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Frightened woman
On Halloween, some kids (and some adult kids) pretend they are monsters, demons and things that go bump in the night. In the background of our minds, it’s a way to scoff at the possibility that such nasties actually exist.
But for Agnes, that possibility seemed all too real. Her daughter, Tina, a 10-year-old with no prior history of psychological challenges was, as her mother put it, “in the grip of something evil.”
Agnes and her husband were not kooks, dope addicts or religious fanatics. Tina was an A student, well liked and, prior to the onset of her troubles, even-tempered and mature for her age. Then, abruptly, she developed behaviors no one could explain.
Night Terrors?
Tina’s symptoms included what seemed like night terrors, a frightening sleep stage disturbance in children where they appear awake and terrified by something only they can see. In fact, they are not awake.
These characteristics were not present in Tina’s version of a night terror. During her nighttime awakenings, her emotional state was angry and menacing, and she was not asleep. “She’s like a whole different person,” Agnes continued. “She doesn’t look at you. She looks through you and her eyes are full of hate.”
Soon, the episodes spilled into the day. Tina’s countenance changed to the point that Agnes thought it “contorted.” She grew increasingly hostile, non-compliant and volatile. She had to drop out of school. “The psychiatrists claim it’s some kind of psychosis. One said hormones. They did blood work, neurological tests and brain scans. Nothing,” Agnes explained.
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Nostrums to No Avail
Numerous well-meaning healers offered all manner of nostrums—talk therapy, medication, energy work, dietary regimens, all to no avail. Finally, in desperation, Agnes went to her parish priest. While sympathetic, he felt Tina’s condition did not meet the high standard imposed by the Catholic Church for conducting a formal exorcism.
By the time Agnes found her way to my door, they had hospitalized Tina in a locked mental health unit. For the safety of both her and the rest of the family, her parents felt they had no other choice.
The question of whether human beings can undergo possession by and be under the control of a spiritual being or entity with malevolent intent remains unsettled. On one side, you have the empiricists. In the psycho-neurological realm, they believe that human thoughts, emotions and behaviors arise entirely from biology. To them, it is a bio-mechanical process, so they look askance or even scoff at the possibility that demonic possession occurs.
Presence of Evil?
Flip the coin and you have the true believers. They subscribe to spirits, including devilish ones, and often believe in a central demonic figure, such as Satan. The classic film The Exorcist scared the hell out of them because, in their minds, it could happen to anyone.
Rather than building their belief on neuroscience, like empiricists, they attribute it to their own direct experiences. Many claim to have felt the presence of evil or seen flashes of it in other people. Some believe they’ve experienced visions of ghost-like, menacing presences, or felt reactions (“my skin went cold”) when in circumstances that carried the feel of evil.
Like many, I’m somewhere in the middle. Over many years in this profession, I’ve seen a smattering of clients, like Tina, who seemed outside the lines of any available diagnosis in clinical psychology. And, in these cases, we did our homework, complete with medical tests, neuro-psychological exams, brain scans and second opinions. Still, some of them left me scratching my head and one in particular had me outright rattled.
There is much we don’t know about the forces in our midst. Astrophysicists tell us only about five percent of the matter and energy in the universe is directly detectable using our current technologies. We’re mostly flying blind. So, closing the book on anything, including demons, when 95% of the data is missing seems an unwise choice.
I’m keeping an open mind.
For more, visit philipchard.com.
