Dissociative Identity Disorder Analysis

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a psychological condition in which a person will create one or more alternate identities. DID (formerly known as multiple personality disorder) is just one of three dissociative disorders. This disorder is set apart by the way the identities “switch” from one to another. Patients who suffer from dissociative identity disorder can often lead normal lives when diagnosed properly and treated accordingly; sometimes, they cannot. People suffering from dissociative identity disorder often have similar causes, symptoms, and treatments.

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a condition where there are two or more distinct identities that are and will become present in an individual. These personalities can and will eventually take control of the individual, many people consider having dissociative identity disorder an experience of being possessed. The individual can and most likely will experience memory loss that is more extensive than ordinary everyday forgetfulness (Dissociative Identity Disorder (Multiple Personality Disorder). Around two percent of people will experience dissociative disorder, women are more likely than men are to be diagnosed with DID. "Almost half of adults in the United States experience at least one depersonalization/derealization episode in their lives, with only 2% meeting the full criteria for chronic episodes” (Dissociative Disorders).

Dissociative Identity Disorder is a severe psychological disorder characterized by at least two or more distinct personalities or different identities. The different personality states are said to occur spontaneously and involuntarily and function more or less independently of each other. The person suffering from the disorder also experiences memory loss that is too extensive to be explained by ordinary forgetfulness. Many people who experience this type of behavior are unaware that they have more than one personality because they can not remember anything that is happening while one of the mind alters are

Dissociative Identity Disorder is a mental disorder where an individual experiences two or more distinct personalities. When an individual is diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder, one personality has dominant control of an individual. This personality controls how a person may act and how they live everyday life. A person diagnosed with this disease may or may not be aware of their alternate personalities. Each personality is contrasting of each other with distinctive likes and dislikes. They can differ in eyesight, prescriptions, language, and education levels. Many people who suffer from Dissociative Identity Disorder have experienced severe childhood trauma. Many Psychologist and others argue

Dissociation is defined as “a mental process, which produces a lack of connection in a person 's thoughts, memories, feelings, actions, or sense of identity” (Grohol, 2016). The Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) is a severe condition in which two or more separate, distinct identities or personality states are present in an individual. In other words, a person has, what seems like, actual distinct and contrasting people in their head and these “alters” are able to take control of an individual’s mind and body at any time and act as a completely different individual. Each alter is capable of having its own set of likes, dislikes, talents, memories, and personal experiences. The alters’ usually have a specific name, age, gender and possibly race. According to Psychology Today (2014), the alters’ characteristics are typically very different from the primary identity, including their history, self-image, vocabulary, knowledge and predominant mood. The primary identity tends to be passive, dependent, guilty and depressed. A person with DID experiences extensive memory loss which is typically more extensive than what would be experienced by ordinary forgetfulness. For instance, if an alter were to take over, once the individual is back in control of his or her own body, they typically report not remembering anything that was done or said. Some individuals report feeling “familiar” with the conversations or experiences that were had by the alter, but as if they had only overheard

Mental disorders are common in many people, all over the world, and affect all ages. It is characterized as “psychological symptoms or behavioral patterns that reflect an underlying psychobiological dysfunction, are associated with distress or disability, and are not merely an expectable response to common stressors or losses.” (Sue et al., 2014). Mental illness becomes prevalent because of many factors and interactions within the individual. Looking into one specific group of disorders, dissociative disorders, a person has a separation of their consciousness, memory, or identity. One particular dissociative disorder, dissociation identity disorder, will be discussed in this paper. There will be a general overview of dissociation identity disorder,

The reason I chose to explore DID was the curiosity I have always had over the disorder, because I feel that I have a sister that has a mild form of it and it is something I always have struggled with understanding. My older sister I believe has a mild for of the disorder, was indeed severely traumatized and sexually abused for years as a child. After watching Sybil I do have a better understanding of what DID is and how childhood trauma can definitely attribute to this disorder. So when choosing my topic of whether the disorder even existed, I definitely wanted to explore why the disorder is still typically a debate of existing or not and what has been researched on the disorder.

Counselling is thought to be the best way to handle this disorder as well as something called supportive care which is mainly focused on making the patient feel more comfortable (Dissociative Identity Disorder, 2018). Additionally, The condition usually persists without treatment. (And) It is believed to affect about 2% of the general population and 3% of those admitted to hospitals with mental health problems in Europe and North America. DID is diagnosed about six times more often in females than males. The number of cases increased significantly in the latter half of the 20th century, along with the number of identities claimed by those affected ((Dissociative Identity Disorder, 2018). With the small amount of diagnosed DID patients, linkage of this disorder to people already suffering from mental illnesses, and inconsistent symptoms, it is easy to see why this is such a highly disputed disorder in the medical

Dissociative Identity Disorder, previously called multiple personality disorder, is a severe form of separation. It is the most dramatic, least common, and most controversial dissociative disorder (King, 2012, p.569). Individuals that suffer from this disorder have more than one distinct personality, or identity. One of the identities is dominant, each identity takes over at different times. One identity may or may not be aware of the other, if someone has more than two, the identities may be aware of only certain others or none at all. If a situation is thought to be too violent, traumatic, or painful to assimilate with their main personality, the person with dissociate themselves and switch to another identity.

The opposing side of Dissociative Identity Disorder claims DID is not a real condition and should be taken out of DSM-V for reasons concerning patients faking their symptoms, patients misdiagnosed and the treatments used on them. The first evidence used to show DID is not a real condition says patients diagnosed are faking their symptoms. David H. Gleaves of Texas University, author of The Sociocognitive Model of Dissociative Identity Disorder: A Reexamination of the Evidence, claims, “Individuals who are diagnosed as having DID are generally attention seeking and it is obvious in the clinical presentation” (43). The opposition believes patients may want to fake their symptoms for a diagnosis to avoid being identified as insane by others around them. It has been said DID symptoms are easily recognized, but patients diagnosed may show symptoms that are difficult to follow. Inexperienced clinicians still diagnose these patients as having Dissociative Identity Disorder. Inexperienced clinicians may also not recognize that some of these symptoms are linked to other disorders that they may be less familiar with. “Dissociative symptoms have been found to discriminate patients with DID from those with a variety of other disorders, including schizophrenia, eating disorders, panic disorder, borderline personality disorder, partial complex seizures, and simple posttraumatic stress disorder” (Gleaves 44). Dissociative Identity Disorder is a disorder that doctors can diagnose patients with if they are unsure what else this could be. This can be unbeneficial to the patients who are misdiagnosed because they are not actually receiving the correct treatment they need for the condition. Gleaves also states the treatment of Dissociative Identity Disorder can create or worsen the disorder by clinicians putting thoughts into the patient’s head.

Dissociative Identity Disorder, commonly known as Multiple Personality Disorder, is characterized by an involuntary escape from reality characterized by a disconnection between thoughts, identity, consciousness, and memory (Dissociative). An example of mild everyday dissociation is when you are given a list to accomplish throughout the day, but forget some along the way. The dissociation experienced in MPD is more involved in the long-term memory. Symptoms are the reaction of enduring a traumatic event, commonly expressed in abuse and military combat. DID has a vast variety of symptoms including mood swings, dissociative amnesia, distress, and sleep loss. Dissociative amnesia is also tied to what most patients refer to as “blackouts”. Even

Dissociative personality disorder (DID), formerly known as multiple personality disorder, is an illness that is characterized by two or more distinct sub-personalities that repeatedly take control of the patient’s conscience and behavior. Each unique personality may exhibit behavior patterns, memories, and social relationships exclusive to that personality. According to the National Alliance of Mental Illness, the occurrence of DID is in one percent of the population of the United States (National Alliance of Mental Illness, n.d.). There is a rough estimate of 316 million people in the United States according to the census in 2013. Rendering to this statistic, 3.16 million people have Dissociative Identity Disorder in the United States.

My topic of choice for this research paper is Dissociative Identity Disorder or DID. This appellation is rather new; therefore, most are more familiar with the disorder's older, less technical name: Multiple Personality Disorder or MPD. When first presented with the task of selecting a topic on which to center this paper, I immediately dismissed Dissociative Identity Disorder (which for the sake of brevity will be referred to as DID for the remainder of this paper) as a viable topic due to the sheer scope of the disorder. However after an exhaustive examination of other prospective topics, I found myself back at my original choice. There are several reasons why I chose DID. The foremost of which is the widespread fascination of this

Dissociative Identity Disorder, DID for short, is also known as Multiple Personality Disorder. It is a way of dealing with anxiety. David G. Meyers (2014) skeptics have asked questions on whether or not this disorder is real. People may be loud and wild with friends but more enclosed and quiet around family members which doesn’t mean they have that personality disorder. The ways to understand dissociative identity disorder is through its symptoms, the roles it plays, and the ways it can be treated.

The definite cause of DID is unknown, but one main cause of the disorder is believed to be severe and prolonged trauma experienced during childhood, including emotional, physical, or sexual abuse. Symptoms of DID can include: an inability to remember large parts of childhood, sudden return of memories, as in a flashback and/or flashback to traumatic events, episodes of feeling disconnected or detached from one's body and thoughts, hallucinations, changing levels of functioning, from highly effective to nearly disabled, depression, anxiety, alcohol and/or drug abuse, headaches, and eating disorders. DID is a serious mental illness that occurs across all ethnic groups and all income levels, but has been proven to affect women nine times more than men. Research has shown that the average age for the initial development of alters is 5.9 years old. Statistics show that DID occurs in 0.01 to 1 percent of the general population (Mayo, 2014).