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Engaging Multiples #1
Engaging Multiple Personalities
The general public is bewildered and fascinated by Multiple Personality Disorder/Dissociative Identity Disorder. Through books, television and movies, a distorted view of DID is often presented. While it may make for good entertainment, it fails to truly present the depth and intensity of the inherent trauma. Outside the ordinary day-to-day life experience of most people, it is hard to understand.
Ignoring past trauma simply will not help a patient.
In his psychiatric practice, the author encountered a number of his patients' alters face-to-face. He found that the most effective course of therapy was to engage them directly.
Talking to alters is a strange, serious and ultimately compelling experience. They are not real according to our customary definitions, but neither are they false or fake. They are survivors of childhood abuse, present in shared flesh and blood.
The author discusses the phenomenon of DID through case histories, and how it manifests clinically. Most important, he elucidates techniques necessary to help these traumatized patients heal. DID patients can successfully engage in and profit from therapy. By processing the impact of their past traumatic memory, they may reclaim their present.
Ignoring past trauma simply will not help a patient.
In his psychiatric practice, the author encountered a number of his patients' alters face-to-face. He found that the most effective course of therapy was to engage them directly.
Talking to alters is a strange, serious and ultimately compelling experience. They are not real according to our customary definitions, but neither are they false or fake. They are survivors of childhood abuse, present in shared flesh and blood.
The author discusses the phenomenon of DID through case histories, and how it manifests clinically. Most important, he elucidates techniques necessary to help these traumatized patients heal. DID patients can successfully engage in and profit from therapy. By processing the impact of their past traumatic memory, they may reclaim their present.
234 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 8, 2014
8 people are currently reading
59 people want to read
About the author
David Yeung
10 books5 followersDr. David Yeung practiced psychiatry in a variety of settings on three continents. Engaging in private practice for 40 years, he retired in 2006. In the beginning of his career, despite his education, training, and qualifications, he was ignorant about DID/MPD. Through years of trial and error, he learned to recognize and treat patients with multiple personalities. It was a long and lonely journey of discovery. It is his hope that by sharing his clinical experience through this series, new generations of therapists will come to understand the importance of correctly diagnosing DID and treating it appropriately.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 5, 2019
Have you ever wondered what creates a split personality in people?
The author, David Yeung, a retired psychiatrist with many years experience treating patients with Dissociative Identity Disorder, (think, “The Three Faces of Eve”) presents his material in a balanced, calm manner. I was impressed with his ability to describe the roots of DID, and the controversy surrounding the diagnoses of this condition. The books he has written answer many nagging questions I have had regarding DID, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and delayed onset of memories of child abuse. Most people think that the only way to treat traumatic memories is to drag them out kicking and screaming, and sometimes they do spring out that way unannounced, but there is another way to treat DID patients who do not have raw memory slamming them up against the wall. This man thinks outside the box.
“A terrorized child stores information in a non-verbal way, so on recall all the child experiences are somatic sensations and visual images. This is what is characterized aptly as “speechless terror.” I was wondering about all those things that happened when a child is too young to speak. Where do the memories go? They are stored in the body. Trapped, really.
“DID can develop when trauma occurs either before or just as one’s personality is beginning to coalesce. This is especially likely when the traumas occur during the pre-verbal stage of cognitive development. Lacking the ability to use language, very young child-victims have not yet developed the conceptualization skills of a mature mind to help them withstand the intense physical and/or psychological assaults.” Some people develop “alters”, fragmented pieces of one person. “Alters are distinct identities, each of which has its own personality traits and ways of thinking about the environment and self.” They are created in the face of unbearable suffering to dilute the pain across a continuum of fragmented consciousness.
“A single core personality has splintered into pieces, or… a single core personality was never given a chance to form – such as when abuse happens in infancy.” PTSD occurs, however, after a person has developed a single core personality and arises after unbearable stress – accidents, terrifying incidents, combat related stress, and many survivors of child abuse have PTSD but not DID as individuals vary, as do circumstances of assaults.
“There is a general denial of the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse. There is a more intense denial of the kind of abuse that is beyond the imagination of anyone who has led even a somewhat sheltered life. There are numerous examples of atrocities and grossly deviant behavior too horrible to acknowledge. Many people do not know, or do not want to know of the horrors adults inflict upon even infants.”
“DID is a complex disorder. For therapists to take the position that they should “forget about the past, just treat the manifest depression of the present” is a dangerous error of oversimplification…only through medications. Time and time again…patients…did not improve…relying on such a mechanistic view…”
There is one question I have seen nothing about until reading these books. Or shall I say there is one reality I know to be true that everyone avoids. Children are capable of having sexual feelings. However. And this is a big, big however, they are not emotionally ready for it to be forced upon them and if it is forced upon them some children will grow up and avoid sex, others will grow up and be re-victimized as easy prey for sex traffickers, and some will create “hyper-sexualized” dissociative alters after being, at a completely inappropriate age, place, and context, hyper stimulated sexually. This creates shame that casts a giant shadow on personality. For those afflicted with DID it may create internal alters that are in a life or death conflict with the angry parts of a person hating the fact that, just as a human being will digest a meal even if it is eaten forcibly or partially vomited, a person can be, like Pavlov’s dog, conditioned to experience sexual feelings that they feel they cannot live with. Just as in a person with a core self that is complete, they may hate themselves and blame themselves for this type of violation. It can be seen as a sin or a failure of fulfillment of commitments in life.
Healing is a long, uncomfortable journey in life whatever the problem. The author, after outlining his therapeutic model for treating DID says, “A DID patient may heal to the point where the alters coexist in a harmonious manner, but without full integration.” This is considered a viable healing even though some do come to a place of having a core that is not fragmented.
Human consciousness is a strange and complicated thing. “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamt of in your philosophy”, or so the Bard said.
The author, David Yeung, a retired psychiatrist with many years experience treating patients with Dissociative Identity Disorder, (think, “The Three Faces of Eve”) presents his material in a balanced, calm manner. I was impressed with his ability to describe the roots of DID, and the controversy surrounding the diagnoses of this condition. The books he has written answer many nagging questions I have had regarding DID, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and delayed onset of memories of child abuse. Most people think that the only way to treat traumatic memories is to drag them out kicking and screaming, and sometimes they do spring out that way unannounced, but there is another way to treat DID patients who do not have raw memory slamming them up against the wall. This man thinks outside the box.
“A terrorized child stores information in a non-verbal way, so on recall all the child experiences are somatic sensations and visual images. This is what is characterized aptly as “speechless terror.” I was wondering about all those things that happened when a child is too young to speak. Where do the memories go? They are stored in the body. Trapped, really.
“DID can develop when trauma occurs either before or just as one’s personality is beginning to coalesce. This is especially likely when the traumas occur during the pre-verbal stage of cognitive development. Lacking the ability to use language, very young child-victims have not yet developed the conceptualization skills of a mature mind to help them withstand the intense physical and/or psychological assaults.” Some people develop “alters”, fragmented pieces of one person. “Alters are distinct identities, each of which has its own personality traits and ways of thinking about the environment and self.” They are created in the face of unbearable suffering to dilute the pain across a continuum of fragmented consciousness.
“A single core personality has splintered into pieces, or… a single core personality was never given a chance to form – such as when abuse happens in infancy.” PTSD occurs, however, after a person has developed a single core personality and arises after unbearable stress – accidents, terrifying incidents, combat related stress, and many survivors of child abuse have PTSD but not DID as individuals vary, as do circumstances of assaults.
“There is a general denial of the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse. There is a more intense denial of the kind of abuse that is beyond the imagination of anyone who has led even a somewhat sheltered life. There are numerous examples of atrocities and grossly deviant behavior too horrible to acknowledge. Many people do not know, or do not want to know of the horrors adults inflict upon even infants.”
“DID is a complex disorder. For therapists to take the position that they should “forget about the past, just treat the manifest depression of the present” is a dangerous error of oversimplification…only through medications. Time and time again…patients…did not improve…relying on such a mechanistic view…”
There is one question I have seen nothing about until reading these books. Or shall I say there is one reality I know to be true that everyone avoids. Children are capable of having sexual feelings. However. And this is a big, big however, they are not emotionally ready for it to be forced upon them and if it is forced upon them some children will grow up and avoid sex, others will grow up and be re-victimized as easy prey for sex traffickers, and some will create “hyper-sexualized” dissociative alters after being, at a completely inappropriate age, place, and context, hyper stimulated sexually. This creates shame that casts a giant shadow on personality. For those afflicted with DID it may create internal alters that are in a life or death conflict with the angry parts of a person hating the fact that, just as a human being will digest a meal even if it is eaten forcibly or partially vomited, a person can be, like Pavlov’s dog, conditioned to experience sexual feelings that they feel they cannot live with. Just as in a person with a core self that is complete, they may hate themselves and blame themselves for this type of violation. It can be seen as a sin or a failure of fulfillment of commitments in life.
Healing is a long, uncomfortable journey in life whatever the problem. The author, after outlining his therapeutic model for treating DID says, “A DID patient may heal to the point where the alters coexist in a harmonious manner, but without full integration.” This is considered a viable healing even though some do come to a place of having a core that is not fragmented.
Human consciousness is a strange and complicated thing. “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamt of in your philosophy”, or so the Bard said.
September 4, 2018
Amazing well written and easily understandable through anecdotal stories from mr. Yeung's personal experiences working with people with DID, which for such a complicated disease makes it way more understandable.
Greatly recommendable if you have a loved one with DID or complex PTSD
Greatly recommendable if you have a loved one with DID or complex PTSD
March 24, 2018
Very informative
A must read book for anyone in the mental health field. The author is knowledgeable and the book is easy to follow.
A must read book for anyone in the mental health field. The author is knowledgeable and the book is easy to follow.
December 11, 2014
Great
Anyone who is treating DID or have it should read it. It was easy to understand and finally someone gets it and explains in understanding
Anyone who is treating DID or have it should read it. It was easy to understand and finally someone gets it and explains in understanding
March 5, 2016
Interesting
I learned so much about something I knew so little about. I couldn't put it down . The author shines a bright light in a dark room.
I learned so much about something I knew so little about. I couldn't put it down . The author shines a bright light in a dark room.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews