Cause and Effect

[tamaranth]

After being suddenly savaged by a brief-but-intense headache yesterday -- not for the first time -- I'm starting to wonder if the day's-worth of black mood (with no apparent cause) before the headache was a kind of signal -- the way that some epileptics get warning signs of fits -- rather than a cause. I have certainly had headaches without the preceding mood swing, and moods without headaches. But this particular species of headache -- brief, migraine-ish, nauseating and (most distinctively) making me extremely sleepy -- only ever seems to happen after a meaningless mood swing.

I have another theory -- or question, at any rate.
It's a given that physical illnesses -- colds, 'flu, stomach bugs, bubonic plague etc -- are transmitted by viruses. Does this happen with mental / emotional conditions? (I'm thinking of the bouts of lowness which occasionally seem to prevail, rather than severe psychiatric conditions). If not, why not?

Comments

[del-c.livejournal.com]

I have a vague memory of an Oliver Sacks book on migraines mentioning that they sometimes announce their presence ahead of time in various ways, including scotoma (patterns of light and darkness in the vision) and jamais vu (the conviction that you have never seen this place before). It's possible that your black dog is something similar, although IIRC those other symptoms came on within minutes of the migraine, and not hours.

On the gripping hand, the other impression I got from the book was that everybody's migraine is different.

(Googling, I hazard a guess that the book I read was this one-- Migraine: The Evolution of a Common Disorder (http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?isbn=0685178757&pwb=1)). The blurb reads:

The many manifestations of migraine can vary dramatically from one patient to another, even within the same patient at different times. Among the most compelling and perplexing of these symptoms are the strange visual hallucinations and distortions of space, time, and body image which migraineurs sometimes experience. Portrayals of these uncanny states have found their way into many works of art, from the heavenly visions of Hildegard von Bingen to Alice in Wonderland. Dr. Oliver Sacks argues that migraine cannot be understood simply as an illness, but must be viewed as a complex condition with a unique role to play in each individual's life.