How to Explain Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID)

Most people do not understand what Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) really is. The media portray DID (formerly known as multiple personality disorder) as several people sharing a body, but that simply is not true. Instead, every alter personality or part is one part of the person's spirit. Young children who suffer severe and ongoing trauma have no defense except to compartmentalize the trauma. By "splitting off" parts of the spirit that contain the painful emotions and memories of the abuse, the child is able to function despite suffering abuse severe enough to break many adults. Here is how to explain Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID).

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Define dissociation. Everyone has experienced some level of dissociation, such as "losing yourself" in a good movie and "forgetting" that you are sitting in a dark room with one hundred other people. Dissociation is when you separate your focus from your present circumstances and, instead, "lose yourself" into an altered state of awareness, which can include the past, present or future.

2. Describe the dissociation continuum. On the far left is normal dissociation like "losing yourself" in a good movie. In the middle of the continuum is post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), where people experience flashbacks that return the person's focus to the past in a vivid manner. On the far right is DID, where the dissociation is so extreme that it is experienced as if another part of the person is experiencing the emotions and memories.

3. Use an analogy to explain how parts of a person's spirit can feel separate. A good example is a frozen lake with chunks of ice floating on the surface. While each chunk of ice might appear separate, it is part of the underlying lake. There is no difference between the properties that make up each individual chunk of ice and the lake itself.

4. Describe how a person feels when an alter part is present. A person with DID might feel as if someone is "stepping into her face" when an alter part is present. She might also experience "loud thoughts" or strong emotions that do not feel as if she is creating them.

5. Explain why a person with DID develops alter parts. As a child, the person suffered ongoing trauma that was too severe to survive with all of the emotions and memories in conscious awareness. So, the child split off parts of her spirit to compartmentalize the pain. Each alter part holds memories and/or emotions related to traumatic events that the child experienced.

6. Emphasize that all of the parts make up one whole. No alter part is a separate person. Instead, all of the alter parts fit together to make one human being. DID is the way that the child compartmentalized the pain, but the child who experienced the trauma owns all of the pain. DID is a highly effective way to survive severe trauma. DID was a highly effective coping strategy that only became maladaptive after the abuse ended.

Tips & Warnings

• People with DID are frequently highly intelligent with a very strong desire to survive.
• DID is a disorder rather than a mental illness, so people with DID are usually sane.
• DID only develops in people who suffered severe and ongoing trauma from a young age.
• Healing from severe trauma is extremely painful, so people with DID should not attempt to integrate their DID alter parts until they find a qualified therapist with experience in counseling people who have been severely abused.

Resources

• Understanding Integration

[Mal112]

on 11/21/2008 It's a good way to live if you can come to a middle ground when situations present themselves that not everyone agrees with. Integration isn't for everyone, I applaud those who have completed the process, but for us, we live better with eachother. We might look like a puzzle to the singletons out there but we are happy :) The best advise we can give is to do what is best for everyone, not just one of ya:) We is gonna be happy no matter what.

[Mal112]

on 11/21/2008 It's a good way to live if you can bring everyone to some middle ground when situations present themselves that not everyone agrees upon. Not everyone has to intergrate, I applaud those that do but for us, we live better with eachother. The best advise we can come up with is do what is right for everyone not just for one. Our glue is our desire to survive and live, we might look like a puzzle to the singeltons out there but we are happy :)

[lostinacrowd]

on 10/20/2008 I have not, I am only in the beginning stages of therapy. I will see if my therapist recommends we read it. Thank you.

[FaithAllen]

on 10/20/2008 Yes, I do understand because I am in the later stages of recovering from DID.

Have you read the book "Safe Passage to Healing" by Chrystine Oksana? It is a wonderful resource for understanding the role of each personality in a DID system.

Take care,

- Faith www.faithallen.wordpress.com

[lostinacrowd]

on 10/18/2008 I wonder if the person who wrote this article knows about how the internal family system works in DID? Because we are very much separate people inside, we fight, we argue, and we do eachother's homework (because not everyone wants to take every single class). Different parts know different things, they're good a doing things that others inside aren't.

We are very much different people. But we do understand that we are all a part of a single core, and one day we'll be able to glue ourself together.