Kleptomania is a psychological disorder of lack of impulse control. It is defined as a repetitive behavior of useless and worthless theft. In other words, kleptomania is an irresistible urge to steal that which is neither essential nor necessary.
Kleptomania is more common in women and usually appears in adolescence. People affected by this psychological disorder do not seek treatment until a few years have passed, either referred by the judicial system or to treat another psychiatric disorder.
Psychiatric specialists state that kleptomania must be differentiated from the activity of a habitual or sporadic thief whose objective is either to steal for personal gain or to harm the owner of the stolen object. For the kleptomaniac, the moment of theft is in itself the purpose of the act. It does not pursue personal enrichment or harm to the person he/she steals from.
The differential diagnosis of kleptomania includes other psychological disorders of inappropriate behaviors that can lead to sporadic acts of theft. Some of these disorders include antisocial disorder, conduct disorder, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or cognitive disorder or dementia.
Symptoms of kleptomania
Kleptomania has some common symptoms with other types of addictions such as:
- High levels of anxiety in situations conducive to the act of stealing.
- Recurrent thoughts of intrusion that incite you to commit theft.
- Impotence to resist the impulse to commit the theft.
- After committing the theft, they feel a release of pressure, it is a satisfying and gratifying sensation.
- Once the previous release has passed, they then feel a sense of guilt and remorse.
In addition, there are some characteristics of people affected by kleptomania. It stands out the fact that they usually get rid of what they have stolen, even throwing it in the trash or giving it to someone else, since their goal is neither to accumulate objects nor to get rich with it.
Kleptomania may be accompanied by other concomitant disorders, whether affective disorders such as depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) or eating disorders or the consumption of illegal substances.
Treatment of kleptomania
The main problem in successfully treating kleptomania is that the patient is often unable to ask for help. Despite being aware that he or she has a problem and, moreover, knowing the legal consequences if caught in the act of stealing, as described above, he or she does not usually come forward on his or her own. But once the problem has been identified and recognized, there is hope for improvement with treatment, for which different techniques are used:
- Relaxation and breathing techniques: they aim to increase control in stressful and anxious situations.
- Cognitive therapies: help to control recurrent thoughts that arise at the moment prior to the act of theft, using techniques such as thought stopping or thought conversion.
- Behavioral therapies: consists of the patient relearning to be in the places of temptation, i.e., where he/she normally used to steal, without giving in to the impulse in case it occurs.
- Communication techniques: teach the patient to learn to express internal tension in a positive and constructive way.
- Psychopharmaceuticals: they are used to stabilize the patient’s mood and reduce anxiety, usually serotonergics or mood stabilizers, and thus favor the application of other treatments.