Good health is what many people wish as long as they live. Any problems with health normally complicate the situation in families. Marylen Moss is thirty-eight years of age. She has a reliable husband whose name is George. It is her second marriage. She bore two children in her previous marriage. But now they have grown up.
The chief complaint is that Marylen has a mood disorder. Her psychological problem has caused her to feel ecstatic and have erratic behaviors. She needs medication and or treatment to help her come back to normal again (Coaley, 2010).
The history of this present illness started few months after she got pregnant. Four months into her pregnancy, her moods changed (Boyle, Matthews, & Saklofske, 2012). She grew very tired. She could sleep until after midday. She started having problems with her appetite. It caused her to lose weight. She gave birth when she had lost so much weight that she was several pounds lighter (Coaley, 2010).
It affected her entire work at home and the workplace. She could not continue keeping both records correctly (Langwith, 2009). It caused her to stop dealing with the family and business finances. She could not focus long enough to come up with the right records (Goodwin & Sachs, 2010).
All this time George had been thinking that it was the pregnancy that was causing her to have changes in her moods. Towards the end of her pregnancy term, she confessed her feelings to her husband (Coaley, 2010). She thought she could not survive the childbirth. So she wished her husband well with her baby after birth (Goodwin & Sachs, 2010). She thought that her condition was not going to improve.
Immediately after giving birth to the first child in her second marriage, her moods changed abruptly. She was no longer getting tired. The long night sleeping hours till afternoon also disappeared (Langwith, 2009). All these disappeared instantly after birth, and she seemed to have a lot of energy (Coaley, 2010).
She had never had such symptoms in her life. The new personality traits have been with her for the past one month. It is a medical condition that the husband does not understand. She had not sought any medical help (Krawitz & Jackson, 2008). Her mood swings indicated bipolar symptoms (Langwith, 2009).
The pregnancy, therefore, triggered a major depression. She has some neurovegetative symptoms (Echevarria, 2012). She has middle and terminal insomnia. She cannot sleep ordinarily. Her sleep lasts two to three hours. On the day before the visit to the hospital, she had woken up at five in the morning.
It means she had slept at around two or three in the morning. She wakes up feeling restless, but ready to go. She does not take any medication for sleep and does not have nightmares. Her condition only causes her to become a lot more active than normal. But she does not go about destroying everything. She is not a threat.
When she was pregnant, she lost most of her weight because of lack of appetite (Goodwin & Sachs, 2010). But after pregnancy, Marylen has not had problems with her appetite. She has also not taken measurements for her weight, even though she has been eating a lot lately (Langwith, 2009). She has a lot of energy during the day until she surprises her husband. It is not normal for her to behave that way (Echevarria, 2012).
Moss used to enjoy opening her bakery shop and doing business. Lately, she has been doing badly with the finances (Langwith, 2009). At some point, she tried charging their Visa card for the kitchen supplies. Her sexual drive has also increased. She cannot concentrate on one thing. She keeps changing from one activity to another.
The maniac phase started after her few moments of normalcy (Boyle, Matthews, & Saklofske, 2012). She thinks of opening her bakery, but it is just in her minds. In the real sense, she is not up to the task. She is only fantasizing. She develops the grandiose illusion.
On a scale of one to ten, her mood can be eight. She feels very happy about herself (Goodwin & Sachs, 2010). She likes going out with her girlfriends to have fun on weekends. She does not have bad thoughts about other people. She only thought of dying when she was pregnant (Langwith, 2009). But afterward she feels full of life and would go out of her way to always feel happy (Krawitz & Jackson, 2008).
The manic symptoms include her sexual urge and the desire for instant gratification (Echevarria, 2012). Her spending sprees are also out of control. She also has racing thoughts. She starts things and leaves them unfinished. She could not concentrate in the shop; she could also not do and finish baking (Boyle, Matthews, & Saklofske, 2012).
She has not had any psychiatric disorders. During all this time, there had been no doctor who had diagnosed Marylen because she had not visited any hospital. There is no history of her taking alcohol or drug abuse prescription (Boyle, Matthews, & Saklofske, 2012). The only drug that she has been taking is Marijuana. She used to take it before pregnancy. She also continued using it after pregnancy (Langwith, 2009).
George and Marylen have a family business. When her condition was poor, her husband used to continue with the business. During the examination, she seemed restless and guarded. She was anxious and told of how she felt better than at any time in her life.
Marylen has had no physical injuries. She does not show any signs of allergies. She has also not been exercising. She has been using her energy move around and do things that she feels make her happy. There are also no visible signs of any accident.
It is not possible to tell if there has been a family history of the disorder. Since her response to questions is still not very clear, there is some information that would remain unclear perhaps until after medication. She still has a good and working relationship with her husband.
Despite discovering her condition, husband still understands her and would like to help. He is the one who decides to take her for the medical examination. The family does not have financial problems for now. They can still maintain their family with that they have (Langwith, 2009). The husband continues to work so that he can provide for the family.
Marylen is one of the few people who are struggling with mood disorders in the world. Sometimes it is not easy to recognize the condition when it starts. For instance, Marylen’s husband had thought that she was just sad because of her third pregnancy after a long time. But the pregnancy had triggered depression that was slowly wearing her down.
References
Boyle, G., Matthews, G., & Saklofske, D. (2012). Psychological assessment. London: SAGE.
Coaley, K. (2010). An introduction to psychological assessment and psychometrics. London: SAGE.
Echevarria, K. (2012). Mood disorder. Delhi: Research World.
Goodwin, G., & Sachs, G. (2010). Bipolar disorder. Abingdon: HEALTH Press.
Krawitz, R., & Jackson, W. (2008). Borderline personality disorder. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Langwith, J. (2009). Mood disorders. Detroit: Greenhaven Press.