Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
Rationale:
PTSD is a syndrome characterized by the development of symptoms after an extremely traumatic event. Symptoms include helplessness, flashbacks, intrusive thoughts, memories, images, emotional numbing, loss of interest, avoidance of any place that reminds the affected person of the traumatic event, poor concentration, irritability, startle reactions, jumpiness, and hypervigilance.
Delusions are beliefs that guide one's interpretation of events and help make sense of disorder. Common delusions among older adults involve being poisoned, having their assets taken by their children, being held prisoner, and being deceived by a spouse or lover. Hallucinations are visual or auditory perceptions of nonexistent objects and sounds. Older adults with hearing and vision deficits may hear voices or see people who are not actually present. OCD is characterized by recurrent and
persistent thoughts, impulses, and urges of ritualistic behaviors that improve the affected person's comfort level.
Depression
Rationale:
Decreased sexual desire is a major symptom of clinical depression. Other vegetative signs of depression include changes in bowel elimination, eating habits, and sleeping patterns. Although depression is often related to unmet dependency needs, the decreased sexual desire is associated with the depression, not the
unmet dependency needs. The sexual difficulties are associated with the depression, and the depression, not the sexual difficulties, may be the major cause of marital stress. Also, there are no data indicating marital stress. Role confusion, not identity confusion, is usually associated with depression.