Discovering Multiple Personality Disorder

I discovered that I had Multiple Personality Disorder in August of 2010. I had been going to a free counselor that my school sponsored and I thought it would be a good idea to look through an old journal to help remember some things we had been talking about. This is when I found two journal entries that I did not remember making.

The entries claimed to be from "Thanatos" (Greek for "death.") He made a few claims. First, that he had taken over because Erin was overwhelmed with schoolwork. Second, that he did not intend to let Erin come back until her work was straightened out. Last, that his name came from the Bible, Romans 6:23, "For the wages of sin is death..." A few entries later, Erin wrote again saying that she was back but she didn't know for how long. This was the one of the only mentions of Thanatos in my entire journal.

Before I found these journal entries, I had some suspicions about some "characters" I had created back in middle and high school. The fun thing to do back then among my tiny social group was to create characters to draw and make stories about. I thought nothing of these "characters" that I created until I noticed that they held more symbolic significance for me than other people's characters held.

When I talked with my close college friends (many of whom had counseling or psychology backgrounds)their suspicious were raised, but they thought they were just symbolic characters I had made in order to express myself more fully.

After I found the journal entries, I began having panic attacks in which these "characters" would show up and prey on my fears and failures: friends and family abandoning me, bad grades, slacking at responsibilities, hypocrisy, and the list can go on.

My college room mate, Nickie, was adamant about me telling my counselor about this... I procrastinated... until Tuesday, September 28. The voices of my "characters" were so loud that it felt like I was going to be lost among them and lose my own identity.

October 6, 2010, I began counseling with Roberta. I had gathered as much information I could about all my "characters" and presented it all to her... Poor woman, I'm sure it must have been information overload... She took it all in and we have begun to work on figuring it all out.

The point of this blog, what I hope to gain from it, is for me to have a place to vent out fears, struggles, and hopes while I go through this process. I hope that those reading can relate, if only a small amount, to these struggles. If you are like me, I hope this blog will be a bit of encouragement; you are not alone.

--Yomi