Broken-down house, Source https://www.flickr.com, Authors Forest and Kim Starr (CC BY-SA 3.0 United States)
This post from Stephen Forrest at Therapy Glasgow eloquently conveys the essence of Dissociative Identity Disorder:
“Still Like A House
Fractured? No, curiously I feel fractured but I see myself in the mirror and I’m whole, standing still like a house. The mirror may be fractured, but my eyes still swivel like windows in this head, guided by a nose that acts as a weather vane. I open and close my mouth like a door and my ears sit like unoiled hinges. But I don’t feel like a house. I feel like a room: a room divided against itself.
Whole Not Hole
If I am whole, how come there are holes in my experience? Not holes; they just feel like holes. They’re no more holes than my forgetting what I had for breakfast last Tuesday is a hole. If I decide, out of my indecision comes a need to follow a trail of breadcrumbs, walking backwards in flip-flop sandals: Shameday, Shatterday, Frightday, Thugsday, Whensday, Chewsday: vegetarian bacon that tasted like cardboard soaked in lapsang souchong.
Not Broken
Broken. Like a wine glass washed in a lapse of concentration, snapped stem in the sink? No, I just feel broken. I’m no more broken than my daydream in the bubbles is a symptom of a broken mind. I just went travelling for a second and broke a glass, not my hip…” [Continued at https://therapyglasgow.com/2019/02/02/dissociative-identity-disorder/?c=166#comment-166. ]
FOR MORE OF MY ARTICLES ON POVERTY, POLITICS, AND MATTERS OF CONSCIENCE CHECK OUT MY BLOG A LAWYER’S PRAYERS AT: https://alawyersprayers.com
ANNA WALDHERR A Voice Reclaimed, Surviving Child Abuse 
This is a wonderful peek at the mind of a sufferer of dissociative affective disorder. Split personality and dissociation may allow perpetrators of violence to remain emotionally distant from their behavior and minimize empathy toward those they victimize, enabling them to commit acts of violence.
Probably, at the core of a lot of domestic violence issues are a mental health issue. At the first sign of abuse or abusive traits, partners who observe behavior must seek and insist on counseling and therapy even if the abusive partner is unwilling. Unwillingness to seek help is a red flag and must be taken seriously before things get out of hand. Love is not enough and fear of stigmatization is no reason to condone or keep a partner unwilling to seek help.
Thank you, Anna, for another wonderful post. Love and blessings!
I always appreciate your valuable insights, Gbolabo. I would add only that trauma can, iteself, result in dissociative identity disorder. Victims may so effectively distance themselves mentally and emotionally from the horrific events they are experiencing that they do not form coherent memories. In that sense, dissociative identity disorder is actually a protective mechanism of the mind. Compartmentalizing the rage they cannot express is, also, a a way for victims to respond to the violation they have suffered. Love and blessings to you! ❤
You are so right Anna. Trauma, especially childhood maltreatment is a risk factor for developing dissociation and for subsequent intimate partner violence.
I am just learning that it is also a protective mechanism. Thank you for this explanation.
Many thanks for reposting this Anna. Gbolabo, when I wrote this I was writing from the perspective of the person who experiences DID phenomenon as a benign way of coping rather than compartmentalising violence or aggression. But you’re right, some people do experience this [I haven’t come across any myself however]. Passive-aggression is not dissimilar in some ways – a means of expressing dissociated aggression – although much more subtle, and is something that most of us exhibit to some degree or another. All the best, Stephen