Method of Madness

by Brad Kelln

  "Ba­si­cal­ly all psycho­tic di­sor­ders are at the end of a con­ti­nu­um of nor­mal be­ha­vi­o­ur," Wen­ton con­ti­nu­ed.

  He was se­ated be­hind his desk and Nor­ma was se­ated ac­ross from him. They we­re dis­cus­sing Wen­ton's re­cent in­vol­ve­ment in the bar­ri­ca­ded su­bj­ect ne­go­ti­ati­on of Barry Bo­se­man.

  "The su­bj­ect in this po­li­ce stan­doff was di­ag­no­sed as dep­res­sed with psycho­tic fe­atu­res but might ac­tu­al­ly ha­ve be­en sho­wing the prod­ro­mal signs of la­te on­set schi­zoph­re­nia. I don't know the who­le his­tory but ap­pa­rently he had so­me kind of fi­xa­ti­on on di­se­ase. He saw it in his ho­use, at work, everyw­he­re. Even du­ring the po­li­ce ne­go­ti­ati­on he was ra­ving abo­ut di­se­ase be­ing all aro­und him. Not surp­ri­singly, his fi­xa­ti­on star­ted shortly af­ter his wi­fe and son left him."

  "Is that li­ke the stress part of the di­at­he­sis-stress idea?" Nor­ma as­ked, wan­ting des­pe­ra­tely to se­em com­pe­tent in Wen­ton's eyes.

  He nod­ded. "Di­at­he­sis is the bi­olo­gi­cal por­ti­on of an il­lness, the part that is pas­sed on by ge­ne­tics. May­be this guy had so­me odd cha­rac­ters in his fa­mily tree. A ge­ne pre­dis­po­sing mem­bers of his fa­mily to men­tal il­lness can be pas­sed along much li­ke the ge­ne for ma­le pat­tern bald­ness is pas­sed. The 'stress' part of di­at­he­sis-stress is the idea that even tho­ugh a per­son has a ge­ne­tic pre­dis­po­si­ti­on to a di­sor­der, it still ta­kes a stres­sful li­fe event to fi­nal­ly push the per­son over the ed­ge. For examp­le, so­me­one might be des­ti­ned to be crazy but ma­na­ges to fight it off for ye­ars right up un­til so­me- thing big hap­pens that bre­aks them. So­met­hing li­ke ha­ving yo­ur fa­mily pack up and le­ave you. But you ne­ed both parts: stress won't ca­use psy- cho­sis wit­ho­ut the ge­ne­tic pre­dis­po­si­ti­on, and yo­ur pre­dis­po­si­ti­on might not me­an shit un­til yo­ur wi­fe fucks off and le­aves you."

  "That's ter­rib­le," Nor­ma sa­id with a no­te of sad­ness.

  "Shit hap­pens. Any­way, as I was sa­ying, men­tal il­lness is on a con­ti­nu­um. One of this guy's symptoms was se­e­ing di­se­ase everyw­he­re, a fre­qu­ent symptom in ob­ses­si­ve-com­pul­si­ve di­sor­der. But just se­e­ing di­se­ase or dirt do­es not cons­ti­tu­te a psycho­tic con­di­ti­on. It's a mat­ter of deg­re­es. If a per­son starts to see di­se­ase everyw­he­re to the po­int whe­re it dis­rupts the­ir nor­mal func­ti­oning, that's a prob­lem. Be­ing ab­le to tell the dif­fe­ren­ce bet­we­en what's re­al and what's not is what se­pa­ra­tes re­ality from fan­tasy. Psycho­tic pe­op­le can't ma­ke that dis­tinc­ti­on." Wen­ton sto­od and pe­ered over the top of his desk. "The­re," he sa­id po­in­ting, "Do you see that bug over in the cor- ner of the ro­om. I think it's an ant. Right the­re, next to the ra­in stick."

  She shif­ted aro­und in her se­at and lo­oked. "Ye­ah, I see it. Do you want me to get it?"

  Wen­ton lo­oked at her li­ke she'd just sa­id so­met­hing of­fen­si­ve. "No. I'm il­lust­ra­ting a po­int."

  "Oh," she sa­id shif­ting in her se­at.

  "Lo­ok at that ant aga­in. This ti­me, mo­re ca­re­ful­ly."

  She tur­ned back to the spot. "Okay."

  "Is it an ant?"

  "I don't know."

  "Well the first ti­me you lo­oked you we­re su­re, we­ren't you?"

  "Yes, be­ca­use you told me it was an ant."

  "I told yo­ur bra­in it was an ant. I didn't tell yo­ur eyes what to see. Yo­ur bra­in told yo­ur eyes what it was lo­oking at." Yo­ufac­kin' idi­ot

  "I think I get it."

  "You pro­bably don't," he sa­id sar­cas­ti­cal­ly. "The po­int is this: that's not an ant. That's a speck of dirt. From this dis­tan­ce it's dif­fi­cult to know for su­re, arid our minds easily fil­led in the mis­sing de­ta­ils with wha­te­ver in­for- ma­ti­on we had ac­cess to. In this ca­se, you we­re che­ating yo­ur per­cep­tu­al skills by rel­ying too he­avily on what I sa­id. Yo­ur mind tho­ught you al­re­ady knew it was an ant, so when you lo­oked at an am­bi­gu­o­us lit­tle speck of dirt, you didn't qu­es­ti­on yo­ur mind's pre­con­ce­ived jud­ge­ment."

  "Okay."

  "Stop sa­ying 'okay.' Just lis­ten." He won­de­red if it was po­int­less to try and edu­ca­te Nor­ma on anyt­hing.

  "Sorry," she sa­id, fe­eling li­ke she'd di­sap­po­in­ted him aga­in.

  He nod­ded im­pa­ti­ently and con­ti­nu­ed. "What if yo­ur mind tells you things that aren't true arid yo­ur per­cep­ti­ons just fol­low along? Bo­se­man's mind was tel­ling him the­re was di­se­ase all aro­und him. His per­cep­ti­on was get­ting tric­ked, fo­oled in­to be­li­eving that everyt­hing was pro­of of what his bra­in was tel­ling him.

  "In ot­her words, the pro­cess of be­co­ming de­lu­si­onal is ste­ady and in­sid- io­us. It starts with an over­va­lu­ed idea that se­eks out va­li­dity. This Bo­se­man guy tri­ed to con­vin­ce him­self that he ma­gi­cal­ly cont­rac­ted her­pes, that the di­se­ase must be mo­re com­mon, mo­re easily cont­rac­ted than an­yo­ne knows. He be­ca­me ob­ses­sed with the idea and se­lec­ti­vely se­arc­hed out pro­of of what his mind had al­re­ady de­ci­ded was true. This way anyt­hing he saw pro­ved him right. So Barry Bo­se­man en­ded up con­vin­cing him­self that his ho­use was in­fes­ted with her­pes. Every speck of dirt, every im­per­fec­ti­on in the flo­or, was pro­of of di­se­ase run­ning ram­pant. His over­va­lu­ed ide­ati­on tur­ned to de­lu­si­on and sup­por­ted his hal­lu­ci­na­ti­ons."

  "And the mo­re di­se­ase he saw the stron­ger his il­lness be­ca­me," Nor­ma ad­ded.

  "Ba­si­cal­ly. The pro­cess fe­eds it­self. Ta­ke anot­her clas­sic examp­le: the Jesus de­lu­si­on. A lot of men­tal pa­ti­ents be­li­eve they're Jesus. Why?" Wen­ton didn't wa­it for Nor­ma to ans­wer. "It starts with the idea of uni­qu­eness. That's not psycho­tic. Most pe­op­le ha­ve so­me deg­ree of ne­ed to be­li­eve they are uni­que. But the uni­qu­eness ne­eds a ba­sis, a jus­ti­fi­ca­ti­on. 'Why am I uni­que?' The ans­wer: 'I'm spe­ci­al. The­re's so­met­hing spe­ci­al abo­ut me that se­pa­ra­tes me from all ot­hers.' Thus, the over­va­lu­ed ide­ati­on be­gins. The per­son ne­eds to jus­tify the be­li­ef in uni­qu­eness, ne­eds to pro­ve that they are spe­ci­al. It pre­ser­ves the­ir ego, pro­tects the­ir fra­gi­le self-este­em.

  "At so­me po­int the spe­ci­fic no­ti­on of be­ing Jesus is int­ro­du­ced. The per­son latc­hes on­to this exp­la­na­ti­on be­ca­use it so easily exp­la­ins everyt­hing that has co­me be­fo­re and will co­me in the fu­tu­re. Our minds are hard wi­red to se­arch for qu­ick and easy exp­la­na­ti­ons to help us or­ga­ni­ze our ex­pe­ri­en­ces. If we are pla­gu­ed by the qu­es­ti­on of what ma­kes us uni­que, then I'm the Son of God' do­es a pretty go­od job of ans­we­ring a few qu­es­ti­ons.

  "And then pro­of co­mes from all over. Everyt­hing starts to ta­ke on spe­ci­al me­aning. A man walks down the stre­et and no­ti­ces so­me­one is lo­oking at him. 'Pe­op­le sta­re at me be­ca­use they know I'm Jesus,' he thinks. He picks up a Bib­le and his fin­gers ting­le. He re­ads the news­pa­per and the­re's a story on re­li­gi­on. Everyt­hing has spe­ci­al me­aning to him, a me­aning that con­firms he is Jesus."

  Nor­ma de­ci­ded to risk as­king a qu­es­ti­on. "But what if so­me­one po­ints out the dif­fe­ren­ces? What if so­me­one tells the guy he isn't Jesus be­ca­use he do­esn't per­form mi­rac­les?"

  "That's the most dan­ge­ro­us thing for pe­op­le with de­lu­si­ons," Wen­ton res­pon­ded. "Small chal­len­ges to the va­li­dity of the be­li­efs only pro­vi­de op­por­tu­ni­ti­es to bu­ild on the la­yers. With each small chal­len­ge, the de­lu­si­onal per­son adds mo­re depth to his story
, co­mes up with exp­la­na­ti­ons for mis­sing pi­eces in his story and the de­lu­si­ons be­co­me mo­re fi­xed, mo­re ela­bo­ra­te. It's the sa­me as bra­in­was­hing tech­ni­qu­es that we­re re­por­tedly used in Japa­ne­se in­tern­ment camps du­ring World War II. Sol­di­ers we­re ma­de to do lit­tle things li­ke wri­te an es­say con­dem­ning so­me as­pect of Ame­ri­can cul­tu­re. Over ti­me, the­se exer­ci­ses wo­re them down and they star­ted to be­li­eve what they Wro­te."

  "Wow. What can help then?"

  "Almost not­hing. On­ce the de­lu­si­onal system is in­tact and the la­yers are de­ep, the­re's very lit­tle that can be do­ne. Psychot­he­rapy is bul­lshit. You can't talk a per­son out of be­li­eving he's Jesus. Ra­ti­onal ar­gu­ments don't work. The per­son is too de­fen­si­ve. The­ir who­le per­so­na­lity, the­ir who­le sen­se of self, is ba­sed on the be­li­efs. If they gi­ve up tho­se be­li­efs, then they're ad­mit­ting that everyt­hing they be­li­eved was crazy, a lie, de­lu­si­ons. They lo­se them­sel­ves in the pro­cess. Sud­denly they aren't uni­que or spe­ci­al-they're just a men­tal pa­ti­ent. No one is wil­ling to let that hap­pen.

  "Be­si­des that, de­lu­si­onal be­li­efs are al­most al­ways pre­mi­sed on bits and pi­eces of re­ality that can't be con­fir­med one way or anot­her. For examp­le, the per­son who thinks he's Jesus pro­bably did ha­ve pe­op­le sta­ring at him on the stre­et. He may ha­ve be­en we­aring a bath to­wel at the ti­me, but pe­op­le we­re sta­ring at him. It isn't so much the ac­tu­al events but the in­terp­re­ta­ti­on of the events. Li­ke that speck of dirt on the flo­or be­hind you. You lo­oked at it and saw an ant. It's not an ant, but yo­ur mind told you that you we­re lo­oking at an ant. But that do­esn't me­an the speck of dirt do­esn't exist.

  "The se­cond re­ason de­lu­si­ons are hard to tre­at is that they can ra­rely be pro­ved or disp­ro­ved. Many men­tal pa­ti­ents ha­ve de­lu­si­ons that re­vol­ve aro­und an event that only they we­re in­vol­ved with. For ins­tan­ce, a guy might say he was vi­si­ted by an ali­en who told him the world was go­ing to end. The guy in­sists that the world is go­ing to end, and if we ar­gue with him, he says, 'You we­ren't the­re, you don't know,' and he's right."

  "It's the sa­me as if so­me­one says they're Jesus," Nor­ma sa­id nod­ding.

  "Right. How wo­uld we know if so­me­one re­al­ly was Jesus? Men­tal he­alth pro­fes­si­onals ha­ve be­co­me so ac­cus­to­med to the­se kind of de­lu­si­ons that they auto­ma­ti­cal­ly dis­co­unt any story that so­unds re­mo­tely psycho­tic. This re­j­ec­ti­on has be­co­me so auto­ma­tic that it's do­ubt­ful they'd be ab­le to re­cog­ni­ze a le­gi­ti­ma­te far-out story from a de­lu­si­on. But this way of thin­king al­so simp­li­fi­es our jobs. If we didn't trust this pro­fes­si­onal judg­ment, we might spend far too much ti­me on a sing­le pa­ti­ent, trying with lit­tle suc­cess to disp­ro­ve a crazy story."

  "And drugs? Wo­uldn't me­di­ca­ti­on help the pa­ti­ent re­cog­ni­ze that his be­li­ef is a de­lu­si­on?"

  Wen­ton smi­led. "De­pends on who you ask. A psychi­at­rist will tell you that drugs help. The drug com­pany will tell you that they ha­ve a cu­re. Most ot­her pe­op­le wor­king with the truly de­lu­si­onal pa­ti­ents will tell you it's all bul­lshit, psychot­he­rapy do­esn't work be­ca­use it just te­ac­hes the pa­ti­ent to not talk abo­ut the­ir de­lu­si­ons; drugs don't help be­ca­use they just tran­qu­ili­ze the pa­ti­ent so they aren't as agi­ta­ted as they con­ti­nue to be­li­eve they're Jesus. A re­al­ly in­tact de­lu­si­on can only be sup­pres­sed, it will ne­ver di­sap­pe­ar. Even the pa­ti­ents who se­em to be bet­ter are re­al­ly just hi­ding the­ir de­lu­si­on. If you dig a lit­tle you can nor­mal­ly find it."

  "That's fas­ci­na­ting," Nor­ma sa­id, nod­ding.

  "I don't know if it's fas­ci­na­ting" Wen­ton sa­id coldly. "It's pretty dis- tur­bing. The­se ide­as, the­se de­lu­si­ons can ta­ke the per­son over, cont­rol them, dest­roy them. Can you ima­gi­ne be­li­eving so­met­hing with every oun­ce of yo­ur self and then be­ing told you're just crazy? Can you ima­gi­ne exp­la­in- ing everyt­hing that you are and ever will be to so­me­one and then ha­ving them tell you that you're 'de­lu­si­onal'? It dest­roys pe­op­le. It in­va­li­da­tes them. It le­aves them now­he­re to turn. It le­aves them su­ici­dal."

  Wen­ton was ho­ping to spend mo­re ti­me with Nor­ma af­ter the­ir me­eting, but she was ir­ri­ta­ting him. He fo­und her man­ne­risms, her ef­forts to be in­te­res­ted and ke­en, re­al­ly dis­tas­te­ful. He de­ci­ded he co­uldn't lo­ok at her any­mo­re.

  "Anyway, I ne­ed to get so­me ot­her stuff do­ne."

  Nor­ma frow­ned. "Okay, do you want me to go?"

  "Ye­ah," he lo­oked away from her and ope­ned his lap­top.

  She he­si­ta­ted. She felt li­ke she had so­me­how up­set him or do­ne so­met­hing wrong.

  "We don't ne­ed to me­et aga­in?" When she he­ard her­self ask the qu­es­ti­on she sud­denly felt awk­ward and pat­he­tic, li­ke a high scho­ol kid, and des­pe­ra­tely wis­hed she co­uld suck her words back in. It was im­por­tant to Nor­ma that he res­pect her. She wan­ted Wen­ton to see her as a com­pe­tent grad stu­dent.

  "Abo­ut what?" he sa­id and lo­oked at her de­li­be­ra­tely.

  He'd do­ne this to her be­fo­re and she ha­ted it. He al­ways pic­ked up on her we­ak­ness and pus­hed it back in her fa­ce. He li­ked to ma­ke her fe­el silly.

  "Not­hing, I gu­ess," she mumb­led and sto­od to le­ave.

  Wen­ton re­tur­ned to his com­pu­ter, ba­rely no­ti­cing when the do­or clic­ked be­hind her.

  TWELVE

  I'm an idi­ot, Dr. Cla­ric tho­ught as he re­tur­ned to his of­fi­ce. What the hell was I do­ing in the me­eting? They must think I'm in­sa­ne. I ne­ed to let this shit go.

  He sat at his desk and sta­red at the lo­gin scre­en on the com­pu­ter.

  I ne­ed to ke­ep so­me pers­pec­ti­ve he­re. The­re's not­hing go­ing on. That e- ma­il co­uld ha­ve be­en anyt­hing. A glitch in the system. And the­re are whi­te vans everyw­he­re. The van I saw didn't even ha­ve the sa­tel­li­te dish or wha­te­ver the hell it was sup­po­sed to ha­ve.

  He re­la­xed in his cha­ir, a lit­tle.

  I ne­ed to get back to work and for­get abo­ut this shit. Cat­he­ri­ne Mer­cer is a sick wo­man. A very sick wo­man who mur­de­red her own fa­mily be­ca­use of a men­tal il­lness. If the­re are elect­ro­nic we­apons, it do­esn't me­an they ha­ve anyt­hing to do with her il­lness and that's a pretty big "If! Just be­ca­use so­me wac­ko knows how to put to­get­her a go­od Web si­te do­esn't me­an it's fact. An­yo­ne can put a si­te on the In­ter­net-whet­her it's true or not!

  Dr. Cla­ric nod­ded and le­aned for­ward, res­ting his fin­gers on the key- bo­ard. He felt mo­re con­fi­dent now and typed in his lo­gin na­me.

  On the ot­her hand, he tho­ught, the­re we­re spe­ci­fic na­mes of pe­op­le on so­me of tho­se si­tes. Na­mes of sci­en­tists at re­pu­tab­le uni­ver­si­ti­es who are do­ing re­se­arch in this stuff.

  The com­pu­ter scre­en flas­hed and Win­dows ME ca­me in­to vi­ew. Af­ter a mo­ment of de­li­be­ra­ti­on Dr. Cla­ric drop­ped his mo­use to the icon for his In­ter­net brow­ser.

  He sta­red at the aut­hor bio lis­ted at the be­gin­ning of an ar­tic­le en­tit­led "Effec­ti­ve­ness of Non-nuc­le­ar Elect­ro­mag­ne­tic Pul­se on Be­ha­vi­o­ur Mo­di­fi­ca­ti­on."

  The si­te of­fe­red both an e-ma­il ad­dress and pho­ne num­ber for the aut­hor, Dr. Byron Pinc­her, who was ap­pa­rently a pro­fes­sor with the Stan­ford Uni­ver­sity Re­se­arch Cent­re.

  Dr. Cla­ric sta­red at the pho­ne num­ber on the scre­en.

  After a few mi­nu­t
es, he pic­ked up the pho­ne and he­si­tantly punc­hed the num­bers. As he pres­sed the last num­ber he glan­ced at his watch. With the fo­ur-ho­ur ti­me dif­fe­ren­ce it was pro­bably clo­se to lunch­ti­me the­re.

  So­me­one pic­ked up on the third ring. "Lab. Tracy."

  Dr. Cla­ric was so start­led he al­most hung up. "I'm sorry," he stam­me­red. "I was lo­oking for a…Dr. Pinc­her?"

  "He's not he­re," the wo­man bar­ked.

  "Oh, oh, I see. Urn, is he go­ing to be back so­on?"

  "Ye­ah, he's just out for lunch. Is the­re a mes­sa­ge?"

  "No, no I don't think…wa­it, I was gi­ven this num­ber by a fri­end and told to get hold of Dr. Pinc­her. Exactly what kind of lab do you ha­ve the­re?"

  "What?"

  "I'm sorry. This is Dr. Bri­an Cla­ric and I'm just fol­lo­wing up on so­met­hing." Damn, I sho­uldn't ha­ve told them my na­me! "I won­de­red what yo­ur lab is for? What do­es Dr. Pinc­her do?"

  "You a re­por­ter?" she as­ked bluntly. "Or are you re­al­ly a doc­tor?"

  It surp­ri­sed him and he ans­we­red de­fen­si­vely, "No! Not at all. I'm a cli­ni­cal psycho­lo­gist."

  When Tracy even­tu­al­ly res­pon­ded it was with mo­re than a tra­ce of an­no­yan­ce and su­pe­ri­ority. Psycho­lo­gists ob­vi­o­usly didn't imp­ress her and it was ap­pa­rent that she as­su­med he wo­uldn't be ab­le to de­cip­her the comp­li­ca­ted pur­po­ses of the re­se­arch.

  "Dr. Pinc­her's a physi­cist spe­ci­ali­zing in ne­uro­bi­olo­gi­cal ap­pli­ca­ti­ons. We're stud­ying bi­olo­gi­cal elect­ro­mag­ne­tic fi­elds he­re. Who did you say you we­re?"

  "That's okay. Thank you. Thank you very much," Dr. Cla­ric sa­id and hung up.

  He co­ve­red his fa­ce with his hands. What was that? Why did I pa­nic?

  Why did I tell them my na­me?

  The pho­ne rang.

  Dr. Cla­ric jum­ped back from his desk. His he­art po­un­ded and his hands we­re sha­king.