Multiple Personalities Do They Really Exist Essays -

Multiple Personalities: Do They Really Exist? Multiple personalities- the existence of two or more distinct personalities or personality states within one person. In actuality, up to ten or even more personalities can coexist within one person, some documented cases have revealed over one hundred. But, the question remains, what exactly is the multiple personality disorder (MPD)? First I will look at what exactly the disorder is. It is, in simple terms, many complex personalities all inhabiting the same body. At any given time, one of those personalities is in control of the body. Each one has different tastes, style, thought process, and many other things that define a person. However, research has proven even more than that. In clinical studies it has been found that of the different personalities of one person, the eye prescription, allergies, athletic ability, and even diabetes can exist in one of the personalities and not the others. The person can switch at any given time from one personality to another, often not realizing it. This can account for memory loss and time loss in the primary personality, who often does not have access to the memories of the other personalities. A common misconception among the general public is the confusion of MPD with the disease of schizophrenia. Schizophrenics do NOT have distinct personalities, rather, they have hallucinations of voices outside their heads. Schizophrenia is caused by brain malfunctions and can be treated with drugs, whereas suffers of MPD cannot because MPD is an almost purely psychological disorder. MPD seems to be caused mainly by incredibly violent and terrible childhood abuse. In fact, about 98% of MPD sufferers were abused as children. The disorder also occurs between three to nine times more in women than men, the person being abused creates other personalities to handle the pain. In the case of a man named Milligan, his father beat him and sexually abused him. Then he forced the boy to dig his own grave, burying him alive with only a stove pipe to breath through. Then the father urinated into the pipe onto the boy's face. With that kind of abuse, you either go crazy, die, or develop other personalities. That is why, in many people with MPD, there are agitated and distracted child personalities. These personalities were created in order to suffer the pain of abuse. When the abuse was over, their call was no longer needed and the primary personality could resume control, dropping with that second personality all memory of the event and continuing as if nothing happened. This type of personality exists in almost all MPD sufferers. Another common personality is the Persecutor personality. This personality is created to absorb the rage the person feels towards his abusers. It often lashes out, either at other people or at the other personalities, because it believes some of the punishment was their fault. To punish that personality it will often harm the body of the person, not realizing it is hurting itself in the process. A final common personality is the Protector personality. It is created to give a feeling of protection to the child personalities and to try to prevent the Persecutor from lashing out at others or itself. These are obviously not all the personalities, found, but they are the most common. Due to all these conflicting interests the personalities often argue with each other. This is why the person often hears voices "inside his head" whereas the schizophrenic hears them from outside in the world. Many people dispute the existence of multiple personalities. They argue that such an idea is impossible and that the people are simply making it up. However, I believe the opposite, and many people share my opinion due to one study. Around 10 years ago a Dr. Putnam conducted an experiment, whereby he hooked several MPD sufferers up to a machine that measures brain waves. He then subjected each personality of each person to a set of stimuli. Each personality reacted differently, the difference was around the same as between two separate people. The control group of volunteers faking the disorder could produce any difference, indicating to me that something is very different about those states of mind, and they cannot simply make up the changes in response to stimuli, nor can they fake diabetes and different physical requirements as I stated earlier as examples in differences of personalities. To move on to treatment, there is virtually no treatment a psychiatrist can offer other than extensive psychotherapy and hypnosis. In bringing out the suffering that caused the development of personalities, usually many