“Lost Daughter” (post 2) by Elena Ferrante (post 10): Amnesia for stealing doll, moving doll, getting lost, indicates multiple personality since childhood.

The little girl, Elena, was frantic about her missing doll. Her whole family was frantic. They could not “stand hearing the child scream anymore.”

Leda (47, divorced, protagonist and first-person narrator) says, “I was confused, placed a hand on my chest to calm my racing heart. I had taken the doll, she was in my bag…I discovered that I couldn’t recall the exact moment of an action that I now considered almost comic, comic because it was senseless” (1, p. 44). She tries to rationalize the theft, but the fact is it was “senseless.” And she was surprised to find the doll in her bag, because she could not actually recall having taken it and put it there. Moreover, whatever had made her take the doll now prevented her from simply returning it.

Later, in the privacy of her own apartment, Leda says, “I placed the doll on my knees as if for company…I kissed her face, her mouth, I hugged her as I had seen Elena do…I slept on the sofa…I looked for the doll but didn’t see her…I looked around, hunted under the sofa, afraid that someone had come in and taken her. I found her in the kitchen, sitting at the table, in the shadows. I must have brought her there…” but she does not actually recall having put the doll there (1, pp. 62-63).

Indeed, Leda has been having memory gaps since childhood. She says, “I had experience with getting lost. My mother said that as a child all I did was get lost. In an instant I would vanish…I didn’t remember anything about my vanishing…” (1, p. 40). She doesn’t say that it was a long time ago and so “I don’t remember” anything about it now, but that “I didn’t remember” anything about her vanishing even at that time.

Comments

A standard question that is used to screen people for multiple personality is: Do things ever happen that nobody else could have done, but you don’t remember doing it?

Leda, if truthful, would have answered, “Yes, since childhood,” and then reported what I have quoted above.

Actions that the person must have done, but cannot recall (when the memory gap cannot be better explained by ordinary forgetting or a medical condition) were probably done by an alternate personality. Search “memory gaps” for past posts on this cardinal symptom of multiple personality.

Of course, clinically, I would not make a formal diagnosis of multiple personality based only on the probability that an unremembered action had been done by an alternate personality. The formal diagnosis of multiple personality is not based on an interpretation of what is probable. It is based on actually meeting one or more of the person’s alternate personalities.

The usual way to meet an alternate personality is to discuss with the person their unremembered action—such as stealing or moving the doll, or vanishing in childhood—discussing it at length. Since the regular personality does not relate to this subject matter, but the alternate personality involved in that matter does relate to it, the regular personality will eventually tune out, and the alternate personality will come out.

You will see a change in demeanor. The alternate personality can explain more about what happened, often including details that can be corroborated. And they will give you their own age, gender, and name (though they are often reluctant to divulge their name until they know you better and are sure they can trust you).

If you then turn the conversation away from the subject matter of interest to that personality, or just mention the person’s regular name, there will be a switch back to the regular personality, who will have amnesia (a memory gap) for your conversation with the alternate personality.

In conclusion, since Leda does not understand the significance of her memory gaps, the novel ends as it begins: She is a mystery to herself.

1. Elena Ferrante. The Lost Daughter. Translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein. New York, Europa editions, 2006/2008.