Wendigo Psychosis: The Demon Within Symptoms & Prevalence The name wendigo comes from Canada as it is a culture based psychosis (among the North American regions and the Algonquian Indians) it means: One who has a chronic mental state where they lose their hold on reality and they believe they are possessed by an evil spirit of a cannibalistic demon which also goes by the name of Witiko. The Witiko were known to be demons of the winter, with long fingers, cryptic faces and antlers, a creature of the woods, who also were known for throwing up ice and having a heart made of ice. Witiko, wendigo or windigo is all the same to the locals of the Alberta region, and they tremble when they hear the name. Symptoms are characterized by an unappeasable …show more content…
urge to eat human flesh, even with what we would deem “normal” food was available the urge would continue. Delusions, disorganized behavior, and the realization that they are in fact becoming a cannibalistic monster.(Marino, Lonny. "Anatomy of a Fairytale: Wendigo Psychosis." (2015)) The Witiko, or Wendigo was originally a mythical monster with cannibalistic tendencies found in northern Algonquian folklore. There have been tales recorded about both the monster and the people who have become inflicted by this condition. “The affected individual may see the people around him turning into beavers or other edible animals” (Brown, J. 1971 The Cure and Feeding of Windigos. American Anthropologist 73:20–22.) In the seventy cases reported for Canada, “44 involve an actual act of cannibalism.” In 26 cases or 37 percent of the potential “wendigo” either recovered or was killed to prevent further cannibalism. Nevertheless, the Native people considered these cases “wendigo” (Vivian J Rohrl “A Nutritional Factor in Wendigo psychosis” San Diego University (1969)) Swift runner, 1878, a Plains Cree trapper in Canada butchered and ate his wife and his five remaining children, despite being within 25 miles of food supplies, and is the most famous well known case of wendigo psychosis. In the 20th Century, with the urbanization of the Algonquian people, wendigo psychosis sharply decreased and is now rare, although cannibalism is still a mental illness in certain psychosis and disorders. Causes The people of the Algonquian Region are known to suffer through brutal winters depriving them of proper food and other important nutritional needs, causing some to go into extreme survival mode in order to get through the very cold and savage winters of the North American Region. Depravities could well possibly prove to be one of the driving forces behind this psychotic break. A psychoanalytic elucidation of the psychosis: It is suggested that a cause of this condition represents a breaking down of egotistical defenses and an expression of dependency and aggression needs (Vivian J Rohrl “A Nutritional Factor in Wendigo psychosis” San Diego University (1969)) From a Neuroscientific approach the brain’s frontal lobe, amygdala, hypothalamus and thalamus are affected which are all very important to basic human everyday life and interaction. The frontal lobe is the section of the brain that makes decisions, from what you eat for breakfast to what you choose to be in the future. It is also used for speech and forming personality. The amygdala is an almond shaped piece, there are two of them and they are located close to the hippocampus, in the frontal portion of the temporal lobe. Your amygdalae are essential for your ability to feel particular emotions and to recognize them in other people. This includes fear and the many changes that it causes in the body. The hypothalamus is in charge of a lot of functions, especially the behaviors of hunger and thirst. The hypothalamus is involved in many functions of the autonomic nervous system and if it is affected you can see how it could affect one’s psychological balance.
The thalamus is the relay station of the brain: it takes information from the sensory glands and sends the information it gathers to the correct parts of the brain. (FREBERG “DISCOVERING BIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY” (2010)) Treatment Though gruesome and terrifying there has been successful treatment. Let us now turn our attention to those cases in which the individuals were cured. A Cree tale that involved a woman who had eaten her very own children and her husband, but was miraculously cured with a drink of melted bear’s grease. “The drink caused her to vomit ice, after which she came back to her natural self” (Vivian J Rohrl “A Nutritional Factor in Wendigo psychosis” San Diego University (1969)) The content of the bear meat are noted to having excellent source of Vitamin C that was probably extracted from the numerous berries bears tend to consume, also bears are notably known for eating fish especially salmon, Salmon is an prominent source of vitamin B12, selenium, vitamin D, Niacin, omega-3 fatty acids, protein, phosphorus, and vitamin B6. It is
also a very good source of choline, pantothenic acid, biotin, and potassium.
legends about those wild half-human beasts who haunt the edges of our forests and lurk in the
Before Kirkbride's standardized methods for mental hospitals, those with mental illness suffered crude and inhuman treatment. Beginning in Colonial America society, people suffering from mental illness were referred to as lunatics. Colonists viewed lunatics as being possessed by the devil, and usually were removed from societ...
Misery loves company and in Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener", Bartleby exhibits traits of depression and catatonic schizophrenia as defined in the DSM-IV; however the narrator's other employees also show symptoms of catatonia either influenced by Bartleby or by Melville's own mental state. The theme of mental disorder is prominent throughout the text and a close analysis of specific passages in concordance with the DSM-IV will first reveal how Bartleby exemplifies these mental disorders and secondly show to what extent the entire story serves to personify them.
Throughout time, mankind has persistently been seeking ways to maintain their health and to cure those that had not been so fortunate in that task. Just about everything has been experimented with as a cure for some type of illness whether physical, spiritual or mental. There has always been evidence of spiritual healing and it will continue to be an important part of any healing process, large or small. In particular, the roots of Native American Medicine men (often a woman in some cultures) may be traced back to ancient times referred to as Shaman. A special type of healer used by the Indians is referred to as a medicine man (comes from the French word medecin, meaning doctor).
Archeologists speculate that treatment for mental illnesses dates back to the Neolithic era, where a hole would be chipped into the skull by a sharp object to relieve the patient of an evil spirit. The diagnosis and acknowledgment of particular types of mental illness date back to the 5th century BC in Greece (Harris). Since then, the classification of different mental illnesses has varied immensely. Some classification methods included a handful of diagnostic categories while others included thousands (“History of the DSM”). However, recent Western diagnoses of mental illnesses stem from Sigmund Freud in the mid-to-late 1800s (McLeod). Currently, mental illness is defined as a group of mental disorders that causes severe disturbances in thinking, feeling, and relating
(Lawren). It had the body shape and the head of a goat, and a dappled coat
Folk medicine is an important aspect of the Appalachian region. According to Mathews, folk medicine is known in involving diseases or illnesses “which are the products of indigenous cultural development and are not explicitly derived from the conceptual framework of modern medicine” (Mathews 1). Folk or traditional medicine is found in all societies, throughout in history, and predates innovation of modern medicine. Folk medicine also explains roles for “indigenous practitioners”(1) who treat and restore health for the individual and community. Folk medicine beliefs and practices serve for the treatment and prevention of aliments and are resistant to change even when the cultural tradition may have gone extinct.
Lesley Stevens and Ian Rodin justified the need of acquisition to the mental disorders’ aetiology in their book “Psychiatry”. They pointed out the fact that psychiatrists need to be familiar with the contribution of a particular disorder in order to make a more confident in the diagnosis. Knowing the aetiology of psychotic disorder is as important as the diagnosis. For the simple reason that psychotic disorders do not have particular tests that can be made for diagnosis; on the contrary, physical illnesses do. Knowing the probability of patients vulnerability to a particular disorder helps in the diagnosis. They gave an example explaining that the probability of having angina is more likely in a 60-year-old male smoker rather than a 30 year-old female non-smoker. Although the causes of schizophrenia remains incompletely reveled, research has shown strong factors that might contribute to the disorder. The factors that increase the risk of schizophrenia include: genetics, environmental factors, and some encephalon(brain) abnormalities.
The treatment of the mentally ill started back in the far past. In 400 BC, Hippocrates, who was a Greek physician, treated mental illness as diseases of disturbed physiology, and not displeasure of the Gods or demonic possession ("Timeline: Treatments for," ). Greek medical writers found treatments such as quiet, occupation, and the use of a drug called purgative hellebore ("Timeline: Treatments for,”). During these times, family members took care of the mentally ill ("Timeline: Treatments for,”). In the middle Ages, the Europeans let the mentally ill have their freedom, as long as they were not dangerous ("Timeline: Treatments for,”). The mentally ill were also seen as witches who were possessed by demons ("Timeline: Treatments for,”). In 1407, the first mental illness establishment was made in Valencia, Spain ("Timeline: Treatments for,”).
“Schizophrenia is Greek and comes from the words ‘split’ (skhizein) and ‘mind’ (phren) which was introduced by Eugen Bleuler. Schizophrenia is a devastating psychotic disorder that may involve characteristic disturbances in thinking (delusions), perception (hallucinations), speech, emotions, and behavior” (Barlow and Durand, page G-17, 470). It is sometimes categorized as prophets, witches, and devils (Kaplan and Sadock, page 1432). “Schizophrenia is a serious and lifelong mental disorder that affects one percent of the population worldwide. The onset is occurs mainly in adolescence or early adulthood” (Minzengberg and Yoon, Chapter 10). Though it mainly occurs in adolescence and early adulthood, it is also common in late adulthood.
In prehistory, the idea of a mental illness was challenging to comprehend. The people of these ancient times thought it was magical spirits o...
History shows that signs of mental illness and abnormal behavior have been documented as far back as the early Greeks however, it was not viewed the same as it is today. The mentally ill were previously referred to as mad, insane, lunatics, or maniacs. W.B. Maher and B.A. Maher (1985) note how many of the terms use had roots in old English words that meant emotionally deranged, hurt, unhealthy, or diseased. Although early explanations were not accurate, the characteristics of the mentally ill have remained the same and these characteristics are used to diagnose disorders to date. Cultural norms have always been used to assess and define abnormal behavior. Currently, we have a decent understanding of the correlates and influences of mental illness. Although we do not have complete knowledge, psychopathologists have better resources, technology, and overall research skills than those in ancient times.
There are documents written by “healers, philosophers, and writers throughout the ages point to the long-standing existence of depression as a health problem, and the continuous and sometimes ingenious struggles people have made to find effective ways to treat this illness.”.. said (RASHMI NEMADE, 2007). Depression was once called “melancholia.” It was in ancient Mesopotamian texts in the second millennium B.C. This place was “an ancient region in the eastern Mediterranean bounded in the northeast by the Zagros Mountains and in the southeast by the Arabian Plateau, corresponding to today’s Iraq, mostly, but also parts of modern-day Iran, Syria and Turkey.” (Mark, 2009) Anyway, mental illnesses at that time were attributed to being possessed by demons (which I find sadly kind of accurate.) Apparently, the “first historical understanding of depression was thus that depression was a spiritual (or mental) illness rather than a physical one.” (RASHMI NEMADE, 2007) Long story short, throughout time ancient Greek and Roman literature had plenty of demonic references in regards to mental illnesses. “In the 5th century B.C., the Greek historian Herodotus wrote about a king who was driven mad by evil spirits.” (RASHMI NEMADE, 2007) Chinese, Babylonian, and Egyptian civilizations all decided on demonic possession but used exorcism techniques such as beatings, restraint, and
Culture-bound syndrome is a broad normality that incorporates certain behavioral, affective and cognitive phenomenon seen in different cultures. The phenomena are irregular from the common behavior that the individual of that culture might exhibit. The dynamic nature of the category makes it difficult to define and has lead a dispute on what would be the most proper name and definition for it. The DSM-IV (appendix I, p.844) defines culture-bound syndrome: recurrent, locality-specific patterns of aberrant behavior and disturbing experience that may or may not be linked to a particular DSM-IV diagnostic category. Many of these patterns are indigenously considered to be “illness”, or at least disorders, and most have local culture names. People
Mental illness dates back to 5000 BCE, it was believed back then that mental illness was the result of “supernatural phenomena such as spiritual or demonic possession, sorcery, the evil eye, or an angry deity and were treated with mystical treatments such as exorcisms, prayers, charms, amulet and brutal treatments” (Atkinson, R.L. et al.1996)