Absorbing personalities / different nationalities...

All:

Thanks for your time in reading this. I am posting this because a close relative of mine suffers from a type of identity disorder that I cannot seem to pinpoint online; his symptoms are common but there are others that are strange, and perhaps one of of you have, or know someone with similar circumstances that may be able to provide some guidance. Of course, he is in complete denial of the situation, and the immediately family is of no help, mostly because they've tried to get him to seek help and he has refused repeatedly and partially, unfortunately, because they find a lot of it funny...

The earliest symptoms were sleepwalking, and narcaleptic-type behavior. He has, for years, done waking things in the middle of the night such as walk to the neighbors house. And, conversely, often falls asleep in the middle of the day. However, most disturbingly, he's developed a behavior of falling asleep - immediately - as soon as someone puts pressure on his forehead. His wife has actually demonstrated this to us. Like all the rest of his behaviors of this nature, he has absolutely no knowlege of it happening and vehemently denies it when he snaps out of it.

Now, onto more serious behavior - most recently, the identity disorder kicked in. However, unlike stories I have read or whatever research I have conducted (and please understand I do not know of a person personally that has been diagnosed), his disorder seems to be one of absorbing personalities. That is, he may fall into a trance while watching TV, and the next day, may develop a personality similar to that which he observed on whatever show he was watching. This started happening about a year or two ago, but he has, so I've heard about ten or more different personalities that reflect something that he has observed. And all of it occurs within a few minutes, and he snaps out of it, completely (seemingly) normal when he does. He has a chinese personality (which he got from, what I hear, watching Chinese news stations). And other nationalities, french, spanish, norwegian, almost all from watching different channels (cooking shows, variety shows, whatever). He even claims to be an alien in one. He is actually able, at this point, to speak very basically in other languages (I can't tell if they are actually words or just mimicked phrases), but has in fact ordered chinese food once from a restaurant in chinese and they claimed to have understood his dialect and his order. All of these personalities are of different nationalities. They even have names appropriate to those nationalities and know the language and music, to varying degrees. They don't seem to come from 'nowhere', they seem to be channeled by conversation, music, or tv.

What is most aggravating is that he seems to have a subconcious ability to turn this identity issue on and off when appropriate. His kids say he falls into this state all the time at home, and others close to him have said they see it occasionally, as I have. His wife sees it all the time. However, he has never demonstrated it in front of a doctor or around a large group of people. It's like his normal, and dominant personality, is able to keep it at bay until he is relaxed and in a familiar environment, where it lets go.
Thus, he has had no real treatment for it.

Other things I have been told is an occasional hallucination, though this appears to be less frequent.

He is not an active hard drug user. He experimented in his past (he is in his late 50's now). He is also on a strong heart medication, which his wife blames for it (I wish I knew the name of it but I've never asked). However, it seems much to complex at this point to blame on a single drug.

Does this sound familiar to anyone? I wish I could do more, but again, he has stubbornly refused treatment. I fear it may be really too late anyway, but at least if someone has had a situation that they were able to come to terms with and fight, it may give us some idea of where to go next.

Many thanks to all for your time.

In my experience I would say that his alters have learned when they can come out safely and when they need to hide / be quite.

i read some literature from a survivor of extensive programming and training from birth in a cult group. it might be helpful to you. she spoke of how this group trained children from infancy, toddlerhood to dissociate under trauma and began intense indoctrination for the groups goals. the reason i mention this is that a cult member could be trained to be a quick learner and a language learner. these people lead one kind of life in the daytime and another in the night. two to three nights a week they were roused and taken as a family for training. it is some of the most chilling material i've read. yet it was believeable and not just "whacked out" or something strange and unbelievable. some of these groups are incredibly covert and all members of the family are dissociative and have installed amnesic barriers so that even they often are not aware of what has been going on.

i find it really sad that they would not want something more for him. they need to care about what may be really happening to him.

and just to go to a totally opposite idea - what if this man had some kind of brain tumor pressing on the language centers of his brain?

i understand that his strong ability to hide it in public is pretty strong indications of dissociation. but if his wife can cause him to immediately "appear to sleep" by pressing his forehead there is something fishy going on somewhere.

to get the articles i spoke of "google" 'Svali Speaks' she writes incredibly helpful articles from her experience of being raised to be a programming trainer herself until she began to question what she saw and went throgh and did to people.

it helped me discover some things that had been done to me by those who abused me and start to break down some programming. good luck. i applaud your concern for a friend.

leslie and her pixies