dougvincent1138
New member
- Joined
- Jan 13, 2018
- Messages
- 50
- MBTI Type
- INFJ
Hi, my name is Louise, and I am an INTJ. I know my profile says my name is Doug and I am an INFJ, but that's because, well... You know that part in the title of this post about sharing my brain? I wasn't speaking figuratively. I have a condition called DID, which stands for dissociative identity disorder. You may know it better by its previous name, which was multiple personality disorder. Actually, the part of "us" known as Doug isn't INFJ either, he is an INFP. The reason our profile says INFJ is because it was started by Leyna, another part in our system who is an INFJ.
But anyway, on to what I was actually planning to write about. When I did an online version of the MBTI test and found out that my profile is INTJ, and started reading what the website said about that profile, I realized how right it was about me. But I also realized something else: that someone who had the most extreme version of INTJ, at 100% of each of those traits, would end up looking a lot like Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory. It made me realize how lucky I am to literally share the same brain/body with others who have different personality types. So far, 16 of us have taken the simplified version of the MBTI from that same website, and we've found out that between those 16 parts, we have at least 11 different personality types in our brain.
I thought about the two others within our system that I have been the closest to over the years: Doug, who was my best friend in the internal world when we were growing up (even though he didn't know that I existed in the external world...it's complicated), and Mattie, who is my "little sister". Doug is INFP, like I said earlier, and Mattie is ENTP. I think that Doug's friendship has helped me to learn to be more comfortable with my emotions that most INTJ's, and my little sister Mattie's bubbly, enthusiastic friendliness has helped me to be somewhat more comfortable with extroversion and being sociable. I know what you're probably thinking, how is this any different than being positively influenced by friends and family in the external world? Well, it's hard to explain to someone who doesn't have DID, but there is a closeness between us within our system that is not something that can be achieved by two people who don't share the same brain/body. We can have a much more direct, and much more profound, influence on one another. It's pretty much impossible for two people in the external world to always be together physically, even if they live in the same house or apartment. But since it is literally never possible for me to be physically separate from Doug or Mattie, or any of the others in our system, that creates a symbiotic relationship in which we all influence each other. Of course, the flip side of that coin is that it's also possible for us to profoundly influence each other in negative ways, as well. That's why we have to constantly make an effort to do the best job we can of cooperating with and loving each other, and to avoid tensions and bitterness from forming. If we are capable of forming friendships like no one else, that means we are also capable of making enemies like no one else. However, that doesn't mean that we are ticking time bombs that are likely to become extremely violent with others at any time, like most of the fictional movies that have been made about people with DID like to claim. In practice, when DID systems are thrown into chaos due to lack of cooperation, it is much more likely to lead to self-harm and/or suicide attempts than it is to violence toward others.
In conclusion, the point I'm trying to make is this: if properly understood, DID can actually give people like us an advantage. It can help us to bring balance to our own personalities, develop our strengths, and lessen our weaknesses. It can help to make sure that we don't ever become so extreme in our personalities that we become almost incapable of forming healthy relationships with others, like Sheldon Cooper. I know that Sheldon doesn't have very many friends on that show, but I think in real life, someone with a personality as extreme as his would have even fewer friends. I'm not trying to be arrogant and say that I'm better than most of you because I have DID, I'm just saying that that is one advantage that DID can potentially have, IF the DID person puts in the work to develop a good cooperative relationship with the rest of their system. Believe me, that's not easy. It has taken us years of therapy to get to where we are today. There are some potential advantages to DID, but there are also a lot of disadvantages. But part of the reason I am writing this, too, is to make the point that we DID people are not as "freaky" as most people tend to think we are (again, based mostly on what is shown in fictional movies about us). We are just people trying to live our lives and overcome our difficulties to be the best person/people that we can be.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and let me know if you have any questions for me. I would be happy to answer them.
Louise Vincent
But anyway, on to what I was actually planning to write about. When I did an online version of the MBTI test and found out that my profile is INTJ, and started reading what the website said about that profile, I realized how right it was about me. But I also realized something else: that someone who had the most extreme version of INTJ, at 100% of each of those traits, would end up looking a lot like Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory. It made me realize how lucky I am to literally share the same brain/body with others who have different personality types. So far, 16 of us have taken the simplified version of the MBTI from that same website, and we've found out that between those 16 parts, we have at least 11 different personality types in our brain.
I thought about the two others within our system that I have been the closest to over the years: Doug, who was my best friend in the internal world when we were growing up (even though he didn't know that I existed in the external world...it's complicated), and Mattie, who is my "little sister". Doug is INFP, like I said earlier, and Mattie is ENTP. I think that Doug's friendship has helped me to learn to be more comfortable with my emotions that most INTJ's, and my little sister Mattie's bubbly, enthusiastic friendliness has helped me to be somewhat more comfortable with extroversion and being sociable. I know what you're probably thinking, how is this any different than being positively influenced by friends and family in the external world? Well, it's hard to explain to someone who doesn't have DID, but there is a closeness between us within our system that is not something that can be achieved by two people who don't share the same brain/body. We can have a much more direct, and much more profound, influence on one another. It's pretty much impossible for two people in the external world to always be together physically, even if they live in the same house or apartment. But since it is literally never possible for me to be physically separate from Doug or Mattie, or any of the others in our system, that creates a symbiotic relationship in which we all influence each other. Of course, the flip side of that coin is that it's also possible for us to profoundly influence each other in negative ways, as well. That's why we have to constantly make an effort to do the best job we can of cooperating with and loving each other, and to avoid tensions and bitterness from forming. If we are capable of forming friendships like no one else, that means we are also capable of making enemies like no one else. However, that doesn't mean that we are ticking time bombs that are likely to become extremely violent with others at any time, like most of the fictional movies that have been made about people with DID like to claim. In practice, when DID systems are thrown into chaos due to lack of cooperation, it is much more likely to lead to self-harm and/or suicide attempts than it is to violence toward others.
In conclusion, the point I'm trying to make is this: if properly understood, DID can actually give people like us an advantage. It can help us to bring balance to our own personalities, develop our strengths, and lessen our weaknesses. It can help to make sure that we don't ever become so extreme in our personalities that we become almost incapable of forming healthy relationships with others, like Sheldon Cooper. I know that Sheldon doesn't have very many friends on that show, but I think in real life, someone with a personality as extreme as his would have even fewer friends. I'm not trying to be arrogant and say that I'm better than most of you because I have DID, I'm just saying that that is one advantage that DID can potentially have, IF the DID person puts in the work to develop a good cooperative relationship with the rest of their system. Believe me, that's not easy. It has taken us years of therapy to get to where we are today. There are some potential advantages to DID, but there are also a lot of disadvantages. But part of the reason I am writing this, too, is to make the point that we DID people are not as "freaky" as most people tend to think we are (again, based mostly on what is shown in fictional movies about us). We are just people trying to live our lives and overcome our difficulties to be the best person/people that we can be.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and let me know if you have any questions for me. I would be happy to answer them.
Louise Vincent