How did you know you had DID?

It started with intrusive thoughts somewhere at the start of 2012 (now almost a year ago, what a long time is that). I was kind of worried then about them, but learned to cope and moved on. I was in a very stressful time then and didn't really feel good so I thought that might cause them, but still it felt weird and not 'mine' and didn't really understand it.

Somewhere in the spring I saw a documentary about DID. It interested me very much but it didn't ring a bell - it was certainly not something I had, right? Wrong! (At least, as of yet, I, myself, do have some proof I lost a few seconds, but I don't know whether... [...] anyway, let's just say insiders believe it's DID.)

Those thoughts came back in the late summer and the start of the college year. I was worried about them, wanted to get help but at the same time was embarrassed about them.

** Trigger warning ** Those thoughts were suicidal thoughts - and I have never been like that! ** end **

I wanted to know what was going on, so with all things I want to understand, I searched on the internet for information. I came along schizophrenia, depression but it didn't really 'fit'. Then I read something about DID (related to intrusive thoughts) and it fit more, but not really at the time.

I can't believe you have been in denial the whole time. And I asked you to accept it! Not so. So, can you accept it now? ~ Sandra

Well, yes, actually. It is still an open question whether it is DID or DDNOS (i.e. do I lose time?) but for what I hear I do - but I don't know about it.

Anyway, I kind of accept it now (with the preliminary DX).

Finally, I did go to a GP, told my problems. I was nervous! It was like I had to do the exam again - and that single exam would decide whether I passed or not. I couldn't really confirm some of her questions. On "do you hear voices" I answered no, while that was not entirely correct. Yeah, we were there already, constantly persuading you to go there but you were resistant ~ Sandra That's right, I kind of knew it, but not really. Didn't believe it or something. I actually was instructed to ask for help and knew it. But I didn't consider it to be 'voices'. [...] No, they weren't just voices, but they didn't really seem to be voices either, more like, constant intrusive thoughts or something. I don't know. I was referred with a description of 'PTSD-symptoms'. Somehow, she saw what was going on.

I kept searching for information on the net. This forum kept popping up in search results. Then I searched specifically in this forum for information because it tended to contain high-quality information. And finally I signed up. The rest is history.

********************Trigger warning: Mentions self harm*************************



My 'original' had been hearing voices since primary school.....but it wasn't until high anything big happened Nel days were always blank, she didn't understand why she would self harm whilst in and out of reality if she didn't remember it was a blur, the male voices were telling her to k*ll people she confided in her friend. she said it was nothing and to ignore them and you can control the voices. it didn't help it just got worse. but by then she had made a friend who was showing similar syptoms. one day they blurted to each that they thought they had a personality disorder he researched...DID. Charlie, Barry had introduced themselves nell was drawing them all the time(she didn't realised at the time) things had calmed down are friend let us meet someone in his system and Barry got the courage to say hi... Nell didn't react to well and she dissappeared but the rest of us it was freeing experience.......we are still undiagnosised but surviving. and we have a close friend with the same condition.

I remember how shocked she was when I screamed at her 'my name is charlie not wierd voice in your head'

I started showing symptoms when I was in third grade. I would bounce a ball back on forth on the wall for hours every day after school. It drove my parents nuts! During this time I would tell my mom I would just make up stories in my head and pretend to be someone else in them. It was quite odd but for some reason they just ignored it figuring I was imaginative. It then grew to other areas, usually physical activity, such as when I played basketball or rode my bike. When I was probably eleven is when I would just lay in my bed and "go off into another little world". That concerned my mom and I got sent to a counselor. I had little alters that I "identified" as me and their backstory would grow but it was never traumatic. A year later my younger brother came out with allegations of sexual abuse against his father. That's when many things clicked and people started questioning me. (he had adopted me) That was also the year I developed a new alter and my strongest one yet. She was the one who had memories of abuse and her whole development was pretty much based around that. I also saw her at different ages and "phases". The rest is history, but it has only gotten worse as I've gotten older.

lifelongthing wrote:I tried answering this but it got way way way way long

I´d be interested in hearing the long version either on the forums or via PM. That is only if you see this and are ok with it (if it´s not too much work or too emotionally difficult writing it down).

tragic guardian wrote:[color=#000000][size=100]Well i could write a whole long thing but i'd rather not.

Again, I´d be interested. Again, only if you happen to see my post and are ok with talking about it.

I'd be more than comfortable to share at least a version of it. I'll consider whether to put it up here or PM you

It's still forever long Going to take me a while to shorten it (have tried making this a lot shorter because we wrote several pages about this with a tiny font). Might you tell me what in particular you'd like to read about in regards to this so I don't write up lots of stuff you find boring and leave out what you're actually wanting to read about?

Cool, thanks. Looking forward to it.

You're welcome Please see my last comment though, for ease

Oh, sorry, didn´t see you latest comment at the time I was responding. I don´t think I can say what I´d like to hear about or what is important about your experiene - it is yours afterall. Write whatever you feel comfortable sharing or without exhausting yourself. I have time and am interested in anything you have to say. There is nothing I´m looking for in particular. I´m just interested in someone´s experience from a subjective point of view rather than reading studies on it only.

I have tried making this a lot shorter because we wrote several pages about this with a tiny font.

We are at a psych hospital for a week. I ask for my papers one day and I see I have several diagnoses I did not know about, amongst others I have a dissociative disorder. I ask what dissociative means and the person working there says she doesn't really know, she has never heard of it and prints me out a copy of something from some medical journal that makes absolutely no sense to me and upon asking her again, explaining I didn't understand this - she shrugs and says neither does she. I figure it's probably nothing important.

Then comes therapy with a great T and while I have no memory for it, she has several of us. Lin tells her we don't remember everything we do and shares with her that there's a lot of flashbacks and I am described in my journal as dissociative many times, which I see years later. I get no explanation at the time. I get the diagnosis PTSD.

I go in-patient again where I'm spending most of my time hiding in places no one can find me and I don't remember (this would be Anastasia) and after three months they are suspecting DID without me knowing about it. I am asked to do tasks I don’t understand, such as helping them write down different aspects of myself I have noticed, or how I react to situations – especially after they notice I go mute sometimes and will also switch languages I speak or use.

I talk to an employee at a different in-patient unit I'm at briefly about something random and it comes to my attention, after a confusing conversation, that I have a half smoked packet of cigarettes in my pocket from 4 hours away. I get picked up to go back to the normal unit. I laughingly tell my nurse I’ve got cigarettes in my pocket. She woners if I’ve started smoking. I shrug and tell her they we're just in my pocket when I got there. I tell her about the conversation I had with the other worker about my jacket and she asks if there's lots I don't remember. I answer yes; “Everyone does. I do lots of things I don’t remember.” Upon further inquiery I reveal I usually lose a few hours or weeks or stuff like that. She reminds me of something we had written a while back about the different “aspects of me”. That there was at least 4 aspects of how I behaved at the post. I don’t see neither the point of what we had written back then nor its relation to what happened now.

I meet with a dissociative specialist at the unit. I didn’t understand why I was meeting her or who she was. I believed this appointment took approximately 5 minutes but it took 45. She greets the different parts as they come out, none talk to her or do anything. Upon leaving I ask a worker; “Do you notice I’m not always me?” I feel lost and this thing is dawning on me even though I still have no idea what DID is or much of what dissociative means.

I meet an amazing employee who works with dissociation. He tells me he believes I have DID. I don’t know what it is but he asks me what happens when x things happens. We go through many examples, and I describe how I experience them. I don’t understand what it means but he describes dissociation to me. I find at all very strange but I’m still not convinced I have DID. I don’t fully understand what it even is. Then later he meets Anastasia; a frightened child. No one has wanted to talk to her. Several people have met her and either thought she was me or sent her to her room as “child parts shouldn’t be seen in a post”. She and other parts of us have started coming out and being themselves, though many pretend to be me.

Now over a year has passed and after therapy and getting the diagnosis a 2nd time (long story) we have now come to a place where we can no longer deny the DID and work on accepting who we are.