Huang Lee’s Blog

“The Minds of Billy Milligan” by Daniel Keyes is a book I finished few weeks ago. It’s a story about a person called Billy Milligan with dissociative identity disorder (DID). The Chinese and Japanese versions of this book were quite popular both in Taiwan and Japan, but unfortunately the English version hasn’t been published due to Milligan’s ongoing lawsuit against the State of Ohio.

I knew this book when I was a college student, but I didn’t get the chance to read it until now. Reading this book made me wonder how little I know about brains and minds again.

I guess, in some sense, we all have “multiple personalities” but unlike DID persons, all our personalities share the same memory. For example, from this book Billy has 24 personalities and at beginning each of his personality had his/her own memory so each personality didn’t know other personalities exist. They just felt that sometimes they lost some time and memory and awoke in unexplained locations and situations. Later one “smarter” personality tried to figure out what happened and even found a way to organize all other personalities. Actually, the original personality (Billy) was put into sleep for several years when he tried to attempt suicide and stopped by other personalities.

Not just memory, each Billy’s personality has his/her own names, (mental) ages, interests, skills, hand writing, accent, and sex. One of them is even color-blindness and one of them is a lesbian. (I am kinda surprised that some of above things are related to our mentality.) They use their own time learning, so one of them became an expert in picking locks and escaping, one of them became a weapon expert and know how to control his adrenalin to generate powerful strength, one of them was really into science and liked doing research, and etc. Naturally, different personalities play different roles. For example, one is responsible for protecting the body (and all other personalities) from dangers, one is responsible for organizing all personalities. However, most Billy’s personalities are kids. I guess it’s because kids are easier to survive from trauma.

Currently, the causes of DID haven’t been fully identified, but high percentage of DID persons report child abuse, especially sexual abuse. Researchers conjecture that when a person is harmed by someone he/she truests, this person splits off his/her awareness and memory to mentally survive from the events. Later the memory becomes a separate personality. This happens repeatedly and multiple personalities develop. The book describes some doctors tried to help Billy to merge his multiple personalities. He did merge some of his personalities for a while but later he was sent to a different hospital and his personalities separated again possibly because of stress. The book ends here and the latest (final) result was not written in the book. I am not sure what’s the state-of-art treatments for DID persons but I believe it takes time. Curiously, it seems that some of Billy’s skills were weakened when his personalities were merged.

In addition to “The Minds of Billy Milligan”, recently I also read some books by Oliver Sacks. He is a neurologist and also the author of several books of case studies of people with neurological disorders. I enjoy his books very much and recommend to people who are interested in psychology.

After reading those books, I get more interests and curious about subconscious. I wonder how it influences us, and maybe I should read more starting from the books by Carl Jung.

Dr. House: It’s a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies. The only variable is about what. The weird thing about telling someone they’re dying is it tends to focus their priorities. You find out what matters to them. What they’re willing to die for. What they’re willing to lie for. <Three Stories, House, M.D.>

Today I met an American. He lived in Taiwan for around a year before (Hualien is one of his favorite place in the world now) and can speak good Mandarin. Someone asked him why he wanted to live in Taiwan and learn Mandarin. He said he once felt illness and went to see a doctor. That doctor told him that he needed to have big brain surgery. He was shocked, but later luckily his doctor told him that his diagnosis was wrong. This event made him realize that he might not have the chance to fulfill his dream, which is to live in a foreign country and learn a different language. That’s why he made his mind to act soon.

Actually, few days ago, I met someone who just recovered from a big brain surgery. He had a benign tumor removed from his brain and after the surgery he permanently lost his taste for food. He told me that his dangerous surgery made he have a new perspective on life.

Few days ago, a friend of mine told me something he read from a book. The book says if you want to plan your life, you can start it by imaging your funeral. Imaging in your funeral what you want other people to say about you?