question: Hello doctor, In general, I am in good health and a functional, if not happy, person. Recently, I have undergone emotional stress and strain which has brought on symptoms similar to ones I have had under similar circumstances in the past. This time, however, it is a lot worse. In the past, I have tended to hallucinate, owing to lack of sleep and food. Usually, this would be something like moving patterns or other visuals, and nothing too scary. However, then, as now, I become convinced of things, usually, the identities of people, walking, driving in a car next to me, and for a while, I totally believe that it is this person. Only after a short while will I snap out of it a bit. The worse my emotional and mental state, the more severe and frequent, events like this happen. Recently, I have been pushed into a suicidal mood, something that genuinely is outside of my personality. I give a class at an institution and often times I find myself stumbling over words. It is nothing new, and people tend to do these types of things. However, it is happening more frequently, and twice now, I have heard myself losing the plot of my sentence but was unable to stop. I need to know if these are just the signs of severe emotional stress or maybe something darker. Any help is appreciated.