Ralph B. Allison The following guidelines evolved from data revealed in the course of treatment of three women, each with multiple personalities.

Two were treated personally by the author and the third was seen in consultation while under the care of another physician.

Their stories are so remarkably similar in certain important aspects that it was felt that we might now have some keys to just how parents, or even better, prospective parents, might raise their daughters so that they too can have more personalities than the girl next door. Seven guidelines have been developed, and will be illustrated by brief historical items from each case. When all seven principles are adhered to vigorously, it is almost a certainty that any daughter would have to develop multiple personalities to survive.

The patients: Elizabeth has had five personalities in all, but is now settled down to one, the one she was born with. Kay has had eight personalities, of whom two still persist. Doris has only had two personalities, since her parents were not as talented as the others. She now manifests her original personality most of the time.

The Rules Rule 1: Don't want the child in the first place.

Elizabeth's mother already had a son, never wanted any children at all, and this second child was to be Daddy's. He wanted a boy, but had to take what mother delivered.

Kay's mother became pregnant six months after a very difficult delivery with her first child. She was very unhappy at the prospects of another difficult delivery so soon. Kay also felt from birth that her father never wanted her.

Doris' mother was poor and her husband deserted her six months after the child's birth. We can only guess at her feelings at the time of the pregnancy.

Rule 2: Create and strengthen polarity between mother and father.

In all families, there seemed to be a "good parent" and a "bad parent." But the child could never really tell which was which.

She felt rejected by father or mother, but yet could not identify with the other parent.

Elizabeth's mother favored the older brother and chastised Elizabeth.

She was her father's favorite, at least until her younger brother was born, when she was abruptly displaced.

Kay's mother tried to care for her, but was developing a brain tumor at the time. Her father was rigid, demanding of perfection and drove himself and everyone else to superhuman limits.

Rule 3: Make sure one parent, especially the favored one, disappears before the child is six years old.

Elizabeth's father went into the Army when she was three. She was so lonely that she created her first two alter-personalities as imaginary playmates.

Kay's mother was hospitalized for a year for treatment of her brain tumor, when Kay was three years old. She was placed with her paternal grandmother, a fanatical man-hating workaholic, who had trained her father well.

Doris' father deserted the family when she was six months old.

It was not until she was five that mother remarried.

Rule 4: Encourage sibling rivalry, or at least don't recognize it or help your daughter deal with it.

Elizabeth's "bad" personality developed when her mother came home from the hospital-the moment her younger brother was put into her arms. She knew her father was just waiting for a son, and her hatred of the baby boy was more than she could contain.

So she created her bad alter-personality in which she stored all of her hate energy.

Kay was the favorite of the maternal grandparents with whom she lived from birth to six months. When her younger sister was born three years later, Kay was never pleasant to her. With father pushing for perfection in his children, each daughter probably had to strive for favor, so competition was intense, but success was never rewarded.

Rule 5: Be ashamed of your family tree.

Elizabeth's mother constantly told Elizabeth about Elizabeth's aunts, whom she considered prostitutes. She would also berate her for acting up with such comments as "If you keep that up, you will end up just like your Aunt Floozy." After a while, Elizabeth secretly wished she could be like Aunt Floozy and have some fun in her life.

Kay's father kept secret from her the fact of a previous marriage.

When she was twelve, she accidentally came across a picture of his daughter, Linda, and used this name for one of her alter-personalities-an amoral nymphomaniac. Her father maintained a strict code of secrecy regarding family affairs, making it very difficult for her to feel free to ask for help outside the family-she would be guilty of spilling family secrets.

Rule 6: See to it that her first sexual experience is traumatic and that she can't tell you about it.

Elizabeth was raped on the school grounds at age eleven. Because of her mother's tirades against her aunt's sexual behavior, Elizabeth didn't dare tell her for fear of being branded immoral and evil.

Kay was sexually assaulted at age thirteen by a band of Hells Angels while living at grandmother's ranch. She didn't dare tell grandmother because she had taken her horse out at 2:00 A.M., in violation of grandmother's rule. She knew the punishment for breaking the rule would be to lose the use of her horse, which she loved more than any human.

Doris' stepfather refused to let her go to school past the sixth grade because boys were in the school. He constantly accused her of sexual misconduct of which she was too shy to be guilty.

This engendered the same guilty feeling about sexuality as the episodes in the lives of the other two girls.

Rule 7: Make sure her home life as an adolescent is so miserable she wants to get married to get away. Then allow her to marry a sexual deviate who can carry on in your tradition.

Elizabeth was so miserable at home during her high school years that she couldn't do her school work well. She then created a dumb personality who flunked all her classes and persuaded mother to let her drop out. Then she married her first husband, whom her parents thought was a good catch only to find out that he was a transvestite. When she delivered a cerebral palsied child, he laid all the blame on her, even though the child was born breech with the umbilical cord around her neck.

Three weeks after graduation from high school, Kay married a young man who was well known for his sexual promiscuity. He was never faithful to her in their eight years of marriage.

So she, as "Linda," was unfaithful to him to pay him back. When she left him, he forced her to come back. To punish her, he was sadistic physically and verbally during sex, helping her to become a classical sexual masochist.

Doris's husband was told by her stepfather how bad she was and therefore needed all the beating he had been giving her. The husband kept beating her to keep her in line and almost killed her. Only when she had her one and only affair did he realize what it was like to be hurt himself, and then he stopped beating her.

Epilogue All of these rules must be applied with a great deal of energy.

Keep the ambivalence powerful so the girl is charged with strong but incompatible drives which simply cannot be satisfied within the confines of only one personality. Thus, she will have to develop alternate personalities to be able to handle these conflicting emotions. Teach her that it is wrong to hate, but give her plenty in you to hate. Teach her it is bad and sinful to have fun and point out all the sexy people who look like they are having fun, while you are miserable in your work.

This paper was directed at interested parents. Family therapists, however, must have a firm grip on these rules if they are to be able to help parents break them.

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