Note: Please note that throughout this article, I may switch between personal pronouns. This is on purpose, which will hopefully be explained by the article’s topic (Dissociative Identity Disorder). Typically, ‘I’ describes a specific alter, whereas ‘we’ is used for our collective system in this shared body. A glossary of terms used is at the end of this article.
We were once in A&E and, explaining the mental health crisis we were in at the time, told the psychiatric worker on our case we had DID. She promptly went, ‘Oh, like Split!’ I groaned. I had, however, not seen Split, just heard of its reputation within the DID community. So, for this week’s column, I have finally braved it and watched Split, along with a few other media presentations of DID.
Rating: 2/5
Let’s open with the one that everyone knows about. The movie stereotype: ‘person with mental health problems ends up being a serial killer’. As I’ve discussed in a previous article, we also have psychosis. So, really, we are never gonna win in the media!
Split details the story of a person with DID who abducts three teenage girls, and then discovers a long suppressed alter. ‘The Beast’ (who also climbs up walls, but we won’t comment on that!) kills a number of characters by the end of the movie. I will admit to being surprised by this film as I was prepared to give it 0/5 or not even watch it! However, it did explore aspects I thought it may ignore: littles were depicted (there was a little called Hedwig), the therapist was remarkably okay, and it depicted a larger system size than most media portrayals (which, as a system of almost 100, I felt pleased with, given media usually only depicts the host and another ‘dark alter ego’ character: think Jekyll and Hyde). However, the dangerous stereotype ruined it for me and there were actually a few triggers in there which caused flashbacks for us (hence, I’d warn others with DID against watching it). Please remember, the media portrays us as dangerous, but people with serious mental illnesses are much more likely to be the victims of crime than commit them. The only thing that helped was laughing at it and reassuring ourselves it was a bad fictional presentation and far from real.
Interestingly, I had a connection to the character Casey, one of the three abducted girls, due to her childhood memories, which are woven into the plot. I believe Casey herself may have DID, and I’m definitely going to be writing a spin-off where it’s portrayed far better. Watch this space!
Rating 3.5/5
Criminal Minds is one of our comfort shows, which I know is odd for a show full of serial killers, which is, at times, rather graphic! I think it is because there is vindication in the fact that they catch the bad guy, and when you have been abused and not had any justice come of that, seeing justice on screen is healing. Plus, we have an introject of one of the main characters, JJ, who is an immense source of comfort to us (see our recent article ‘My mother used to say all I knew how to do was daydream’ for an explanation of this!) Yet, I digress.
Criminal Minds has two explicit DID storylines that I want to comment on. The first, briefly, is the story of Tobias Hankel, an abused child turned serial killer. He has alters, which are almost exclusively introjects, one of his father and one of the archangel Gabriel (do note that for survivors of religious abuse, this storyline could be triggering!). It is a rather stereotypical presentation, though slightly better than Split in my eyes, because there is a clear portrayal of the inner conflict between alters and how they aren’t all ‘evil’.
The other presentation is incredibly fascinating (I would say unique in media) because in the Mr Scratch storyline, it is the adults with DID who are the victims of someone else, rather than perpetrators. They still commit crimes, but only because they are forced through drugs and coercion. Whilst obviously a fairly distressing storyline, I am at least glad to see that, for once, I am not a mindless, manipulative murderer just because of my condition! There is also a good presentation of people having alters of different genders, which is very common (although, within my system, we are all woman-adjacent) and it was nice to see a male body being portrayed as having had two young girls as headmates.
I would still recommend Criminal Minds as a show and, when taken with a pinch of salt, the DID presentations aren’t ones I would actively warn against!
Inside Out (2015) and Inside Out 2 (2024)
Rating: 4.5/5
Whilst these films are not directly about DID, which is the reason for the slightly less-than-perfect rating, an incredible amount of detail is transferable to understanding systems’ experiences. Indeed, as discussed in our previous article, these movies have been a great therapeutic tool for us! The main character, Riley, and all the other characters, are depicted as having a control room inside their minds where different emotions can take over and control the situation. Whether that be Disgust keeping Riley safe from the dreaded broccoli, Joy appearing when Riley is doing ice hockey, or Anger when she misses a goal, the presentation of different emotional states and their individual personalities is akin to our experience with DID.
Moreover, it helps explain the origin of DID: everyone has these different emotional states in childhood until about the age of 7-9 when the personality fuses into one (think of the magical ‘Sense of Self’ in Inside Out 2). But when you experience severe and enduring childhood trauma, this sense of self is ruptured, and you continue to have different states which develop into what we know as alters.
Rating 4.5/5
This is a rather curious short film directed by someone who has a parent with DID. I very much enjoyed watching it, and felt a strong connection to the lead character, Rose, and her headmates. While certain parts felt less similar to our experience, the general presentation (and the fact that Rose isn’t a serial killer!) was overwhelmingly positive. The clever portrayal of switches between alters (represented by different actors), the conversations between Rose and her headmates, the relatively accurate portrayal of what a flashback feels like, and the support offered by Jeremy (Rose’s partner) when she tells him about having DID: all these meant that I felt safe and represented in this film. I also loved the pie analogy used to explain DID to Jeremy, and will certainly be using that down the line!
‘I’m like this pie. I have this condition, its a protective mechanism really called Dissociative Identity Disorder, because of the abuse I suffered for many years as a child. Each time something traumatic happened, my brain did this thing where it divided me into these different parts. They’re actually wonderful and they helped me deal with the traumas. It was a way that I didn’t have to hold all of the emotions at once so I could survive this horrible abuse.’
It was only the ending that, for me, didn’t quite sit right, but that may have been a misunderstanding: whilst Rose seemed to welcome her headmates and say she needed to work more with them, the ending showed them each sitting on her lap and then disappearing, which to me seemed to imply that they had decided upon final fusion. I support those who do wish this, but I fear to an audience of people without DID, it may appear that healing can only happen when all alters have integrated and become ‘one person’ again. I fear this pressure may remove the choice to heal in other ways and make systems feel unworthy unless they are working towards a societal ‘normal’ and becoming ‘whole’ again.
Overall, there are so few presentations of DID in the media, even though the condition is by no means rare (affecting 1-3% of the population), and there are even fewer positive portrayals. There is work to be done, and it’s a good job I am a writer because I hope to share my stories (both fictional and memoir) with the world and show that we are simply ourselves: traumatised and surviving, vulnerable and brave.
Glossary:
DID: Dissociative Identity Disorder, previously known as Multiple Personality Disorder. A condition where a child’s brain, due to extreme and ongoing trauma throughout childhood, does not form the same way as most people, leaving a person with distinct identity parts and a level of amnesia between them.
System: the term people with DID typically use to describe themselves as a collection of alters.
Alter: a distinct identity part within the system. Others may call these parts, identity states, headmates, or simply people. Some still use the term personalities, though this is less common and can cause controversy. Alters can be different ages and genders, look different internally, use different names, and have different interests and personalities.
Host: the alter in the system who fronts most often. For some, this is the alter who identifies most with the body; some systems do not have a single host or any at all.
Headmate: another term for alter.
Switch: when the alter fronting changes.
Fronting: a term used for when a specific alter is out and doing things as themselves in the body.
Littles: child alters, who usually are stuck at the age of trauma. When a child alter is fronting, the body has the mental capacity of that age and acts and often talks like a kid.
Introjects: alters that have a ‘source’ that they are based on. This can be a fictional character or someone in real life. These alters have absorbed qualities, beliefs, skills or even memories from significant figures in your life and take on aspects of these figures (both positive and negative). They are not a carbon copy of these people and whilst they reflect them, these alters are still distinctly themselves.
Final fusion: the term used by systems who aim to integrate their alters and become ‘one person’. Some fusions happen naturally, as alters resolve their individual traumas. This was previously viewed as the only treatment by psychiatric professionals.
Resources on DID:
FPP charity (legacy site) https://www.firstpersonplural.org.uk/dissociation/complex-dissociative-disorders/
@dissociation.info (Instagram)