It's All in Your Head: True Stories of Imaginary Illness

Suzanne O’Sullivan, a consultant neurologist, details common medical cases where patients suffer from severe physical symptoms—blindness, seizures, and paralysis—that have no physiological cause. She focuses on psychosomatic illness, a condition where emotional distress manifests as bodily disability. Through various clinical histories, O’Sullivan explains the biological mechanisms behind dissociation and conversion disorder. She argues that these ailments are not faked or "imaginary" but are real neurological events triggered by the subconscious mind as a response to trauma, stress, or repressed memory.

This book is for readers interested in the intersection of psychology and neurology who want to understand the physical reality of mental health. It serves those looking for a clinical perspective on how the brain bypasses conscious thought to impact the body. Readers finish the text with a clearer framework for distinguishing between organic disease and functional disorders. They gain a specific vocabulary for discussing the stigma surrounding medically unexplained symptoms and learn how physicians approach the diagnosis of illnesses that possess no visible biological signature.