ABSTRACT
On February 2013, a man was discovered unconscious in a motel in Palm Springs, California. He was transported to an emergency room where he regained consciousness. Subsequently, he was hospitalized after not recognizing his own face on his California driver’s license. Nor did he recognize three other pieces of personal identification. The name on the license and other identification was that of Michael Thomas Boatwright. Instead, the man claimed to be Johan Ek. An interpreter was needed since he only spoke in Swedish. Four months later he remained hospitalized, still insisting he could not remember his past. During this time, it was learned that Boatwright was born in Florida and had a sister in the U.S. who said she had not been in contact with him for years. It was also learned that he did speak English, that he had served in the military, and did live for a while in Sweden. A psychiatric consultant speculated that Boatwright was likely experiencing Dissociative Amnesia, in which his “break from reality may be a form of ‘self protection.’” Assuming that this man was not suffering from a stroke or other brain condition and was not fabricating the story to avoid some problem, the diagnosis of a Dissociative Disorder is most reasonable. Likewise, the psychological mechanism of dissociation as a form of self-protection is a common explanation among clinicians. Of course, Adlerians prefer the term “safeguarding” instead of self-protection to explain Dissociative Amnesia.
