Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD)

[256bits]

TL;DR Summary

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), or body dysmorphia, is a mental health condition where a person spends a lot of time worrying about flaws in their appearance. These flaws are often unnoticeable to others.

https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/body-dysmorphia/
Most people have some mild apprehension about their body, such as one thinks their nose is too big, hair too straight or curvy.

At the extreme, cases such as this, are difficult to completely understand.
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/health/ot...p&cvid=68ce4014b1fe4953b0b4bd22ef471ab9&ei=78
they feel like they're an amputee in the body of a regular person
"For the majority of people who have it right now nobody knows about it, they haven't told anybody, they're suffering in silence."

 

[BillTre]

I haven't heard of the extreme examples before. Pretty unusual. However, its not that surprising to me. Consider the distinct weirdnesses described in the Man who mistook his wife for a hat or The mind of a mnemonist.
These represent very specific breakdowns in the organization or functioning of the biological brain (which underlies conscious phenomena), resulting in specific and weird behaviors as particular functions (like body awareness) become messed up. The person that feels like an amputee may have a dead brain area (due to stroke perhaps?) for sensing that part of the body.

Its a lot like collecting new mutations. Break things (genetic or brain) and see what weird stuff can result.

 

[pinball1970]

I haven't heard of the extreme examples before. Pretty unusual. However, its not that surprising to me. Consider the distinct weirdnesses described in the Man who mistook his wife for a hat or The mind of a mnemonist.
These represent very specific breakdowns in the organization or functioning of the biological brain (which underlies conscious phenomena), resulting in specific and weird behaviors as particular functions (like body awareness) become messed up. The person that feels like an amputee may have a dead brain area (due to stroke perhaps?) for sensing that part of the body.

Its a lot like collecting new mutations. Break things (genetic or brain) and see what weird stuff can result.

Would anorexia be included here or is that on its own? Images I have seen of these (mainly) is are terrible to look at.

 

[BillTre]

Would anorexia be included here or is that on its own? Images I have seen of these (mainly) is are terrible to look at.

I don't know the specifics of particular problems. I am speaking generally.
Anorexia could be strictly biological or some think where social inputs had big effects.

 

[256bits]

Its a lot like collecting new mutations. Break things (genetic or brain) and see what weird stuff can result.

so you think it is a neurological,, as is the general belief, rather than a a psychiatric condition.

Would anorexia be included here or is that on its own? Images I have seen of these (mainly) is are terrible to look at.

I had the same thought.
Although, the Fat is Beautiful campaigns kind of led me away from BDD being completely responsible for whole internal body image, though it might in some cases. As long as the people behind the Fat is Beautiful ( not the activists as they screw things up) know their stuff to attempt to change public mindset, and peer pressure influence/
But I am whistling Dixie here as I did not investigate further.

 

[BillTre]

so you think it is a neurological, rather than a a psychiatric condition, as is the general belief.

Psychiatric conditions will effect the brain in order to effect behavior, the output of the brain is my basic contention. Between the two a line would have to be drawn.
I would expect that there would be non-psychiatric (organic brain damage of some kind) ways to get the brain to do the same thing.
I am not very familiar with anorexia, so maybe I'm wrong.
However, as time goes on, more cases of biological effects from psychiatric conditions are being uncovered.

For all I know, there may be more than one kind of anorexia with differing causes.