Structural Dissociation Quotes

“It is a rare person who can cut himself off from mediate and immediate relations with others for long spaces of time without undergoing a deterioration in personality.”
― Harry Stack Sullivan, The Interpersonal Theory of Psychiatry

“Those who are aware of their condition and experience themselves as "multiple" might refer to themselves as "we" rather than "I." I shall use the term "multiple" at times, in respect for their internal experience. It is important to point out, however, that I recognize that someone who is multiple is actually a single fragmented person rather than many people. On the outside, a multiple is probably not visibly different from anyone else. But that image is only an imitation: people who are multiple cannot think like the rest of us, and we cannot think like them. (In fact, since it is difficult for the multiple to understand how singletons think, some of them might think that is is you who are strange).
Just as a singleton cannot become a multiple at will, a multiple cannot become a singleton until and unless the barriers between the parts of the self are removed. Those barriers were put up to enable the child to tolerate, and so survive, unavoidable abuse. p20

[Multiple: a person with dissociative identity disorder (DID) or DDNOS.
Singleton: a person without DID or DDNOS, i.e with a single, unified personality]”
― Alison Miller, Healing the Unimaginable: Treating Ritual Abuse and Mind Control

“The primary driver to pathological dissociation is attachment disorganization in early life: when that is followed by severe and repeated trauma, then a major disorder of structural dissociation is created (Lyons-Ruth, Dutra, Schuder, & Bianchi, 2006).”
― Frank M. Corrigan, Neurobiology and Treatment of Traumatic Dissociation: Towards an Embodied Self

“The "apparently normal personality" - the alter you view as "the client"

You should not assume that the adult who function in the world, or who presents to you, week after week, is the "real" person, and the other personalities are less real. The client who comes to therapy is not "the" person; there are other personalities to meet and work with.
When DID was still officially called MPD, the "person" who lived life on the outside was known as the "host" personality, and the other parts were known as alters. These terms, unfortunately, implied that all the parts other than the host were guests, and therefore of less importance than the host. They were somehow secondary. The currently favored theory of structural dissociation (Nijenhuis & Den Boer, 2009; van der Hart, Nijenhuis, & Steele, 2006), which more accurately describes the way personality systems operate, instead distinguishes between two kinds of states: the apparently normal personality, or ANP, and the emotional personality, or EP, both of which could include a number of parts. p21”
― Alison Miller, Healing the Unimaginable: Treating Ritual Abuse and Mind Control

“Secondary structural dissociation involves one ANP and more than one EP. Examples of secondary structural dissociation are complex PTSD, complex forms of acute stress disorder, complex dissociative amnesia, complex somatoform disorders, some forms of trauma-relayed personality disorders, such as borderline personality disorder, and dissociative disorder not otherwise specified (DDNOS).. Secondary structural dissociation is characterized by divideness of two or more defensive subsystems. For example, there may be different EPs that are devoted to flight, fight or freeze, total submission, and so on. (Van der Hart et al., 2004). Gail, a patient of mine, does not have a personality disorder, but describes herself as a "changed person." She survived a horrific car accident that killed several others, and in which she was the driver. Someone not knowing her history might see her as a relatively normal, somewhat anxious and stiff person (ANP). It would not occur to this observer that only a year before, Gail had been a different person: fun-loving, spontaneous, flexible, and untroubled by frightening nightmares and constant anxiety. Fortunately, Gail has been willing to pay attention to her EPs; she has been able to put the process of integration in motion; and she has been able to heal. p134”
― Elizabeth F. Howell, The Dissociative Mind

“In fact, rather than being "more" than the others, the ANP is generally one that is very limited, with little power in the system, little memory of what happened, and limited energy or emotions.”
― Alison Miller, Healing the Unimaginable: Treating Ritual Abuse and Mind Control

“We propose that BPD involves secondary structural dissociation. Consistent with this, Golynkina and Ryle (1999) found that patients with BPD encompassed a dissociative part of the personality that seems to represent an ANP (a coping ANP) and more than one EP (abuser rage, victim rage, passive victim, and zombie). Some patients with BPD have severe dissociative symptoms, and may actually border on DDNOS or DID. Our clinical observations suggest that dissociative parts in BPD patients have less emancipation and elaboration, and less distinct sense of self than in DDNOS or DID.”
― Ellert R.S. Nijenhuis, The Haunted Self: Structural Dissociation and the Treatment of Chronic Traumatization

“Trauma-related structural dissociation should be distinguished from more ubiquitous phenomena that are often termed dissociation, but likely have a different underlying process. Over the past several decades the original meaning of dissociation has been quite extended by the addition of other phenomena not typically considered to be dissociative. These include alterations in consciousness such as absorption, daydreaming, imaginative involvement, altered time sense, trance-like behavior, and “highway hypnosis” (e.g., Bernstein & Putnam, 1986).”
― Onno van der Hart

“It is unlikely that one ANP will serve as a constant throughout the person's life. Your client is, therefore, likely to have others besides the ones you know, or several who you might think of as "the host". Adults with dissociative disorders often have several ANPs from earlier stages of life inside. They usually have the same name but are of different ages. Sometimes, there are several current ANPs, each of whom assumes she or he is the "real" person and is amnesiac for the existence of the others. Their current knowledge and experience may overlap, while their other characteristics differ somewhat. This makes them glide easily from one to the other, and the therapist can easily miss the switch. p22”
― Alison Miller, Healing the Unimaginable: Treating Ritual Abuse and Mind Control

“Now and again there occur alterations of the 'emotional' and the 'apparently normal' personalities, the return of the former often heralded by severe headache, dizziness or by a hysterical convulsion. On its return, the 'apparently normal' personality may recall, as in a dream, the distressing experiences revived during the temporary intrusion of the 'emotional' personality.”
― Charles S. Myers, Shell Shock in France, 1914-1918: Based on a War Diary

“Complex structural dissociation involves an extensive range of phobias that exacerbate and maintain dissociation and impede functional adaptation. They include the phobia of (1) mental actions (i.e., an individual's inner experience of emotions, thoughts body sensations, needs, wishes); (2) dissociative parts of the personality; (3) attachment and attachment loss; (4) traumatic memory; and (5) change and healthy risk taking (van der Hart et al., 2006).”
― Kathy Steele

“Based on theoretical analysis, clinical observations, and some research findings (e.g., Kluft & Fine, 1993; Nijenhuis, Van der Hart, & Steele, 2002; Putnam, 1997; Reinders et al., 2003, submitted; Steinberg, 1995), as well as on 19th and early 20th century literature on dissociation (cf., Van der Hart & Dorahy, in press), we propose that traumatization essentially involves a degree of dissociative division of the personality that likely occurs along the lines of innate action systems of daily life and defense— what has been called structural dissociation of the personality (e.g., Nijenhuis et al., 2002; Van der Hart, Nijenhuis, Steele, & Brown, 2004). Dissociation of the personality develops when children or adults are exposed to potentially traumatizing events, and when their integrative capacity is insufficient to (fully) integrate these experiences within the confines of a relatively coherent personality.”
― Onno van der Hart

“In principle, the number of parts of the personality in a given individual has little bearing on whether dissociation is at the secondary [OSDD] or tertiary [DID] level. A patient with secondary structural dissociation may have many EPs, while a patient with tertiary structural dissociation may only have two ANPs and two EPs. However, in general, more divisions relate to less mental efficiency and more likelihood that a traumatized individual will have tertiary structural dissociation.”
― Ellert R.S. Nijenhuis, The Haunted Self: Structural Dissociation and the Treatment of Chronic Traumatization