Dissociative Disorder 

Dissociative Amnesia is the breakdown of memory, consciousness, awareness or perception where a person loses the ability to recall important autobiographical information. And the person may even find it difficult to recall some traumatic or stressful event. 

The memories of the person are buried within his/her mind and can’t be recalled, which duration can range from hours to years 

Dissociative stupor is caused by high levels of stress or a traumatic experience, which affects the sensory organs severely causing unresponsiveness to external stimuli like sound, light and touch; it also restrains the voluntary movement of the body. The person stops reacting physically to the external environment, even though they are awake and conscious. 
 

SYMPTOMS 

• Loss of feeling 

• Blurred vision 

• No response to external stimuli 

• Lack of speech 

• Partial or full paralysis 
   

When a person faces a huge traumatic event like loss of a parent, physical abuse, sexual exploitation or emotional stress, to overcome that deep pain the self defence mechanism of our brain creates a new identity and dissociates with that stressful trauma. 

As a result 1 or more individual starts living in a person’s brain, alternately taking control of the individual. 

Dissociative Identity Disorder was formerly called multiple personality disorder because each of the personality has its own characteristics, mannerism and perception. 

People with Dissociative Identity disorder many times also have dissociative amnesia and dissociative fugue. 

This type of disorder sometimes causes extensive memory loss. 
 

SYMPTOMS 

• Depersonalization (feeling disconnected or detached from one’s body or thoughts) 

• Depression or mood swings 

• Problem functioning sexually 

• Hallucinations 

• Severe headaches 

• Anxiety or panic attacks 

• Amnesia 

• Derealisation 
   

Dissociative fugue is a state where a person becomes confused about his identity due to severe stress or trauma. He/she travels away from home work without planning or warning anyone to a new location. 

They cannot recall the past of their own life and have no conscious understanding or knowledge of their actions. In severe cases they may form a new identity of their own. 
 

SYMPTOMS 

• Loss of memory 

• Confusion of identity 

• Unplanned travel away from home 

• Extreme distress 

• Problems in functioning of daily life