But other people with OSDD do indeed have less obviously distinct parts of the personality and report feeling perplexed when they read about people with DID talking about their 4-year-old part called Alice or their 6-year-old boy part called Ricky. I know how you feel, believe me. So our focus is on living with that entire range of symptoms, and being able to deal with the underlying cause. You may disable these by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions. I don't have OSDD/DID, but on two occasions where I was in an unsafe and triggering situation, the first time I turned into this older masculine and calm dude, the second (yesterday ago heh) into this caring 40yo+ female motherly figure. You might sometimes experience heightened or muted visual/auditory distortions with no medical cause, such as blurry vision, muffled sounds, or tunnel vision. Your experience feels very akin to ours (not a lot of amnesia presently, but nearly no childhood memories), so it was nice to see this witnessed outsides ourselves and on top of this writing itself, seeing another set of persons sharing that same experience. Paul Dell (Dell & O'Neil, 2009) argues convincingly that the externally-observable 'signs' of switching between personality states are only a very small part of what dissociative identity disorder is like in practice . It may be important for some people with OSDD to distinguish their experience from that of people with dissociative identity disorder and it would be good for people in this category to come forwards and write about their experience to help people, clinicians in particular, understand the unique characteristics of life with OSDD. they can't front and they're very angry about it, which they take out on me pretty much 24/7. A life filled with pain every day, pain to bring me to my knees and wish to die. So not all information on this website might apply to your situation or be helpful to you; please, use caution. I feel like I'm still doing things but Feels Different. OSDD fits a lot better. TW: Implied mentions of childhood trauma and fusion/integration. Your healing journey is very much appreciated and is very encouraging! You might sometimes experience the loss of a physical function without a medical cause, such as your sight, hearing, speech, or feelings of hunger. onset of diagnosable symptoms can occur much later in life. It soon became apparent that what I had been taught was simply not true. The cookies collect information in a way that does not directly identify anyone. While they do not occur in everyone who lives with DID, they are a painful reminder to many that they are burdened with the disorder. The primary symptom of dissociative disorders, of course, is dissociation. This can occur slowly, with obvious signs, or very fast. But an interesting point in this concerns the progress of therapy, which is to re-integrate traumatic memories into mainstream consciousness. This is a scholarly article from Harvard College that tackles six beliefs about DID, why they are irrefutably myths, and how they are damaging. Thanks. The following personal communication from someone with OSDD (reprinted with permission) is revealing: I dont have parts like other people seem to. I just had an alter front for the first time.jn years the other night on a super sleepless night. Slow switches are usually consensual switches in which two or more alters are co-conscious to varying degrees and slowly blending and retreating to allow one alter to gain prominence. I dont related in any intimate way to friends or lovers I remain unattached and dont know how to be intimate or close to anyone .. Your early system days should be spent getting used to the idea of having other people in your head and getting to know said people. One of our systems little quirks is that our childhood is just *poof* gone. They have similar names but not the same names .. Denying and downplaying symptoms as much as possible is common. The only other.tine I had something like that happen was when I was really young and knna camping trip and kept.auddenky.thinking I was at home. I dont feel that I can ask for help because I cannot allow anyone to see the dark part, so I feel myself always looking happy weirdly (and thankfully), I always feel happy too (I think). My brain creates vague replicas of people and it feels as though I become them (and it can feel horribly intrusive, it seems to be mingled with something obsessive compulsive), have their face and ways of behaving, but I dont take over the identity or names, so this is possibly a different mechanism. None of us remember it, but thats ok. We dont need (or want) to know what happened in our childhood that caused everyone to form, although our carer usually encourages us to try to remember because she thinks it will be good for us or something. This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Additionally, switching can be more varied than many may be aware. Normally, a reed switch is constructed of two thin metal strips, or reeds, which are sealed in a glass tube. But some people do justifiably feel the need for an official diagnosis for a number of reasons, including the pursuit of treatment on the NHS (although a diagnosis of either DID or OSDD is never a guarantee of appropriate therapy); in order to receive better care from the NHS than the pejorative catch-all personality disorder label will elicit; to justify or at least corroborate a claim for welfare benefits; to negotiate appropriate support from an employer; or to determine the pathway of treatment, amongst other reasons. It should be kept in mind that some systems use the term trigger to refer to both positive and negative stimuli that can catch an alter's attention. As someone who lives in the States, but plans to move to the UK at the earliest availability, this also helped urge us to get our treatment while we can. I think these lower end spectrum OSDDs/dissociative mechanisms are really hard to recognize and categorize. I hope this can be useful to help educate singlets or even help newly found systems understand themselves more. Alter - A dissociated identity, found in DID and OSDD. Then I would forget to bring it up because everything seemed fine again until I would again, a while after talking, realize that I was hurt by something they said. I think it would make sense for my experience to be a spectrum than necessarily one or the other. Diagnostic And Statistical Manual Of Mental Disorders: Fifth Edition, Treating Trauma-related Dissociation: A Practical, Integrated Approach, Understanding and Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder: A Relational Approach, The Dissociative Identity Disorder Sourcebook, A Fractured Mind: My Life with Multiple Personality Disorder. This was a wonderful read that we in our system very much appreciated. A lot of people dont even realise that Ive changed I just get told that Im moody or something like that. The alters within the system may have contradicting thoughts, preferences, and opinions. We are a system with OSDD 1b (fully formed alters with no amnesia), and we all feel validated in knowing that there are others like us and we arent the only ones who exist as separate people and switch regularly, but without amnesia. OSDD is from the DSM, P-DID is from the ICD. An output signal switching device (or OSSD) is an electronic device used as part of the safety system of a machine. Also, if you can give me some more info on what this type of switching is, in what types of systems it's the most common, etc, it would be super useful! Triggered switches are especially likely to be quick, but too many triggers or too much overall stress can also lead to rapid cycling. I've had alters who have sabotaged my life and done awful things. As always, we encourage you and your System to follow your own truth, to soul search, to find words, labels, visions, theories and communities that arent only within your values but also match your lived experience and/or long term goals, so that you might find belonging and dont have to try to fit in. They all respond to my name. It is rarely accompanied by an alter changing what clothing the system is wearing, announcing themselves in public, or extreme whiplashes in behavior or personality. Thank you though. Infographic created by TraumaAndDissociation. In this article were using the terms interchangeably whilst mainly using the term OSDD for brevity. Blurry describes a "feeling" or internal state of a System. And as the OSDD appellation is so often dropped in favour of DID due not least to its incredibly cumbersome name, which hardly rolls off the tongue! I can feel this happening but have no amnesia , I can also be extremely confident and competent and can do extremely difficult work with ease ..and can feel I am invincible as a professional in my career and the more difficult my work is (others feel I should be stressed) the easier it feels to me ..I can also experience triggers out of my control and extreme anger and emotional stress and hurt which can immobilize me .. It can be highly disorienting for those involved and can interfere with memory formation, concentration, and remaining covert (that is, not appearing visibly mentally ill to others). Set ground rules for your system. These intrusions may vary in strength and influence and may result in the fronting alter taking actions or voicing opinions that they can't explain or account for. We are The Alexandrite System, when we first discovered our plurality, we spent months confused and distressed because we didnt fit into the very rigid DID mold. Necessary cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. A fantastic video from Dr. Mike Lloyd from the CTAD Clinic on how alters/parts in DID/OSDD develop from complex trauma. Many people who have what we call complex trauma have had many years of trauma; mostly were talking about child abuse. Passive influence can be described as intrusions from alters that are not currently prominent in the mind or using the body. Littles are child alters, and are actual children. A wonderful article by the nonprofit Beauty After Bruises, run by volunteers with complex trauma & dissociative disorders and their loved ones + supporters. Thats not really how DID and OSDD work. This is certainly the view of a number of experts in the field. A hurricane raging above. (DNI: If you have been blocked, please do not interact. It should be said that OSDD systems who have shared memory with their system tend to have a leg up over systems who have memory gaps. The structural theory of dissociation would say that I have DID and leave it at that, but I feel as though that theory is incomplete and inaccurate to my experience. The Dissociative Identity Disorder Sourcebook by Haddock, Deborah Bray on understanding DID. In general, you are going to more easily be able to orient new system members on your current life situation and possibly be able to communicate with them better than DID systems. Sometimes, when in big distress, it feels like derealization and everything seems to just zoom by. For more information on the data that this website collects and how to opt out, please visit the Privacy Policy page. It does cause distress, but that does not indicate what type of help I should be looking for. Even switching is rarely as blatant or extreme as the media commonly portrays. Where is my childhood? Will we be left behind? Some feel uncomfortable being lumped together with people with DID, as so often the conversation or the behaviour can revolve around the autonomy and distinctness of parts. Im sure that plenty of systems are already quite familiar with that feeling and theres no reason to continue spreading that within your own head. This is a painful position to be in, and yet a variety of studies have regularly found that OSDD is either the most common or among the most common dissociative diagnoses: it is diagnosed, according to ONeil et al (2008), in 40% of cases. On the other hand, a switch that is forced is not wanted by one of the alters involved. For example, ducks at the pond could be a trigger for a 7 year old alter to push their way to front, or someone calling who is a special friend for one alter in particular might trigger that alter to switch out. In terms of other differences, it seems that as a general rule the degree of the trauma or attachment difficulties leading to OSDD will be less severe than people who are diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder, especially polyfragmented dissociative identity disorder. I suppose this tip isnt specifically for OSDD systems, but a general tip that we always try to put out there. But people may be diagnosed as OSDD as opposed to dissociative identity disorder simply because their parts didnt show up on cue at a diagnostic interview. A body with multiple identities is known as a system. Thank you for investing the time to read this article. I can watch everything that Im saying and doing, but its like I cant do anything about it and I dont know whats going to happen next. 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