Name: Alice
IrrisorAge: 15
Physical Appearance: Average height, somewhat slim with
long ultraviolet hair and bright blue eyes.
Family:
Father,
Mother,
Elder Brother and
Younger Sister.
Interests: Literature, Social interaction, Psychiatry
Biography: Alice's memories of her early childhood are rather hazy, though her recollections of this unremarkable phase of her life are quite clear from piecing together information from her friends and family. She was adopted as a baby by her family and had a stable upbringing. Though her parents initially tried to hide her past from her due to their silent, mutual trepidation that the truth would bring tumult and disassociation into her early childhood. These fears would soon prove to be unwarranted: sentimentalism was not a trait that Alice possessed. She didn't care that her family was not her own nor did she seek to find the identities of the parents she never truly met. Instead, upon the revelation of this fact, she thanked the people she considered to be her family for their concern. If the rest of her family life could be summed up in a single word, that word would be "idyllic", she had good relations with her sister and could converse with her brother surprisingly well despite the age difference (when he was at home that is, he tended to spend great lengths of time studying by himself in a nearby library where he could get some peace and quiet). She picked up various skills from both her mother and father and their respective careers though she didn't show any interest in a specific career path in that point in time.
She did relatively well in her education with marks slightly above average though she never stood out that much, at least not for that particular reason. She had a certain charismatic amicability that allowed her to gain several friends quickly. Alice's understanding for the subtle, capricious projections of emotion that allowed her to consistently actuate her serene aura unbeknownst to anyone at that time where the early symptoms that acted as harbingers for the turmoil that followed.
In hindsight, it had a certain farcical comedy to it. After all, she lived her life until then, unperturbed, releasing a kaleidoscope of ardor and yet this same kaleidoscope would soon be transmuted into a phantasmagoria.
At the age of 12, Alice was diagnosed with a mild case of psychopathy. It could've been worse, Alice's condition only resulted in slightly shallower emotions rather than anything that would be detrimental to her relations. Her friends stood by her in this difficult time yet the diagnosis had already sown the seeds of self-doubt. Alice began to reflect on everything she had ever done, everything she said and every facet of her past as she was caught inside an abyss of uncertainty. She recalled that she had always followed her heart yet she knew that it could have just been a lie. A lie so intricate that it convinced not only her peers but herself. Who was she? Was she a person or was she just a deluded facade to a cold, calculating persona? Agonizingly slowly, she began to withdraw from society, shutting herself away from everyone she knew. This withdrawal manifested as the progressive automation of her actions. She delegated every facet of her personality, mannerisms and identity to instinct while she plunged further into the abyss of despair.
Alice was slowly becoming the person that she feared she was. She found solace in literature; after all, she could never lie consciously or unconsciously to empty constructs of ink and paper. Perhaps she was similar to them: nothing more than an empty shell. No one else noticed much of a change in her other than a significant improvement in her English marks. She kept on smiling happily and interacting with the same vitality she normally had, reduced to little more than a simple marionette. She cried herself to sleep at night and struggled to motivate herself to continue her meaningless existence in the morning. The boundaries between day and night began to blur, caught underneath a heavy curtain of sorrow that slowly wore her down with it's relentless attrition.
Perhaps she would have contemplated the schadenfreuden irony of her predicament if it were not for the soul-crushing paroxysms that it brought with it. After all, it is undeniably unusual for a psychopath, a person with reduced emotional capacity to suffer from depression, the excess of emotion. Perhaps even more ironic considering that her fears of her identity being nothing but an elaborate fabrication had done exactly that. Perhaps. But the hypothetical tend to remain separated from reality, much like how her soul was now cruelly disassociated from her body. An immaterial pain tormented her heart.
The mere act of existing was now torture for her, yet Alice never did seek help. She couldn't bring herself to do so. As pathetic as it surely would have sounded (and she was quite aware of that fact). She wanted her despair to be
real. She didn't ant to be told that it was a phantasmal construct of an unstable, psychotic mind. Even if her existence was perpetually intertwined with agony, at least it would be real. And she didn't want to be told otherwise. It was the only dim, twisted fragment of her identity that remained.
Yet tears cannot flow on forever. Eventually she couldn't cry anymore, and the pain started to gradually dull.
Slowly, she began to recover. She started to enjoy some of the compositions she read, especially Goethe's masterpiece,
Faust. Once again, she found happiness in the thoughts and emotions of others. The same interactions that she once doubted retrogressed back into their former, pleasant states. Maybe it is all a lie. Her identity, her personality, her entire existence.
But surely if everyone believes in that one lie, it becomes indistinguishable from reality.
Reestablishing and reforging her former bonds, she returned to her initial social circumstances. Her interest in literature allowed her English marks to rise further and she soon discovered that she had an interest in psychiatry, through a combination of effort, independent research and reading, she began to study psychiatry outside of school. She is now once again content with her life, though admittedly part of her still wonders how brighter life could be without psychopathy filtering her emotions and part of her is still uncertain about herself. She's learned to accept that these parts of her will be with her forever, whether she likes it or not.
Quick Reference Summary: Alice was diagnosed with a slight case of psychopathy. This made her doubt her own identity. Resulting in depression. The depression eventually "burned-out" since it pretty much became impossible for her to remain depressed for the rest of her life. She has now recovered. Part of her still wishes to be "normal".