The Truth About Multiple Personalities

Dissociative Identities

Source: Adrian Fletcher

When you think about multiple personalities, what is the first thing that comes to your mind? For many, it is a disturbing picture from a Hollywood film about a deranged and sociopathic murderer. Multiple personality disorder (MPD) was changed to dissociative identity disorder (DID) in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in 1994. The inaccurate portrayal of DID in the media has contributed to harming people living with DID including me, a licensed psychologist who lives with the condition.

Though there has been a great deal of stigma surrounding multiple personalities within and outside of Hollywood as well as in the field of mental health, it did not occur to me how dangerous the stigma was until I stepped into the world to speak openly about it and listened to others living with DID share their experiences with me, which were heartbreaking and concerning to hear. Being in the field, I felt a great deal of shame about not being properly educated myself, and I also could relate to what they were sharing, having gone through my own troubling misdiagnoses and inappropriate medication regimens that made me more ill than DID itself.

People have lost friends, family, and career opportunities because of being honest about their condition. Not only is the stigma rampant, but the public’s general lack of awareness (through no fault of their own) is concerning at best. I have heard things said either to me or to those I know who live with DID, including but not limited to the following:

“So, does that mean you are going to murder me?”

“Multiple personalities are not real.”

“It’s not like you suddenly like switch into [insert name]; I would see it.”

"If my client had DID, I would know; I would see it.”

“People who claim to have DID are just looking for attention.”

“People with DID are so sick”

All these comments are hurtful and harmful to the population of people living with DID.

DID is a real mental health condition, and many clinicians are missing the diagnosis, especially trauma-informed professionals, because DID is a hidden condition, and few clinicians are trained in its assessment and treatment. In fact, when I was completing my own doctoral program in clinical psychology, I was told in my adult psychopathology course not to worry about DID. I was told it was extremely rare, and I would not see it in my office. The condition is not rare at all: An estimated 1 to 3 percent of the population lives with it, and the actual numbers are suspected to be much higher. It is difficult to obtain accurate statistics on a condition clinicians are missing and those who do know they live with it often will not disclose on legal and medical forms that they do out of fear of repercussions. Who would want to disclose that they live with DID when the person on the other end of receiving that disclosure would begin to think they were going to be harmed or murdered?

People with DID are no more dangerous than any other human beings. In fact, people with DID are more likely to experience re-traumatization and become victims of continued abuse and exploitation than they are to harm anyone else. Most with DID are more at risk to themselves should one of their parts engage in self-injurious behavior such as cutting, burning, and/or substance abuse to cope with the emotional and physical pain that, for most with DID, is the result of unresolved trauma. Another stigma that exists is around patients who have self-injurious behavior. Most clinicians immediately assume the patient must have borderline personality disorder and, without proper assessment, could be missing patients who are living with DID and who may have experienced ritual abuse in which some parts have been “programmed” to harm the physical body, and the self-injury is completely out of the control of the individual until co-consciousness (communication between parts) is reached.

Clinicians are missing DID and that is a huge problem for people living with the condition. Imagine for a moment that you spent years of your life trying antidepressant medication, antipsychotic medication, and therapist after therapist only to discover a decade later that you are living with DID. Many people living with DID have sought help, and they have been turned away, dismissed, and misdiagnosed and, as a result, have been traumatized when seeking care. It is estimated that a person with DID will have sought mental health care for seven years before the correct diagnosis is made. That is seven years of someone’s life. Surely with advancements in care, this can be prevented.

However, the other problem is that clinicians doubt the existence of the diagnosis. So, until people can understand the realities of the condition and the field can provide accurate training to students and providers, we are going to continue to have quite a problem. It does not help that in recent years respected institutions have contributed to furthering the stigma by displaying online accounts of people living with DID and making accusations that these people were fake in claiming their DID. While we all need to use discernment on social media platforms, no one has the right to suggest that someone else may be faking their condition. I live with DID, and, let me tell you, it is a lot easier to fake not having it than it would be to fake having it. I must mask my parts and blend in with the world to stay safe when around people or places that will not understand the complexities of what a life with multiple identities looks like.

If you are curious to learn about DID, the best resource to go to for accurate information is An Infinite Mind: The International Organization on DID. They hold a conference every year called Healing Together as well as a monthly speaker series, and they offer vetted the resources on their website. This DID Awareness Day (March 5, 2025), I urge you to learn more about this complex yet brilliant condition and refrain from making jokes at cocktail parties about multiple personalities. Living with the condition is a constant fight for one’s life, and recovery from the trauma that led to its development is exhausting, costly, and consuming. The least we can do for those living with the condition is to acknowledge it, educate ourselves, offer compassion and support, and refrain from engaging in harmful banter and jokes.