Citation

Pontius AA. Psychol. Rep. 1990; 67(3): 935-945.

Affiliation

Harvard Medical School, Department of Psychiatry, Boston, MA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1990, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

2126878

Abstract

A tenth case (a subtype of complex partial seizures) is proposed as a Limbic (?) Psychotic Trigger Reaction. Upon crying, an infant girl was hit fatally by her devoted father while he was off anticonvulsants prescribed for Jacksonian and petit mal (?) seizures with "porencephalic cyst involving motor cortex and limbic system." Crying revived traumatic memories of frequently repeated ("kindling") experiences of his mother crying when hit by his father, in turn sometimes hit by patient while helping the mother. Hitting also had been helpful (cognitive mismatch between helpful and harmful hitting) during the victim's accidental choking 11 days earlier. This had occurred on the same day his distant mother died. Two days later he attempted suicide with anticonvulsants. Symptoms of the well remembered, unmotivated infanticide included flat affect, olfactory and command hallucinations, and delusions of grandeur (his mother leaving him millions and power).

Language: en