first a warning...this post may be a bit triggering in order for me to answer the posters question....

DID is a mental disorder that is created in children when children under the age of 5 (according to my states statistics on mental disorders) undergo extreme mental, physical and sexual abuse.

the answer is both... I was emotionally, physically and sexually abused, and forced to do things that children should never have to do, in a mine shaft.

as a person with DID those trauma's dissociated into creating alternate personalities who job, purpose, reason for being was to be the ones being abused so that I would not remember those abuses thereby ensuring my survival. I also had alternate personalities that had the job, purpose, reason for being was to ensure I did not tell what was happening to me at all costs, including actions of self harm suicide and acting out the abuses that had happened to cause me to become DID.

when I did finally remember what had happened to me that caused me to dissociate to the extreme of my mind unconsciously creating alternate personalities it was like going through those emotional, physical and sexual abuses. when ever I attempted to talk about this with treatment providers I would end up in the hospital due to extreme self harm, suicide, and those alters who's job purpose reason for being was sex would seek out abuse related sexual partners, situations including acting them out on their own if needed. this was not limited to times when I was alone. this was something that permeated my whole life time and permeated every aspect of my life (memories, perception, behavioral, occupational, sense of sense of self, sense of agency, affect, motor skills...you name it...having these alters and going through the extreme abuses affected everything about who I am and what I could and couldnt do before my alters integrated with me.

after integration it was even more so traumatic because my mind was one whole person again I had all that was the alters including the physical and emotional pain of the trauma's I went through and remembering the trauma's (suicide, self harm violence...) was inflicted on me in the name of keeping the secrets

here is where you can read more about what DID is and how having alternate personalities affects a person with DID.....

http://forums.psychcentral.com/disso...s-dsm-5-a.html