Articles and Blogs

Dissociative survivors talk about what is hardest for them in living with dissociative identity disorder.

OSDD is a strange-sounding diagnosis and seen by many as a 'not yet' or 'not quite' version of dissociative identity disorder. This article explores the differences between the two diagnoses and whether that difference matters or is arbitrary.

Dissociative survivors face a range of challenges and here, in their own words, they describe the things they find hardest about life with dissociative identity disorder.

Should we talk to parts? Or does that make things worse? When someone switches, is this attention-seeking behaviour? And is talking to a ‘part’ in some way dangerous – does it reinforce pathological behaviour? What should you do?

The recommended treatment for dissociative disorders is psychotherapy, but how do you go about finding a therapist or counsellor? This article guides you through the process, either via the NHS or privately.

It’s scary to think you’ve ‘gone mad’. It’s scary to think you have some serious, incurable ‘mental illness’. It’s scary to not understand what on earth is going on in your brain. And perhaps what’s even scarier is finding out that what is ‘wrong’ with you has a name: dissociative identity disorder.

Depersonsaliation/derealisation disorder sounds complicated and scary. But it makes perfect sense once you understand how the brain reacts to threat, and how that reaction can become a habitual response to any form of stress. This article makes the complex simple.

I was abused by my dad, and also my grandad. And in many ways, I want to just leave it there and not say any more, because every time I say it a huge cloud of fear comes up and a voice screams in my ear that none of it really happened. It’s like, for a moment, my heart falls into my feet and I’m overcome by this terror that I really am just making it up.

How can we explain the experience of dissociation? Using an analogy from the superhero movie 'Avengers Assemble', one survivor explains what life is like for her to live with multiple parts of the personality.

When we have dissociative identity disorder, the problem is not always simply that we have dissociated parts of the personality. The problem more often is in the hatred we can feel for these disavowed parts: 'She is the hated child'. How do we heal the trauma of self-rejection and develop compassion for even the most traumatised and alienated parts of ourselves?

Once we understand dissociation as a logical response to overwhelming trauma, it stops being so dramatic and different, and the person suffering dissociation stops being ‘complex’ and ‘bizarre’ too. There is nothing bizarre about dissociative disorders—what is bizarre is how some people can be so badly mistreated that they end up with a dissociative disorder.

Someone who has dissociative identity disorder may have distinct, coherent identities that are able to assume control of their behaviour and thought. Read on to find out more about this poorly-understood phenomenon.

What medications should be used in the treatment of dissociative identity disorder? This fact sheet takes guidance from the ISSTD’s Treatment Guidelines for DID.

How should dissociative identity disorder be treated? What do the guidelines say, and who produces them?

There are many ways to describe dissociation. This article takes a closer look at dissociation as it pertains to dissociative identity disorder and trauma.

Dissociative identity disorder is a creative survival mechanism for coping with overwhelming and chronic childhood trauma.