Among the bodily symptoms of hysteria, the most common are abdominal pain, palpitations and cardiac disturbances, a ball feeling in the throat and menstrual disturbances in women. Among vegetative symptoms, vomiting, hiccups, dizziness, urinary retention and petechiae in various parts of the body are the most common. Sometimes there are anaesthesias that do not coincide with the anatomical innervation, and other times there are hypersensitivities. All these symptoms are highly variable and depend on the suggestive influences of the environment.

They arise suddenly and disappear just as suddenly. Central neurological symptoms include seizures, blindness, mute and deafness, as well as walking and standing disorders, lack of motor coordination, and hemiplegia. Hysterical personality is a personality type with a characteristic lack of a sense of identity. Hysterics are characterised by unpredictability and excessive impulsivity, exaggerated exaltation. Hysterical people may behave in an unnatural, even theatrical way - this is due to the person's inherent ways of reacting, which are not so easy to change. The hysterical personality is characterised by emotional decision-making with a weakened influence of reasoning.

Some researchers believe that the characteristic features of the hysterical personality are excessive dependence on the approval of the environment, insecurity expressed in dependence on others. There is no clear criterion for drawing a line between health and hysterical illness. Hence, it is impossible to say who should be treated and when a particular behaviour is a hysterical neurosis.

photo ojoimages

When making the diagnosis, it is important to establish the existence of a possible neurotic conflict in the history. The patient often unconsciously induces various symptoms to achieve specific goals. The strength, form and repetition of certain behaviours allow us to assume the existence of neurotic hysteria.