How did you explain DID with family/friends?

i think that genetics can leave us predisposed to certain things happening... may not be a cause, push shove kind of thing...

Im confused the thread question is .....How did you explain DID with family/friends?.... but suddenly the conversation is a discussion on whether DID is genetic or not.

for me when I told my wife ( who was not my wife back then) that I had DID a big discussion on genetics didnt enter into our conversations.

it was just one night after being together we were talking about moving in together and we were doing the well if we are going to move in together theres this to consider and that to consider and oh by the way what about any food allergies and health issues that may affect the other in a committed relationship. she told me she had this and that and I said I have bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, and dissociative issues. she asked what that meant and I said sometimes I dont make the most fantastic decisions, more on impulse or extremely depressed or switch alters. her response switch alters this could be interesting but not new considering DID is a mental disorder that begins in very early childhood not a sudden wham bam thank you ma'am garden variety cold or flu. then she asked if she could come to some of my therapy sessions so that we are all on the same page with my therapy and such. I said sure Ill call my treatment provider in the morning and let him know you are coming with me on friday....

it was that simple we didnt have any discussions or debates about whether my DID was genetic.

now you see why Im confused. first this thread is asking if we told anyone or how then suddenly the discussion in this thread changed to genetics. so im wondering how all this genetic information fits in with how those people discussing genetics factored in to their disclosure to friends and family about their having DID. genetics means others in the family also have the disorder and if follows down through the family line... kind of like having blue eyes follows down through family lines generation after generation, Parkinson disease follows down through a family's line from generation to generation if something is genetic that means theres a long history of family members through the generations that have it...

so my question is trying to tie this genetic conversation in with the topic of the thread if your DID is genetic (family history down through the lines of the family) am I correct in thinking it was easier to disclose the DID to family and friends since its just part of your genetic family history anyway and was the reception of that disclosure treated like ok so another person in the family has this, just the normal way our family genetics are kind of thing like MS tends to run in my family so it was no big surprise to anyone when I was diagnosed with it and when i was showing MS symptoms even before diagnosis kind of thing.

if your DID is genetic and family and friends reacted badly to it im wondering what the problem was, since genetic means family history of many generations of having it. I mean in order for someone to have a genetic problem their parents had to have had that abnormal gene as did their grandparents as did their great grandparents and so on and so forth. so if DID is genetic for you others in the family have had the problem to...so what made it more of a problem with your disclosure vs a siblings or cousins or grandparents, or great grandparents generation and so on through the years....

It's a side note that relates to some aspects of the ongoing conversation, AL. Sorry if that is upsetting for you.

On the contrary, the recent research implies that illnesses, both mental and physical, arise a result of how our experiences in the environment interact with out genes. The implication is that diversion from normal development is dependent on both factors.

Obviously genetics play a role in most things to some degree. But corporate America has brain washed most people to believe it plays a daily role.

For example the alcohol industry, at one time, promoted the idea that alcoholism was genetic. It wasn't marketers promoting people to abuse alcohol. No, it is genetic. It has been used as a corporate scapegoat from lawsuits.

Another example: Breast cancer is genetic. It is not caused by carcinogenic chemicals in the environment. We can solve this argument by taking a sample of fat cells from any woman with breast cancer and doing a spectral analysis of the cells. For some reason the medical profession has not done this simple test yet. Wonder why?

The Nazis believed that skin color was a permanent genetic trait. It is not. Skin color can change over generations due to environmental conditions.

The agricultural industry has been involved with genetic research 100s of years. Now originally it was about breeding livestock. But today it is very high tech. They have promoted some of the misinformation about genetics. I heard someone say once, "Adolf Hitler knew a little bit about breeding animals and believed he understood genetics." I thought that was funny. It goes to peoples' arrogance.

May I suggest the book "The Body Keeps The Score" with no judgement at all. It opened my eyes and helped me understand.

Just wanted to put it out there.

I tend to think that mental and physical illness is a combination of genetics, how a person is/was raised, and lifestyle.

I am not in the US, so I can't speak to what kinds of social brainwashing you have over there. In my country we are not controlled by corporate giants or pharma companies. We are not ruled by health insurance or driven by the need for a diagnosis. In my country health care is available to all citizens for a minimal cost. We are informed by science and research, not by lining the pockets of a select few with the money of regular citizens.
In my country we research, and we pay attention to what the results tell us. And the current scientific enquiry says genetics give us the range of possibilities, and our experiences within our environment decide which of those possibilities will be averted, and which will be actualized.

To use your own example the research would imply that breast cancer is not caused by genetics nor is it caused by elements within the environment. Rather it is caused by the interaction of those chemicals within the environment upon particular weakened genes. The genes give us the bullet, and the environment pulls the trigger.

thanks for explaining luce, not upset, just confused ... heres why...

if you read all the posts from beginning none of them mention anything about their DID being genetic or other family members having DID too they are all talking about if they told anyone about their having DID and the reactions they received when they told. then out of the blue without linking or quoting someone elses post in the thread you wrote this which started the discussion about genetics...

posted by luce in this thread....
You know there is probably a gene responsible for DID. There is a study called the Dunedin longitudinal study that has been going for many years and they are discovering all sorts of things from that. Like they have learned that schizophrenia is caused by a short (weak) gene, but not everyone who has this weak from of that gene develops schizophrenia. But they found that everyone who had that weak form of the gene AND smoked cannabis developed schizophrenia.
And this person contacted the Dunedin researchers and said please look into my family, nearly EVERY single person in my family is a violent criminal. And the researchers did. And they isolated a short form of a gene which they figured out is responsible for violent criminal behavior. And then they looked at the violent criminals in their subjects in the Dunedin study, and they found that every violent criminal had that very particular weakened version of that particular gene. But they also found that many other people had that same weakened gene, but were not violent criminals. So they went back through all of their many years of mountains of data to see what other commonalities they could find. What they found was that every person who had the weakened form of that specific gene AND had childhood trauma and DIDN'T have restorative experiences of some form became a violent criminal. Every single one. The people who had the short gene and no trauma turned out like every day typical citizens. the people who had the long gene (the normal form) and no trauma were fine. Interestingly the people who had the long gene (strong) but also had trauma were also fine. Well, they may have some trauma effects, but they did not turn out to be violent criminals.

Anyway, my point is many different mental health and behavior issues can be traced to a weakened form of a specific gene that gets triggered by some event in the environment. Schizophrenia. Depressive illness (true)! Violence. And it stands to reason that every human trait, behavior or 'condition' is likely caused in the same manner - a weakened form of a gene that is triggered by an event/s in the environment. Which explains why some people can have the same or similar events happen to them and not be affected, while for others it completely changes their world.
I reckon one day they will locate the gene or genes responsible for DID.

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I was trying to figure out how that fit in with the discussion on whether anyone has told anyone they have DID and how they reacted (topic of the thread and what all the preceding posts are about. i couldnt see where anyone said their DID was genetic (runs in their family) and how their family and friends reacted to being told they had DID.

to me it was like the genetics post was just thrown in there taking the thread off topic and Im trying to find the connection. of how we got from talking about telling our friends and family we have DID, how we told them and what their reactions were.

suggestion re read the thread from the beginning. maybe you can find the connection that I seem to be missing here, to me it still looks like the genetics discussion was just thrown in there out of the blue with no tie in to any of the preceding posts or topic. Im just trying to figure out where my perception seems to be off here. would love some help here in figuring out how you came up with tying in genetics with the topic of the thread.