UNFORGETTABLE TALES OF AMNESIA: Part 3 - Have You Lost Your Mind?

By Lisa Malice, Ph.D.

Everyone loves a good amnesia story. Authors love to cook them up, readers love to devour them. Don’t believe me? Plug “amnesia” into BookBub’s search engine and you’ll get a list of more than 3,000 books across a variety of genres that interweave memory loss as a plot point, among them dozens of bestsellers, including Girl on the Train, Before I Go to Sleep, and the Jason Bourne series.

Today’s blog draws on a mix of fictional and true-life cases of a rare form of amnesia that has no physical cause—dissociative fugue. You may already be familiar with this form of memory loss. The terms “shell-shock” and “battle fatigue” were coined during WWI and WWII, respectively, to describe soldiers who cracked under the horrors of war and wandered away from the battlefield confused and foggy, unable to remember who they were, or where they were. These soldiers were often reported as AWOL or MIA. The lucky ones regained their memory and found their way back to their units, or were recovered by their comrades or MPs, before they could be captured or killed by the enemy.

Dissociative fugue, as a mental health disorder, is triggered by severe psychological trauma or post-traumatic stress (PTSD). It serves as a shield from memories too painful to keep in conscious memory, and thus, is classified as a psychological defense mechanism. Just like battle fatigue, the condition leaves sufferers stupefied, muddled, and wandering, their minds empty of any personal memories or identity. Typically, this form of amnesia is temporary, lasting no more than hours or days. Sufferers usually snap out of it without any memory of what they did, where they went, or the people with whom they interacted.

Probably the most famous character in films, TV, and books to fall victim to dissociative fugue is Jason Bourne, the elite CIA assassin created by Robert Ludlum. The psychological trauma that led to the character’s fugue occurs during a mission. Aboard his target’s yacht, holding a gun to the man’s head, he is set to pull the trigger. When he spots the man’s children nearby, the look of fear in their eyes sears his soul, causing something inside him to snap. He cannot carry out his orders.

Disoriented—as if in a daze or fugue—he stumbles to the deck of the yacht, where he is shot by the man’s guards. He plummets overboard and is left adrift in the ocean, until he is rescued by a fisherman. He wakes without a single memory to his name, which is not Jason Bourne—that is just one of many his cover aliases he used in his job. Over the course of three books and five films, his memory slowly emerges, until one day everything comes rushing back—his true name (David Webb), his past, and every memory he had before being shot.

The Grand Dame of Mystery herself, Agatha Christie, is said to have suffered from dissociative fugue, and happily for generations of readers, did recover her memory. On the evening of December 26, 1926, the 36-year-old writer vanished from her home. Her abandoned car was discovered an hour away the next morning, but Christie was nowhere to be found. The story hit the radio and newspapers with a frenzy. Once word spread that her husband, Archibald, had recently asked for a divorce, speculation ran wild that he had murdered the famed mystery maven. Some speculated that Agatha had committed suicide. The gossip died when, eleven days after going missing, Agatha was found safe and sound as a guest at a hydropathic hotel. She claimed she had no recollection of how she arrived there, nor any memory of the events that transpired during the time she was missing.

Although some suggest the Agatha Christie faked her fugue state—perhaps as a way to get back at her husband, or simply for the publicity—there is evidence that she genuinely lost her memory. On the cold evening Agatha disappeared, a witness encountered her walking down the road, appearing confused and upset, and clad in nothing but a thin dress. It’s been theorized that Agatha, suffering from depression from her impending divorce and her mother’s recent death, entered into a fugue state after crashing her car. She then wandered off leaving behind her memories and the distress associated with them. The truth died with Agatha fifty years later when she passed at age 86.

Suppose you were like Agatha, and you woke up to find yourself in a wonderful spa, far away from home with no recollection of who you are and no one to vouch for your identity—what stressful situation would have driven you to mentally escape your life? And more importantly, what would it take to snap you out of your fugue?