Hi, Smile, that sounds like a very sad situation. No, I don’t know anyone who has gone through this. That sounds odd, though, to receive a diagnosis of a “hysterical personality.” I didn’t know women still received such a diagnosis. Gosh, I mean, I thought that was back in Freud’s time?

Anyway, of course it’s also possible that someone else molested her…or that it all happened within another time frame. I’ve always felt that if someone has symptoms, that these symptoms arise from something. I mean, even if you want to call it “hysterical,” WHY is she hysterical, is what I'd wonder? I don’t think we’re born hysterical…any more than we’re born addicts. My sense is that something happens to cause these behaviors.

Looking back on it, in fact, I can see how I, too, could have received such a diagnosis, in that I had “hysterics,” and “temper tantrums,” whatever you want to call it. But of course there was a reason why. I was trying to let others know that I was having an emergency. I just didn’t have the language, back then, to “speak” aloud what my father was doing.

I mean, obviously I don’t know what happened in this situation with your friend. Nor am I a psychologist. So I’m just wondering aloud here.

But, okay, you’re asking for advice. Sorry if I went off on a tangent. Yet, to be honest, my advice would be not to necessarily discount the daughter’s problems as totally something she made up. I mean, maybe she did; but, as I say, it could be that something (else) happened to her. And it might be beneficial to the whole family to discover what…if that makes sense? Sue