Sensory stupor
Content Warning
The inability seems to be dependent in some way on the type of stimuli. Most people, in fact, are more or firstly affected in their perception of the stimulations that are prevalent in their day to day life.
Sailors stranded on sandy islands lose the ability to appreciate textures close to that of sand, animal breeders can't hear frequencies similar to the call of their animals, lovers of spicy foods lose the ability to taste their favourite spice, gardeners lose the sense of smell for the flowers in their garden and so on.
mental illness and disability
Oh... I didn't notice the wound...The sensory stupor is a rare neurologic condition that affects people in their adult life. The afflicted person gradually starts to experience a numbing of all or some of their senses, most commonly touch and smell or taste, but occasionally experience sight disturbance like shortsightedness and partial loss of hearing.
A mystery unsolved
by Danie Franco
When we found him he already had the marooned gloom.The exact cause of the disease is unknown, but the clues point to something local to both the major cities on the continent and extremely isolated locations, it was firstly described in sailors marooned for long periods of time alone on small islands and thus called marooned gloom. Most cases develop over a few months until the condition stops progressing, leaving the person permanently disabled to some degree in one or more of their senses. In a few occasional but heartbreaking cases, the condition progressed until leaving the patient completely impaired in several or all senses.
A feared pathology
No! You are not going to see that healer, do you want to get back ill for real?Because of the nature of these damages, and despite the rarity of these extreme cases, the general public is fearful of catching the disease, in particular after a theory spread according to which the Sensory Stupor might be contagious. The theory has been proven false, but the distrust for the afflicted remained alive in the years and caused many of them to suffer more severe consequences from the isolation that these rumours caused. Recent discoveries seem to hint that a way to halt the progression of the disease is to expose the patients to new types of stimulations they never experienced before.
Ahh, that's a very depressing condition! Very creatively thought through, I think. I like the nickname for the disease too, which gives a nice bit of extra lore there. It might be interesting to link this article to someone experiencing sensory stupor. I was a little confused by the sentence talking about the exact cause of the disease, with clues pointing both to major cities and to extremely isolated locations. I guess... Perhaps, they could both have loneliness in common? And segregation? Nice article :)
Thanks for reading and commenting. You are not too far with your guess, though I still don't have fully developed that bit of the lore.