Patient Introduction
Name: Kiku Honda
Age: 20
Ailment: Kiku suffers from Body Dysmorphic Disorder, Hypochondriasis, mild Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD), Perfectionism and Selective Mutism.
How they came to be a patient: Kiku's relative contacted Kiku’s parents, and they decided to send him to the Palestone Center for the Mentally Disturbed in the hopes that not only would Kiku learn not to dishonor his family but also that Kiku would recover from his illnesses.
History: Kiku was originally born into a strict, Japanese family that accepted nothing less than perfection from their only son. Stealing money and eventually running away from his parents, Kiku made his way slowly to Vermont. To make his living, Kiku began to draw and sell an illustrated story about a detective that followed elaborate clues in order to solve a mystery. The illustrated story became immensely popular, and Kiku began to publish a new issue weekly in order to keep up with demand. He stayed in his home, refusing to come out except for late at night, when almost no one wandered the streets. Each week, the plot became more elaborate, and the drawings perfected down to the last detail. To the fans, the story almost seemed real.
What Kiku’s readers did not realize is that Kiku was actually using the comic as a published blueprint on how he planned to carry out his own suicide.
All of Kiku’s fans began to worry when the release of the final comic was an entire month late, though it was rumored that the artist had contracted a cold while out at night and refused to come out. During a sneak peek of the unfinished final story, one of Kiku’s more avid readers realized that something was off about it. The man took the story to some of his friends, and the group decided to investigate. One of Kiku’s distant relatives, having come to the same place some time ago, happened to be part of the group. He immediately sought out information on Kiku, and when the final issue of the comic was released he began to piece together the information. Gathering some police, he ran to Kiku’s place of residence, only to find the man staring intently himself in the mirror, a family sword clutched forgotten in his right hand. The police listened as Kiku mumbled to himself, words like ‘imperfect’ and ‘unacceptable’ being some of the only ones they could understand. Kiku was brought to the station, where the police read the comic and found that Kiku had been planning to use the sword to not only cosmetically alter his appearance, but to also carry out the suicide. When questioned, Kiku found that he could not explain his actions.
