Brief educational thread on various dissociative disorders.

It's important to note that dissociation can occur from a disorder that is not explicitly dissociative; i.e borderline personality disorder, depression, anxiety disorders. These are categorized as such because a *major* symptom is dissociation.

Derealization/Depersonalization:
Ongoing feelings of the world or yourself not being real. These feelings are persistent and interfere with your daily life, as well as causing significant distress. Common triggers are stress, childhood trauma, and/or a comorbid disorder.

Dissociative Identity Disorder:
Debated, but generally believed to be caused by childhood trauma at any age before 9. Before the personality is developed, disruptions cause it to "split" or "branch off" into multiple personalities. Dissociative amnesic barriers exist. -

One part may be completely unaware of others due to this amnesia. Many of those affected also have amnesia involving their original trauma and much of their childhood. This disorder is highly debated by psychologists but brain scans and research prove it is a real phenomenon.

Dissociative Amnesia:
A rare dissociative disorder used to describe wide gaps in memory which cannot be explained by other mental disorders, physical ailments, or drug use. It is stereotypically seen in mysterious stories wherein somebody remembers nothing about their past life.

These are the "main three." Otherwise Specified Dissociative Disorder is another diagnosis, often used as a "catchall" when one almost fits into the categories above, but I'll leave this thread to those three for the sake of simplicity.