La Enfermedad Del Susto

Sandra I. Colón
SSC 327
El Susto
La enfermedad del susto or literally translated “the fright” is a very popular culturally specific psychological disorder and one of the most widespread diseasesthroughout Latin America. El susto has remained in their epidemiology from pre-Hispanic times, especially in indigenous people where the incidence is more common, but can also be found in diversebackgrounds as well as in other parts of the world.
According to the cultural believe el susto, is a common disease usually treated by their traditional witch-doctor or curanderos. The syndrome is one ofcultural association and caused by a sudden impression or shock, from which develops two immediate consequences: the loss of mental abilities by the affected individual (loss of the soul), and therise of "the gut", an anatomical part usually located in the navel, which moves to the top of the stomach, forming a sort of "ball", which can be detected by palpation and sobadas (rubdowns).
The shockcan occur in different circumstances like a big fall or the sound of a strong wind, thunder or lightning, an accident, a near death experience, a surprise encounter with an animal or the content of anightmare. Whatever the underlying cause of sudden surprise, it triggers a process that people described as follows: the frightened person loses his soul, he or she remains alive but his soul is outof the body lost in the place where he or she was frightened. The soul remains in that place where an “entity” takes it and keeps it without hurting it, but remains in the place of fright caring forthe lost soul, after a week, “the entity” takes the soul to another place farther away and harder to find so the frightened should be healed soon before is too late.
Some of the symptoms presentedby the individual frightened or shocked can be attributed to the loss of one of their mood entities; and one of the primarily characteristics of this is the sudden change of the subject's behavior....