Delusional Disorder

https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-42951788

Four years ago, still trying to understand why Stan had concocted the elaborate hoax, Pauline came across an article in a medical journal about a condition called delusional disorder.

"As I read this article I thought, 'This completely describes Stan, somebody who is in every respect normal and competent, but has this crazy delusion,'" she says.

Pauline contacted the author of the paper, a psychiatrist at Harvard University. He was very excited to hear her story. Stan had all the hallmarks of a person with delusional disorder, he said. Another academic, the leading expert on the disorder, agreed.

Finding a reason for what Stan did to her family may have helped Pauline come to terms with her past, but it can't ever repair the damage that he did to their lives.

"I feel very sad for my mother," Pauline says.

"She had such a difficult life and she was vulnerable to Stan, mostly because he was a gentle, caring guy - too bad he had this terrible delusion.

"But I also feel sad for myself and my brother - two little kids whose lives were hijacked."

Pauline Dakin worked for many years for Canada's national broadcaster, CBC, and is now assistant professor at the school of journalism at the University of King's College, Halifax NS. She is the author of Run, Hide, Repeat: A memoir of a fugitive childhood, published by Viking.