Childhood is often considered to be a magical time. Imagination is encouraged, and creativity is applauded. As children grow, less importance is placed on imaginative play until it is often positively discouraged when we are adults.

Many behaviors that are supported in children are viewed as mental health disorders in adults. It is thought that many adults still indulge in this kind of play but keep quiet about it out of concern that they will be considered mad.

Here are 10 common childhood behaviors that are considered mental disorders in adults.

10 Human Mental Disorders That Affect Pets Too

10 They Have Imaginary Friends

Many young children have imaginary friends. Sometimes, it is difficult to know whether they are playing “pretend” or whether they really believe that they have friends whom only they can see. These companions can be invisible friends or personified objects (like stuffed animals).

Researchers at the University of Oregon estimate that 37 percent of children have had an invisible friend by age seven. These friends can appear to be humans, animals, or even fantasy creatures. When the invisible friends are human, research has shown that boys almost always see male imaginary friends, while girls have friends of both sexes.

Although it is traditionally thought that these friends are conjured by lonely youngsters looking for companionship, this is not always the case. Many children develop good social skills as a result of their friendships.^[1]

The same cannot always be said for the imaginary friends. They are sometimes naughty—not coming when they are called, for example. Also, when something has been broken or someone has made a mess, the invisible friend is often blamed for it. However, researchers discovered that even very young children were usually aware that their invisible friends were “only pretend.”

Although an imaginary friend in childhood is not a cause for concern, it can become so in adulthood, particularly when it is believed that the friend is real. Adults may act out conversations or role-play situations with a friend who is imagined. When adults talk to invisible friends whom they believe to be real, those individuals may be suffering from schizophrenia. This is particularly true when the friends talk back.

9 They Think They Can Fly

Many children report having a recurring memory of flying.

Some children can vividly describe how flying feels as well as the things that they saw and did while flying. Others develop an inner conviction that they can fly, but they have just forgotten how.

However, this belief in adults can be a symptom of psychosis. In 2013, 17-year-old Henry Kwan jumped from the top-floor balcony of his home after taking synthetic LSD. The drug induced a psychotic episode in which Kwan believed that he could fly. Despite his mother’s attempts to restrain him, Henry Kwan took off his clothes and fell from the balcony to his death.^[2]

This is a particularly dangerous delusion, and sufferers are advised to seek help.

8 They Believe They Are Someone Else

It is common for a child to adopt a different persona. Role-playing can be a crucial part of a child’s development as he “tries out” different characters. Researchers have speculated that pretending to be an astronaut or a fireman, for example, can allow a youngster to practice making “predictions about others’ actions and thoughts.”

While they are playing, children often believe that they are the astronaut or the fireman. For most youngsters, their game will last only an hour or two, though some can become elaborate and last a long time.

However, when adults believe that they are someone else, it may be a sign of dissociative identity disorder (once known as “multiple personality disorder”).

It is thought that this may result from regularly repeated trauma, such as domestic violence or sexual abuse. The brain tries to protect itself by inventing another personality to gain distance from the previous painful experiences and the knowledge that they may happen again.

Studies have shown that as many as 99 percent of patients with dissociative identity disorder have experienced a pattern of recurring, overwhelming, and life-threatening events.^[3]

7 They Think They Can Levitate

Many children believe that they have levitated, usually by floating down the stairs. It is not clear whether they are confusing dreams with reality or whether it is another form of fantasy. But the belief that they have levitated or can levitate is a common one in childhood.

The phenomenon has been around for a long time. Samuel Pepys even recalled an episode of childhood levitation in his diary in 1665. Then it was considered evidence of supernatural intrusion.

Adults have also experienced the illusion that they can float. Often, this takes the form of an out-of-body experience. This may manifest in an isolated episode during which a patient on an operating table floats above himself while watching the medical team working on him.

For most people, these strange episodes do not pose a threat to their overall mental health and can even be a positive experience. However, prolonged out-of-body episodes may indicate that a person is suffering from a depersonalization disorder in which he may feel disconnected from his body and thoughts.^[4]

6 They Think They Are Robots

Robots hold a special fascination for children. They are intrigued by the idea of something that looks and talks like a human but isn’t. Young kids often enjoy pretending to be robots by walking like automatons and talking in stilted robotic voices.

However, some people suffering from a form of depersonalization disorder have distorted perceptions that make them feel like robots. They believe that they are not humans but rather machines without the ability to experience emotion.

The condition is often confused with depression. Although distressing, it is usually temporary. However, without treatment, the symptoms may recur.^[5]

10 Strange Psychological Disorders That Will Blow Your Mind

5 They Believe They Have Special Powers

Young children often believe that they have special or secret powers. It is difficult to know whether they get this idea from movies and TV or whether it is an innate childhood belief. Some experts maintain that the superhero belief gives youngsters a sense of control and assists them in developing patience, helpfulness, and confidence in their own abilities.

However, if you believe that you have superhuman powers as an adult, it can be a sign that you are suffering from delusions of grandeur. This is recognized as delusional behavior. For example, it may take the form of believing that you are secretly the heir to the throne or a celebrity in disguise. Unfortunately, these delusions can last a long time.

One psychiatric journal reported the case of a man who was convinced for 25 years that he was “an internationally renowned secret agent” who had managed to change global military strategy when he was only eight years old. In addition, he was able to direct the maneuvers of the US Army by the power of his mind alone. Oh, and he single-handedly coordinated Kuwait’s liberation.

This man even convinced his wife and child that he was a kind of supercharged James Bond. It was considered to be a case of folie a trois, in which three individuals share the same delusional beliefs.^[6]

The man claimed to have been paid over $100 million for his efforts by grateful countries. Unfortunately, when he tried to withdraw the money, the bank denied that the funds existed.

When foreign countries approached him for his intelligence-gathering abilities, he rebuffed them. In retaliation, they used their influence to refuse him planning permission on his house. At least that’s the way he saw it.

Although the delusions can seem ludicrous to outsiders, it is thought that sufferers genuinely believe them to be true. They are unable to tell the difference between fantasy and reality even while they are falsifying “proof” for the benefit of other people.

It is thought that the condition may sometimes be a symptom of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.

4 They Do The Same Thing Repeatedly

Children like routine. It is quite common for a child to want to watch the same film, read the same book, or play with the same toy repeatedly. Younger kids can become upset quickly if their routines vary even a little bit.

Adults can also enjoy familiarity and routine. However, when the routine becomes of primary importance and disrupts normal life, it can spill over into an obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

Although a child might like to listen to the same bedtime story every night because it is comforting and familiar, an adult who needs to read the same page repeatedly to make sure he hasn’t missed a bit is not likely to feel comforted.

The disorder can take up an increasing portion of each day as a sufferer repeats activities until his anxiety passes and he can move on to something else. Experts claim that these checking rituals can last up to 10 hours a day for people with severe OCD, which severely limits their life opportunities.^[7]

3 They Have Night Terrors

Sometimes, children (usually between the ages of 4 and 12) experience night terrors. Although they usually remember little or nothing about these episodes, it can be distressing to witness. The terrors usually begin around 2–3 hours after the child falls asleep. The youngster may sit upright or try to get out of bed. He may scream and appear panicked. The child is also likely to be breathless, sweaty, and have a racing heart as though he has been running.

Night terrors are often temporary. Most children have only a few episodes, though it’s possible to have them more often. It is thought that the terrors usually occur if the child is overtired or sleeping in a new place.

In adults, however, night terrors can be much more serious. Those who experience such episodes are more likely to have a mood-related condition such as anxiety, depression, or bipolar disorder. A link has also been found between night terrors and post-traumatic stress disorder. Although night terrors are not thought to be dangerous, the underlying causes often require treatment.^[8]

2 They Are Fussy Eaters

When babies and toddlers eat, it is common for them to develop food fads. They may often refuse to eat anything except a very small group of foods or reject anything new. This is frustrating for parents because most foods will be new when children are that young. But it is usually a phase that lasts only a few years.

Some people, however, continue to obsess about food well into adulthood. This can have a severe impact on their mental and physical health. Conditions such as anorexia and bulimia are well known, but some people may also suffer from lesser-known conditions.^[9]

With rumination disorder, sufferers feel compelled to regurgitate and rechew their food. Another problem is avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder. In these cases, people do not eat enough to meet their nutritional and energy needs. However, they do not worry about their weight or body shape.

Obviously, these conditions can have a negative effect on quality of life.

1 They See Monsters Under The Bed

At some point, almost every child has been scared of monsters under the bed or in the closet. Films have been made about this subject. Despite the terror induced by movies such as Monsters, Inc., the fear that something dangerous is hiding in dark corners usually disappears by the time a child reaches puberty.

Teraphobia (the fear of monsters) is experienced by almost 100 percent of kids but relatively few adults. However, temporary teraphobia can be induced by watching scary movies or telling ghost stories, but this will generally disappear in a few days.

For some people, however, the feelings of terror persist. Like all phobias, this can begin to affect the sufferer’s quality of life. Treatment includes antidepressants and cognitive behavioral therapy.

Therapists also suggest leaving the light on.^[10]

Top 10 Culture-Specific Illnesses And Mental Disorders

About The Author: Ward Hazell is a freelance writer who is also studying for a PhD in English Literature.

In 2019, US law enforcement arrested over 800,000 people for larceny/theft. This is separate from burglary. It’s safe to say that theft is a major crime in the US and it’s the crime with the third highest arrest rate after DUI and drug-related crimes. Knowing that will help give this list a little context as there are some staggering theft statistics in the world at large.

10. Millions of Pets Are Stolen Every Year

Some things are more desirable to thieves than others. Or at least it seems like they should be. Cash has to be the most tempting item for any thief. Then you have things like cars, electronics, sneakers, drugs, and so much more. It turns out that pets are pretty high on the list as well. People will absolutely steal your pet.

It’s hard to put precise numbers on pet theft since it’s also possible a pet ran away, got lost, and then someone adopted it thinking it was a stray. Or maybe the animal wandered off and came back and the owners thought it was stolen but returned. So stats are fuzzy, but in 2017 around 360,000 residents in the UK were convinced someone had stolen their cat. Of those, 55% got their cat back. 

In America the numbers can be fuzzy as well. The Humane Society merges stats for stolen and lost pets together. Their stats say 10 million pets are lost or stolen every year. The American Kennel Club has more refined numbers and estimates two million dogs were stolen from their owners in 2020. That number rose in subsequent years and was blamed on a rise in demand during the pandemic.

9. One Million Parking Cones are Stolen Every Year

Parking cones are a ubiquitous part of the driving experience. We see those orange cones on the side of the road constantly during construction or around worksites and accidents. Most of us probably don’t think twice about them, but someone sure does. One million traffic cones are stolen per year in America. 

If you’re struggling to figure out why anyone would steal a parking cone, you’ll be equally surprised to learn many towns have had to deal with this for years. It got so bad in Coventry, Connecticut that local authorities started begging thieves to bring them back. The town would set them out after storms to warn residents of downed trees and power lines and the next day almost all would be gone. 

In the UK, police have sometimes resorted to amnesty days where people who have taken cones can return them with no questions asked hoping to recoup losses. The cones can cost around $20 and it’s taxpayers who foot the bill. 

8. 10% of Employees Admit to Stealing Toilet Paper From Work

Have you ever stolen from work? If you said no, you’re in the minority. According to the US Chamber of Commerce, 75% of employees have stolen something from their work. But what does that mean? Are they stealing cash from the till? Fries from the fryer? Computers from the office?  Well, it’s a tough one to break down.

Aside from things of great value, small things are just as likely to be targeted. Maybe more so, because you might figure no one would miss something insignificant like toilet paper. In one survey, 61% of office workers admitted to stealing from work and one in 10 of them was stealing toilet paper. 

It’s not just office workers, of course. A hotel cleaner was caught with a garbage bag full of 66 toilet paper rolls he stole from his job in 2020. He claimed to be donating them to a friend who was out of work. 

In some contexts, stealing toilet paper makes a little more sense. Recall the early days of the pandemic when people were hoarding toilet paper and there were even fights over in stores. In 2020, police recovered a truck loaded with 18,000 pounds of stolen toilet paper. 

7. Thieves Once Stole $18 Million in Maple Syrup

One quart of organic Vermont maple syrup costs about $22 from Walmart. That’s a good amount of syrup, too. It should last a while, depending on your penchant for pancakes. So keep that in mind in relation to this story about a team of thieves in Canada who stole $18 million worth of maple syrup.

Between 2011 and 2012, a group of thieves worked together to make off with 9,600 barrels of maple syrup from a Quebec warehouse. Officials thought nearly $30 million had been stolen at first but a recount of missing barrels brought it down to that slim $18 million.

After the suspects were caught, authorities reclaimed around 70% of the stolen syrup but the rest was believed to have been sold to Americans. So over $5 million in purloined syrup found its way to US waffles. 

6. Up to 380,000 Guns are Stolen Every Year in America

In 2020 it was estimated that there were 433.9 million guns in America. That’s 1.3 guns for everyone in the country. With that many guns around you just know someone has to be stealing them, and they definitely are. There are up to 380,000 guns stolen from private owners every year in America. 

The ATF’s numbers show that, between 2017 and 2021, over one million guns were stolen. They also pointed out that these were reported thefts and there is no federal law requiring you to report a stolen gun and most states don’t have one, either. That means the true number of stolen guns is likely a lot higher.

Gun theft is not just a big city crime, either. The town of Jonesboro, Arkansas, with a population of under 80,000, had reported over 40 gun thefts in 2022 by April of that year. 

5. One in Five Americans Had Their Identity Stolen in 2021

By now most of us are aware of identity theft and that we need to be careful when sharing sensitive information, especially online. Less well known may be how prevalent identity theft is. In the year 2021, one in five Americans were the victim of identity theft. That cost people about $56 billion in losses. Around 33% of all Americans had experienced identity theft by the year 2018. 

In a global sense, Americans are definitely leading the pack, suffering identity theft at twice the global average. The research also showed a lot of this was because of poor habits relating to security. For instance, 44% of people who took part in the survey that produced these results didn’t have password-protected wi-fi at home.

Another alarming stat is that, in 2016, 11% of victims of identity theft didn’t want to file a police report, likely out of embarrassment. As these types of crimes have become more and more common, it’s a reasonable assumption that there are also higher numbers than being reported for this same reason. 

4. Porch Thieves Steal  260 Million Packages Per Year 

If you spend a lot of time online, you have no doubt heard of porch thieves. Videos of these thieves taken from Ring cameras and other home security have been around for years. These are thieves who see a package left on someone’s porch, something from Amazon or other kinds of package delivery, and will simply walk up and steal the box before the rightful owner gets home.

The reason there are so many videos of this kind of crime is because there’s just so much of this kind of crime. In 2021 alone it was estimated that 260 million packages were taken off of porches. In 2016 that worked out to 1.7 million packages being pinched from porches every single day. 

Security firm Safewise conducted a survey to determine San Francisco was the worst city in America for porch thefts. Over 75% of Americans have experienced porch theft and losses are up to $19.5 billion with average packages valued between $50 and $100.

3. Millions of Bicycles Are Stolen Every Year

In 2021 about 51 million Americans rode bikes. It’s even more popular in Europe where you can find enormous populations of cycling enthusiasts in major cities. It’s estimated 90% of the people in the Netherlands regularly cycle. As with anything that’s popular there are thieves waiting in the wings to ruin it for everyone. 

It’s estimated that around 4 million bicycles are stolen every year in Europe, many of them unreported. In the US, that number is around two million. The under-reporting of bike theft makes it hard to get concrete numbers, with at least once registry services estimating that only one in five thefts is ever reported.

2. $75 Million in Used Cooking Oil is Stolen Every Year

There’s an old saying that goes “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” and that’s very true in the world of oil. Used cooking oil from restaurants was once considered nothing but a trash by-product from making french fries and chicken. Now it’s a huge business. 

Old cooking oil, which restaurants sometimes store outside in sealed barrels until it can be picked up, can be used for many purposes if it’s cleaned and recycled but the biggest one is biodiesel. It is just old oil and not that much different from the oil we already refine into gasoline. 

While gas prices have continued to rise over the years, biodiesel is actually even more expensive. In April 2023 a gallon of gasoline in America averaged $3.69 but the most expensive kind of biodiesel averaged $4.95 per gallon. If it can be made from buckets of trash behind fast food restaurants, you can see why some people might want to steal it. And steal it they do.

America produces over 2.5 billion gallons of used cooking oil every year.  About $75 million in used oil is stolen in the same time period. The whole industry was set up to be very tempting to thieves. Restaurants can’t legally just throw the stuff out, it has to be taken somewhere to be processed. There are laws requiring that a certain amount of biodiesel be used every year, too, so the demand continues to grow. 

1. Dairy Farmers Lose Up To $100 Million a Year in Milk Crate Thefts

How many milk crates have you seen in places that weren’t grocery stores in your life? Milk crates in basements, garages, backyards, wherever. Those plastic cubes are used the world over for storing and organizing people’s junks and, of course, for shipping milk. But most of those crates that don’t have milk in them are supposed to. They were never purchased; they were stolen, and the expense is part of the reason you pay as much as you do for milk. 

Dairy farmers pay for those crates and when they get stolen, new ones need to be purchased. Every year, dairy farmers lose up to $100 million in milk crate theft, a number which is hard to comprehend given what we’re talking about. 

The number of crates works out to between 20 to 25 million. Just try to imagine what people need with 25 million milk crates if they’re not in the dairy industry already. The problem had a bit of light shined on it back in 2021 when the Milk Crate Challenge became a thing on TikTok and people were sharing videos of themselves stacking precarious milk crate structures and trying to climb them. 

Each crate costs about $4 and they only end up at the grocery store to ship the milk. Stores are meant to return them so they can be reused but, obviously, that doesn’t happen nearly as often as it should.

The medical world is a very organic and ever-changing thing. Science improves, and we gain a superior understanding of the causes and treatments of disease. What was treated 100 years ago with something like cocaine and leeches can be treated with antibiotics or NSAIDS today. The world of mental health is very similar. The things we used to consider “crazy” can be better understood, better treated, and even de-stigmatized. And sometimes the things we used to consider disorders weren’t really issues at all.

10. Nostalgia

A whole lot of pop culture seemed to be fueled by nostalgia, this sense of sentimental warmth and attachment we have to things from our past. Whether it’s just an era or specific things like movies and music, it’s actually a big money maker as well. Just look at how shows like Stranger Things jam pack their stories with it, and retro gaming systems land with a big splash. People love loving the things they used to love.

Back in the 17th century, nostalgia was described as a mental disorder that was characterized by being uprooted, having fragmented contacts and dealing with isolation, frustration and alienation. Which, in so many words, sounds like loneliness.

The name comes from the Greek terms for homecoming (nostos) and pain (algos). Sufferers were considered manic with longing. It affected soldiers or children who had been sent to the country or really anyone who was away from home and wanted to go back. Some people even faked it in the hopes they could be sent home. 

Symptoms ranged from feelings of melancholy to brain inflammation. For a time it was thought it was caused by a nostalgia bone. Treatments could range from being weaned off of whatever the patient was nostalgic for to the much less gentle sounding incitement of “pain and terror” and then later, shame. 

9. Homosexuality

For younger generations, it may come as a surprise that, for many years, homosexuality was considered a mental disorder. And not simply in the sense of intolerance, that there are people out there who are prejudiced against the very idea of homosexuality, but from a professional standpoint. Mental health professionals the world over had long considered it a legitimate mental disorder, and it was listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, or DSM, for the American Psychiatric Association until 1973. That’s the manual that lists and details all recognized mental conditions. The World Health Organization only de-listed it as a mental disorder in the year 1990. 

Some viewed homosexuality as a phase towards heterosexuality that the immature basically got stuck in. Others thought it could have been caused by some prenatal defect or exposure to some kind of pathogen. Another belief held that homosexuals just have the brains of members of the opposite sex, which causes them to be attracted to the “wrong” sex.

Numerous cures were tried, some far more terrifying than others. Things like hypnosis gave way to conversion therapy and the use of reinforcement to force homosexuals into believing they were not gay. Other more aggressive and cruel methods included electroconvulsive therapy and lobotomies. One doctor castrated homosexual men and then transplanted “heterosexual testicles” into them. 

8. Sluggish Schizophrenia

Most people have at least a passing understanding of what schizophrenia is. Unfortunately, this is one of the conditions most people often associate with the idea of being “crazy.” It can manifest in the form of delusions, visual and auditory hallucinations, behavioral issues, disorganized thinking, and more. It can very much limit or even destroy someone’s ability to function. That said, you may be less familiar with sluggish schizophrenia.

Sluggish schizophrenia was most often diagnosed in the Soviet Union and it was less a legitimate mental illness than it was a political tool. Imagine a doctor decides that you have schizophrenia and are therefore a danger to yourself and others. You need to be medicated or institutionalized. You might feel very scared of what that implies. And you might be tempted to defend yourself by saying you have no symptoms. Well, sluggish schizophrenia sidestepped that defense. It allowed doctors to acknowledge that, sure, you have no symptoms now, but you might later. Best to medicate you or lock you up now. It made for a convenient way to get rid of people who posed political problems for those in power. 

Victims of the diagnoses were given painful treatments with no anesthetic or even forced into insulin comas, among other abuses. 

7. American Nervousness 

Despite the fact this sounds like it might fit nicely into modern society, American nervousness is no longer considered a real condition, though it was a term that existed back in 1881 when George Miller Beard wrote a book explaining it in detail.

Beard believed America had a unique set of illnesses not experienced in other countries. His characterization of American nervousness included things like susceptibility to narcotics, hay fever, tooth decay, premature baldness, diabetes and even unprecedented beauty of American women among many, many, many other things. 

There were a number of causes identified by Beard, who was apparently quite a prominent neurologist, and they included environmental and social factors such as things like science, the telegraph and steam engines. He also blamed increased mental activity of women. All of these combined to overtax a person’s mind and lead them into the darkness of American nervousness.

6. Penis Envy

It’s hard to pinpoint a more controversial figure in the history of mental health than Sigmund Freud. He created the entire field of psychoanalysis and arguably evolved the whole concept of psychiatry and the treatment of mental disorders by leaps and bounds while at the same time getting so very much wrong.

In Freud’s view, nearly every aspect of human psychology had a sexual basis and women were on the inferior side of things. Women suffered penis envy because they wanted to be men. This weirdly blanket view informed pretty much all of his opinions on women, who were, in his mind, little more than incomplete men. 

Freud believed penis envy manifested in women desiring their own fathers at a young age and then, later, wanting to have male children because this was as close as they could ever get to having a penis of their own. These days the entire premise is considered little more than nonsense.

5. Transgenderism

In 2019, being transgender was no longer considered a mental illness, according to the World Health Organization. Obviously, transgender people still face a number of hurdles and, in many places, a stark lack of acceptance, but they are no longer considered mentally ill by the majority of mental health professionals in the world. Instead, it was reclassified as an issue related to gender incongruence, which is essentially feeling a persistent incongruence between your assigned sex and your experience with gender. 

Under these terms, the WHO still acknowledges that a transgender person may require medical assistance in some way, but that they don’t suffer a kind of pathological condition at all. The change went into effect at the beginning of 2022 and the new classification could both limit some of the stigma transgender people face and also offer up additional healthcare resources.

4. Catastrophic Schizophrenia 

Yet another schizophrenia variation, this one has also been rendered defunct but was a functional diagnosis for a time. So what has to happen for schizophrenia to become catastrophic?

The condition is mostly defined as, well, really bad schizophrenia. That includes acute onset of the disorder and “devolution into a serious chronic psychosis without remission.” So it’s fast and furious and doesn’t seem to go away. It’s also referred to as “schizocaria” which leads to “rapid deterioration of personality.”

Dementia was the end result, and it occurred within two or three years of the initial diagnosis. Based on what doctor’s observation, it tended to occur most often in patients in their late teens and early twenties. 

The diagnosis fell out of favor and is more generally considered just an acute onset of schizophrenia that is not likely to respond to treatment.

3. Newyorkitis

There’s a long history of mental illness being the butt of jokes, sometimes in a mean-spirited way and sometimes a little more tolerably. Few illnesses seemed to have been written off almost entirely as jokes, only to have some evidence crop up later that people took it entirely seriously, but that seems to be the case with Newyorkitis.

In the early 1900s, Newyorkitis was a nervous condition afflicting those who lived in New York. Tongue in cheek though it sounds, that didn’t stop people from offering up treatments for it. You could head to the YMCA back in 1908. As one doctor involved put it, they were using “straight psychology applied directly to the abnormal conditions of urban business and social life.”

Dr. John H. Girdner wrote an entire book on the subject, fascinated by what he perceived as a condition unique to those in New York, of all places. He said many people in the city lived an artificial life and all the noise, the pursuit of money, the tall buildings and everything considered part of that New York experience was inflaming itself in people’s mind, body and soul. 

Doctors would send patients to New Jersey to have hydrotherapy baths as a cure for the condition, which apparently caused nearsightedness (from all the tall buildings), irritated ears (from the noise), and muscular degeneration along with greed and self-centeredness.

2. Hysteria

Hysteria dates back to the second century BC and is, by and large, considered the mental disease that was only applicable to women, though it’s worth noting someone did make up male hysteria at one point as well. In women, hysteria was a physical condition before it was a mental one. Way back it was actually demonological, for whatever that’s worth. It was listed in the DSM until the year 1980. 

Ancient cures ranged from more sex to less sex to herbs and even fire. Sometimes marriage was considered a way to fix it. A roving uterus was blamed for it once and then Freud ushered in the idea of it being a mental condition caused by trauma and repression, And, because this is Freud, his basic reasoning was that female hysteria was a result of women not having a penis. If traditional methods of curing the condition didn’t work, then the idea of uterine massage was offered up. That involved, as you might suspect, massaging the uterus. This came from a technique first developed to treat a prolapsed anus and involved some fairly invasive manual stimulation. Clinics used to treat over 100 patients per day. 

1. Drapetomania, the Slave Disease

The first slave ship arrived in America in 1619 and for the next 246 years, until the passing of the 13th Amendment, slavery was perfectly legal. During that time, slaves were not regarded as people, but that didn’t stop some backward thinking doctors from trying to both treat them as people and then act like they were broken in some way for not wanting to be slaves. Chiefly, this was the work of Samuel A. Cartwright.

Cartwright was a medical doctor and believe there must have been some disease at play for any slave who tried to flee bondage. He called this condition drapetomania and it could be cured by slave owners whipping it out of their slaves or cutting off their toes.

The lengths Cartwright went to in an effort to justify slavery from a scientific point of view are shocking by today’s standards. He claimed, medically, that a slave was incapable of being happy unless they were a slave and that they had immature nervous systems and small brains. 

All of this fed into the propaganda spread by slave owners that slaves were actually benefitting from their position and that slave owners were basically doing their slaves a favor.