We all love and adore the children’s shows and movies about Winnie the Pooh and friends. The lovable, giddy, relatable characters like pooh bear, piglet, Christopher Robinson, tigger, eeyore, too, rabbit, and owl all have some sort of special place in our hearts. Some characters we may feel a certain attraction or closeness too but why is that? These children’s fiction characters are also excellent representations of what different mental illnesses and struggles can look like.
It can be stated that each of the main characters resemble a mental illness.
Pooh represents an eating disorder. Piglet represents an anxiety disorder. Tigger represents attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Eeyore represents major depressive disorder. Rabbit represents obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). Owl represents narcissistic personality disorder. Christopher Robinson represents schizophrenia. Each of these characters may present and behave in a way that showcases the symptoms of these disorders, but what are these disorders? And how do these characters fit these mental disorders and illnesses?
Binge eating disorder is repeated binge eating disorders that occur at least once a week for at least 3 months. The binge eating episodes must include several features such as eating fast, eating even if not hungry, eating past feeling full, and feeling bad about eating so much. No compensatory behavior is present. It is typically associated with obesity and history of dieting with a BMI over 30 but only 2-25% of obese people meet criteria for Binge Eating Disorder. It is often comorbid with mood disorders, anxiety disorders, conduct disorder, and substance use disorders. Rick factors include childhood obesity, critical comments about being overweight, weight-loss attempts in childhood, low self-concept, depression, and childhood physical or sexual abuse. It is more prevalent in women and more prevalent than anorexia or bulimia. It is equally prevalent among Euro-, African-, Asian-, and Hispanic-Americans.
Generalized anxiety disorder is excessive, uncontrollable, and long-lasting worry about minor things. Worry is the cognitive tendency to chew on a problem and to be unable to let go of it. Common worries include relationships, health, finances, and daily hassles. This disorder typically begins in adolescence and includes difficulty concentrating, tiring easily, restlessness, irritability, and muscle tension. The DSM-5 criteria for generalized anxiety disorder is excessive anxiety and worry at least 50% of days about multiple domains of event or activities such as family, health, finances, work, and school. The person will find it hard to control the worry and the anxiety and worry are associated with at least three, or one in children, symptoms including restlessness of feeling keyed up or on edge, tiring easily, difficulty concentrating or mind going blank, irritability, muscle tension, and sleep disturbance.
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder is characterized by hyperactive behaviors that are extreme for a particular developmental period, persistent across different impairment situations, and linking to significant impairments in functioning. There may be particularly difficulty controlling their activity in situations that call for sitting still such as classrooms. They may also experience difficulty getting along with peers caused. By aggressive and intrusive behaviors, difficulty noticing subtle social cues, and being singled out very quickly and rejected or neglected by peers.
Major depressive disorder is a sad mood or loss of interest and pleasure with at least 5 symptoms present. Symptoms include sleeping too much or too little, psychomotor retardation or agitation, poor appetite and weight loos, or increased appetite and weight gain, loss of energy, feelings of worthlessness or excessive guilt, difficulty concentrating, thinking, or making decisions, or recurrent thoughts of death or suicide. These symptoms are present nearly every day, most of the day, and for at least two weeks and are distinct from and more severe than a normative response to significant loss. Major depressive disorder I is episodic where symptoms tend to dissipate over time and recurrent where once depression occurs, future episodes are likely. Among people with a first depressive episode 15% report persistent depressive symptoms and 50% report at least one additional episode. Major depressive disorder II is useful to consider depression symptoms as a continuum of severity and patients may present with quite varied symptom presentations.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder is a diagnosis based on the presence of obsessions and/or compulsions in which most people experience both and often before the age of 14. Obsessions are intrusive and persistent thoughts, images, or impulses that are uncontrollable and are often experienced as irrational. Typically, a person spends hours immersed in obsessions with the most common obsessions being contamination, responsibility for harm, sex and morality, violence, religion, and symmetry/order. Compulsions are repetitive, clearly excessive behaviors or mental acts to reduce anxiety and are extremely difficult to resist the impulses that may involve elaborate behavioral rituals. Compulsive gambling, eating, etc are NOT considered compulsions because they are pleasurable. Compulsions are motivated by the desire to reduce anxiety. The DSM-5 criteria defined obsessions by recurrent, intrusive, persistent unwanted thoughts, urger, or images in which the person has tried to ignore, suppress or neutralize the thoughts, urges, or images. Compulsions are defined by repetitive behaviors or thoughts that the person feels compelled to perform to prevent distress or a dreaded event. The person feels driven to perform the repetitive behaviors or thoughts in response to obsessions or according to rigid rules and the acts are excessive or unlikely to prevent the dreaded situation. The obsessions or compulsions are either time consuming of more than 1 hour per day or cause clinically significant distress and/or impairment.
Narcissistic personality disorder is a grandiose view of self with preoccupied fantasies of great success. Self-centered is the demand of constant attention, lack of empathy, feelings of arrogance, envy, entitlement, and view of themselves as superior to others. The primary goal of interaction with others is to bolster their own self-esteem. They value being admired more than gaining closeness and have a tendency to seek out high status partners. They are highly likely to be vindictive and aggressive when faced with a competitive threat or a put-down.
Schizophrenia influences the way a person thinks, feels, and behaves. It involves disordered thinking where ideas are not logically related, faulty perception and attention, lack of emotional expressiveness, and disturbances in movement or behavior. Widespread disruptions in life occur that range from maintaining jobs, living independently, an having close relationships. Schizophrenia is one of the most stigmatized psychological disorders and has high rates of substance use, suicide, and mortality rates. The lifetime prevalence is approximately 1% and affects men slightly more often than women. Schizophrenia is diagnosed more frequently in African and Latinx Americans and appears to reflect a bias among clinicians. The onset typically occurs in late adolescence/early adulthood however, men are diagnosed at a slightly earlier age. People often experience several acute episodes with less severe symptoms between episodes. The DSM-5 criteria for schizophrenia is two or more of symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, disorganized (catatonic) behavior, and negative symptoms such as diminished motivation or emotional expression for at least one month. One symptom should either be delusions, hallucinations, or disorganized speech. Functioning in work, relationships, or self-care will have declined since onset and signs of disorder are present for at least 6 months. During a prodromal or residual phase, negative symptoms or two or more symptoms of delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, or disorganized (catatonic) behavior are in a less severe form.