psychosis

/saɪˈkoʊsəs/

/saɪˈkʌʊsɪs/

Other forms: psychoses

If your Uncle Marvin starts talking to his furniture and sewing his own clothes out of newspapers, he may be suffering from psychosis, which is a serious psychiatric illness in which a person loses touch with reality.

The Greek psykhe, or "mind" combines with the Latin suffix -osis, "abnormal condition," to form the word psychosis. An "abnormal condition of the mind" sounds like it could describe a lot of mental conditions, and in fact psychosis is a broad term that covers many different disorders. The symptom that those who suffer from psychosis have in common is that they don't experience reality in the same way that most people do; they may hallucinate, or see and hear things that aren't really there.

Definitions of psychosis

1. noun

   any severe mental disorder in which contact with reality is lost or highly distorted
   types:

   DTs, delirium tremens, jimjams

   acute delirium caused by alcohol poisoning

   paranoia

   a psychological disorder characterized by delusions of persecution or grandeur

   dementia praecox, schizophrenia, schizophrenic disorder, schizophrenic psychosis

   any of several psychotic disorders characterized by distortions of reality and disturbances of thought and language and withdrawal from social contact

   borderline schizophrenia, latent schizophrenia

   schizophrenia characterized by mild symptoms or by some preexisting tendency to schizophrenia

   catatonia, catatonic schizophrenia, catatonic type schizophrenia

   a form of schizophrenia characterized by a tendency to remain in a fixed stuporous state for long periods; the catatonia may give way to short periods of extreme excitement

   disorganized schizophrenia, disorganized type schizophrenia, hebephrenia, hebephrenic schizophrenia

   a form of schizophrenia characterized by severe disintegration of personality including erratic speech and childish mannerisms and bizarre behavior; usually becomes evident during puberty; the most common diagnostic category in mental institutions

   paranoic type schizophrenia, paranoid schizophrenia, paraphrenia, paraphrenic schizophrenia

   a form of schizophrenia characterized by delusions (of persecution or grandeur or jealousy); symptoms may include anger and anxiety and aloofness and doubts about gender identity; unlike other types of schizophrenia the patients are usually presentable and (if delusions are not acted on) may function in an apparently normal manner

   acute schizophrenic episode, reactive schizophrenia

   schizophrenia of abrupt onset and relatively short duration (a few weeks or months)

   type of:

   mental disease, mental illness, psychopathy

   any disease of the mind; the psychological state of someone who has emotional or behavioral problems serious enough to require psychiatric intervention