Friday, 21 May 2021 12:29:22 PM

Who is at risk for dissociative identity disorder?

Google : People of any age, ethnicity, gender, and social background can develop DID, but the most significant risk factor is physical, emotional, or sexual abuse during childhood. Dissociation, or detaching from reality, can be a way of shielding the main personality from a painful mental or physical experience.

Children exposed to the Catholic religion are at risk of physical, emotional, or sexual abuse during childhood as the evidence of multiple Royal Commissions have shown - a few come to mind being Stolen Generations, Forced Adoptions, Forgotten Australians, Stolen Generations and Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. There are many than just these few that documented the horrors that children faced over generations.

Dissociation, or detaching from reality, can be a way of shielding the main personality from a painful mental or physical experience. There is no greater threat than a direct life threat as a 3 to 5 year old. A perceived threat is sufficient to trigger a trauma response; my reading indicates that Freezing is the most common response followed by withdrawal into the depths of their own mind as this is the only safe place available to them.

At the fore of my thoughts are the words of Alice Miller (For Your Own Good) when she spoke of an enlightened witness. I had always know that I was fortunate, but just how fortunate I was has really come to the fore in my reviewing Dissociative Disorders as I feel confident that an upcoming report will diagnose me this regard in some way. What else it diagnoses I am yet to find out.

I joined a number of online groups for those dealing with Dissociation and DiD. It is a much broader spectrum than I had understood it to be. I have been reading a few for a month or so now, some a little longer and one of the standouts is in the DiD group there are many more with religious origins or early experiences.

Dissociation ranges from Day Dreaming through to a fully fragmented identity of multiple personalities.

In dissociative fugue, the circumscribed amnesia is accompanied by a loss of identity as well. In other words, the patient has lost semantic as well as episodic self-knowledge. Berkeley

In dissociative fugue identity may simply be lost, or the person may adopt a new identity. In either case, the change in identity is typically accompanied by physical relocation -- hence the name "fugue".

During the period of the lost (or new) identity, the patient loses access to autobiographical memories associated with the previous, usual identity.

The fugue state is temporary. When it has resolved, and the patient has regained his usual identity and autobiographical memories, he is left with an amnesia covering autobiographical memories associated with the period of the fugue
[My experience is that the fugue state came about when a safe environment presented an opportunity for these events to be heard. The traumatic experience had been there since 3 or 4 years of age. The reason why it came out this way goes back to what Miller described as an enlightened witness. In reviewing I can see my mother and my grandmother being the first of those and along with that comes a better understanding as to why my survival trajectory is different in some ways to the general survivor who had no-one to turn to as every individual in their environment was also a captive of generational traumatic bonding to a religion. Amnesia covering autobiographical memories associated with the period of the fugue can be unravelled with time and/or suitable support.]

There is no evidence of brain damage that would account for the memory disorder, hence the label "functional". There is a presumed psychological cause of the amnesia, hence the label "psychogenic".

*Identity may simply be lost. *"is left with an amnesia covering autobiographical memories associated with the period of the fugue" [In my experience that event I am trying to describe is still in a shattered state - the act of describing or playing out when you can review and see how it is now put together again in a much more accurate timeline of the event and how it fits into the overall experience. The experience no longer is shattered and simply fits in its place in autobiographical telling of the experience. This process is something that I have had repeat experiences of going right back to my use of the phrase "Too much white" which I understand now came from my experience with music and a nun and her cold white hands and before that the stark whiteness of the nun who caused my 'gears' incident.

*physical relocation Yes in most occassions it seems.]

Eureka A Northwestern University researcher has found a key source of chronic pain appears to be an old memory trace that essentially gets stuck in the prefrontal cortex, the site of emotion and learning. The brain seems to remember the injury as if it were fresh and can't forget it. 4-JUN-2007

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