Brain Stains: In Sheri's Words

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Brain Stains: In Sheri's Words

(October 07, 2007) -- Sheri J. Storm believes that recovered-memory therapy led to her diagnosis of multiple personality disorder. In this memoir, she describes the role that art and writing played in her therapy. The accompanying image gallery depicts several examples of the artwork created by Storm while in therapy.

Sheri Storm Artwork While in therapy, I was assigned homework that included art therapy and journaling. Two kinds of journaling were prescribed: “regular” journaling about my experiences, and “automatic writing” using my left hand (I normally write with my right hand). My psychiatrist explained that if I supplied my left hand with a writing utensil and relaxed, it would tap my subconscious—giving “people inside” permission to come out to release their own images, memories, feelings and messages.

Numerous hypnotherapy sessions taught me “self trance” techniques. For art therapy, my psychiatrist encouraged me to go into trance deep enough to allow free thinking and sharing. He urged me to accept my diagnosis and to heal myself by allowing my alternative personalities to come forward and reveal their traumatic memories.

For me, the process was scary rather than liberating. There was no end to the amount of material that emerged, its volume growing with each session. My journals became darker, more menacing and more graphically detailed. The number of alternative personalities and memories increased exponentially.

Often I was unaware of what I had written or drawn until days later, when I accidentally came across the pages. Some of the content horrified me. Some amazed me. At times, my creations seemed profound and too insightful for the average human being to have produced. Was there a spiritual essence to them? Were they survival miracles that required acceptance and appreciation in order for healing to begin? Or were the creations simply hard evidence of mental insanity?

The constant struggle to interpret my journaling, and to make writing and drawing a “normal” part of my daily life rather than an intense interruption, caused a mental shattering that I irrationally believe remains obvious to people around me.

Long-Lasting Impact of Traumatic Therapies

Sheri Storm''s Artwork

Art therapy can be a healthy and powerful tool for “safe” expression when used appropriately. Unfortunately, in my case, art therapy was used to substantiate false memories induced by my psychiatrist and other “specialists” in recovered-memory therapy. Words cannot adequately describe the deep sadness, utter madness and profanity I feel when viewing most of my drawings. Profound shame blankets each reaction. Those illustrated “memories” didn't really happen after all, did they?

Once I discovered that my multiple personality disorder was induced, I terminated all treatment of that type. Since then, I do not journal and have not returned to sketching. I fear that similar art projects that were once innocent and enjoyable may trigger a loss of mental and/or emotional control.

I understand there are opposing views of recovered-memory therapy. There are heated, passionate arguments in support of both sides. My own personal experience of that therapy—and the multiple personality disorder that it induced—is real. Its fallout is staggering. How does one explain something so incredible and bizarre? When I have risked telling my story to several others, they became visibly uncomfortable and told me “that can’t happen” while looking directly into my eyes.

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It did indeed happen to me. It happened to many others. And it continues to occur in some therapeutic practices under different names. I share now because it needs to stop—no matter what category the treatment is under—and victims of recovered-memory therapy require specialized help to heal. If your story, or that of someone you love, appears to have similar circumstances to my own, I strongly encourage you to explore the possibility of false memory syndrome and even iatrogenic Dissociative Identity Disorder (formerly known as Multiple Personality Disorder).

Read the Long-lasting impact of traumatic memories about Sheri and other's similar cases.

Source: Scientific American Mind

Last updated: 10/07

Brain Stains: In Sheri's Words

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