Catatonia means a person is awake, but does not move, talk, or react to anything but pain. The person can stay stiff and still for hours. A person with catatonia may look to be in a stupor (being mentally numb and in a daze). The cause is in the nervous system; the brain and nerves. This problem was first written about in 1874 in Die Katatonie oder das Spannungsirresein.