DID/RA/MC Post & Inquiry

[Project Willow]

Post

Trish Fotheringham has a 3 hour DVD interview available for those who are interested an in-depth and honest first person account of healing from extreme abuse and mind control. Psychologist Ellen Lacter conducted the interview. Here is a small clip:



The full DVD can be ordered here:
http://morethananidea.wordpress.com/dvd-interview/

You may remember Trish as a contributor to the Noblitt's RA anthology published last year:


Inquiry

I would like to create a FAQ about DID, only that's difficult because I am immersed in the subject, and hardly anyone ever just asks me about it. So, please let me know if you have any and fire away your questions about DID. I'll answer as best I can, and through that process perhaps generate a list of pertinent unknowns.

As long as I'm on the subject, I'm also looking for an intern. I need someone to make a 3 month commitment, perhaps 3 to 5 hours every other week doing research (mostly academic). All of this work will go into activism. Please pm me for details.

[barracuda]

Is there a difference between DID and "multiple personality disorder"?

Does DID occur on a spectrum of severity?

What does the low end of the spectrum look like?

Is DID always trauma/abuse -based?

How else might it occur?

[justdrew]

it seems like maybe a primary goal of the early phases is to ensure the person becomes highly suggestible and hypnotizable, laying in a whole system of mental structures and information memories recalled only when in certain states. It's often said a subject becomes 'better' at being hypnotized with practice, so that phase may be part of an initial intensive "practice."

earliest I've seen any reference in entertainment media is probably 1955's Son of Sinbad. A old wise-man's daughter's mind caries the secret of greek fire, and to recall it, she's set in front of what is for all intents and purposes a Gysin-like 'dream-machine' (which he didn't "invent" 'til 1959 it seems... interesting) and enters a trance state which then enables her to remember the formula. This film was produced by Howard Hughes. This is exactly one of the 'applications' they were interested in for secret information couriers.

[DeltaDawn]

Because of past, and knowing you don't really want me on your threads: I ask PW, may I comment on what I think of Trish's interview?? Not that I have shit to add to your post, just noticed a couple of things that struck a chord.. If not alright with me, no hard feelings!!! Just want to be me, as you want to be you

[hava1]

very timely for me.

say thanks to this lady.

[blanc]

From the clip, a couple of things really resonated for me. That a person has a part of them which remains somehow viable and strong (soul, or pick another term ). This seems to me close to miraculous.

Unrelated to that one, that you can't tell people about this stuff.

[sw]

Has any DID survivor of govt backed MC ever reached a place of justice in the U.S?

[nathan28]

Is there a difference between DID and "multiple personality disorder"?

Does DID occur on a spectrum of severity?

What does the low end of the spectrum look like?

Is DID always trauma/abuse -based?

How else might it occur?

I am not a psychologist, social worker or psychiatrist but IIRC DID replaced MPD as the terminology in part to indicate there was a "spectrum" involved, or that "personality" gives the wrong impression; my impression is that the current theory holds that a dissociation might be partial and might resemble a fugue as much as a "personality". There's a (small) survey of therapists with DID clients where the average client presents by the therapists' judgment something like 100 alters. Also IIRC MPD was a proposed category for DSM-III and appeared in DSM-IV, but I might be mistaken about that.

It's my understanding that the current theory also holds that DID is partly determined by biology or very-early socially-acquired traits, because if I understand the literature correctly not all childhood abuse/trauma leads to DID but all DID originates from childhood abuse or trauma. It's also my understanding that DID should not be conflated with "strong compartmentalization", emotional mismanagement or factitious disorders.

It's also my understanding that DID/MPD remain controversial diagnoses, and that according to some literature, MPD/DID patients tend to be manipulative towards therapists.

I can source these statements if someone wants, but it'll take a little time.

[jingofever]

Have there been any studies on how multiple personalities work neurophysiologically? How does memory become segmented? Is it some extreme form of context dependent memory?

[sw]

Jingo fever: I've wondered about the neuro aspect of DID as well. I don't have an answer but mabye pw will.

I do know that the parts would often have their own dreams. (the host was not dreaming, the part was.)

I also think that I hold my memories (as an integrated person) differently than people who have never been DID. My memories are stored where I can often access them like a CD player would go directly to a song and play it where as other non DID people seem to remember more like the old VHS tapes where the past seems very distant and they have to rewind to get back there in time. I never had the rewind feeling now. It's like the memories are stored differently.

The woman on the video is amazing. I don't know how one can put words to this stuff. Words don't capture it or I can't get them to. It is so hard to explain and do justice so as I try to think of answers, it's like there is too much info to download and i just remain silent because words can't capture it and then if they could, there is too much info to get in. Like explaining a tornado by saying it is strong wind and leave out the part where you were killed by the tornado and saw others killed by the tornado and the tornado lasted for years. Sum it up by : strong wind. Does not capture it. that is why I like pw's art.

[Project Willow]

I have answers to the first set of questions but I need a couple cites. I am recovering from First Thursday (it was a blast last night!) and have a lunch date, be back this evening with input.

DD: speak freely.

SW: Thanks.

...

Trish: "So if you've got something in your life to deal with, it's going to get better if you deal with it."

Ellen: "Extraordinary."

What a wonderfully brave and intelligent survivor and what a gift she has given with her sharing through this video and through all of her work!

[DeltaDawn]

ty PW!! No sw, don't believe so in USA, although Canada children victims received a lil compensation, I myself don't know of any US children....stand to be corrected!!

Yes Nathan, don't agree with MPD being represented as DID, personally think that they are different "problems" but agree that therapists can be manipulated by MPD patients, my own opinion is that DID persons more 'understand' there are 'others' and more want to integrate them than fool anyone that there is nothing wrong. Only my opinion.

First thing that kind of bothered me about OP is that the clock in the background is a little hypnotizing in itself. But totally understood about son brought the need not to commit suicide, if it hadn't been for him, who knows what life would or not be right now.

Also noticed her stress ball, which I carried around a rock for years to 'console' inner ??? Trish seems to be a 'typical' example of true victims coming 'around'. Also what she said about lung problems hit a chord with me, although at this stage, makes me think, for real??? like what would that have to do with it all???, but somewhere in my mind, think, WOW!!!

"Divine timing beyond alters" yeah sooo get that, if it wasn't for the "Divine" would never have come this far in life!!!! Truly Trish is one of the survivors I can't help but listen to!!

Thanks for an informative thread!!!

[Project Willow]

Is there a difference between DID and "multiple personality disorder"?

1. Essentially no, there are no differences between the two disorders. Understanding of the processes of dissociation grew more sophisticated and prompted the name change. The label officially shifted from MPD to DID in 1994 with the publication of the DSM IV.

Does DID occur on a spectrum of severity?

2. Yes, but more accurately it might be termed complexity. Studies have established a correlation between the complexity of dissociative reactions and the quantity and complexity of trauma endured by the sufferer.

On a related note, the long held assumption that all dissociative experiences, from the normative, to the so-called pathological exist on a continuum has come under question recently due to some brain imaging studies. This was the citation for which I was searching earlier. I found it but then lost it again when my computer quit on me. I will find it eventually and then that might be another good question to explore!

What does the low end of the spectrum look like?

3. The low end on a spectrum of DID would represent the threshold for the diagnosis, the existence of two personality aspects, and perhaps created by a single traumatic event. Moving further into more complexity you might find a small, flamboyant alter system as exemplified by the case of Sybil, while towards the other end would be complex cases involving dozens of major personality aspects and hundreds of fragmental aspects.

Is DID always trauma/abuse -based? ...How else might it occur?

4. "Always" is a difficult standard, but DID approaches it. Civilian science has been able to create what looks like DID using hypnosis but it is unknown whether the condition was permanent. Creation by hypnosis might be considered non-traumatic. Civilian science lags far behind military and intelligence agency science so this area is essentially an open ended question. In general however, so many studies have established a trauma etiology for DID that the APA ranks it, out of all disorders, amongst those with the highest level of this association.

[Project Willow]

I am not a psychologist, social worker or psychiatrist but IIRC DID replaced MPD as the terminology in part to indicate there was a "spectrum" involved, or that "personality" gives the wrong impression; my impression is that the current theory holds that a dissociation might be partial and might resemble a fugue as much as a "personality".

Yes, the intention was to place DID on a continuum with what were assumed to be experiences that shared a common underlying mechanism - namely dissociation. The normative end of that continuum includes experiences such as intense absorption and trance. The pathological end includes other DSM disorders such as dissociative fugue and dissociative amnesia. (These are not exhaustive lists.) The continuum concept has undergone clarifications and revisions, and recently challenges, as I mentioned above.

You are also correct about the personality issue. The perception used to be that additional personalities inhabited the bodies of people with MPD, rather than parts of or splits from the whole. The former label supported this misunderstanding.

[Project Willow]

it seems like maybe a primary goal of the early phases is to ensure the person becomes highly suggestible and hypnotizable, laying in a whole system of mental structures and information memories recalled only when in certain states. It's often said a subject becomes 'better' at being hypnotized with practice, so that phase may be part of an initial intensive "practice."

One model of DID posits that it is the result repeated auto-hypnosis in response to stress since most people with DID are more easily hypnotizable than controls.

earliest I've seen any reference in entertainment media is probably 1955's Son of Sinbad. A old wise-man's daughter's mind caries the secret of greek fire, and to recall it, she's set in front of what is for all intents and purposes a Gysin-like 'dream-machine' (which he didn't "invent" 'til 1959 it seems... interesting) and enters a trance state which then enables her to remember the formula. This film was produced by Howard Hughes. This is exactly one of the 'applications' they were interested in for secret information couriers.

Are you referring here to mind control rather than DID? Either way you may want to go back almost hundred and fifty years further and look to Mesmer, then Charcot, Janet, and in the US the case of Mary Reynolds. In the entertainment media of 1885, don't forget The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and My Hyde.

Here's an excerpt from Loewenstein and Putnam's Dissociative Disorders (2007):

Paracelsus, writing in 1646, is credited with the first medical report of an individual with alternating selves.

In 1791,Eberhardt Gmelin described a German woman who alternately exchanged her peasant personality for that of an aristocratic French lady, each amnesic for the other's existence.

By the early 19th century, such cases, with diagnoses of dual, double, or duplex consciousness, were being regularly reported on both sides of the Atlantic.

In 1811, Benjamin Rush, considered the father of American psychiatry, included a classic example in his medical school lectures.
...
In the same year, [I thought it was 1816?] the case of Mary Reynolds, who became the American archetype of dissociative identity disorder for the remainder of the century, was first published.
...

In Europe, disciples of Franz Anton Mesmer developed the first systematic descriptions of what is now called hypnosis. These thinkers developed an interest in magnetic diseases (from Mesmer's theories of animal magnetism): amnesia, fugue, somnambulistic states, and alternating or multiple personality that could be treated with artificial somnambulism, that is, hypnosis.
...

At the end of the 19th century, Pierre Janet in France, Prince and William James in the United States, and others across Europe were engaged in a lively transatlantic discussion about possible psychological and neurological mechanisms underlying cases of multiple personality, amnesia, and fugue. Pierre Janet's research and clinical theory, in particular, his emphasis on the role of traumatic antecedents of dissociation, are widely regarded as the foundation for modem views of dissociation.