Ghost withering

The woman wailed wordlessly she clawed and threw things feebly with her magi-kenetic grip and clawed and any surface in reach. They would be getting nothing from this ghost she had been here for far too long. They should move her on as soon as possible.

Mortals are made to be connected to a body, without it they have a hard time keeping their thoughts from slipping away.

Symptoms

The effects of ghost withering happen at a pace varying by individual. The first symptom will be memory loss followed closely by listlessness and lethargy. Next any skill at appearing or interacting with object or people with become hard to control and the success of attempts at it will fluctuate wildly in association with the lethargy. Over time the memory loss and listlessness with worsen to the point that an individual cannot form coherent thoughts easily and will often cling to a particular thing in an attempt to keep themselves together. This has the unfortunate side effect of associating that particular thing with the negative feelings derived from the isolation and fear that the inability to interact with the world around you brings.

Treatment

Signs of remembrance and other tokens to the dead have been known to stave the withering off for a time. The effective practices vary by individual and mostly correlate with ethnic and family practices. Sometimes there have been cases where ghosts manage to transform into a kind of spirit, usually an ancestral guide or guardian spirit. This is managed by both an immense reserve and control of mana. Generally the makes humans as one of the least likely species to transition from ghost to spirit due to their comparatively low mana. Mer are far more likely to be capable of the transition but are often encouraged to move on and not take the weight of eternal watching upon themselves. The most common and easiest to manage cure to the condition is to assist the spirit in moving on. Preferably by coaxing but sometimes necessarily by force.
Treatment is often preformed by a local spiritualist but if there is not one in the area as is increasingly common in the modern day Psychopomps will eventually track them down.