I’ve made it my personal mission, as you know, to express who I am but not always push the MPD label. My closest friends know that I have this so called “disorder” and I’ve outed myself at work quite a bit with jokes and humor. Some catch on, some do not. I’m very confident in most cases but I have had a few disordered moments in my life with others knowing about this.
Mostly, because of the television/movie aspect of MPD and how it’s been exposed, people think there MUST be personalities in me that are so wild and crazy or odd that don’t show up in public. There are, in a way, but not like on TV.
I have had people joke (and I knew they were truly joking, but it reminded me that others truly do feel this) when something went missing that maybe one of my personalities stole it or misplaced it. I wanted to get hurt over the comment but I pushed it aside and realized that, as a joke, it was funny. After all I kid about my “voices in my head” all the time. I want it to be a light subject, not a deep one. Especially in public!
But I’m sure that some people do feel that’s possible. They wonder if I have a side that goes out and takes things or does illegal things, then returns to a normal life. Many of the shows do have an extreme personality example, and I’m not saying I haven’t had this happen in my past to a point, but I always had morals and standards that even my deepest darkest hurt personalities held to. I wonder if this is common in others with MPD.
Just like they say in hypnosis, you won’t do anything while under that you wouldn’t normally do when awake (not sure I believe that, but that’s a whole different post!) Is this the same with personalities? Yes, you have a less moral personality that feels worthless so they go out and do wild things, but they’d never go overboard and break the law, not on purpose. Or, are there some out there that have no control, no idea what “the law” is…and they run wild and free w/o the control I have over my own? Personalities are formed, typically, when a child is young–so it’s very possible that the lines of right/wrong are mixed up in some.
I’d love to know what your experience is, if you have MPD or if you have “sides of you” that come out and have experienced something like this.
Hmmm, Cat. Thanks for writing this. I don’t know. I mean I have heard of some of these portrayals of MPD/DID on TV. To be honest, I avoid them. I watched the opening episode (which was free online) of Tara. I didn’t like that or think it was that real. I know I saw Sybil. But cannot remember it. Mostly I don’t remember the media I’ve seen on MPD. I don’t know why. I must push it away or discount it.
castorgirl.com posted about morals in the system recently. You may want to check that out. In general, I agree with what you and she says. But these moral standards come more from the identification with us as survivors than about the DID/MPD. I am certain there are those who have fragmented personalities who commit horrible crimes. I see that not as a lack of the DID structure to keep their morals intact, but more as a failure of their system to identify as a survivor and try to heal.
I think when you make the decision to heal, this is what sets up the morals.
My personal experience is that, yes, I have parts who do things that are clearly wrong (even law breaking). I think they know not to cross a certain barrier (which is not to hurt OTHERS). But absent that, I think there are few rules for some of them and, yes, they can be wildly out of control.
When you talk about “bad” personalities, we also have to consider those who hurt ourselves. If you were to map the kinds of dangerous things parts of me have done to me ONTO, say, doing those same things to someone else, they would be absolutely reprehensible and land all of us in jail for a long time. It’s scary to think that what distinguishes “US” from someone who does very illegal things is simply that we have that barrier about hurting others. I am glad that barrier is there. But I am very very sad about the things we do to ourselves.
Thanks for bringing this up.
Paul
Very good point, Paul, about the harm we do to ourselves. It’s very common to do that from shame and guilt instead of turning on others. I once read a book that discussed how people who had been abused, most likely would turn into abusers themselves. I completely disagreed and had a hard time believing that could be true.
I see it as the opposite. Truly. Just like children that deal with harsh parents are sometimes the opposite, much less harsh, with their own children. You kinda go, “I don’t want to be like THAT” and you swing to the other extreme. From my experience, that’s what I’ve seen.
I worry sometimes that people assume I’m like those people in the books and movies. But then I have to realize it doesn’t matter what they assume…I am me and us and we and it’s OK!! The people closest to me are the most important and they truly care. I’ve seen it.