6 AV REPORTER AT LARGE THE POLITICS OF HYSTERIA Over the past twenty behavior of thousan Carlson, 2 thirty-five- year-old woman who Tived with her husband and two children in a Minnea- polis suburb, was in the hospital being treated for severe depression. She was referred to a psychiatrist, Diane Humenansky, who came to see her and went oon seeing ber after she left the hospital. As Carlson recalls, Humenansky soon suggested to her that per- hhaps her problem was not depression but multiple- personality disorder. MPD, Husnenarsky explained, was an elusive illness: many diagnosticians failed to recognize the alternating perconalites, or alters, for what they were, with the result that the woman— nine out of ten people with MED. were women—of- ten ended up getting mis- diagnosed. But experts now kknevr that there were cer tain telltale signs of MPD. Did Carlson ever “zone out while driv- ing, and arrive at her destination with~ out remembering quite how she got there? Why, yes, Carlson said. Wel, thar was an alter taking over the driving and shen vanishing again. Another sign, Hu- sacnaney sai was "voies in the Bead” Did Carlson ever have internal argu- ments, telling herself for example, “Tuen right--no, turn left”? Yes, Carlson re- plied, thae happened sometimes. Well, {hat was the aleers quarreling inside her hhead. Carlson was amazed and embas- rassed, All these years, she had done these things, never realizing that they were symptoms of a serious mental disorder T late 1989, Elizabeth BY JOAN ACOCELLA “Multiple personality, Humenansky explained, was associated with child~ hood sexual abuse, though’the abuse ‘ie be forgotten. Carlson should had anyone ever taken liber- with her? Carlson didnt have to acd. She distinctly ro bei molested by owo ily, Saat didn't mean there werent other epidodes, Humenansky said. Worse con:s, maybe. ‘2 help Caslson remember, Hume- iar‘ ky gave her books to read. One s Ellen Bass and Laura Davis’ 1988 The Courage to Heal," now known as the Bible of the recovered-memory rembered sar, saultiple-personality disorder bas been used fo explain the of American «women. Hora was it allowed to Beppen? movement. A third of American women were sexually abused as girls, “The Courage to Heal” stated, and if a woman ‘was repeatedly molested she might have not only forgotten it but developed new personalities in which to seal off the terrible ige. “The Courage to Heal” gave first-person accounts, In a later edi- tion, one woman wrote: Ienowiedgs Tremember sping fe the fe ine whet Tear abour Sree al fdas eerie Fess snd aly fo eg, be ic econo the bas or and raped me Sint a ee the exp e, there and procecive; Busny—Lie ind Boned and See tne Sea decked shave Humenansky also gave _ Cusison books about MPD. cases. One was the 1957 classic “The § “Three Races of Eve,” by Corbett’Thig- # pen and Hervey Cleckley, the story of 2 the shy housewife “Bve White” who on 3 the odd weekend would metamorphose into “Eve Black,” a vivacious party git, e White with unexplained ves and a reputation in local bars. [As a zesul of this book and the 1957 movie based on it, featuring an Acad- § emy Award-winning performance by & Joanne Woodward, Eve became, for a while, the prototype of the multiple § personality. In later cases, as in Eves, 3 there was often the naughty/nice split— 3 “librarian by day and streetwalker by &“Above: Under hypnosis, a patient of the ninoteenth-century Parisian névrologist Jean-Martin Charcot (opposite) ‘would undergo hysterical attacks in front ofa fascinated a 1D. is part of the Bistory of hysteria.fore Cal Teis asky three chib her 989, Hue dited State ag 0 ud eher “hree ated. sys the yr it 7 & tation 8 susT ME by various people. Using this technique, Carlson soon recovered memories of ‘being molested by as many as fifty cela~ 5, inclading both parents, both sets of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and great-grandparents ‘According to Carlson, Hurenansky also used 2 technique called guided im- agery, in which the patient is talked through an imaginary scene in order to awaken buried memories. In one § Humenansky told Carlson to p= Gio om rent ton predcd prem focty oe ‘he Bie Ler Semel berth sandr nat Be Done Burgus believed she swat ‘a satanic priestess. ture herself going downstairs. Look for an altar, Humenanshy stid. Carlson saw a stone slab, Look around for candles and daggers, Homenansky’stid. C: son saw them. Now look for the baby. Houmenansky said, Carlson does not ‘member a what point her own imagi= ration, primed by the books and videos, took over, but soon she saw a pregnant ‘woman. Then the baby was born, and the afterbirth was lying on the alte, and people in hooded robes were eating it, snd so was she. (That was the first ca nibalism scene Carlson recovered with Humenansky. Today, nine years l she still has nightmaces.} The thera sessions often ended with Carlson's weeping uncontrollably. Carlson says Humenansky would give her Tizers and tell her to chew thea so tha ey would take effect faster ‘Te wasnt long before Carlson, under ‘Humenansky’s guidance, began idnti~ fying her different personalities. One of them was Little Miss Fluf a nickname that she had been given as a child; be- cause she liked ily dresses and ctino- lines. In the Eve Black slot, Carlson pro~ duced a hussy named Nikita. Sybil had had two male alters; so, quite soon, did Carlson. She aso located two nuns, Sis- ter Mary Margeret and Sister Mary The- res (che latter wanted to join the Peace Corps) and a seared, dopressed Old Lindy. When Carlson’ mood changed,,Fu- menanskgy told her she had “swits}ied,” or changed alters. IF she showed wp for her session in a short skirt, char Fheant that Nikita was “out.” If she was de~ pressed, that weas the Old Lady taking over, Interestingly, though—and this seems to be the ease with mary thulti- piles who have not written memeirs— Carlson never quite got the hang of multiplicity. To this dey, she diesn't know how maay personalities shi hd. “After twenty-five, [Jost count,” she say. Humenansky had Carlson write’down and key memories on index cards for reference, but, Catlson ays, 1 sl coudent keep the den cbings straight” Once, she lose the car file and they had to do the whole business all over again, Sometimes, she would walk into Humenanshy’s office and say that she didn't want €o explore:alters er that day—she just needed to tall, Carl- son recalls, "Dr. Humenansky said, "Well, who am I talking to? And I would say, ‘This is just me, Elizabeth. She said, 'No, I want to know which alter Im talking to’ ‘Its not an alte T said. ‘es just me.’ Finally she got out an index card and wrote down ‘Just Me.'” ‘Meanwhile, Carlson’s mental condi tion was worsening. The main events of her week were her two appointmer swith Humenansigy—an individual ses- sion and a group session with other MPD. patients. For a year, Carlson was to depressed that she rarely left her bedroom. Heavily drugged, she som times slept eighteen oF twenty hours @ day. She had terrible nightenares anc woke up sereaming and vorniting, “T stank, the room stank," she remembers. “Every few days or so, my husband or ‘my daughter would take me and shove ‘me into the shower and hose me down.” ‘Then she would go back to bed. Carl- cons daughter, Lisha, who was in her teens, took over the household and the care of her younger brother. Eventually, she had to drop out of school. Carison's tpaeriage, which had already been trou bled when she first began seeing Hu- menansky, deteriorated day by day. Carlson says Hurmenansky suggested that perhaps her hasband was trying; 70998, a and adif other hing only was any log’ any hhout ople ado ston linge they mp of the the pers le aly ata wed ing, fey sing use veah ales keer. ‘ago iho nit nel ady alth ind \ ‘CANDYLAND fifty-three per cent have a history of substance abuse. Elizabeth Tarlson came from a family of eight