i'm not me—who are you?

Tree—Messina, Italy (photo: Michael Hale)

"[...] During the treatment period in the unit, it was observed that our patient had symptoms of Capgras, Cotard and Fregoli Syndromes. The main clinical characteristics of the Capgras syndrome is a delusional belief that familiar persons are replaced by strangers (2).The patient refers to some small, misinterpreted physical and behavioral differences in her mind to differentiate the familiar persons from strangers (3). When patients are questioned about their delusional ideas, they find them unbelievable and weird, but these delusional thoughts continue (2). The most dominant delusional thought in our case was that strangers had taken the place of her parents. She maintained that her visitors (real parents) looked the same as her parents, but their behavior and way of looking were different and she insisted on seeing her real parents.
     The Cotard syndrome is characterized by delusional thoughts of denying one's own existence or particular parts of his/her body (5, 9). In the literature, 89% of the cases had depressive symptoms, 69% had nihilistic delusions about their existence, 65% had anxiety symptoms, and 63% had feelings of guilt (5). Our patient said that she had died and didn't exist. Meanwhile, she thought this was all her fault and kept apologizing. She was suffering from significant anxiety regarding her delusional experiences and her mother's state of health.
     In the Fregoli syndrome, patients have delusional beliefs that they know quite unfamiliar persons and places very well. They can perceive the hospital room as their home, or a stranger as their relative (4). Our case believed that some patients in the unit were her parents and some of the staff were her relatives."
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