DID Awareness Day 2024
Hello everyone,
Today, it's DID awareness day!
In this post, there will be a short explanation of what DID is, 5 myths about DID, links to other posts about DID, and then questions for you to answer.
What is DID?
DID stands for dissociative identity disorder which is a disorder that is caused by childhood trauma. The trauma causes the forming identity to split into multiple parts, also known as personalities or alters. These personalities can have their own preferences, dislikes, names, ages, etc. and the person with DID, also called a system in some cases, switches between these different parts. Due to these switches, the person might experience amnesia (memory loss). DID can also correlate with other disorders, for example with PTSD which stands for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Myths about DID
There are a lot of misconceptions about DID, therefore here are 5 myths and their explanation.
1. DID is rare
As DID is quite unknown and can feel strange when you first hear about it, a lot of people think that DID has to be a rare disorder. However, about 1.1-1.5% of the population have DID! That's 1-2 people in a group of 100. (source 1)
2. DID makes people violent and dangerous
Due to misrepresentations like the movie "Split", some people think that DID makes a person violent and dangerous. While some systems do have parts that are there to protect them, people with DID are not more prone to violence than people without DID. (source 2)
3. DID is a personality disorder
DID was previously called "multiple personality disorder" and this leads to people thinking that DID is a personality disorder. However, DID is a dissociative disorder which is a reaction to trauma, while personality disorders are characterised by fixed patterns of personality traits that make the person's life more challenging. (source 3)
4. DID is the same as schizophrenia
People with DID and people with schizophrenia both experience voices in their heads, therefore some people think it's the same or related. However, in people with DID, the voices come from other alters, which are real, fully-formed personalities and parts of the system. In people with schizophrenia, the voices come from delusions and hallucinations. Therefore, it's not the same and not connected. (source 3)
5. It is obvious when a person has DID
As DID causes a person to have different personalities, a lot of people think that it's obvious when a person has it. However, DID is formed to protect the person. Therefore, a lot of systems are covert which means that the different parts are hidden from the outside. This can for example be done, when the host, the personality that's out the most, isn't even aware of the other alters, or when alters pretend to be the host so that other people don't recognize the switch.
Posts about DID
The trauma support writing team has already written a few posts about DID. Here they are:
- What are subsystems and how can they co-exist in harmony - Barltik2065
- The different types of alters and how they developed - a personal experience
- List of YouTube Channels for People with DID/OSDD-1 or those who want to learn about it - HealingTalk, Teacup8809, alex428
- Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID): Myths vs Truth - SunsetShone
- Dissociative Identity Disorder: A Case Study - starryCandy6123
- The Positive Sides of DID - Barltik2065
- How to develop a relationship with alters and communicate with them - Teacup8809
- My Personal Story - WorkingitThrough2
Questions for you
To spread awareness about DID, feel free to answer the following questions in the comments:
1. Do you have DID or know someone with DID?
2. What is a myth about DID that I haven't mentioned?
3. What do you want to know about DID? Or what do you want others to know about DID?
Thank you for reading and answering the questions.
Take care,
audienta
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