Dissociative Identity Disorder: What To Know

In the past, dissociative identity disorder (DID), was often referred to as multiple personality disorder. DID is a rare mental health condition in which a person adopts two or more totally separate identities or personalities that take over at different times. When one identity surfaces, the other identities are forgotten. The switches between identities often involve total blackouts or bouts of amnesia. 

Some of America’s most beloved historical and cultural figures suffered from DID: Marilyn Monroe and Herschel Walker, for example. Walker even authored a book outlining how difficult it is to live with DID—living undiagnosed until adulthood. He describes feeling painfully disconnected from his daily lived experiences and subsequently creating alter egos to cope. 

In the mid to late 90’s, toward the end of Walker’s athletic career, DID became the new name for multiple personality disorder. The medical community felt that the new name more accurately described the condition, where the mind goes to extremes to separate from reality with new behaviors, memories, thought patterns, and mannerisms. 

DID is incredibly creative, generating new ethnicities, genders, senses of humor, and entire skill sets or talents. This dissociation can be extreme, making people feel like they’re being possessed by another person, or less severe, like an out-of-body experience.

Possession Vs. Non-possession: The DID Scale

DID can appear in two forms: possession and nonpossession. In cases of DID possession, people feel like they’re speaking or acting so uncharacteristically that others notice. It can be likened to an unwanted or uninvited entity taking over the body. 

In cases of nonpossession, a person feels like they’re watching themselves interact with the world. It’s like you’re functioning in real-time, but you’re viewing yourself as if you were on a movie screen. 

What Causes DID, and What are Its Symptoms?

Researchers point toward trauma as the main cause of DID. Humans have an uncanny ability to create and deploy coping mechanisms to survive painful and psychologically damaging events and situations like long-term abuse or childhood sexual trauma.  

DID is a form of extreme dissociation, often in an attempt to cope with severe hardship. The creation of other personalities helps to control behaviors and responses in different instances. DID symptoms include the following:

• Possessing two or more separate behaviors, memories, self-images, and thought patterns in the form of separate identities that alternate being in control
• Heavy memory gaps or amnesia around everyday actions, biographical information, and traumatic experiences
• Separate personality states that negatively impact or raise concerns in social situations, in the workplace, or within the home
• Anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts that can result as secondary symptoms 
• Self-harm, substance abuse, and delusions that may also result as secondary consequences of the condition

Unfortunately, there is no cure for DID—but there are effective treatments that make DID manageable and the possibility of living a normal life more than attainable. 

Miramont BH’s Treatment Steps For DID in Wisconsin

Luckily, the Miramont team is more than equipped to treat your or your loved one’s DID with our health services in Middleton, Wisconsin. We offer direct treatment methods clinically proven to improve symptoms and facilitate DID management. These include cognitive behavioral and dialectical behavior therapies, as well as medications as needed to treat the depression and anxiety that can come with DID. 

We’re also situated perfectly to address any co-occurring illnesses, like DID and substance use disorder (SUD). Regardless of what you’re struggling with, we’ll be sure to address every pain point with therapy that addresses the following:

• Detecting and healing from childhood and past trauma
• Learning techniques for managing sudden personality and behavioral changes
• Adopting tools that help blend separate personalities into one single, conscious identity

Whether you’re interested in our inpatient program or our successful intensive outpatient program, contact us today for more information. Miramont is here, and we can help!