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Comment by cLeEOGPw | Hacker News Reader

There are countless ways how brain function can go wrong. Feeling things that don't exist are one of them. But even for the smartest people it can be extremely hard to convince himself that what he is feeling is not real.

Another problem with phantom feelings are that they can overlap with actual feelings. That means the brain feels itch on hand, for example, and scratching of that part triggers a relief response. This not only temporarily "fixes" the itch, but also strengthens the belief that the itch is real. After countless of these confirmations it can become near impossible to convince yourself that it is not real.

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Be careful in how you approach chronic issues like this. Saying the "feeling is not real" is just as dismissive as the doctors in the article. The feelings are real. There just may be no physical cause for them. They are real feelings, perhaps with a psychological or neurological basis.

These people need real help. And that help may be psychological in nature. Don't shame people because of it - support them so they can stand up and accept the help they need.

In general I think the distinction between physical, neurological and psychological is peculiar. It suggests that the mind is not physical but a metaphysical entity that can be be analysed separately from the body and vice versa.

My experience with both mental illness and physical disease is that a systemic perspective is important if we are to avoid fixating on finding a specific diagnosis and instead focus on quality of life.

The mind, at least from our perspective, does not operate like any physical thing. So until neurobiology can explain the psychological phenomena, we need to make the distinction.

I kind of skimmed the end of the article, but what happened with the fibers that were analyzed in the lab and wouldn't melt? The one that went _through_ glass also sounded interesting.

It was not mentioned again.

Don't put too much stock in it - this kind of stuff is usually just a false result from poor lab methodology.

No answer. The payload of the article turned out to be the journalist's rumination on his existential anxieties, followed by a few loose ends tied into a makeshift bow and a shoutout for his forthcoming book. Most disappointing.

I don't believe in Morgellon's syndrome (or rather, I don't believe most of the explanations that are offered for it), but I feel a lot of sympathy towards people who are struggling with it, as I have an occasional recurring OCD itch that is annoying both as a physical itch and a psychosomatic one. I manage to stop scratching, the skin gradually heals, everything is fine, and then some months or years later some casual micro-abrasion sets it off again, the same way an exposed piece of velcro seems to actively pick up lint.

Those reports (fiber that wouldn't melt, fiber going through glass) were second-hand reports from the sufferers themselves. They claimed that these things happened. The only actual lab report found that the fibers were normal household things of the variety you'd expect: cotton, human hair, rat hair, etc.

This is an unfortunate psychological disease.

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