You will complete a minimum 5-page composition on the Case Study of a hypothetical “patient” who is sent to you for diagnosis and treatment.
– Using your textbook and applicable outside sources, you will evaluate the patient you receive and diagnose him or her in with the correct disorder we covered this semester.
– You will discuss what circumstances therapy can “help,” then decide upon the appropriate therapy and make recommendations for your patient based on what we learned this year.
– You will then discuss what you, as your patient’s therapy team, will need to be careful to avoid so that you will not harm your client white he/she is in therapy.
MY “PATIENT”
Michelle
Michelle was 26 when she started having “mood swings.” First, she would experience overly long periods of extremely outgoing and happy mood. Oddly, during these times Michelle would become extremely irritable and restless. She would talk very fast and jump from one topic to another. She also became very grandiose, believing she could do things that hadn’t previously been a strength or interest for her. During times like this, Michelle would impulsively begin multiple new projects and participate in many risky behaviors, like drug use and sex with partners she didn’t know. Several times, Michelle dodged severe harm to herself by a very small margin.
Invariably, what comes up must come down. After Michelle experienced her overly happy period, her mood would drop to the opposite extreme. She began to feel sad and hopeless, and lost interest in the activities she had previously found fun and pleasurable, both the extreme activities she’d participated in days before and the everyday ones he liked before her mood swings started. She began having trouble concentrating, making decisions, and feeling fatigued. Michelle overate during these times, which was atypical of her. Sometimes, she’d even talk about not wanting to wake up and face the day.
Michelle spends periods of times when she feels completely “normal,” but she has had four episodes of either being “very up” or “very down” within the past year.
