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Major Depressive Disorder: Felicia Case Study

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Felicia, a 41-year-old wife and mother, shows signs of Major Depressive Disorder with severe anxious distress, mood-congruent, and catatonia features. Most of the time, Felicia is overpowered by emptiness, sadness and despair. These feelings caused a change in her previous functioning resulting in emotional, physical and social complications. As depression progresses, the individual becomes more socially withdrawn. She reveals that she spends countless hours alone, avoids her children and occasionally sees her friend. The guilt of not saving her mother, troubles Felicia, causing her to battle with insomnia. Not only does she struggles with falling asleep, Felicia has a difficult time staying asleep. She reports that dealing with the guilt of her mother’s death has her on the bathroom floor, shivering to avoid disturbing her husband. Felicia is observed picking at sores on her arms, which is another symptom of MDD. This motion is known as psychomotor agitation and is also a sign of anxiety. Felicia’s thoughts and actions are slow, a result of psychomotor retardation. She struggles handling certain responsibilities. Her husband hired a housekeeper because Felicia can no longer take care of her family on a regular basis. She states that …show more content…

This uncertainty shows that Felicia worries and feels something awful is going to happen to her children if she loses control of herself. These features are also all signs of MDD but with anxious distress. Because she worries, Felicia is unable to concentrate on the emotional connection she has with her children. Felicia is diagnosed with severe anxious distress because she shows four of the signs of MDD with anxious distress. Felicia lacks energy, has a difficult time concentrating on her kids because she worries, feels something bad is going to happen to them and she s, the feeling that she would lose control and the picking of the enlarged sores on her

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