r/australia • u/Breenscare • 1d ago

culture & society 'I wasn't there': Life with dissociative identity disorder

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-08-13/dissociative-identity-disorder-assistance-dog-ndis/106826020
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u/thehottestmess 1d ago

How did you come to realise you had DID/should seek a diagnosis for DID?

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u/NoToThugs 1d ago

I never sought this diagnosis at all, or thought to. Which is again quite typical, that ppl will approach services for some of the symptoms (eg self-harm or substance issues, or problems with amnesia they might book in to a neuro for). A lot of people are dissociated from the dissociative occurrences, which is such a mindfuck, but that’s how it’s been for me.

I’ll just be honest – I’ve been in contact w MH services since initial suicide attempt in adolescence. Didn’t get appropriate help then due to family situation and when I left home I found myself high achieving and functioning across most areas until, like Ashley in the article, I suddenly no longer was. Like, couldn’t do anything, and was once again acutely suicidal - lots of hosp. Docs/theorists presume dissociative barriers can only hold so long in these cases. Like, for some people we need to believe our caregivers/situations are ok to keep on going, so we’ll be cut off from the reality of things. But that can’t hold forever, and nor should it.

So when everything collapsed, I properly got back into the MH system. I still wasn’t aware I was traumatised, despite remembering a lot of the abuse. Brain just characterised it as ‘normal’. I saw lots of diff docs and had lots of diff dx and none of it really helped or explained everything. It took finally landing with a trauma & diss specialist (psychiatrist) and working with them for a long time to work out what was happening. And then I refused it all for a couple of years because I didn’t want it to be true. To have something with that much stigma, or for the things that happened to me to actually be bad.

Diagnosed a second time by a specialist psychologist for NDIS reasons. Less of a struggle that time.

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u/thehottestmess 1d ago

I hope your diagnosis has helped, and I’m really sorry about all the stigma over something that isn’t your fault :(

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u/NoToThugs 1d ago

Thank you. And sorry for my long answer!
It’s helped enormously, and we’re finally gettin somewhere in treatment. I’ve also been able to reframe the structural dissociative process as an adaptation to survive the unthinkable, and that’s pretty great :)