Mental disorders in pre-industrial/fantasy worlds

I have anxiety disorders. It is a hell lot different from being anxious. Take this short visualization:

Brain: Oh hey look, a party but will I let you enjoy it? You bet I won't!

Your spine feels cold, heck your body feels cold, like a blanket drenched in ice cold water was placed on you. Knees feel like jelly, your head spins and feels light and you feel disoriented. And let us not forget shortness of breath and the urge to vomit. FOR NO RATIONAL REASON.

I'm sure you've been plain anxious before. Compare that feeling with my example.

 

Ok, I'll have a go at this...

Depression: the character might be lethargic, sulky, brooding, withdrawn, disinterested in life in general or with things he/she used to like.

Anxiety: Timid, fidgety, hates crowds or new people/experiences, stress, sweats, cramps, heart flutters, headaches, skittish, stammering (maybe), and usually quiet in a group.

Autism: The above examples for anxiety but amplified, withdrawn, aloof, quiet(maybe), inappropriate or misunderstood in social situations, comfortable with routine and solitude, meek, austere on the outside vs soft on the inside, avoids eye contact, fiddles with fingers/nervous tic, quirky, awkward...and stems (like flapping hands, twitching feet, rocking back and forth).

Schizophrenia: This one is hard but obviously hallucinations would be present, talking to themselves, confusion, hysteria, endangering self, aggrandizing self, aggression...That's all I got

My MC is would probably qualify as autistic, but he comes out of his shell later on. In the beginning he does seem crazy, seeing hallucinations of phantoms and imaginary friends, but the reason is supernatural in nature and has nothing to do with Schizophrenia.

 

Do you actually need to convey that it's a specific, namable condition? Take bipolar disorder, for instance--you could confirm that your character has it, but it would create the same effect just to confirm that the character has mood swings and doesn't know why. It might even be more effective that way--the character doesn't know what it is, so neither does the readership.

 

Hi,

Without knowing how you're writing it my take would be to just use some outside perspectives. For example the woman in the town square talking to herself might be assumed by most to be possessed or talking to fairies etc. But someone else could come along and say "No she's just crazy."

The town butcher who might be bipolar and up one day and down the next might be described by most as difficult and with moods that change like the weather. Manic is a word that has often been used. So instead of saying normally changeable you' say something like wildly unpredictable, and it's just the way he is.

Those these conditions weren't diagnosed centuries ago, they were around and they were known. A lot of the English language has been developed simply to describe them. But as a proviso, people who were truly mad were feared and shunned. So the chances were that anyone suffering from an extreme form of mental illness would have been driven out of town long before, killed or hidden away. That's one reason the British aristocracy were known as being a bit mad. They could afford to hide their nutty sons and daughters away keeping them safe and cared for and of course word kept getting out. Eventually some of them even inherited. Mrs. Jones down the road of course couldn't do that, and her child soon got arrested or killed and was quickly forgotten.

Cheers, Greg.

 

Or believed to be a sacred person in favor with the gods, depending on the time period and location.

 

If I would include mental disorders in my novels, I read up on the disorder.
I have several characters with PTSD, my current WIP has orphans so I am reading up on the disorders related to abandonment at a young age, magnified by a system that don't understand the needs of a child.

I think a realistic description of disorders helps people see the fantasy world as having some similarities to our world. Mental disorders were ignored or the people that suffered with them were locked away if they could not care for themselves.

PTSD-shell shock, battle rage, has been around for as long as there has been war.
Orphanage issues: RAD-Reaction attachment disorder-child won't bond with anyone or overly bonds with everyone.