[Amyjay]

I just found this on youtube, made and published by MedCircle. I haven't watched it yet, but I thought it might be interesting to watch and discuss.

thanks for sharing this.

wow I never knew so many people had this disorder

that beginning bit sort of shocked me

[Amyjay]

Hmm, I think their stats are a little off, at one point in the video Encina said something like "1-2% of the population have DID, so that means between 75 and 150 million people have been diagnosed with a dissociative disorder." The 1-2 % of the population figure seems the figure that is most often used, but saying that percentage of the population are estimated to have a dissociative identity disorder and saying 1-2% of the population have been diagnosed with the disorder are two very, very different things. Most likely only a very small fraction of the people who are estimated to have DID ever get formally diagnosed with it. But yes, it seems that 1-2 % figure is the most frequently used estimate of the prevalence of DID. It is not a rare thing.

[Amyjay]

I thought they were very, very brave to let Minnie out to speak to the interviewer. I was so nervous for them!

[Laurel1562]

I liked the video, but it triggered me.

[Michael W. Harris]

Originally Posted by Amyjay

Hmm, I think their stats are a little off, at one point in the video Encina said something like "1-2% of the population have DID, so that means between 75 and 150 million people have been diagnosed with a dissociative disorder." The 1-2 % of the population figure seems the figure that is most often used, but saying that percentage of the population are estimated to have a dissociative identity disorder and saying 1-2% of the population have been diagnosed with the disorder are two very, very different things. Most likely only a very small fraction of the people who are estimated to have DID ever get formally diagnosed with it. But yes, it seems that 1-2 % figure is the most frequently used estimate of the prevalence of DID. It is not a rare thing.

I only know that toddlers and small children get traumatized every second of every day around this planet. It is common sense. Most of the traumas do not come from deliberate abuse but simply bad parenting skills. Most children can get over these type of traumas if their parents are paying attention. But, many parents, like mine, have no common sense about what can traumatize a toddler. They never understand that their child has been seriously traumatized. I personally believe that the majority of mental illness come from childhood abuse, traumas, or other developmental problems associated with dysfunctional parents and families. It will be some years yet before we have correct statistics.

[Michael W. Harris]

Another thing that I am skeptical about. I do not believe adult males sexually molest newborns to six year old children. I do not want to hurt his woman or discredit her. But.....I just find it hard to believe.

The type of male that would do that is extremely mentally deranged. In talking statistics and percentages of men who would be that perverted I believe that it would be less than 0.1 percent.

[Amyjay]

Originally Posted by Michael W. Harris

Another thing that I am skeptical about. I do not believe adult males sexually molest newborns to six year old children. I do not want to hurt his woman or discredit her. But.....I just find it hard to believe.

The type of male that would do that is extremely mentally deranged. In talking statistics and percentages of men who would be that perverted I believe that it would be less than 0.1 percent.

Unfortunately it happens far more often than you believe. I for one know for absolute without a doubt certain that adult men can and do sexually abuse both boys and girls. I wish it was a rare thing but it isn't.
In my case the type of men that did that were apparently normal respectable members of society. My father for one. An upstanding citizen in his community. A respected director of a large company. An apparently loving husband and father.
Also a pedophile who sexually abused many children, some as young as toddlers.

I know many women with DID who were abused between ages newborn to six years old by adult males.
I was as well, starting as a baby. By adult males. Several of them...who were respected men in the community.
it happens whether you believe it or not.

I watched this documentary this morning. I thought Encina did well. She spoke clearly and explained her story well. I also loved how Minnie came out to talk- that was quite courageous of her.

[Amyjay]

Originally Posted by Laurel1562

I liked the video, but it triggered me.

I liked it too. I thought it was done respectfully enough. I think though that the presentations of DID can be so different from one another that it gave a very one-dimensional view of DID. (For instance I think systems with a much higher number of alters present very differently.) But I did like it, it wasn't sensationalized or dramatized and I thought the woman was very brave.

I was amused when the man was so surprised at how many alters she has. I thought “try having 50 of them” To me, she doesnt have that many.
Other than that I thought the man did really well interviewing her.

[Amyjay]

Originally Posted by Starry_Night

I was amused when the man was so surprised at how many alters she has. I thought “try having 50 of them” To me, she doesnt have that many.
Other than that I thought the man did really well interviewing her.

Yes, me too. I don't know how many I have but I somehow "know" there are a lot more than the number that my T currently thinks I have!
I would really like to see a documentary about someone who has more alters. I may be right but could equally be wrong but I suspect that different kinds and frequencies or trauma would cause different kinds of splitting.

[Amyjay]

Originally Posted by Starry_Night

I was amused when the man was so surprised at how many alters she has. I thought “try having 50 of them” To me, she doesnt have that many.
Other than that I thought the man did really well interviewing her.

Also some of my little ones liked how he was respectful of Minnie and liked that he "saw" her. (I think they felt that he was in tune with her being or something, I am not sure how to explain it.) They liked that his eyes sparkled when he was genuinely responding to her.

[Michael W. Harris]

In my case, I was psychologically, emotionally, and physically abused by my Mother and two-year older Brother continually during my toddler years. My Mom's physical abuse stopped when she did not have to deal with toddlers anymore. She did the same type of things to both my Brother and myself. An example: She jerked me up by one arm when I was about two to two and one-half and put welts all over my fat little toddler legs with a switch, aka tree limb. It looked like I ran through a briar patch. She abandoned me in a large department store in Atlanta called Riches when I was between two and three years old because I wet my pants. My older Brother became obsessed with making me cry when I was in the crib. He tormented me continually during the first five years of my childhood. Mom had made him sick.

I believe that these types of traumas are far more prevalent with most DID/MPD patients. I believe that it hurts the diagnosis when all the movies the public sees or hears about make it sound like it takes something as serious as being sexually molested as a toddler to have this mental illness!

I believe that some of these mental health professionals who make these videos are actually trying to discredit the mental illness. This is like the mental health professional who was putting his female patient under hypnosis and actually planting false memories in her head just to prove that he could cause her to have false memories! He admitted that in court. He had her believing that her father and mother used her in Satanic rituals!!!! She actually thought large groups of cultists were having sex with her when she was a toddler! It was all because this asshole psychologist or psychiatrist wanted to discredit Dr. Colin Ross or anyone else who were really trying to help us.

I am fairly sure that this attempt to discredit the mental illness has to do with covering up knowledge of mind control. Many mental health professionals make money doing mind control studies for the Pentagon or the CIA. Read Dr. Colin Ross's book about the government's mind control studies.

[Amyjay]

I agree that the abuse doesn't have to be sexual or even severe to create DID. There have been other cases where a young child has experienced ongoing relational trauma with no adult support and developed DID. But in my experience (limited to online forums and in books and articles) severe abuse (very frequently sexual) is the main cause of it.
I know you believe differently Michael but I haven't seen your scenario play out much in literature or self reports online.

I didn't see anything alarming that might indicate they were trying to discredit DID at all. Not at all. I thought they approached it sensitively and appropriately.

[Michael W. Harris]

I did not watch the whole video. I started to get turned off of it when she said her Dad and his friends were sexually molesting her from newborn to six. Then she said that people can have alters that are rocks!!!! That was it for me.

When I put myself in the Charter Hospital back in 1994, I saw many seriously DID/MPD women. Yes many of them had been sexually abused. But that abuse came when they were ten, eleven, twelve, etc. They had already had a dissociative disorder before that sexual abuse started. In one case the mother beat the woman with a coat hanger when she was two to three years old. This was a severe beating where the child was beaten bloody. In another case the mother poured boiling water on the child when she was two to three years old to punish the child for something. In all cases that I saw the mother was the first person to abuse/traumatize the child. Then the sexual abuse came later in life.

[Amyjay]

People can have alters that are rocks. Alters can be whatever was needed at the time. A person I know has an alter that believes she is a tree. When she was being beaten that part of self believed a tree trunk couldn't be hurt.

We have an alter who is believes she is a dog. Because she was made to eat out of a dog bowl and other more triggering things.

Is she really a dog? Of course not. But she took on the role that she was forced to take on. I can certainly imagine a scenario where an abused child took on the belief that it was better to be an inanimate rock than a tortured young child who had no hope of escape from abuse for years and years stretching into the future.
I would choose to be the rock, any day.

I am a little annoyed because it feels to me like you are denying my own abuse. I am reminding myself that your personal experiences and beliefs have no relation at all to my lived reality.

I have an alter who thinks she is a bunny. Of course she isnt, but she pictures herself that way. I also have one that used to think herself a rock. because her favorite song was Simon and Garfunkle - she liked the line “ I am a rock, I am an island/ because a rock feels no pain/ and an island never dies.”

[Michael W. Harris]

Originally Posted by Amyjay

People can have alters that are rocks. Alters can be whatever was needed at the time. A person I know has an alter that believes she is a tree. When she was being beaten that part of self believed a tree trunk couldn't be hurt.

We have an alter who is believes she is a dog. Because she was made to eat out of a dog bowl and other more triggering things.

Is she really a dog? Of course not. But she took on the role that she was forced to take on. I can certainly imagine a scenario where an abused child took on the belief that it was better to be an inanimate rock than a tortured young child who had no hope of escape from abuse for years and years stretching into the future.
I would choose to be the rock, any day.

I am a little annoyed because it feels to me like you are denying my own abuse. I am reminding myself that your personal experiences and beliefs have no relation at all to my lived reality.

It is a matter of verbiage. If the patient believes in any state, that he/she is a rock, it is called a delusion. That is not an alter but an alter that has a delusion.

[Michael W. Harris]

Here is the way that I think MPD/DID/dissociative patients should explain child alters and fragments to the public:

I, as a multiple, have child alter personalities or fragments. When I switch into those states, that child persona can say all kinds of strange things and can have all kind of strange beliefs, some of which are delusional. I exhibit the same immature mentality as if I was still a one, two, three, or four year old toddler. I cannot control it. It just happens.

(This is not so strange. It is a fact that the professionals have age regressed individuals under deep hypnosis. They have gotten and seen the same behavior as when a multiple switches into a child personality. This leads me to my belief that dissociation is simply the switching into and out of hypnotic states without control.)

[TrailRunner14]

Thank you for posting this!

Denial is searching for words.

[dlantern]

Her hair colors we're cool!

[possum220]

I watched for 9 minutes. Feeling tired. How is it that we get to have alters that have names? Are we told what is a primary and what isn't? If my P'doc said we don't need to name mine because it's all me anyway and it would make things seem more separated if we did.

None of us will experience things in exactly the same way. This doesn't then take away the reality of what the other person is going through.

Originally Posted by Amyjay

Hmm, I think their stats are a little off, at one point in the video Encina said something like "1-2% of the population have DID, so that means between 75 and 150 million people have been diagnosed with a dissociative disorder." The 1-2 % of the population figure seems the figure that is most often used, but saying that percentage of the population are estimated to have a dissociative identity disorder and saying 1-2% of the population have been diagnosed with the disorder are two very, very different things. Most likely only a very small fraction of the people who are estimated to have DID ever get formally diagnosed with it. But yes, it seems that 1-2 % figure is the most frequently used estimate of the prevalence of DID. It is not a rare thing.

I’ve heard them stats too, but also heard an estimated unreported DID drives the number up to 3-4%.

It’s also said that males that have DID are usually imprisoned because of the confusion and lashing out against everything- I almost made prison a few times: that wouldn’t have gone well because of certain female alters.

[Amyjay]

Originally Posted by AlwaysChanging2

I’ve heard them stats too, but also heard an estimated unreported DID drives the number up to 3-4%.

It’s also said that males that have DID are usually imprisoned because of the confusion and lashing out against everything- I almost made prison a few times: that wouldn’t have gone well because of certain female alters.

I have heard that about males with DID as well.
It doesn't help matters (for males or females) that there are still some in the field that refuse to believe the disorder is a real thing. So frustrating!