Nov. 15. Freer. She said: "One day I was in a coffin, that's the day I went to Heaven." She also said she used to see "the crucifix hanging there" (on the ceiling)—"not now but when I was going to Heaven." (When was that?) "Over in that bed" (her former bed). Later she added, "The place changed so ... things used to be coming up and down (dreamily)—that was the day I was coming up on the ship or going down." She is quite oriented.
Nov. 17. Usually stands about with immobile face, preoccupied, but she eats voluntarily.
Nov. 24. When the husband and sister came a few days ago she said she was glad to see them, embraced them, cried and is said to have spoken quite freely. To-day she speaks more freely than usually. When asked why she had answered so little, she said she could not bring herself to say anything, though she added spontaneously, "I knew what was said to me." When shown a picture of her cataleptic attitude with hands raised, she
said dreamily, "I guess that must have been the day I went to Heaven, everything seemed strange, things seemed to be going up and down." (Did you know where you were?) "I guess that was the day I thought I was on the ship." When the sister spoke to her, she seemed depressed and said, "If only I had not done those things I might be saved, if I had only gone to church more."
Dec. 3. Seems depressed. She weeps some, says she is sad, "There seems to be something over my heart, so I can't see my little girls." Again: "I should have told you about it first—I should not have bought it"—(refers to buying carbolic acid). She wrote a natural letter but very slowly.
4. There followed then a state lasting for six months, during which the patient was rather inactive, preoccupied, even a little tense at times. Sometimes she did not answer, again at the same interview spoke quite promptly. For the most part the affect was reduced, at other times she appeared a little uneasy, bewildered, or again depressed. She said that sometimes a mist seemed to be over her. Now and then spoke of things looking queer and she asked, when the room was cleaned, "Why do they move things about?" and she added irrelevantly: "I thought the robbers broke into my house and stole my wedding dress and my children's dresses" (refers to the condition during the onset of her psychosis). In the beginning of this state, when asked about the stupor, she spoke again of the "ship" and about going "down, down," but also said that on one occasion she heard beautiful music, was waiting for the last trumpet and was afraid to move. Moreover, she had some ideas referring to the actual situation which were akin to those in the more marked stupor period. Although she admitted she was better, she said on December 8 that she still had queer ideas at times, "I sometimes think the doctor is Uncle Jim" (long dead). She also spoke of other patients looking like dead relatives, and added, "Are all the spirits that are dead over here?" "We never die here, the spirits are here." But after that date no such ideas recurred, in fact this whole period seems to have been remarkably barren of delusions. Exceptionally isolated ones were noted. Thus, on January 28 it is mentioned that she stated she sometimes felt so lonely, and as though people were against her; and on February 13 she
said she felt as though the chair knew what she was talking about. It is also mentioned in January that she wept at times, but this seems not to have been a leading feature at all. In March, when asked why she was not more active and cheerful, her lips began to quiver and she said, "Oh, I thought my children would be cut up in Bellevue." "I don't know why I feel that way about them." She sometimes cried when her friends left her.
5. Then followed a week of a rather faultfinding, self-assertive state, during which she demanded to be allowed to go home, saying indignantly that she was not a wicked woman, had done nothing to be kept a prisoner here; she wanted justice because another patient had called her crazy. But in this period also she said that after the robbery (at home) she felt afraid that her honor would be taken away. When told that her husband had been with her, she said "Yes, but I was afraid they would get into a fight." (You mean you were afraid the other man would kill him?) "No, he is not dead." She further talked of a disagreement she had at that time with her husband, and that she felt then like running away and leading a bad life, but thought of the children. With tears she added: "I would not do anything that is wrong. I have my children to live for." Quite remarkable was the fact that she then told of various erotic experiences in her life, though with a distinctly moral attitude and minimizing them.
6. On June 16 another state was initiated with peculiar ideas, the setting of which is not known, as she told them only to the nurses. She said that she was not Mrs. W. but the Queen of England, again that she was an actress, or again the wife of a wealthy Mr. B., and that she was going to have a baby. But at night she is said to have been agitated and afraid she was to be executed. She asked to be allowed to go to bed again, then stopped talking, and remained in this mute condition for about a week. She often left her bed and went back again, remained much with a perplexed expression. On one occasion she put tinsel in her hair saying it was a golden crown.
7. At the end of that time she became freer and more natural, and remained so for three weeks. She occupied herself somewhat. When asked what had happened in the condition preceding, said she thought she was a queen or was to be a queen.