Frank: The Forcibly Feminized Fireman
I looked down at the Victoria's Secret pink lace panties that Carlotta had made me wear. It was downright shameful. I've always been a man's man. How did this happen to me? I reached up and snatched the long ash blonde wig off my head. This insanity had to be stopped, but I obviously couldn't do it on my own. What Carlotta wanted me to do next, to let them do to me, to What is missed is that, at times, the medical problem is the major cause of the mental disorder.
For example, comorbidity is common in anxiety and depressive disorders, particularly in cardiovascular disease, skin problems, and diabetes. Many medical conditions — including heart disease, breast cancer, prostate cancer, diabetes, alcoholism and Alzheimer's disease — have been shown to be passed down through families. Physical illnesses or vulnerability for illnesses runs in families.
These illness patterns can be caused by genetics, but also are related to idiosyncratic family diets, lifestyles, exposure to toxins, geographic location, and socio-economic status. Look for early family deaths. People with mental illness tend to die young, but so do their families. A prime example of a familial pattern of mental illness is the connection between heart disease and depression in families which is presented below. Relatives of people with early-onset major depression die younger than the normal population — an average of eight years younger than normal life expectancy.
More than 40 percent of first-degree relatives die before reaching age There is also a five-fold increase in infant mortality rates. Older family members have a greater than average incidence of Alzheimer's. Is there a significant level of osteoporosis in the family? Major depression commonly co-occurs with decreased bone mineral density. Family history, family medical records, death certificates, obituaries, and old family letters can be valuable sources for medical histories.
Even old family photos can sometimes provide visual clues to diseases such as obesity, osteoporosis, and hair or skin problems. A thorough medical history can also give you data about family genetics and genetic fallout. Your shoulder bone connected to your neck bone. Your neck bone connected to your head bone. I hear the word of the Lord. Somatic Symptom and Related Disorders. The problem in this category of diagnoses is that there is no scientific evidence that this can occur. The problem here is two-fold.
As long as we label unusual maladies as psychosomatic of somatoform, we risk missing an underlying illness. Although tests can rule out specific maladies, there is no medical assessment that can diagnose the absence of illness.
Once this process begins, the doctor may dismiss symptoms that do not fit his preliminary diagnosis. But they quickly fall apart when a doctor needs to think outside their boxes, when symptoms are vague, or multiple and confusing, or when test results are inexact. In such cases — the kinds of cases where we most need a discerning doctor — algorithms discourage physicians from thinking independently and creatively. Instead of expanding a doctor's thinking, they can constrain it.
Groopman also confesses in the beginning of his book that he has no idea how mental health practitioners make a diagnosis, because there is often complete absence of an observable physical abnormality to verify the pathology. One-third of new referrals to neurology clinics have symptoms that are poorly explained by identifiable organic disease.
It is not uncommon for a person who has an array of symptoms that do not fit any particular disease criteria to be labeled as having somatization disorder. The patient will then go doctor shopping, which will eventually get them the label of hypochondria. Oftentimes, the sufferer will eventually find a doctor who actually finds the undetected medical disorder, or the person will become so ill that it becomes clear that a medical disorder is the cause.
Diseases such as Lupus, multiple sclerosis, Lyme disease, parasites, or intestinal infections are often misdiagnosed as mental illness. All of these are discussed below. Or this assumed causal link may not exist at all: Concomitant events are not necessarily causally related. Medical conditions diagnosed as conversion disorders. The new description of somatic symptom disorder in DSM-5 represents a big step forward, because the decision has been made to use, for classification, a positive criterion, namely maladaptive reaction to a somatic symptom, instead of the earlier negative criterion.
The primary cause of conversion disorder is purportedly a traumatic event or stressful situation that leads the patient to develop bodily symptoms as symbolic expressions of a preexisting psychological conflict. In fact, these events are often correlated, but keep in mind that correlation is not cause-and-effect. A study of 34 children who developed pseudo-seizures showed that 32 percent of the children had a history of depression or sexual abuse, and 44 percent had recently experienced a parental divorce, death, or violent quarrel.
But familial studies have also shown that conversion symptoms in first-degree female relatives are up to 14 times greater than in the general population, suggesting a genetic predisposition to these symptoms. The surgeons found that she had been repeatedly raped as a child by her father, who stifled her cries by smothering her with a pillow. In the adult population, conversion disorder may be associated with mobbing, a term that originated among European psychiatrists and industrial psychologists to describe psychological abuse in the workplace.
One American woman who quit her job because of mobbing was unable to walk for several months. Adult males sometimes develop conversion disorder during military basic training. One problem with this diagnosis is that conversion disorders seem to be culture bound. Mental health practitioners in the Middle East and Asia have reported that symptoms of conversion disorder in the DSM-5 and ICD do not fit with the symptoms of the disorder most frequently encountered in their populations.
Books by Dominick Cummings
Most conversion symptoms afflict the left half of the body. Researchers hypothesize that a dysfunction in the right amygdala and parietal lobe circuits are the cause of the disorder. Brain damage in these areas often causes conversion symptoms and body image distortions.
Some studies suggest that changes in these areas could be caused by traumatic events, which result in changes in body image, perception, and behavior. Unfortunately, there is no way to prove that a conversion disorder is caused by psychogenic trauma. Before this diagnosis is rendered, clinicians should make sure the client has had a complete medical workup. Conversion disorders may be signs of hypoglycemia, an undetected neurological disorder, or a seizure disorder. Researcher Iraj Derakhshan found in 79 consecutive patients with conversion disorder, 76 percent had unilateral cerebral abnormalities found in brain scans, while abnormalities on EEG assessments were found in 78 percent.
Hypochondria is the interpretation of bodily symptoms as signs of a serious illness. Frequently the symptoms are normal bodily functions, such as coughing, pain, sores, or sweating. Although some people will be aware that their concerns are excessive, many become preoccupied by the symptoms. Typically, this will trigger frequent visits to doctors. They often are preoccupied with the belief that they have a serious illness, and have a penchant for bodily functions.
They often ruminate about illnesses, have an unrealistic fear of infection, and have a fascination with medical information. They may spend a great deal of time on the Internet looking at diseases, symptoms, and treatments. Hypochondria is classified as an anxiety disorder. There is little doubt that hypochondria is a viable diagnosis. However, it is also clear that many people given this diagnoses actually suffer from an undetected medical condition.
For example, Lyme disease is often misdiagnosed as hypochondria. In many cases, a family history will reveal that many family members suffer from similar maladies. Charles Darwin and five of his seven children were diagnosed as suffering from either hypochondria or depression. It appears that the man who created the theory of natural selection and inherited traits may have had a familial genetic predisposition for mental illness. The world of gene testing is exploding. Today, there are dozens of companies that can detect genetic predispositions to illness. As a result, new treatments are emerging which can alter gene expression.
This is the world of genomics. All health practitioners need to have a working knowledge of this breakthrough. The mapping of the human genome has revealed a multitude of genes which are highly correlated with the presence of mental illnesses. DNA is a series of molecules linked together in a microscopic spiral called a chromosome. Humans have 23 chromosomes, and every cell in our body has two versions of each of the 23 chromosomes — one from each parent.
This combination is called a diploid genome. The human genome contains a total of 30, genes. Females have two X chromosomes, while males have one X and one Y chromosome. We inherit half of our genetic profile from each parent. Both males and females retain one of their mother's X chromosomes, but females retain their second X chromosome from their father. Since the father retains his X chromosome from his mother, human females have one X chromosome from their paternal grandmother and one X chromosome from their mother. It is for this reason that many of us resemble our parents, not only in appearance, but in personality, demeanor, social skills, and coping skills.
In addition, we also may inherit genes that can cause or increase the risk of medical disorders. The interplay between fraternal and maternal genes has consequences for mental illnesses as well. It has long been established that most people with mental disorders have a genetic predisposition to their woes. We know this because mental disorders run in families. However, it is now evident that the predispositions to certain medical disorders are predictors of mental disorders in family members, and that family genetics contribute to mood, behavior, and mental well-being.
These discoveries have revealed that a fundamental cause of many human maladies is how these two sets of genes interact. Ninety-nine percent of all human DNA is identical, but that one-percent difference is often the root cause of mental disorders. The complete mapping the human genome has allowed researchers to scan DNA for genes that may cause, contribute to, or even prevent mental disorders.
At the time of this writing, despite the explosion of genetic research, only a small number of these genes have been identified. But even though gene research in mental illness is still in its infancy, a person can still gather some information about their genetic risk of physical and mental illness simply by looking at his family tree. Moreover, looking at the family history of certain maladies can predict other problems in family members.
These familial problems can be said to be family fallout. It has long been known that mental problems run in families. What is not well known is that the children and relatives of people who have mental or medical illnesses are also prone to other illnesses. The people you work with will tell you about their mental symptoms, but they will seldom disclose their physical maladies.
Furthermore, without prompting, they will not discuss the medical problems of their family. Genetic penetrance is the likelihood that a certain gene will result in a specific disease. In , researcher Roger Webb, at the University of Manchester in England, showed that the risk of fatal birth defects is higher in the children of parents who have been hospitalized for mood disorders.
There is even more risk is associated with maternal schizophrenia. Moreover, children of mothers who had previously been admitted to a hospital for any type of psychiatric diagnosis had significantly higher risk of death from birth through early adulthood. The risk of infant death among children with two mentally ill parents was significantly higher than that associated with having only one affected parent.
Families with fathers or mothers who have a history of psychiatric hospitalizations also double the risk of sudden infant death syndrome SIDS compared with the general population. If both parents were hospitalized, the risk of SIDS was increased by almost seven-fold. There is evidence that SIDS may be in part caused by abnormalities of serotonin in the brainstem. There is strong evidence of a genetic transmission of recurrent major depression. In fact, having a family member with major depression increases a person's risk eight-fold. Heritability is considered to be about percent. A history of depression in a parent is the strongest risk factor for depression in a child.
Researcher Myrna Weissman at New York State Psychiatric Institute found high rates of psychiatric disorders — particularly anxiety disorders — in the grandchildren of families with two generations of major depression. Fifty-nine percent of these grandchildren, with a mean age of twelve years, were suffering from a psychiatric disorder.
A twin study found a 46 percent concordance of depression in identical twins and 20 percent in fraternal twins. Interestingly, in this study, shared family environment had no impact on depression. This high level of mortality in families with depression may be linked to heart disease. A significant number of studies show a relationship between depression and cardiovascular problems. Studies report the prevalence of major depression in cardiac patients as between 17 percent and 27 percent in hospitalized patients. Serotonin may play a part in depression, but is also contributes to cardiovascular disorders.
Serotonin plays a role in platelet aggregation, and platelet serotonin levels correlate negatively with severity of depression. In a clinical study University of Pittsburgh, blood platelet serotonin levels were 39 percent lower in patients who had made a suicide attempt. Recently, scientists have discovered a gene that contributes to depression, called the serotonin transporter gene.
Two forms of the gene have been discovered, described as the short and long gene form. Some studies suggest that inheriting the short form of the gene doubles the risk of depression, but recent studies found no correlation. Those who carry two copies of the short version of the gene are also more prone to alcohol abuse. It has long been known that bipolar disorders also have a high genetic predisposition. The genetic penetrance of bipolar disorder is about 70 percent. What is not as well known is that bipolar disorder has also been genetically linked to cystic kidney disease , a disorder in which cysts growing in the center of each kidney cause them to malfunction.
In one study, out of seven members with medullary cystic kidney disease, five had bipolar I disorder, one had unipolar depression, and one had a hyperthymic phenotype. Two known genetic loci of cystic kidney disease are found in regions of chromosomes 1 and 16 — areas that have been previously linked to bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. The children of parents diagnosed with bipolar disorder are more likely to exhibit disruptive behavior disorders, separation anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, social phobias, or depression.
These problems usually emerge in early or middle childhood. Hagop Souren Akiskal, the director of the International Mood Center in San Diego, has found temperament dysregulation as an important familial genetic factor in the vulnerability for manic- depressive episodes. He believes that a trait known as hyperthymic temperament is a state often found in families with full-blown bipolar disorder.
This temperament is characterized by upbeat, highly energetic, and overconfidence. People with these traits do not seek help for mental problems and, therefore, are rarely seen by mental health professionals. They often, however, will seek help for marital problems, job instability, or problems with impulse control.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, more than two million Americans are affected by some form of schizophrenia. This array of illnesses can severely impair a person's ability to manage emotions, interact with others, and think clearly. Symptoms include hallucinations, delusions, disordered thinking, and social withdrawal. Although there are several treatments available today, the majority of people suffering from these maladies will suffer chronically or episodically throughout their lives. Even with treatment, one of every ten people with schizophrenia eventually commits suicide.
There seem to be genetic and epigenetic contributors to schizophrenia. The heritability of schizophrenia is about 70 percent. Several studies suggest that there is an increased risk of schizophrenia in people with older fathers. The risk of schizophrenia is increased for both males and female with fathers 55 years or older. The seasonal peak in schizophrenic births increases the further north a person resides.
There is evidence that lack of UV light and low vitamin D may contribute to schizophrenia. In , scientists at Columbia University asserted that up to one fifth of all schizophrenia cases are caused by prenatal infections. Interestingly, Cox 2 inhibitors, which are powerful anti-inflammatory drugs, are an effective treatment for schizophrenia. Patrick McCann, at the University of Oklahoma, has developed a diagnostic breath test that uses lasers to measure the amount of carbon disulphide in breath of children.
Carbon disulphide is known to be at higher levels of in the breath of people with schizophrenia — even in infants. This allows him to make diagnoses decades before symptoms occur. Family members of schizophrenics but without the disorders are at higher risk for other problems. For example, idiosyncratic use of language a trait similar to the thought disorder observed in schizophrenia occurs in 37 percent of clinically unaffected first-degree relatives of individuals with schizophrenia, a rate almost six times higher than the presence of schizophrenia in the same families.
Frank: The Forcibly Feminized Fireman - Kindle edition by Dominick Cummings. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Read "Frank: The Forcibly Feminized Fireman" by Dominick Cummings with Rakuten Kobo. Frank is used to being many people's fantasy man.
Other researchers have noted that family members of a person diagnosed with schizophrenia have a higher incidence of seizure disorders. When the rates for thought disorder, schizophrenia, and related clinical conditions are combined, the proportion of potential gene-carrying relatives is close to 50 percent, consistent with a dominant gene, and much higher than the 6.
Course Outline
Family members also have difficulty following a slow-moving target with one's eyes, syntax errors, or idiosyncratic use of language. Physically, they often have subtle anomalies in the midline of the face, and have difficulty filtering out noises and other irrelevant stimuli, a condition known as sensory gating. Although methamphetamine does not cause schizophrenia, the greater familial incidence for schizophrenia, the more likely an amphetamine user in that family would develop psychosis and the longer that psychosis is likely to last.
Prenatal influenza virus infection has been associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia. Mental symptoms of Wolfram Syndrome. Physical symptoms of Wolfram Syndrome. Wolfram Syndrome was first described in as a familial disorder usually presenting with Type 1 juvenile-onset diabetes and vision loss. The syndrome is an autosomal recessive disorder meaning that it only occurs in individuals who have received one copy of the gene from each parent.
It is caused by a gene on the short arm of chromosome 4. The frequency of carrying the recessive genetic trait in the US population is approximately one percent. The syndrome is also characterized by the presence of neurogenic bladder frequent urination , hearing deficits, and other neurological problems. A majority of individuals who have two mutant Wolfram Syndrome genes have these distinctive symptoms. Despite the array of symptoms, most people will have the disorder for several years before an accurate diagnosis is made.
Wolfram Syndrome may also present with psychological symptoms, such as depression, violent and assaultive behavior, chronic anxiety, panic attacks, and hallucinations. Most people with the disorder die prematurely with progressive, widespread atrophic changes throughout the brain.
Unfortunately, 60 percent of those with the syndrome die by age While it takes two aberrant genes to manifest the full-blown syndrome, those who carry a single mutation, a condition called Wolfram Syndrome Heterozygotes , have no distinguishing physical characteristics but constitute approximately one percent of the population. Family members who carry a single mutation in the Wolfram Syndrome gene are 26 times more likely to require hospitalization for depression and suicide attempts than people who do not have the gene.
Researchers Ronnie and Michael Swift at New York Medical College estimate that even though only one percent of the general population carries the gene — about 25 percent of the patients hospitalized for psychiatric difficulties may be carrying the gene. Mental symptoms of hemochromatosis. Physical symptoms of hemochromatosis. Hemochromatosis is a genetic disorder that causes iron accumulation in the body. People of Western European descent — with ancestors from Ireland, Wales, Scotland, or Great Britain — have a percent probability of carrying a gene for hemochromatosis.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, Type 1 hemochromatosis is the most common genetic disease in the United States. Like Wolfram Syndrome, hereditary hemochromatosis is an autosomal recessive condition. The person must inherit two mutated genes called HFE one from each parent. This type of the disorder is deemed responsible for sexual dysfunction in percent of men. They exhibit loss of libido and potency, and have high iron and low plasma levels of testosterone.
However, in some cases, inheritance of only one mutated gene may eventually lead to significant iron accumulation. Although the majority of these people will never know that they carry the gene, some will begin to feel aches and pains and changes in energy and mood. This condition is also thought to contribute to what is called treatment resistant mental disorders. A study by researchers David Feifel and Corinna Young Casey at the University of California in San Diego showed that 80 percent of people with treatment resistant bipolar disorder carried one gene and lacked a family history for this disorder.
They estimated that one percent of psychiatric patients were likely candidates for iron overload. Common symptoms of hemochromatosis are fatigue, aches and pains, disorientation, confusion, and memory problems. In these cases, the diagnosis is often missed for several years, as symptoms are mistaken for depression or dementia. Signs of the illness usually appear between ages 40 to 60, but some people show symptoms as early as Patients suffering from idiopathic hemochromatosis exhibit low plasma levels of testosterone with loss of libido and potency.
It was Eugene Weinberg that was the first to look at the effect of iron in our bodies. He found that the presence of high iron could cause chronic inflammation. Hemochromatosis causes inflammation in the liver, joints, heart, lungs, pancreas, and the brain, especially in the basal ganglia. This part of the brain is rich in dopamine, and in these cases, iron may cause damage to the dopamine system contributing to many neurological disorders, including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease. The gene is thought to accelerate the onset of Alzheimer's disease by five years.
In the past, people with hemochromatosis usually did not survive past their forties or fifties. But as a result of better recognition and treatment, most people with the disorder now have normal life spans. This has resulted in another problem, iron overload in the central nervous system. Bloodletting has been a treatment for this illness for centuries and is still the treatment of choice. Another treatment is chelation therapy.
We now know that lowering iron is not only useful for hemochromatosis, but may actually be beneficial to the immune system. Infections need iron to survive. The human body contains many natural chelators.
In , author Whitley Strieber wrote Communion, an allegedly non-fiction book describing his encounter with aliens whom he claimed had abducted and sexually molested him. They often are preoccupied with the belief that they have a serious illness, and have a penchant for bodily functions. Physical illnesses or vulnerability for illnesses runs in families. In the developed brain, there are two essential types of cells — neurons and glia. The patient will then go doctor shopping, which will eventually get them the label of hypochondria. Feminization Rockstar Crossdressing Erotica.
Mental symptoms of Wilson's disease. Wilson's Disease affects approximately 1 in 30, people worldwide, making it a rare disorder. However, it is estimated that at least half of the people with Wilson's Disease are never diagnosed, and therefore will suffer, and sometimes die, from the disease. Wilson's is a genetic disorder that causes the body to retain copper.
The liver of a person who has the disease cannot release copper into bile as it should. Over time, the copper reaches a toxic level and injures liver tissue. Eventually, this damage will result in high levels of copper in the bloodstream, which leads to damage in the kidneys, brain, and eyes. Untreated, high copper will eventually cause liver failure and brain damage.
Wilson's Disease occurs equally in men and women. Although some cases of Wilson's Disease can occur due to spontaneous genetic mutation, most cases are transmitted from generation-to-generation. The responsible gene is called ATP7B and is located on chromosome In order to inherit the disease, both parents must carry the gene. Siblings of Wilson's Disease patients have a one-in-four chance of having the disease.
Since both of a siblings' parents are carriers, one-fourth of the siblings' children have the disease, one-half are carriers, and one-fourth are disease-free and carry no Wilson's Disease gene. A child of a Wilson's Disease patient has a percent chance of getting one abnormal gene.
The patient's spouse has a one-in-one-hundred chance of carrying the abnormal Wilson's Disease gene, and half the time, he or she will pass it on. For this reason, all siblings and children of Wilson's Disease patients should be tested for Wilson's Disease. Other relatives who have had symptoms or laboratory tests that indicate liver or neurological disease also should also be tested. Because Wilson's Disease is often mistaken for other maladies such as multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, or psychiatric problems, medical specialists estimate that only about one thousand cases per year are ever diagnosed.
In the early stages of the disease, especially when psychological symptoms occur, the diagnosis is often missed. The delay between symptoms and diagnosis ranged from one to five years. Depression sometimes leading to suicidal ideation and suicide attempts is common. Deteriorating academic and work performance is present in almost all patients. Interestingly, many Wilson's Disease patients exhibit increased sexual preoccupation and reduced sexual inhibition. It is also linked with pedophilia. A barrier to the diagnosis of Wilson's Disease is that most patients have no family history of it. Because both parents must carry the gene to manifest the disorder, people with only one abnormal gene usually have no symptoms, or may have mild, but medically insignificant, abnormalities of copper metabolism, and do not become ill.
People with Wilson's Disease may not have any outward signs, symptoms, or evidence of illness. However, people with mild or non-apparent Wilson's Disease will become seriously ill and eventually die if they are not treated. Diagnoses are usually made by blood and liver tests. Chelation therapy is commonly used as treatment. Doctors will also recommend avoiding foods high in copper such as liver, shellfish, mushrooms, nuts, chocolate, dried fruit, dried peas, beans and lentils, avocados, and bran.
Scientists believe the XXY condition is one of the most common chromosome abnormalities in humans. About one of every five hundred males has an extra X chromosome, but many have no symptoms. It is likely that about 60 percent of the cases are undiagnosed. Symptoms depend on how many XXY cells a man has, how much testosterone is in his body, and his age when the condition is diagnosed.
Children with this condition will often exhibit attention deficit disorder. The syndrome is normally diagnosed during puberty. At this age, those with Klinefelter's Syndrome often have less facial and body hair and may be less muscular than other boys. They are often shy and have trouble fitting in with peers. Mature men with this syndrome have several distinguishing characteristics, such as tall stature, long arms and legs, lanky build, feminized physique, little chest hair, female-patterned pubic hair, testicular atrophy, hypogonadism, osteoporosis, breast development, and low levels of testosterone.
The low testosterone accounts for the lack of development of male secondary sex characteristics. They may be infertile and are more likely to have certain health problems, such as autoimmune disorders, breast cancer, vein diseases, osteoporosis, and tooth decay. Behaviorally, they exhibit reduced aggression and lack of exploratory behavior.
They also have trouble using language to express their thoughts and needs, but experience increased levels of emotional arousal. Problems with reading, trouble processing what they hear, emotional instability, and anorexia nervosa may occur. The main treatment is for this syndrome is testosterone. It has long been known that certain families show tendencies for hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism. What is not usually known is that members of such families are also prone to other conditions including insulin-dependent diabetes, pernicious anemia lack of vitamin B12 , premature gray hair, vitiligo white spots on the skin , arthritis, and allergic conditions, including asthma, hives, and hay fever.
There is also an increased tendency for members of these families to have various types of perceptual learning problems and dyslexia. Researcher Lawrence Wood suspects this relationship is missed because women in the family tend to get thyroid problems, while predominantly the men in the family have learning problems, but are seldom seen by family physicians.
See more on thyroid later in this document. DNA is found in every cell of the body. Another type is found in a part of the cell called mitochondria. DNA in the mitochondria, therefore, identifies maternal risk factors of medical and mental illnesses. Mitochondria are specialized organelles found in every cell of your body, except red blood cells. There are approximately 1, mitochondria in each human cell. They are vital to the production of cellular energy. In fact mitochondria are responsible for creating more than 90 percent of the energy needed by the body to sustain health.
Inside the mitochondria, ingested sugar is broken down in the body by a process known as glycolosis , which changes glucose to a compound called adenosine triphosphate ATP , which is then converted in to pyruvate. The pyruvate next delivered to tiny mitochondria. When this system fails, less and less energy is generated within the cell. Cell malfunction, and even cell death, may follow.
Diseases of the mitochondria appear to cause the most damage to cells of the brain. Mitochondria damage contributes to developmental delay, mental retardation, autism, dementia, seizures, atypical cerebral palsy, atypical migraines, stroke and stroke-like events, and other psychiatric disturbances. In early , researchers Kato Tadafumi and Kato Nobumasa at the University in Tokyo proposed a mitochondrial dysfunction hypothesis for bipolar disorder. Postmortem tissue samples extracted from the hippocampi of the brains of nine individuals with bipolar disorder showed significant mitochondrial depletion.
A search for mutant mitochondrial DNA in the tissue samples revealed two suspect genes. A Cleveland Clinic survey of 38 outpatients with mitochondrial diseases found 70 percent met the criteria for major mental illness, including 54 percent with lifetime depression, 17 percent with lifetime bipolar, 11 percent with lifetime panic, and 11 percent with current generalized anxiety.
On average, the mitochondrial disease was diagnosed about four years after the onset of psychiatric symptoms, and 14 years after a physician was seen for diagnoses. Genetic testing has helped significantly in identifying mitochondrial risk factors. Out of our 30, genes, only two percent of deoxyribonucleic acid DNA codes for proteins.
These genes were considered to be the byproduct of millions of years of evolution — genes were still inherited but were no longer used. Recently, however, scientists have discovered that some of this junk DNA actually switches on RNA that interacts with other genes. The field of research of these phenomena is epigenetics. Epigenetics is the science of turning genes on- and-off with nutrients and other chemicals, resulting in changes of expression of those genes.
The process of suppressing and enhancing genes is called methylation, a chemical process that, among other things, aids in the transcription of DNA to RNA and is believed to defend the genome against parasitic genetic elements called transposons. Transposons are spans of DNA that — through a process called transposition — can actually move to different positions within the genome of a cell. Transposition was first observed by researcher Barbara McClintock; this discovery earned her a Nobel Prize in More fascinating is the finding that these mutations may be inherited by children.
Environmental toxins have been shown to alter the activity of genes through at least four generations after exposure. For example, women who smoke while pregnant double the risk of asthma in their grandchildren. For this reason, no two brains are alike, including those of identical twins. It is thought that about 40 percent of our genes can be modified epigenetically.
Although identical twins share the same DNA, their epigenetic material can be different. Moreover, the older the twins become, the more discrepancies will occur in their DNA. Fifty-year-old twins have four times as many differentially expressed genes than three-year-old twins.
Even more interesting is the discovery that genes are regulated by maternal care. Thus far, at least nine hundred genes can be altered by maternal care. For example, the presence of a variation in the monoamine oxidase A gene MAO-A combined with maltreatment predicts antisocial behavior. In mid, researcher Moshe Szyf at McGill University reported that commonly-used pharmaceutical drugs can cause such persistent epigenetic changes. Szyf and his co-author Antonei Csoka posit that drug-induced diseases, such as tardive dyskinesia and drug-induced lupus, are epigenetic in nature.
Love, Sex and Science. Suck It Up 2: Mandatory Man Sex Day. Confessions of Straight Men Seducers: Kinky is the New Black: Kinky Is the New Black: How to write a great review. The review must be at least 50 characters long. The title should be at least 4 characters long. Your display name should be at least 2 characters long.
At Kobo, we try to ensure that published reviews do not contain rude or profane language, spoilers, or any of our reviewer's personal information. You submitted the following rating and review. We'll publish them on our site once we've reviewed them. Item s unavailable for purchase. Please review your cart. You can remove the unavailable item s now or we'll automatically remove it at Checkout. Continue shopping Checkout Continue shopping. Chi ama i libri sceglie Kobo e inMondadori.
Home eBooks Romance Frank: Buy the eBook Price: Available in Russia Shop from Russia to buy this item. Or, get it for Kobo Super Points!