DID is an abbreviation of Dissociative Identity Disorder. DID refer to a mental ailment where a patient experiences two distinct personalities or identities. Each personality has its own way of relating and viewing the world in a consistent manner. In some cases, DID patients have been seen to have identities that exhibit a completely different emotional reactions, blood pressure, pulse and flow of blood to the brain. Formerly known as the multiple personality disorder , this condition is colloquially called the split personality disorder. Statistics indicate that at least 3 percent of patients in mental or psychiatric hospitals have this condition. DID is also said to occur 9 times more in females than in males. The preponderance of this condition to females may be as a result of challenges in identifying DID in males. Disagreements within professionals on mental health on how DID manifests clinically or even its existence may also cause challenges in estimating how frequently it occurs.

The Debate around DID

There are professionals who hold the opinion that there is no such disorder as DID. This skepticism is driven by questions such as why individuals that have gone through awful abuse as children or endured stress fail to develop DID and why many kids are not diagnosed with DID. There are also questions as to why some of the DID patients do not have a history of serious trauma. One of the explanations to what some professionals see as inconsistencies is, given the unknown and complex nature of human psyche and brain, most people expected to develop DID fail to do so because of their resilience. The other concern around DID diagnosis has to do with reliance on traumatic memories of DID patients. Some practitioners hold that DID is a myth based on culture because it is mostly assessed in people living in North America as opposed to other parts of the world.