Dissociative

Identity Disorder

By: Shri Vennu

What is Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID)?

Dissociative Identity DIsorder is when someone has more than one

personality, it was once called Multiple Personality Disorder. This
disorder is caused by severe trauma, usually severe childhood abuse,
this could be physically or even sexully (Porterfield). These different
identities or “alters” are a way for the mind to compartmentalize pain
(Kaplan).
Living with
DID...
“‘We’ – she generally refers to herself
as ‘we’ – ‘had lots of adult parts.
Development should be seamless… But
because we didn’t grow up naturally, we
would update ourselves… Finally, there
were nine different adult parts, each
managing a stage of our abuse-free
adult life’” (Young).
“Melanie describes it this way: ‘If you’re in a
totally impossible situation, you dissociate
to stay alive. Trauma can freeze you in time.
And because the trauma is ongoing over
years, there are lots of little freezings
happening all over the place’” (Young).
“Walker, 46, believes DID ‘can be a
powerfully effective tool for some people’
and writes, ‘I don't think of myself as a
“victim” of the disorder, nor do I suffer from
it. Quite simply, I have it’" (Weir).
“‘Over time, we began to understand what was
happening as a whole,” she adds. In a threatening
situation, perhaps someone walking into the library in
a way that triggered awful memories, ‘I could talk to
the little ones and say, “I’m going to keep you safe…
the library’s a safe place. Just allow me to stay still and
see if we really are in danger, and I promise you if we
are, I’ll handle it.’”
Now, the parts are all still there, but they coexist. ‘We
are not one, but we all agree to live harmoniously
together,’ says Melanie. ‘Which works well most of the
time’” (Young).
“‘My alters functioned as a kind of
community supporting me,’ writes Walker”
(Weir).
“‘The goal is not to get rid of my parts,’ Hart
says. ‘It's to help them work better together
-- for all of us’” (Aridi).
Thoughts From Someone With DID…

When you have DID, you don’t HAVE to become a "victim" of DID or that you have to suffer from it. It
could just mean that you have it, and because of it, you have the ability to survive the severe trauma of
your past. Dissociative Identity Disorder is a way for them to survive their daily lives. They don’t try to
get rid of the/an alter(s) (the different personalities), rather they try to “share” the body between
themselves. Different environmental factors might bring out a different alter, or it could be random,
making it really hard to have a “concrete” sense of time. They tend to "forget" what they did with one
alter when they switch alters or personalities, because they (the alters) don’t always share memories.
This is how their minds help themselves get past their severe trauma of their past, so that as an “adult”
you can live your best life.
Physiatrist
Thoughts...
“DID ‘is a legitimate psycho-physiologically based
syndrome of psychological distress,’ Dr. Richard P.
Kluft, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Temple
University School of Medicine not associated with
the study, told Brain Decoder. The condition is not
just a product of culture and psychiatrists'
suggestions, he said; as in B.T.'s case, it ‘represents
the mind's attempt to compartmentalize its
pain’”(Kaplan).
“Between 59 to 98 percent of people diagnosed with multiple
personality disorder were either physically or sexually abused
as children. … Not all children who are severely and repeatedly
abused develop multiple personality disorder, but if the sexual
or physical abuse is extreme and repeated, disassociated
clusters of thoughts and feelings may begin to take on lives of
their own, especially when the child has no time or space in
which to emotionally recover between abuses. Each cluster
tends to have a common emotional theme such as anger,
sadness, or fear. Eventually, as the walls of disassociation
thicken, these clusters develop into full-blown personalities,
each with its own memory and characteristics” (Porterfield)
“DID reflects a failure to integrate various aspects of
identity, memory, and consciousness into a single
multidimensional self. Usually, a primary identity carries
the individual's given name and is passive, dependent,
guilty, and depressed. When in control, each personality
state, or alter, may be experienced as if it has a distinct
history, self-image and identity. The alters'
characteristics—including name, reported age and
gender, vocabulary, general knowledge, and predominant
mood—contrast with those of the primary identity.
Certain circumstances or stressors can cause a particular
alter to emerge. The various identities may deny
knowledge of one another, be critical of one another, or
appear to be in open conflict” ( Psychology Today)
“A person with DID has two or more different and
distinct personalities, the person’s usual (“core”)
personality and what are known as alternate
personalities, or “alters.” The person may experience
amnesia when an alter takes control over the person’s
behavior. Each alter has distinct individual traits, a
personal history, and a way of thinking about and relating
to his or her surroundings. An alter may be of a different
gender, have a different name, or a distinct set of
manners and preferences. (An alter may even have
different allergies than the core person.)” (Cleveland
Clinic).
Thoughts From A Physiatrist…

Dissociative Identity Disorder is something that someone develops as their minds attempt to
compartmentalize the severe trauma (usually trauma they have from childhood abuse, physically or
even sexually) of their past. As the brain does this more, the person starts to dissociating their
memories, which causes full blown identities to form in the person called alters. These alter can be as
different as night and day, there are no boundaries on what the personality types have to be like in order
for it to be considered DID. The “alters” or the different personalities tend to deny the presence of the
other alters. But over time as the “barriers” start to crumble your personalities tend to become aware of
the different alters in your body. There are are times when one personality is more dominant than the
others, and this personality tends to be “in charge” or the body more than the others.