Multiple Personalities
In early times, evil spirits were thought to possess people and make them act in strange and frightening ways. By the 1800's, the study of this hysteria led some doctors to believe one person could have separately functioning personalities.
In this rare research film from the 1920's, a woman has different personalities who believes they are separate people. One is a male that is not comfortable in women's clothes. Another is a small child. The affliction has been known by different names, but recognized for centuries. Today it is called multiple personality disorder.
Why have they become tormented and broken into different personalities? What is the childhood pain that lies buried in the unknown depths of their mind? How can they search for the deadly memories that holds the secrets of their paths and the promise of their healing?
i needed this because my friend at school has it and i dont understand i just say hay lunar,void,midnight,storm,and fang i still dont undersnad alot but some any help for me
In the aftermath of the Sybil story, DID (dissociative identity disorder) is still something that will divide the psychiatric community. Some therapists help create personalities -like Sybil- to help the patient deal with childhood trauma. As such, some cases raise questions and will continue to do so because they might seem unethical and may worsen psychological damage.
In John's case, he found out about his personalities in therapy. I also wonder why he switches when a new situation/setting/task etc presents while at work, and why do the children personalities only appear in therapy? Sure, one showed up while at home with his dog but I would not feel safe if my life depended on a police officer with DID. As much as I sympathise with patients, some will cause skepticism in me.
The DSM-5 provides the following criteria to diagnose dissociative identity disorder:
1. Two or more distinct identities or personality states are present, each with its own relatively enduring pattern of perceiving, relating to, and thinking about the environment and self.
2. Amnesia must occur, defined as gaps in the recall of everyday events, important personal information, and/or traumatic events.
3. The person must be distressed by the disorder or have trouble functioning in one or more major life areas because of the disorder.
4. The disturbance is not part of normal cultural or religious practices.
5. The symptoms can not be due to the direct physiological effects of a substance (such as blackouts or chaotic behavior during alcohol intoxication) or a general medical condition.
Also, as someone from Europe, DID is much more prevalent in the United States (1% of general population) while it's not in the EU. We often tend to look at it as a cultural phenomenon rather than a widespread factual one, and as such it raises even more questions. Some psychiatrists will only see 1 person who has DID I their career.
It is actually called dissociative identity disorder now, not multiple personality.
how can that guy be a police officer isnt that a bit dangerous.. he can switch at any time.... like... wtf.
Excellent documentary. Understanding these MPD individuals helps me understand all of us from another vantage point. I can see the goal of these individuals is to become whole again, truly mature, and this is the goal of us all, even though most of us are not considered sick. I believe wholeheartedly that those who are aware of their blocks or obstacles and strive to overcome them are much closer to wholeness than the average person. I believe that is our universal goal: to grow unfettered, and pull in as many positive rays as we can to grow more and feel more and express more.
Excellent editing of what I'm sure must have been hours upon hours of video documentation.
I feel privileged that I was able to see this moving documentary. Thank you.
This was a good documentary. Very hard to watch what these poor people went through. It would be interesting to have a follow up documentary to see how they are doing today.
This was a great documentary. It is always interesting to see how the mind coupes with its ever-changing environment. Regularly, our intelligence pushes us to adapt or to flight, and through experience, we develop a complexity to our personality. When the mind is faced with an environment that denies both options, to see their splits, not only taking the complexity of personalities, but also, most importantly and more critically, the memories with them. Maybe this is an evolutionary step forward in the state of consciousness, perhaps wielded in a primitive manner. The most interesting thing that strikes me though, and one that the film did not seem to take notice, was with Barb in the cereal isle when she switched to the 5 year old girl. Pat took off the glasses saying that the child had problems seeing through them. Now, did the child think she had problems with the glasses, but could not really see without them, or did her vision physically change with the personality switch. If the latter, then we might as well throw out all our understanding on physical medicine to date because its all wrong. That moment blew my mind.
I have another personality left over from my own childhood trauma, her name is Jade. Jade is everything I'm not; tough, selfish, mean, angry, self destructive. She was the fighter that got me though it, but now that its over she has nothing to do so she fights with my mom. I know she had good intentions, even though she's mean to me, she came around to protect me emotionally. As I get older it makes it worse becuase I can't fight with everyone. Personally, Jade is really upset that she's "losing" me in a way. Its really hard to describe.
But I never black out. I lose control of my body, but I still see whats going on. It makes it really hard because I can see and hear myself being incredibly nasty to whoever Jade thinks is threatening me. She also caused me to become clinically depressed and made me attempt suicide 3 times.
There was nothing I could do except sit back and watch while she slowly destroyed "ourself".
We have conversations and function like two people. But we're not friends.
I don't think.
I think that in the era this film was made the psychiatric/ therapeutic system seems WAY too eager to "discover" "repressed" memories.
I think this is not always a good approach. I would never let someone do it on me.
Yeah right, a 10 year old police officer who carries a firearm?
I have DiD ( multiple personalities) and borderline personality disorder followed by depression. All my life i have lived with different parts of myself, i have four personalities, Alice, Elisa, Sarah, Rose ( host aka me) . The oldest is Alice she is 16 , loves to drink/smoke and is often linked with my impulsivity behaviours (also linked to BPD) Elisa is 4, Sarah is 6 and I am almost in my 20's. I can assure you, this illness is VERY VERY REAL. Some nights i find myself drawing and painting for hours, i go into a daze often switch back and forth ..these days its more Alice (impulsivity,Anger,Sadness) but while i was dating my ex boyfriend my alters would come out and literally manifest themselves to him. Sarah The six year old was most fond of my ex boyfriend..she always told me that she loved playing and listening to his music...ive gone through alot of abuse and trauma in my short life and ladies and gentlemen if you are telling me creating different parts of yourself to hide away the pain isint real, then what is. We all inside, have parts of ourselves we manifest in our lives.
Ah? Cop? Gun? Severe mental illness? WTF?
It almost doesn't seem real. I don't mean to imply that these people were faking their disorders or inventing their trauma. It's just such a surreal state of mind to conceive of. The cop was especially interesting. I'd like to know if there have ever been cases of conversations between personalities. Not like through a journal but literally constant switching between personalities. As sad as these stories are, things like this really do make me marvel at the minds abilities.
Barb's husband seems like an incredibly good guy. I can't imagine having to put up with a partner who has MPD. Wow..
Thankfully I have been to many Dr.'s getting the loving therapy that I needed, to resolve my childhood abuse issues, and am now living as one integrated individual person! Living with the "Hollywood" stigma of a person with "multiples" is hard enough without having the ignorant people misuse God as a weapon towards people who have already been abused enough in their lives.
God is love. Jesus was loving. We need to be loving to each other as well.
I don't even have to watch this documentary...why?...because I was diagnosed by five different doctors as having Multiple personality disorder, now called Dissociative Identity Disorder (D.I.D.). I will speak to any who are reading these comments, from my vast knowledge on this subject. I am also a Bible teacher and student of the Holy Scriptures, and have been for 30 years.
Are we on the same page? I know the Scriptures God gave us, and I also know anything you want to know about living with D.I.D. ! God is Love. God sent His only begotten Son, Christ Jesus to live and die for us. Jesus death gave the ransom to buy back what Adam lost. Jesus cured many demon possessed people, including children. Is having D.I.D. being demon possessed? NO!
It is showing ignorance to type away your personal feelings, without having the facts. Your personal feelings could hurt other people, and then God will hold you "accountable". Please read your whole Bible, and then ask one of Jehovah's Witnesses to explain to you what you've just read. God's Holy Name is Jehovah = YHWH Ps.83:18 Ex. 6:2-4
At the end of the movie, we see a a text: "...and these people also show us that when allowed to give up its secrets, the human mind can heal itself."
It makes me wonder, does it generalize to society at large. If so, there are tremendously important reasons for Wikileaks to exist.
this was made in the early 90's on HBO lots have changed in treatment and such
Troy, I really, really hope that you're kidding. There has been ample evidence to support the existence of MPD/DID. These people were brave enough to put their entire livelihoods on the line to make an important point to us. The suffering that we see in this documentary is not them "believing a lies." The fact that you, personally, only had "multiple personalities" in the sense that you didn't want to like or accept the truth and you were excessively prideful, doesn't negate the suffering of those who truly have this disorder. I can't imagine that the police officer on this video chooses to turn into a frightened child, hugging a teddy bear, nor do I think that Barb would check herself into a psychiatric hospital because she's scared of personalities that want to kill her because she desperately wants to be someone who wants to kill her. I'm far from an atheist, and no disrespect, but this is just ridiculous.
I speak from experience. I used to have what these people call multiple personalities. Yet it is
They are believing a lies!! They have made up different personalities/persons that they want to be. They don't like or accept the truth, they were abused they did have these bad things happen to them. They just don't want to accept reality.
Sad to say but they are prideful, humility defined is a right view of yourself in relation to God and man with the proper heart response.
The right view of themselves is that they are the person that had this evil happen to them and man meant it for evil but God means it for good. Genesis 50:21 They have a wrong view of themselves because they have a wrong view of God.
The Bible defines the hate and anger they have as sin and needs repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ to save them from the punishment they deserve for being angry and Jesus will cleanse them of their anger and give them love to their enemies.
Take each statement that is being said and define it biblically and you will be able to make sense of everything that is being said. Psychology is a lie and the Bible is true.
Depression is downcast in the bible, which says "Why are you downcast oh my soul, put your hope in God" Psalms
Stress is anxiety. Stress, anger, downcast, obsessive drinking are all sin and need repentance and also faith in Christ.
And the priest that abused the man is a hypocrite and needs repentance as well.
Blessed are those who read and obey the scriptures!!!
Interesting documentary! As a med student, and having studied some neuroscience, the brain and its many functions and how they correlate with our behavior .. it is simply amazing.
My simple opinion is this: Psychology is a behavioral science; behavior is ever changing, ranging from day to day, person to person, unable to be definite...therefore psychological analysis is never definite.
I've read most of the posts here and some were very intriguing. We will all, at the end of the day, have our own views on this subject...the key is to never dismiss nor discriminate..Having an academic background does not automatically give validity to a point... There are so many other aspects we must factor in if we decide to search for enlightenment, truth and wisdom!
The truth hurts
WOW! I was not expecting that ending quote about how "the mind will invent ways of bearing the unbearable." It spoke to me in ways that words cannot describe because words themselves cannot describe the unbelievable. But your mind can protect you from the unbelievable. So who knows, maybe we all have this inside of us and its just waiting to tell you the truth.
P.S. Please don't pretend to know more about everything then you do, live in the realm of possibility. You just may become enlightened.
Well... that was extremely unsettling...especially the cop sitting in the chair hugging a teddy. Not that Im trying to be critical, I understand this is a serious disorder, but this doco was disturbing...
Well, the stories that are being shown are extremely personal and that should be the main reason why they don't go deeper. But still you have a kind of inside on what causes it, syntoms. But still I agree with you since this is a theme that isn't really widespread in the place I live (Portugal).