From the Edge of the Couch: Bizarre Psychiatric Cases and What They Teach Us About Ourselves

by raj-persaud

You may think that vampires and werewolves were merely the stuff of bad Hollywood films and mysterious legends, but as Consultant Psychiatrist Dr Raj Persaud reveals, there are real people out there who believe they are werewolves and vampires. As a result, they behave in ways beyond our most disturbing dreams and the wildest fantasies of imaginative film producers.In the tradition of Oliver Sacks' bestselling book, THE MAN WHO MISTOOK HIS WIFE FOR A HAT, Dr Persaud uses authentic case studies to explain current thinking on brain function and emotional disorders - such as that of the man who could only get his sexual kicks by being crushed in garbage trucks, the film fan who embedded dozens of needles into his body in order to become a robot, and those who take dieting to the ultimate limit by obsessively giving blood or eating nothing but toilet paper.Through these and other conditions, such as Alien Hand Syndrome - where suffers believe that one of their own hands is out to harm them - Multiple Personality Disorder, Erotomania and the cases of some women in Turkey whose tears are actually filled with blood, Dr Persaud also suggests that we may not have as much free will and control over our bodies as we would like to believe and provides startling new evidence that these conditions might be more common than sceptical psychiatrists realize.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Mental Health, Psychiatry

576 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[Hazel McHaffie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating look into the behaviours that show delusions and distorted perceptions as they've appeared to many many mental health specialists around the world and across the centuries. Macabre, scary, amusing, bewildering - Dr Persaud believes they have the potential to teach us about ourselves and how society works. For me the book well illustrates my belief that there's a fine line between the normal and the pathological.

[Thomas Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very very interesting selection of cases, all being delusions of various types... and the author did a good job (especially towards the end) at making some thoughtful interpretations from delusions in psychiatric disorders, with a fundamental focus on respect for the person.

[Persephone Abbott · Rating 3 out of 5]

"He's the most eminent psychiatrist of the age, the guru of common sense," says the back of the book. Well, his picture is on the front, he appears regularly on tv programs, he cracks jokes that I think are funny and inappropriate at times, I liked the first hundred pages and then I got bored because the second part of the book's subtitle got a bit lost, "Bizarre psychiatric cases and what they teach us about ourselves." Either I would have preferred a more clinical reading or a more chatty reading, or even some fictional account of delusion. Either way, the problem was that for me, reading about the treatment of such delusions, I wondered where indeed modern psychology is not going, and by that I mean where is the research on body mind connection? Maybe people get up to all sorts of strange delusions, real and faked, to test out psychiatrists.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

From the Edge of the Couch does at times feel a bit like a freak show in the form of the book - the case studies are compelling because of how weird the subjects are - but it is not an insensitive or mocking book. Psychiatrist Persaud describes various patients who, as the title says, are 'bizarre': the people who genuinely believe that they are vampires or werewolves; the man who can only get sexual gratification by being crushed in garbage trucks; the man who stuck hundreds of needles in his body to try and become a robot. This is more than just an exposition of the weird though - Persaud uses the case studies to hypothesise about human nature and free will. 6/10

[Selene · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sort of dippy in and out of book, which is too much in one sitting.