused because I was lonely, or me for being lonely.
That said, I think it is possible for emotional/psychological issues to manifest as physical symptoms. For example, depression can cause fatigue, but so can MG. In general, though, its too easy for doctors blame something they don't understand on psychological problems. I'm sure some neurologist at UVA would have loved to have me as a patient and been able to get a good case study, but they decided to send me for counciling instead.