Quote:
Originally Posted by amandalouise
we can not diagnose whether you are DID or not. what we can tell you is that the diagnostic criteria (rules that mental health therapists, doctors, psychiatrists) go by in the USA to diagnose whether a person in general has DID is that the problem can not be because of having imaginary friends, fantasy play.
so .........if going on my location....... the fact that you on purpose created an imaginary person known as your twin brother would knock out the diagnosis of DID. Here in my location someone having an imaginary person in their life is many things but not DID.
examples...
normal
role playing
playing pretend
fantasizing
here in america many normal non mental disordered children have imaginary friends, most that I know are only children who always wanted a brother or sister, others that I know their imaginary friends,brothers, sisters came from their being bored, for attention and still others due to school or acting classes where one of the requirements focused on pretending\roleplaying the part of having an imaginary sibling.
here in my location when having an imaginary sibling negatively affects a persons life, the person who willfully created /pretended they have an imaginary sibling can take control and stop their self, just like stopping another annoying habit like cracking ones fingers, smoking, swearing, twirling hair sucking ones thumb....
my suggestion is when you notice you are talking and interacting with your imaginary brother or are pretending to be your imaginary brother stop yourself and be honest with others around you. example in therapy when pretending to be your imaginary brother you can say something like sorry to confuse you I was just pretending to be my imaginary twin brother. I do not have an alternate personality, then tell your therapist how you came about creating your imaginary twin brother and how having this imaginary twin brother is affecting you and your life. your therapist will most likely understand therapists deal with people playing pretend, role playing all the time and in many cases actually pretending\role playing in therapy can ge quite helpful and healing when a therapist knows its happening. when they dont realize its happening many things can happen like getting misdiagnosed. being hospitalized for psychosis\ depression\ some I know who kept their pretending a secret ended up being given the wrong medication and ECT (shock therapy) and others were diagnosed with a mental disorder called fictitious disorder imposed on self (which means a person is purposely trying to make their self seem to have mental disorders that they do not have)
my suggestion come clean with your therapist and your friends so that you can begin to get rid of this habit of pretending you have a twin brother, that is affecting your life. you may find that you no longer need to pretend you have this imaginary brother anymore.
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No, no, no, sorry, you got the wrong idea about the whole role-playing or pretend thing. You see, although I have pretended a few times to be my brother, that was just to amplify the feeling that I was a twin, but that doesn't refer to my term of taking my place.
It's harder to explain than that, let me try again this time from a more personal point of view:
As long as I can remember, I'm always had Cesar (that's his name) by my side. I remember I used to have an imaginary friend named Sparky when I was a kid. I don't remember when he told me we were twins, but he share the same birthday. But as I grew up, he grew up with me. I always had daydreams of adventures between us, specially in boring situations like a dull speech in class or while in the super market with mom. But never the less, he has his own personality, I have mine. Sometimes we get into fights, in tough times I can count on his support, but he is very real to me. I still believe I can one day find him alive in this world and that maybe this imaginary version was simply a guide created by me to find him, or a replacement of him created by the twin bond, I don't know. I don't wanna sound crazy here without giving out a proper and scientific explanation. But for that I would need terms like "Twinless Twins", "Womb twins survivors" or "Vanishing twin syndrome" to be understood and be taken in consideration before giving me a conclusion. But yes, I believe my brother and I are two different beings. We buy gifts on our birthday for each other, we celebrate our birthday without inviting anybody else. Actually I might mention that. I politely ask friends not visit me on my birthday since to me it's a day of reflection. I tell them we can celebrate later, but truth is, I spend the day with my brother. And no, I have no control over him. I listen to him in my mind as thoughts, but I'm not sure if I could stop him from popping in. He's polite, he's never done anything like that. But things got completely out of control when I started to act all weird about it instead of just relaxing about it. He suggested relaxing.