The shocking account of Sybil, a girl with 16 separate personalities that developed as a result of horrendous childhood abuses, sold seven million copies, and even spawned a recognised syndrome, 'multiple personality disorder.Sybil book lie,
The 1973 book told the story of Sybil Dorsett, later revealed to be Shirley Mason, whose personality had been splintered into more than a dozen distinct characters including a baby and two males.
But the titillating tale, serialised across the nation, has now been exposed as a fake, concocted by three women as a calculated money-making invention. Sybil Exposed: The Extraordinary Story Behind the Famous Multiple Personality Case,
A new book 'Sybil Exposed: The Extraordinary Story behind the Famous Multiple Personality Case' denounces the account as a fiction.
According to the author, Debbie Nathan, the memoir was cooked up by three individuals hungry for fame and fortune: Mason, her therapist Cornelia (Connie) Wilbur and journalist Flora Schreiber. +Shirley Ardell Mason,
Mason had indeed had a troubled upbringing. She had come from a strict Minnesota Seventh Day Adventist family and had a nervous disposition, the New York Post reported. sybil dorsett 16 personalities,
She had been abused as a child and had also suffered from OCD tendencies.
As a graduate student in New York in the 1950s, Mason was in therapy.
But in treating her patient, therapist Connie Wilbur prescribed a cornucopia of wonder drugs: Seconal, Demerol, Edrisal and Daprisal, including several that have now been discredited.
Yet another, Pentathol, hailed at the time as a truth serum, is now believed to encourage patients to describe fantasies or experiences that could never have happened.
After one pivotal session, in which Mason described episodes in which she became different people, with multiple names and personalities, Wilbur saw an opportunity, Nathan claims.
Source: dailymail
