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Major Depressive Disorder: The Babadook 

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Major Depressive Disorder: The Babadook 

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In the horror movie The Babadook, this disorder is represented a lot differently. In this movie, a new widow is trying to live life with her son without her husband. Eventually her son discovers a haunted pop book that hold a monster called the Babadook. From this point onward in the movie, their small family is then terrorized by the Babadook and the behaviors that the Babadook causes on their relationship. The movie ends with the Babadook still be in the house, but is kept fed and in check, no longer ignored but instead taken care of but kept at bay, since it isn’t able to feed off of the fear of the family anymore.
The book warns of the curse of the Babadook – how it will beg to be let in, and when it has got in, it will reveal its true terror to you. The final pages warn ‘You’re going to wish you were dead’. These feelings are very similar to how people who have depression feel when it begins to creep into their lives. It also makes an interesting commentary on how the children of those who are suffering from depression can be mistreated, shown in the clip above.
The symptoms of depression the mother shows in the movie are:
1. Depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day, as indicated by either subjec tive report (e.g., feels sad, empty, hopeless) or observation made by others (e.g., appears tearful). (Note: In children and adolescents, can be irritable mood.)
2. Markedly diminished interest or pleasure in all, or almost all, activities most of the day, nearly every day.
4. Insomnia or hypersomnia nearly every day.
6. Fatigue or loss of energy nearly every day.
7. Feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt (which may be delu
sional) nearly every day (not merely self-reproach or guilt about being sick).
8. Diminished ability to think or concentrate, or indecisiveness, nearly every day (ei
ther by subjective account or as observed by others).
9. Recurrent thoughts of death (not just fear of dying), recurrent suicidal ideation with out a specific plan, or a suicide attempt or a specific plan for committing suicide.
One inconsistency was the mother’s aggressive mood swings and taking out her frustrations on her son, which may be more of a sign of grief rather than signs of depression. This movie takes a very interesting spin on what we view depression as, and how we view the recovering from it. The ending of having the Babadook still in the house shows that sometimes the effects of severe depression never really go away, but thee are things that can be done to manage it and keep it more in the background rather than terrorizing people’s lives to the point where they can’t function, similar to being terrorized by a monster. In the clip below, I was lucky to find a video showing all of these symptoms in one continuous video, I hope you enjoy! https://youtu.be/QgHCei5s980

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In the Netflix original movie To the Bone, a 20 year old girl named Ellen is sent to a group home for those suffering from eating disorders. The movie is full of the different behaviors her and her housemates take in order to try ton continue their habits in the group home in secret. Eventually towards the end of the movie, she runs away from the group home and has a near death experience from starvation, that puts her back on the right track.
This movie was created to tell the stories and struggles of those with eating disorders, so it shows a lot of accuracy. Throughout the whole movie, she is shown as severely underweight, while still doing everything in her power to lose more. In the Diagnostic Statistical Manual V, the diagnostic criteria are:
A. Restriction of energy intake, relative to requirements, leading to a significantly low body weight in the context of age, sex, developmental trajectory, and physical health. Significantly low weight is defined as a weight that is less than minimally normal or, for children and adolescents, less than that minimally expected.

B. Intense fear of gaining weight or of becoming fat, or persistent behavior that interferes with weight gain, even though at a significantly low weight.

C. Disturbance in the way in which one’s body weight or shape is experienced, undue influence of body weight or shape on self-evaluation, or persistent lack of recognition of the seriousness of the current low body weight (American Psychological Association, 2013).

Ellen shows all of these criteria throughout the whole movie. In one of the first scenes throughout the movie, Ellen and her sister are seen playing a game where Ellen is able to guess the calorie count of every single item on her plate, which she gets all of them right. This shows she has a long standing control over her caloric intake in order to be  able to look at a plate of food and know exactly how much is on it. In the movie she is very thin and can easily see the bone of her body sticking out through her skin in ways that show how malnourished she is.
She also shows an obsession with the scale and becomes noticeably bothered in the movie whenever she is being weighed and isn’t allowed to look at what the number is. In order to control her weight in the group home because of the food she must eat, at night she secretly does hours of sit ups. In the clip provides, the Doctor talks with her a bit about the bruising on her spine because of this harmful behavior.
She knows that she is small, but she continues to feel as though she should be smaller. There are many scenes where she squeezes the very few parts of her skin that she can pinch and gets every upset with herself and her body for looking like that. Even though she is very underweight, she is still convinced that these natural places where skin pools is a direct reflection of the weight she still needs to lose.
The movie gained a lot of support from those who have eating disorders. Reviews Sid it showed the struggle and the obsession of weight very accurately. Through other characters, it also accurately showed bulimia nervosa, as well as different methods people with anorexia nervosa use in order to control their weight. Overall, the movie itself is heartbreaking, but a powerful window into the lives of those who struggle with such an aggressive disorder, and the ending provides hope.
https://youtu.be/vX0r1WOLI08

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Bipolar Disorder: Silver Linings Playbook

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Bipolar Disorder: Silver Linings Playbook

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(Warning! In the video clip, there is some language!) https://youtu.be/WQslm7HjT0c
In the dark comedy Silver Linings Playbook, Bradley Cooper plays a man named Pat who is now staying with his parents after an 8 month stay in a mental hospital after he beat the man his wife was cheating on him with. Being home, he quickly meets a girl named Tiffany, who clearing deals with her own issues after the death of her husband. By viewers, Tiffany is viewed to have borderline personality disorder. He and Tiffany begin a tense friendship due to their explosive personalities, but both get focused on one goal, and that is to get a 5 or above at Tiffany’s dance competition coming up. Pat believes winning this bet may be the key to getting his wife back, so it and Tiffany soon consume his life for the better. Throughout the movie, we see Oat trying to figure out what his new normal is outside of the hospital. The movie shows some emphasis on the family strain that comes with Pat’s disorder through his relationship with his compulsive father and his fragile, peace keeping mother.

Pat is said in the movie to have bipolar disorder, and after consulting with the DSM-V, I’d have to agree. The required symptoms for the disorder are a bit different than any other disorder I have looked at so far, because it is categorized by different episodes of mania lasting at least a week followed one of two types of episodes that following it which last at least 4 days (APA, 2013). The first type is what people commonly associate with bipolar disorder, which is the depressive episode (APA, 2013). This is when people go from a manic state, them burning out on all the energy and crashing into depression, trying to recover from all of the energy they felt compelled to expel during their manic episode (APA, 2013). The other type is hypomania, which is an elevated mood known for it irritability, which is notably less than the average mania symptoms, but still operating at a much more elevated level than the average person’s resting state. Pat is said to have bipolar I disorder, meaning he go from mania into the depressive episodes (APA, 2013). In the movie, the audience is very rarely able to see the depressive episodes, and when they do come, they only last for a few minutes. The DSM required for both types of episodes to last 4 days each (APA, 2013). Although this point may be faulty because of the movie not showing everyday Pat lives through consecutively, we only really see him in his states or mania, and even hypomania.

However, Pat is able to match the mania episode criteria to a T. The DSM-V (2013) describes the manic episodes to have 4 criteria, with Pat displaying all 4. The first criterion is “A distinct period of abnormally and persistently elevated, expansive, or irritable mood and abnormally and persistently increased goal-directed activity or energy, lasting at least 1 week and present most of the day, nearly every day.” (APA, 2013). Pat shows this throughout the entire movie with being quick to react, often getting into fights with his dad/Tiffany, lacking tact in social situations, and always being defensive or on edge. The second being showing at least four symptoms of mood disturbance. The symptoms Pat lives with are a decreased need for sleep shown throughout the movie of Pat being up at all hours watching his wedding videos, being more talkative than usual or pressure to keep talking shown in his conversations all throughout the movie where he talks himself into a hole constantly (shown in the video), flight of ideas or subjective experience that thoughts are racing shown in how quickly he moves from one topic to the next and how quickly he can jump to conclusions with Tiffany and his wife, and finally an increase in goal-directed activity shown best in his obsession with getting his wife back and the dance with Tiffany (APA, 2013).
The third symptom is showing that the mood disturbances above have impaired social interaction (APA, 2013). There are many examples of this in the movie, one mainly being    a scene where he is having dinner at a family friend’s house and he is constantly saying offensive things those around him because of his racing thoughts and feeling compelled to speak. The final symptom is that none of the other symptoms are caused by any form substance abuse, which Pat shows no sign of.

The movie got some pushback from the mental health community, more due to the messages it was sending rather than inaccuracy. The director in fact has a son who has bipolar disorder, so it got a lot right. The only complaints about accuracy the movie received was that Pat only seemed to be in a state of mania at all times and did not differ in levels. However, the movie did get some backlash for sending the message love can conquer all, including mental illness. Although love can be a great way of healing, mediation and therapy is going to do a lot more than a romantic relationship can, which is where this movie missed the mark. It makes the love story between two dysfunctional people very romanticized. They still warn of the dangers through how explosive their relationship is, but they still have such a happy ending.

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https://youtu.be/--fVvV6JeEA

In the Netflix original tv show, Atypical, an 18 year old boy named Sam tries to navigate high school while living with autism spectrum disorder. He is described to be high functioning and verbal in the show, but there are concerns with the viewers of falling into certain stereotypes of the disorder, as well as showing an uncreative representation of those living with the disorder. The symptoms listed for autism spectrum disorder by the APA (2013) are; persistent deficits in social communication and social interaction, restrictive/repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities. They almost must be present in the early developmental period, and cause clinically significant impairment in social, occupational, or other areas of functioning (APA, 2013).

In Atypical, this is shown in Sam’s social awkwardness, not understanding social cues, or how to spare others feelings, monotone voice, lack of interest in others lives. He also has an obsession with penguins, necessary routines, needing things to go a certain way or else he loses it. Sam shows signs of dealing with sensory overload, where the climax of the first season is centered around him going through a moment of sensory overload (as shown in the clip above). The show also focuses a lot of emphasis on his inability to maintain friendships, and the fact that he has never had a romantic relationships, but wants one desperately.

Although this show did had a lot of great points, it ended up being controversial in the autism spectrum disorder community. Even though all of the symptoms of someone with high functioning autism were displayed, many viewers felt as though it was almost a caricature of some with his condition. It was considered stereotypical because all of the symptoms seemed to attack at every moment. Even though in the show he is considered  high functioning, he seems misses every social cue, takes ever chance to talk about his penguins, and come across as consistently self absorbed and extremely rude. Viewer complained that someone of his functioning level would not miss the mark socially every single time. There is supposed to be variation and learned behaviors on how to behave in certain situations, not a show taking every plot opportunity to show off the symptoms of autism.

It also shows a flipped abuser narrative in his relationship with his girlfriend Paige. He is very rude and uncaring towards her, and never considers her feelings, even though she bends over backwards to make her happy. He verbally attacks her often, when in reality, people who have autism spectrum disorder are the ones that are victims of this type of treatment, not the reverse.

Overall, the show portrayed some good points, and viewers agreed. They felt the writers dod do their homework when it comes to the symptoms of the disorder, as well as an accurate depiction how the family members of those with autism spectrum disorder. It was also applauded for never sugar coating the harsher realities of living with this disorder, for example how hard things can be when over sensitized (clip above). Atypical was clearly very well intended by the writers and producers, but could still be improved on its accuracy.