
Multiple Personalities Support Group
Dissociative identity disorder is a diagnosis described as the existence in an individual of two or more distinct identities or personalities, each with its own pattern of perceiving and interacting with the environment. At least two of these personalities are considered to routinely take control of the individual's behavior, and there is also some associated memory loss,...
A few things to know:
1) It's like hypnosis, but easier to get into. At first the images are weird & hazy, but after a bit you figure out how to understand them.
2) The doc may use the eye machine. That bothered me a lot. I prefer either the ear machine plus the hand buzzers, or the hand buzzers alone. If you have choices, ask for the ones you like best. If no choices, & the eye machine bothers you, ask the doc to buy the ear & hand ones for you. They don't cost that much!
3) It helps you recall the past & work through the trauma, WITHOUT having to experience the extreme pain of flashbacks.
4) You might try to schedule near the end of the day, if you work. It leaves you pretty zoned-out and tired, sometimes. It's like an exhausting physical workout, sometimes.
5) It won't hurt you. The doctor can't manipulate you with it, I don't think. I think it's safer than hypnosis, that way.
6) I hear it takes some clients a few sessions to get the hang of it. But once you "get it" it's extremely helpful!
7) I'd encourage ANYONE with DID to use EMDR. It's an excellent method to deal with trauma, quite painlessly!!!
8) Just so you know, I read the book by the woman who invented it, and I've studied psychology, so I have some idea of how it works. I'm not ONLY speaking from my experience, but from what I know of neuropsychology, as well.
Good luck with it!!
no one knew (not even me) that I had DID. I knew I had PTSD with some depression, so I went to t therapist who did EMDR. I had terrible side effects, and my personalities split in a way that I finally became aware, all on my own, that I had DID, and I was terrified. My psychologist had never had a DID patient before, and so was not experienced with doing EMDR with such a patient. I have also read the book written by the woman who invented EMDR. It repeatedly states that therapists using this technique must use extra caution with patients with DID. EMDR is done a little differently with us--- it is done with what is called 'cognitive interweave'. EMDR at first HURT ME a great deal, but later on, when it was done with more care, it helped a lot, and caused me to get over the emotional pain and guilt and sense of powerlessness caused by the memory of traumatic events in the past. It helped me to process the memories probably a lot more rapidly than with talk therapy alone. Now, when I look back on stuff that used to cause me such strong emotions, I see the events as though I were looking at them through plexiglass - I see and acknowledge that they happened and they were bad experiences, but they can no longer hurt me or cause me painful emotions.
I used the earphones -- the music goes back and forth from ear to ear, and after the first 30 seconds I no longer notice the beautiful music, because I am concentrating so hard on the mental image of whatever we are working on, along with the related body sensations (tenseness, etc) and the emotions that come up. I did not care for the other techniques such as the glasses and knee-tapping, and found them not effective for me, but I found the earphones not only tolerable but pleasant. If I were to do EMDR again with a therapist, I would ask:
1. Do you have experience with doing EMDR with a patient with DID?
2. Do you do cognitive interweave with the EMDR?
3. Do you use earphones/music to do the EMDR?
I just said a prayer for you, chily, that God would help you to be healed from the effects of the trauma of your past. I never did EMDR without asking God to be with me and to work through the therapist. He did!