People are so delusional they believe their lives are being filmed constantly like in "The Truman Show" with Jim Carey.


New U.S. mental illness:<b> '</b>Truman syndrome' :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Nation

NEW YORK — One man showed up at a federal building, asking for release from the reality show he was sure was being made of his life.


Another was convinced his every move was secretly being filmed for a TV contest. A third believed everything — the news, his psychiatrists, the drugs they prescribed — was part of a phony, stage-set world with him as the involuntary star, like the 1998 movie ‘‘The Truman Show.’’


Researchers have begun documenting what they dub the ‘‘Truman syndrome,’’ a delusion afflicting people who are convinced that their lives are secretly playing out on a reality TV show. Scientists say the disorder underscores the influence pop culture can have on mental conditions.


‘‘The question is really: Is this just a new twist on an old paranoid or grandiose delusion ... or is there sort of a perfect storm of the culture we’re in, in which fame holds such high value?’’ said Dr. Joel Gold, a psychiatrist affiliated with New York’s Bellevue Hospital.


In the last two years, Gold has encountered five patients with delusions related to reality TV. Several of them specifically mentioned ‘‘The Truman Show."


Gold and his brother, a psychologist, started presenting their observations at medical schools in 2006. After word spread beyond medical circles this summer, they learned of about 50 more people with similar symptoms. The brothers are now working on a scholarly paper.


Meanwhile, researchers in London described a ‘‘Truman syndrome’’ patient in the British Journal of Psychiatry in August. The 26-year-old postman ‘‘had a sense the world was slightly unreal, as if he was the eponymous hero in the film,’’ the researchers wrote.


The Oscar-nominated movie stars Jim Carrey as Truman Burbank. He leads a merrily uneventful life until he realizes his friends and family are actors, his seaside town is a TV soundstage and every moment of his life has been broadcast.


His struggle to sort out reality and illusion is heartwarming, but researchers say it’s often horrifying for ‘‘Truman syndrome’’ patients.


A few take pride in their imagined celebrity, but many are deeply upset at what feels like an Orwellian invasion of privacy. The man profiled in the British journal was diagnosed with schizophrenia and is unable to work. One of Gold’s patients planned to commit suicide if he couldn’t leave his supposed reality show.


Delusions can be a symptom of various psychiatric illnesses, as well as neurological conditions such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases. Some drugs also can make people delusional.


It’s not unusual for psychiatrists to see delusional patients who believe their relatives have been replaced by impostors or who think figures in their lives are taking on multiple disguises. But ‘‘Truman’’ delusions are more sweeping, involving not just some associates but society at large, Gold said.


Delusions tend to be classified by broad categories, such as the belief that one is being persecuted, but research has shown culture and technology can also affect them. Several recent studies have chronicled delusions entwined with the Internet such as a patient in Austria who believed she had become a walking webcam.


Reality television may help such patients convince themselves their experiences are plausible, according to the Austrian woman’s psychiatrists, writing in the journal Psychopathology in 2004. Ian Gold, a philosophy and psychology professor at McGill University in Montreal who has researched the matter with his brother, suggests reality TV and the Web, with their ability to make strangers into intimates, may compound psychological pressure on people who have underlying problems dealing with others.


That’s not to say reality shows make healthy people delusional, ‘‘but, at the very least, it seems possible to me that people who would become ill are becoming ill quicker or in a different way,’’ Ian Gold said.


Other researchers aren’t convinced, but still find the ‘‘Truman syndrome’’ an interesting example of the connection between culture and mental health.


Vaughan Bell, a psychologist who has researched Internet-related delusions, said one of his own former patients believed he was in the virtual-reality universe portrayed in the 1999 blockbuster ‘‘The Matrix.’’


‘‘I don’t think that popular culture causes delusions,’’ said Bell, who is affiliated with King’s College London and the Universidad de Antioquia in Medellin, Colombia. ‘‘But I do think that it is only possible to fully understand delusions and psychosis in light of our wider culture.’’

Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Faith + Love = Happy

mmmm. that was so nice of you to add the copyright info! Did you ever read it?

I think you mean "did you EVEN read it?" not EVER right?

I read it. I don't think they mean you can't refer to it in it's entirety. This is an AP article word for word identical in every paper it's printed in (at least the ones I read it in this morning online). Newspaper articles are reprinted all the time. I am not trying to take credit for it. I found the article in my local paper this morning and it does not go online until noon so I googled the story and printed this one.
Now is that good enough for you? The things that people pick at on this board are astounding to me.

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Faith + Love = Happy

Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed WITH THE EXCEPTION OF
ANNADROSE.
I meant ever. You published it, broadcast it and redistributed it.

Good grief, here we go again, she was just showing you some info she found. She meant no harm. You need to go bark up another tree. .. and oh.. have a Happy Thanksgiving if you can.

That explains it!!!

I use to sometimes feel like someone was watching us and making a TV show out of our lives. DH and Homer Simpson are so alike sometimes it's uncanny. And I suppose I do have a few Marge qualities, too. However, this was when Matt Groening was writing the show. The new writers apparently decided not to broadcast our lives on TV anymore. Whewww!

.

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~~~MsMiser

I can believe it. Sounds like a legitimate disease/mental illness.

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Mary

Sadly, I think that we all deal with people with mental illness of one sort or another... I know that I do. I'm not surprised to read about this one! Mental illness can fall under so many labels, I have come to learn that the different names for any disability (be it mental, physical, emotional, etc.) is that their are specific ways to treat the symptoms and for insurance purposes.

Just wondering why some people are so nitpicky?

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liitlejo, I was wondering the same thing about some people being no nit picky and truly mean spirited and simply cannot just say something nice about another poster. Afterall, this is suppossed to be a fun site to which all us ladies can come freely and chit chat, however it does not seem that way at all.Peace... catherine

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in memory of my beloved beautiful brother Sonny who is now an angel in heaven

This is particularly ironic. The poster criticized another for posting something even though the supposed offending poster gave the author full credit. Yet this poster copies and pastes verbatim and thinks nothing of not giving credit where it is due. Funny stuff around here sometimes.

I remembered the following because I was impressed the poster seemed to know so much about tobacco. I was disappointed to find he/she just copied and pasted the information someone else had gathered, and even added the touching final sentence to personalize it

Can anyone explain about Homogenized Tobacco Leaf (H.T.L)? - Yahoo! Answers

Update~ warning..LONG ~ Hauntings: The old man in my basement

Funny stuff

For what it's worth, I do think that the copyright means that you should NOT post the article in its entirety on this or any forum....but we have some lawyers here and I'd defer to them. I think the correct way to reference the article for discussion here is to provide a link to a place where it is legally posted. I believe that the rub is that those who use AP articles in their publications pay a fee to do so. I think you can pull a few quotes from an article, citing your reference. On the other hand, I see people post articles all the time. Mycoupons should probably figure out what's the right thing to do here and let people know.

This is not a legal opinion, merely the opinion of a reasonably intelligent person.

cj//

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I was walking home one night and a guy hammering on a roof called me a paranoid little weirdo. In morse code. -Emo Phillips

You guys are funny. annadrose thanks for the info I have never heard of all that.

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Proud mom to 4 great boys Anthony20,Nicholas16,Michael4,Sean2

It's not *new* they have just tagged a name on it from pop culture..for years some of the mentally ill have thought the CIA to aliens have been controlling or monitoring their lives..we all joke about mental illness being a made up issue with fake symptoms etc. but this is just a new name for something that has been around for years and not the first time I have heard of someone thinking this way LONG before said shows ever come to light.
So they are not *delusional* they are mentally ill..so they maybe delusional in a way,but not in the way you are thinking. Different delusional.

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"Cast upon this globe without physical strength or innate ideas, incapable in himself of obeying fundamental laws of this nature which call him to the supreme place in the universe, it is only in the heart of society that man can attain the pre-eminent position which is his natural destiny. Without the aide of civilization he would be one of the feeblest and least intelligent of animals.."
Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard

I feel a little insensitive after reading your post jaboomer2. I did not compare it like you did. I was poking fun at what I thought was something not that serious. Now that you put it that way I feel bad for laughing about it.

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Faith + Love = Happy

It's amazing what a delusional/psychotic person perceives as reality. Auditory/visual hallucinations, delusions (I am superman), paranoia. I found the article interesting. It makes you look around at those who are possibly not diagnosed yet. lol.

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We're off to never never land

To the original OP - The world can be a scary place for people with mental illness.

I understand..that is why I posted what I did...some here know I live on the other side of the looking glass...my life has been touched by mental illness to autism to mentally challanged...
Education not slamming is our future for understanding...so I do my level best not to slam..

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"Cast upon this globe without physical strength or innate ideas, incapable in himself of obeying fundamental laws of this nature which call him to the supreme place in the universe, it is only in the heart of society that man can attain the pre-eminent position which is his natural destiny. Without the aide of civilization he would be one of the feeblest and least intelligent of animals.."
Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard

Jabommer I am sincerely sorry to hear about your health issues, hon as I know also mental health problems are sometimes far worst then any physical problems. I have always thought that with a physical condition, you can take medicine and feel better or get cured, or you can have surgery and get healed and become well again. However while there are medications for mental health problems, it sadly is not that easy. I know I have dealt with Panic and Anxiety attacks all my life so I know and I offer my sincere blessings for you , to go forward and admit and I offer my blessings to you that you feel better... Peace.. Catherine

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in memory of my beloved beautiful brother Sonny who is now an angel in heaven

Well I sincerely thank you from the bottom of my heart for making me more conscious of things like this. It sounded like a joke to me at first because I am ignorant and uneducated on many mental health issues.
Thank you so much for enlightening me and for now making me consciously think about things like this.
I hope you are in a good place right now and stay there.

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Faith + Love = Happy

annadrose are you feeling better, I sincerely hope so. Enjoy the holiday peace and blessings catherine

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in memory of my beloved beautiful brother Sonny who is now an angel in heaven

Thank you so much for enlightening me and for now making me consciously think about things like this

Just keep a open mind and watch first impressions...that child that is loud and having a meltdown in the store might not be just a selfish brat..but a child with autism..a child that is deaf...or any other number of things...the older man or middle aged man looking at your child..<not the leer..every mom knows the leer> might not be the creep you think he is but a child in a mans body..the teen walking thru the store with headphones on might not be all ghetto but blocking out sounds he can not stand..
As a mother with a autistic son I have to use the womens bathroom..slowly I am phasing hiim into the mens, but there is way too many dangers in there...please don't give me dirty looks or pull your little girls to the side and make snide remarks..we DO hear people..womens rooms have stalls, he is not crawling under them or opening up doors on people..you are *safe*...
If this Holiday season if everyone was a little nicer..if everyone had a little more tolerance..a little more understanding..IF you started it now and kept it up thru the year..what a gift that would KEEP giving...for years to come because your children will learn it from you, and they will teach their children...
Give to the shelters near your home..they are full of the mentally ill with no family or place to go..unable to take care of themselves to our societys standards, yet with little to no safety net..
It is so much more peaceful to be nice all year long...a longer wiser life we will all have..it is the practice that we must do to follow that path that is the hardest..

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"Cast upon this globe without physical strength or innate ideas, incapable in himself of obeying fundamental laws of this nature which call him to the supreme place in the universe, it is only in the heart of society that man can attain the pre-eminent position which is his natural destiny. Without the aide of civilization he would be one of the feeblest and least intelligent of animals.."
Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard

There are documented cases of people with brain injuries thinking that their family members are impostors. They recognize them, but because of their brain injury, something looks wrong about the family members, so they assume they are messing with them.

A fascinating book about brain injuries is "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat", by Oliver Sacks.

Icansave obviously didn't spend any time on the election boards....

seemed like it was all one big "published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed" fest....

and I don't remember the AP police visiting once.

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I'm the kind of woman when my feet hit the floor in each morning, the devil says "Oh crap, she's up."