What Do we Really Know About How Lance-Corporal Adolf Hitler Was Treated by Psychiatrist
OBJECTIVE This paper inquires the hypothesis that Hitler's rise to power was in part due to a hypnotic therapy he had undergone when being treated for hysterical blindness at an army hospital in the town of Pasewalk in October 1918 - as recent contributions have argued. Edmund Forster, his psychiatrist at that time, is supposed to have suggested to Hitler that he would be ordained as Germany's redeemer in times of defeat, thus causing a profound change in his patient's personality. METHODS Following three lines of argument, this paper examines if such an assumption can be made plausible. Firstly, it takes a close look at the main historical source which is the novel THE EYEWITNESS, written in German language by the Czech-Jewish author Ernst Weiss. Then it asks if Forster is likely to have chosen hypnosis as a method of treatment. Finally, it exploits the work of the even lesser known author Alexander Moritz Frey who happened to serve close to Hitler as a medical orderly in WW I, thus trying to validate whether or not Hitler really underwent a change of personality in autumn 1918. RESULTS Although the eventualities of such a hypnotic treatment or a profound change in Hitler's behaviour in that time cannot be disproved, both seem highly unlikely. CONCLUSIONS One should altogether abandon the notion of Hitler having suffered a permanent change of personality in 1918, be it due to psychiatric treatment or to psychological trauma itself.
What happens when someone is experiencing an anxiety? Normally, we associate such an occurrence with distinct reactions in the body. Some people feel like their anxiety must be a heart attack. They find that their pulse increases. They feel a tightness in their chest. Their hands and feet may suddenly go numb. Yes, it may just feel like a heart attack is occurring. Even though it is not, still they are experiencing a miserable situation.
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One of the most undisputed, but unusual, fact is that hypnosis can often be used to successfully get rid of warts. This is because warts are caused by a very specific said of human viruses. The presumption has always been that the use of hypnosis for medical applications is rather limited to only psychosomatic illnesses. However, warts are most deftly not the result of all-the-mind, psychosomatic disorders.
One of the earliest cases involving warts being removed to the use of hypnosis happened during World War II. In that case, a medical doctor used the power of suggestion to facilitate...