When A Person Goes Beserk, It Can Last A Few Days

Business, Communication.

When good people go bonkers - we all go nuts sometimes. When this happens, the bizarre behavior of the suddenly wacko can bring damage to themselves, and yes, their business relationships, even their furniture.

Even someone as sublimely well balanced as myself goes off the deep end once in a while. - why do we go bananas? Sometimes a situation pushes a button in our psyche which releases a gusher of emotion stored from long - ago pain. Sometimes we allow frustrations to accumulate without releases such as" talking it through" , physical activity or masturbation until we boil over. This eruption can come seemingly from nowhere and usually scares the piss out of everyone in range including the eruptor himself. I believe the term they used was" we have more patients in crisis" .

At Evanston( IL) Hospital Outpatient Psychiatry, where I spent a six month internship bringing better mental health to scores of afflicted suburbanites, it was openly discussed that more people would flip out during the full moon. - is this human response to the 28 day lunar cycle the etymology of" looney" ? This caused some UFO theorists to opine that women might actually be aliens not from Venus as originally believed, but rather from the Moon, come to disrupt the football games and bank accounts of men. Perhaps not so coincidently, another 28 day cycle which can bring occasional bouts of wackiness is the so - called female cycle, which is not to be confused with a Vespa motor scooter. Some say that men have a similar cycle - not to be confused with a Harley Davidson - but men are either too complex, or more likely far too simple and random for a true pattern to emerge. People in the throes of a psychotic episode can have superhuman strength.

Whatever the reason, when someone you know goes apeshit, do the following: Get the hell away. - they experience something similar to the legendary adrenalin rush which allows animal activists to lift cars off pinned - down pussy cats, a frequent sight in my neighborhood. Stay the hell away. Nutcases in full bloom can easily turn your head all the way around - remember Linda Blair in The Exorcist? - by grasping it lightly between thumb and forefinger. When a person goes beserk, it can last a few days. He is not negotiable yet.

During that time he will be manically obsessing about whatever insult or injury they perceived to have happened. - don' t even try unless your idea of fun is bashing your head repeatedly into masonry. After such an intense outpouring, Dr. Watch( from under the desk if necessary) for the real person to return. Jekyll will crash from exhaustion. That is the time for love and support.

When he emerges, he might be in the sheepish, "What happened? " mode. - try saying, "wow, you really went through something there, didn' t you? " if he says something normal, like" yes" , you are making progress. Have some sympathy. If he snarls or throws his mouse at you, revert to# 2 above. Remember, you have gone daffy yourself. It came from pain, didn' t it? Remember what it was like.

That' s what happened to your psycho, he had a tsunami of pain. - you might need this help if el loco stabbed you in the eye yesterday with a letter opener. Remembering this will help you be sympathetic. Let him talk and offer only gentle guidance. If you offer this insight yourself, you might get, especially too early your hand stapled to your ear. If a person talks enough, he will eventually realize that they got" out of line" , but he will need some space in order to realize this.

Listening is key. - nod slowly and knowingly after they say each sentence. Here' s how you do it: Look into the person' s eyes with a slightly sad frown. Resist the urge to offer your wonderful opinion - this part is called" shutting up" . Count to 1Then say one carefully chosen sentence which is either insightful or encouraging. Wait until he stops talking. Repeat until cool.

To really bring it on home, get your nutcase to commit to monitoring his reactions, so that if another triggering event occurs in the future, he will be ready with a better, more adaptive behavior. - to take lunatic handling to the state of the art, try to get him to analyze the triggering event and why it was so extroardinarily evocative. This might include removing himself from the situation with a planned excuse like, "Pardon me but I must leave this meeting unexpectedly because my dry cleaning is ready. "