Paul Pearsall, Gary E. R. Schwartz, and Linda G. S. Russek. "Changs in Heart Transplant Recipients that Parallel the Personalitis of their Donors." 1999. Integrative Medicine 2:2/3, pp. 65-72.
This is the second in a loose series where I cover strange things that have been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. In the last entry, we looked at the case of a woman who had been accurately diagnosed with a brain tumour by ghosts. Today we’ll be looking at ten cases of people who may or may not have inherited the personality and/or memories of the people whose donor hearts they received. We will be evaluating absolutely none of the relevant scientific, methodological, theological, or hauntological questions posed by this article.
As with all the best scientific articles, this ones opens with the authors stating upfront that they have more or less no idea how the phenomena they’re about to describe could be possible. They toss out terms like “living systems theory” and “recurrent feedback loops” to disguise this fact. I have none of the requisite background to evaluate these ideas and thus have as much epistemological confidence in them as I do in the physics underlying any given episode of Star Trek. With the requisite woo aside, we get to the real meat of the bit, which is all the weird stuff they found.
Case 1: “Danny, My Heart Is Yours”
An 18-year-old boy killed in a car crash gave his heart to an 18-year-old girl whom he had never met. He was a musician, and had written a song called "Danny, My Heart is Yours" about donating his heart (long before the crash). Weirdly, the girl who received the heart was named Danielle. After she received his heart, this happened:
"When they showed me [the recipient] pictures of their son, I knew him directly. I would have picked him out anywhere. He's in me. I know he is in me and he is in love with me."
So that’s odd. Also, when they played some of the donor’s music for her, she could “finish the phrases of his songs.”
Case 2: Jerry’s Baby Talk
A 16-month-old boy drowned and gave his heart to a 7-month-old boy. After the transplant, the recipient "said the same baby-talk words that [the donor] said." Also, the donor had cerebral pallsy, "mostly on his left side." Following the transplant, the recipient developed "stiffness and some shaking on that same side." Also, and most weirdly, when the recipient was introduced to a group of people (one of whom was the donor’s father), he immediately headed over to that guy and called him “Daddy” despite never having met him.
Case 3: “She Would Look at a Naked Woman Model and Paint a Landscape from That”
At this point, for no particular reason, I would like to make it clear that I am taking the titles for these cases directly from the article and not making them up myself.
The donor was a 24-year-old lesbian landscape artist. The recipient was a 25-year-old male grad student. Before the surgery, he was worried that receiving a woman’s heart would make him gay(?). After the surgery, he felt “hornier than ususal and women just seem to look even more erotic and and sensual.” His girlfriend also said the surgey made him a better lover (??) and that he knows more about the female body now. Also, he started carrying a purse and enjoying shopping more (“going to the mall with him is like going with one of the girls”) and he now loves museums and especially landscape paintings, which he didn’t before.
Case 4: “He Died Right There on the Street Hugging his Violin Case”
The donor was a 17-year-old classical musician. He was also black. The recipient was a 47-year-old white man. I am specifying their respective races here because without this context you would not be able to appreciate this absolutely remarkable passage:
I'm real sad and all for the guy who died and gave me his heart, but I really have trouble with the fact that he was black. I'm not a racist, mind you, not at all. Most of my friends at the plant are black guys. But the idea that there is a black heart in a white body seems really...well, I don't know. I told my wife that I thought my penis might grow to a black man's size. [...] After we have sex, I sometimes feel guilty because a black man made love to my wife.
After the surgery, he started hanging out with black people more (?) and also he loves classical music all of a sudden. No information is given on his penis.
Case 5: “She Was Man Crazy When She Was a Little Girl and it Never Stopped”
I’m regretting this project but it’s too late to stop. We’ve gotta push through. Also, this one’s weirder.
The donor was a female vegetarian who was killed in a car accident. The recipient was also female, and gay.
When I got my new heart, two things happened to me. First, almost every night and still sometimes now, I actually feel the accident my donor had. I can feel the impact in my chest. It slams into me, but my doctor said everything looks fine. Also, I hate meat now. I can't stand it. I was McDonald's biggest money maker, and now meat makes me throw up. Actually, when I even smell it, my heart starts to race.
The transplant also….made her stop being gay?
"What really bothers me is that I'm engaged to be married now. He's a great guy and we love each other [...] The problem is, I'm gay. At least, I thought I was. After my transplant, I'm not....I don't think anyway. [...] I have absolutely no desire to be with a woman. I think I got a gender transplant.
Case 6: She Would Skip Meals, and for Awhile [sic], She Was Purging
Look, regardless of the veracity of any of these accounts, it seems pretty clear that this article would not get published today.
Donor was a 17-year-old girl with an eating disorder; recipient was a 47-year-old man. After the surgery, he developed a ton of new energy and also a “girl’s laugh.” Also, he doesn’t like eating anymore, and sometimes throws up after he does.
Case 7: Drowned in the Family Pool
The donor was a 3-year-old girl who, as the title suggests, drowned. The recipient was a 9-year-old boy. His mother says he doesn't know who his donor was or how she died. The donor's parents had a bad divorce, after which the father never saw her, and when she died she had been left with a babysitter by her mother. From the recipient:
I talk to her sometimes. I can feel her in there. She seems very sad. She is very afraid. I tell her it's okay, but she is very afraid. She says she wishes that parents wouldn't throw away her children. I don’t know why she says that.
Also, he developed a new and severe fear of water.
Case 8: “She Would Have Made an Outstanding Physician, but She Wanted to Dance and Sing. That's How She Died.”
That actually was how she died. She was 19, and broke her neck in dance class. Her father, a doctor, wanted her to follow in his footsteps, but she wanted to go to Hollywood. The recipient, like several others in this article, says she talks to the donor sometimes and she seems very sad. She also said (of the donor):
I think she wanted to be a nurse or something, but other times it's like she wanted to be on Broadway. I think she wanted to be on Broadway more.
The recipient now wants to go to med school despite never having an interest in it before.
Case 9: “Timmy Fell Trying to Reach a Power Ranger Toy that had Fallen on the Ledge of the Window”
The donor was 3, the recipient 5. Despite not having been told the donor’s name or age, the recipient said he knew his name was Timmy and that he was “about half [his] age,” and also that he liked Power Rangers. The recipient also used to like Power Rangers, but since the transplant he won’t touch them any longer.
Case 10: “That's Exactly How Carl Died. The Bastard Shot Him Right in the Face.”
The donor was a cop who was shot in the face during an attempted arrest. The only thing the recipient knew was the age of his donor and that he had been healthy prior to his death. He did not know the cause of death.
A few weeks after I got my heart, I began to have dreams. I would see a flash of light right in my face and my face gets real, real hot. It actually burns.
And also:
Just before that time, I would get a glimpse of Jesus. I've had these dreams and now daydreams ever since: Jesus and then a flash.
And that’s that. Next up on this series: the time 3M may or may not have accidentally created some kind of force field.