COUNTYWIDE : Therapist: Memories of Ritual Abuse Real

A therapist who specializes in treating victims of ritual abuse said Tuesday that anybody who would suggest that therapists are encouraging their clients to “remember” abuse that never happened “has never been in a room with somebody going through the process.”

Linda Walker, a licensed clinical social worker whose patients include those suffering from multiple personalities, spoke to about 40 people at a workshop on “Effects of Ritual Abuse” during the Governor’s Conference on Victim Services and Public Safety, held in Anaheim this week.

Walker said multiple personality disorder is no longer considered rare, and studies show that 97% of those diagnosed with the disorder were abused in early childhood. She estimated that she has treated about 50 people with multiple personalities.

The “fragmentation,” or splitting off of multiple personalities, is “a survival technique,” Walker explained. If there’s a problem the survivor can’t handle, the person compartmentalizes it so that hecan function in the world, she said.

However, patients vary in how functional they are. Some may find that there are hours in the day they cannot account for, or they may find themselves someplace and not know how they got there. Others hear voices, which “can be very frightening,” Walker said.

“It’s important to treat (all the personalities) as individuals, even though that may seem strange at first,” Walker said.

As for those who accuse therapists of suggesting the idea of satanic or ritualized abuse to their clients, Walker said: “It would be virtually impossible for a therapist to make up all the horrible things that come out. . . . It’s not just a matter of their saying, ‘Gee, you must have been ritually abused.’

“I don’t know why anyone would want to do that, and it wouldn’t be possible even if they wanted to,” she said.

An Orange County jury last week found in favor of two women who accused their 76-year-old mother of subjecting them to sadistic, satanic abuse when they were children but declined to award any damages. The case drew widespread attention to the issue of ritual child abuse.

“I couldn’t quite understand how (jury members) could come to the conclusion that it happened but not award any damages,” Walker said.

“It was interesting to me that the two women were able to handle the very difficult process of going through the suit,” she added.

Walker said she has had clients who considered suing but decided against it. She said she does not recommend that her clients sue their abusers because some patients may be very reluctant to admit what happened to them.

Walker has a therapy practice in San Diego and is also executive officer of the San Diego Commission on Children and Youth.