“In a rehab facility. I can’t see him for a few days. That’s how they do it there. He needs to focus on his recovery, not on what his parents think or feel.”
“Oh. So you’re married?”
“Divorced,” Mitch said, not sure when his secret revealing would stop; hoping it would be soon.
“Single?”
She smiled like a woman might at a bar, with a sparkle in her eyes.
“Yes.”
“Hmmm…” she cooed. “Do you like my mother? Do you think she’s pretty, Doctor?”
“I don’t think that’s why we’re here.”
Eve bit her bottom lip in an alluring way. “She was married, too, you know.”
“Yes, to your father.”
“He’s dead.” She said it curtly, but sadly, wistfully even, without a hint of venom.
“Yes, I know. And I’m sorry for that. You’re Eve, right?”
“I’m Eve. The one and only.” She made a flourishing gesture with her hands, like she was the grand reveal of a magic trick.
Score one for the doc! Now that Mitch had her, he wasn’t about to waste the opportunity talking about his own life. “Let me ask you, Eve: Do you know a girl named Penny?”
She nodded tentatively, as if wary of where the question might lead.
“Can you talk to her?”
Another long pause.
“That’s not such an easy answer. It’s … all a bit confusing.”
“Try. I really want to know.”
Eve sighed aloud. “Sometimes … sometimes I hear her voice, like it’s in my head, like a really loud thought, but then it goes away. I usually just ignore it.”
“And you think it’s … Penny?”
She nodded. “I hear them all.”
If it weren’t for therapy, Mitch highly doubted Eve would know anything about the others in her head. In cases of DID the primary identity not only carried the given name, but they were most often passive, dependent, guilty, and depressed, which matched Penny’s personality, but in here Eve was the dominant one, and for good reason. People with DID could develop awareness of the mind’s inside chattering at any time, at any age, and that was a key milestone on the path to integration.
Nowhere in Dr. Palumbo’s reports did Eve ever confess to hearing the voices of her various personalities. The prospect of getting through Eve to connect with all Penny’s alters no longer seemed so daunting, but Mitch realized there was another intriguing possibility. What if he could help Penny tap into the darkest places of her mind and gain access to the traumatic memory that preceded the splintering of her self?
Either way, for Eve to speak to him this candidly was a massive step forward.
“Can you name those voices you hear?” Mitch asked.
“Well there’s Penny, and a girl named Chloe, and Ruby, and of course there’s me.”
No admission or even a hint at any hidden alter, Mitch noted.
He wasn’t about to reveal that Penny was the host—the primary self—and that Eve was one of the alters. That would be too much for one session.
“And they all sound like loud thoughts in your head?”
“Sometimes, when I hear them, yeah,” Eve said. “So, doesn’t hearing voices mean I’m schizophrenic?” She sounded tentative for once, and her unexpected vulnerability felt to Mitch like another small victory.
“No, it doesn’t, not at all. It’s a common misconception actually. Schizophrenia is really a split between rationality and emotion, but what you have is different. It’s a split within the personality. In both conditions a person may hear voices, but I do believe you have a grasp on reality. I’d like to know though if Penny—or anybody else speaking those loud thoughts—knows you’re in Edgewater State Hospital?”
To demonstrate that different alters held different perceptions of reality would be helpful in court.
“I don’t know,” Eve said. “Hasn’t really come up.”
Mitch reached into his jacket pocket and took out his portable recorder. “Do you mind if I record our conversation? It will help me to remember it.”
“Whatever,” Eve said.
“What about the reason you’re here? Do these other voices—your alters—do they have different views on that?”
Eve straightened, putting distance between them, and Mitch sensed he was losing her.
“Do they ever talk about what happened?”
She eyed Mitch darkly.