“Sybil”
is a movie that talks about dissociative identity disorder (DID). Different
from other similar movies that exaggerate the horrible effects lead by certain
extreme personality, “Sybil” portrays the real conditions of a patient who suffers
with dissociative identity disorder. It educates people about the pains and
sufferings experienced by a DID’s patient in real life and also the treatments
that they go through in order to sustain their lives with many personalities.
Besides the patient, it also shows the procedures of the therapist in
conducting the psychotherapy towards DID’s patient.
Sybil,
who is the main character in the movie, is being diagnosed with dissociative
personality disorder by her psychiatrist, Dr Wilbur. In the beginning, Sybil
has no idea that she is suffering with DID, although she has lots of memory
gaps in a day and often wakes up in doing something she does not know. Her life
is in a mess as she could not manage her relationship, job and financial
issues. These terrify her, which leads her seeking help from Dr Wilbur. There
are 14 personalities that share Sybil body, including her primary personality. Each
personality shows dissimilarities with her primary personality and handles
different roles. There is a dominant personality, Vickie, who knows everything
about all personalities; a frightened little girl, Peggy, who symbolizes Sybil’s
anger and rage towards the abuses caused by her mother during childhood; a
music-talented and passionate young girl, Vanessa, who helps Sybil in building
a love relationship; a depressed personality, Marcia, who always wants for
suicidal; an infant, Ruthie, where Sybil will regress into when she feels
frightened; and other more personalities that do not show clearly in the movie.
Each personality emerges with a reason and symbolises something that Sybil
supresses for long time without she knowing. Therefore, she is not aware of
these personalities and the trauma that she experienced during childhood until
she is being revealed by Dr Wilbur. The cause of this disorder can be explained
by the childhood trauma caused by her mother when she was young. Being abused
and neglected by her mother who is diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Sybil
first suffers with post-traumatic stress disorder, which later develops
dissociative personality disorder. The causation reveals in this movie suites
the suggested cause of having DID, which is childhood trauma and the symptoms showed
also match with the symptoms proposed in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders (DSM). In other words, “Sybil” manages to portray the real
conditions and suffers experienced by a patient of DID in normal life, without
exaggerating some personalities in order to catch the audiences’ attention.
Besides
displaying the life of a patient with DID, this movie also portrays the life of
a therapist in helping her client to deal with the disorder. Dr Wilbur, who is
the psychiatrist of Sybil, helps Sybil a lot in order to cope with her
disorder. She talks with different personalities and understand the underlying
meaning of the existence of each personality. She uses hypnosis to find out the
trauma that Sybil went through when she was young. She even handles the
personality who has suicidal ideation and immediately rushes towards Sybil when
she receives calls that she is going to commit suicide. In order to help Sybil
to unite all her personalities together, she reveals to Sybil that she has DID,
and leads her to accept the existence of all her personalities and face with
her childhood trauma that she has forgotten. Although she has somehow broken
the ethical rules of being a therapist, which is not forming the relationship
beyond therapist-client relationship, all she did manages to help Sybil to face
with her disorder. From her sacrifices and strong wishes to help her client, I realize
that it is uneasy to be a therapist, especially when facing with patients who
have severe mental disorders and conducting long-term psychotherapy which may
last for years. Lots of patience and tolerance are required, together with lots
of related knowledge and years of experience. These therefore enlighten me to
be prepared and learn to be tolerance before I serve people as a therapist in
future.
In
summary, “Sybil” is a nice movie to be watched as it reveals the life of people
who suffered with DID. It educates people not to be bias and have
discrimination towards these people as they are just normal people who also
need love and attention from others. Some of them might not be aware of their
disorder and suffered with lots of pains and fears. If this case, family and
friends should provide support and help when they needed the most, but not
abandoning them and leaving them alone because of fear. Social support would
definitely help them to cope better and face their disorder bravely and
confidently.