My SO (Japanese male, almost 67) has been going through a huge meltdown over the past three days (lots of crying, which I’ve never seen before, inappropriate anger, huge mood swings, sleeping a lot) and it has me worried. As far as I can determine from what he says, this episode was triggered by one of his hairdressing clients mis-judging his character in a derogatory way* (she is an elderly lady with cancer who cancelled an appt and then didn’t return his calls for weeks; apparently she interpreted his calls as an attempt to drum up business instead of actual concern for her well-being).
Also his emotional fragility seems to have been markedly increased in the past few weeks.
*I understand he may not have handled this in the best way, that is not the point; once he reached her, he was upset by his interpretation of what she said. He seems to have globalized it into “I care about everyone but they don’t care about me.”
This is all more complicated by the fact that he doesn’t communicate in English well at the best of times, and when he is emotional he is nearly incoherent.
So my concern is that this change seems pretty sudden. Maybe he is going through something bigger that he isn’t willing to talk about, or maybe it’s medical. It’s this last question that I hope someone can shed some light on. Also I just had to talk to someone and you folks are available.
Thanks. It doesn’t seem like depression, from what I have read (note the mood swings). And I have never read that medical depression has a sudden onset. But if I can get him to a doctor, hormone levels is one thing that would be easy to have checked.
If it’s not how he usually swings, it would be good to have a medical consult for rule outs. A good general principle is that a sudden change in function or behavior, especially without antecedents, should be medically evaluated before a psychological explanation is jumped to. It could be psychological, but you don’t want to assume that.
I also agree - the first step is a physical, complete with bloodwork and testosterone levels. There is (probably) such a thing as male menopause - it doesn’t sound like it would be a sudden-onset thing, but it could be a contributing factor to anything else that is going on.
Marked changes in personality, emotional lability and so on once stable adulthood is reached can be signs of organic problems such as brain lesions or thyroid disorders.
Screening would include blood work as well as brain studies for structural abnormalities and psychometric evaluation for Alzheimer or similar processes.
Ditto. And check if there is any OTC meds he’s been taking and clue in the doc. Some pretty common stuff can have some seriously funky mood-altering side effects.
Roddy, everyone has given you excellent advice about getting your SO to a doctor. I could not agree more.
I am sending YOU hugs and holding good thoughts for both of you. It’s hell to watch a loved one go through something like that. Hang in there and keep us posted.
Those commercials which tout remedies for same-always imagined some sort of mojo-stealing Far Eastern supervillian named “Loh-Tei”, replete with twirled Fu Manchu moustache…as in “The Seven Faces of…”
Funny thing. When I went to lunch at work last night, I turned on Movies! to watch the Philadelphia Experiment. At the first commercial break they ran some ad about people undergoing sudden and extreme emotional outbursts.
I didn’t pay much attention to the commercial, because they tend to remind me of snake oil pitches, but I do remember that the symptom is called Pseudo (something) Affect, and it’s related to some sort of illness.
Did a quick google and found pseudobulbar affect. It appears to be secondary to neurologic disease or brain injury.
Maybe you could read up on this and see if it’s worth looking into.
My mom had a small stroke and she was an emotional wreck for weeks… She made no sense either. Took me a week to get her to the Dr. I had to make an appointment and tell her we couldn’t break it… She suddenly presented with Parkinson’s during that time also
I appreciate all the good advice and good wishes. After reading up on pseudobulbar effect and emotional lability, I don’t think (in my non-medical opinion) that this is what is going on, mostly because the meltdown was pretty much over after a couple of days. Since then there have been fairly short episodes of depressive behavior but this morning he said he was looking forward to going back to work on Tuesday and that maybe he just had too much time off with nothing to do over the holidays.
In any case, I am going to try to talk to his doctor about additional tests for hormones and anything else he can think of that might affect mood stability at his next physical. Also, I think both of us could use more social outlets, so I’ll be working on that too.