What is a mental health disorder where one sees less than is in reality called?

Distortions of reality are parts of many mental health disorders. I’m not a practitioner but I would imagine there is not just one disorder that has that as a symptom.

Are there any people who have this disorder? If not, then there is no need to have a name for it. It would be like giving a name to a condition where a person has a third eye on their forehead.

Can you provide an example please.

@Forever_Free Ok. Using the washroom and not see the person using the john. Also in a washroom break from ambulance trip head butting a paramedic by accident. While going pee. Not seeing her even when looking at her.

Have you ever heard of someone actually acting like this?

@LostInParadise Yes. Me. Was 12 years ago. I wonder what else that I have missed?

No, but it could be something neurological that a doctor may be able to narrow in on.

@Forever_Free Ok. Just looking for more info to present to the doctor on March 3rd. I was hoping that It was not as uncommon as it sounds.

That’s why I give a mild audio warning when going to the bathroom. Just in case the invisible people are using the John.

I never heard of such a condition. The closest I could find was Anton’s sydrome , which is a kind of blindness and not what you are referring to. Let us know if your doctor has a name for it.

@LostInParadise Ok Thanks I will update on March 3rd.

Perhaps it’s simply a result of being very focused on something else. I’ve apparently had whole conversations of which I have no memory. I’ve also gotten lost on different occasions when driving to an appt that I had once a week for a number of years. Also while driving, I’ve forgotten not only where I was going, but what city/state I was in. I know those aren’t the same thing, but it’s possible that your experiences were also due to being super-focused on something else.

Does it necessarily have to be a mental disorder?
If one doesn’t know what something is, can one know what category it fits in?
Do you have reasons to believe that it is, potentially, a mental one?

@smudges Ok that’s a relief. Both times I really needed to go pee. No point breaking out the psychiatrists, just yet. I will pass it to my dr. on March 3rd. It was more an interest in psychology, and less for a personal diagnosis.

@RedDeerGuy1 best wishes on your upcoming appointment

I’m not familiar with a mental disorder with this effect. My hunch is that it would be related to either an issue with they eye, an issue with the visual cortex, or possibly not a disorder at all but an example of Selective Attention which is a universal psychological phenomena that humans experience—just as we all experience optical illusions.

Thanks @gorillapaws selective attention sounds more logical than labeling myself as insane. As most times when it happened I REALLY had to pee.

Depends also on any meds you may be taking,anxiety etc

I have had that happen but in a much lesser context. I’ve had situations where I was looking for my keys. I had to leave soon and I couldn’t find them anywhere. I had looked in all the usual places, and I started tearing apart the house trying to find them. Then somebody else got home, walked into the house and they found my keys sitting out in plain sight. They picked them up and handed them to me.

It’s happened more than a few times.

Did you actually urinate a lot? Or was it just the feeling that you really had to go?

@raum I was being transferred from hospitals. 250 kilometers or so between bathrooms. It was a 7 hour trip.

@RedDeerGuy1 What were you being transferred for?

@raum I was going to a Long term hospital to help gain skills for independent living. Domestic skills like doing laundry and managing an apartment. Ect.

@RedDeerGuy1 There are a bunch of ophthalmic comorbidities with schizophrenia. Stress can elevate these. Big life transitions can be pretty stressful.

Did you mention it to your doctor?

@raum Yes.

@RedDeerGuy1 I’m glad you told your doctors. :)

This might be interesting to you.

It sounds something like what Oliver Sacks wrote about in The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. The title (not titular) case is one of visual agnosia. The man has “a neurological condition that leaves him unable to recognize faces and objects,” as the Wikipedia article explains it.

Spatial Neglect is a term used to describe people who are completely unaware of anything that is happening to one side. It can be so profound the patient doesn’t even realise they are missing anything.

Since it happened 12 years ago and isn’t happening again right now, I wouldn’t be too concerned. I sure wouldn’t be asking the doctor about my mental disorder. I’d say this happened to me 12 years ago and I’m wondering if I should be concerned?. Then let your doc ask the appropriate questions to determine what he/she needs to know.

I’m more concerned that you’re trying to convince yourself that you have a mental disorder over something that happened around 2010. We all do strange little things like that every now and then but it doesn’t happen all the time so we ignore it. I lost my purse one morning when leaving for work. I looked for it for almost an hour but couldn’t find it anywhere. My husband came in and asked what I was looking for and offered to help me find it. I told him my purse and he broke out laughing. I screamed that it wasn’t funny. He then asked me what was hanging on my shoulder—it was my purse. I had been bending over looking under the sofa, all the chairs, some tables and it had to have been swinging down every time I bent over and still I couldn’t find it. I felt silly but didn’t jump to OMG I have a mental disorder. Don’t forget to let us know what your doc has to say

I was also thinking of the case in The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat. The book is a fascinating read, and is a perfect example of people being misdiagnosed.
Rather than a mental disorder, you could be the victim of some rare neurological condition. I am.
It is super tough to find the right specialist in such cases. Neurology covers a vast field and there are still so much misunderstood, and flat unknown about brain function. Even some of the most expert neurologists encounter stuff which leaves them baffled.

The case @Jeruba references, there is some disruption which causes the brain to misunderstand what the eyes are seeing. That happened to me temporarily after a head injury. I couldn’t read, not because I forgot how. Lettering looked unusual to me. It was like seeing doodles.

Stress can cause a vision disconnect in perfectly healthy people. Ask a cop sometime about disparities in eye witness accounts.

@Patty_Melt, are you saying that Dr. Sacks misdiagnosed all those people?

@Jeruba, quite the opposite! All those patients described, and many more, were referred to him after being misdiagnosed. He was brilliant, and treated people thought to be insane, and/or lost causes.
I can’t get the case out of my head of the man who kept screaming and falling out of bed.
Dr. Sacks was brilliant, and the world is a lesser place without him. I have recommended the book here on fluther in the past. It is thanks to reading it that helped me discover the rare condition I have, which was misdiagnosed for years.

He was responsible for the amazing temporary reanimation of the people as covered in the movie Awakenings.

@Patty_Melt I agree with you. I’ve read a lot of Oliver Sacks’ works, including his autobiography. He was an amazingly brilliant and compassionate man. His writings and case studies are fascinating.

@Patty_Melt @janbb I too found Oliver Sack’s books fascinating. I have all five of them, but not his autobiography. I can also recommend A.R. Luria, Oliver Sacks wrote the foreword to one of his books.

^^^ There was also a great documentary about him that came out about a year ago. He was quite the dashing young man on his motorcycle in California after coming out.

@janbb @flutherother @Patty_Melt Oliver Sack’s research and writings are truly brilliant. Musicophillia was mind blowing to me.

Subconscious Denial.