Have you found any books or workbooks to be helpful in dealing with DID? Or any other self-help materials?
New Landscape ~ DID/MPD Support Group
New York support group for people with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) / Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD)
I’m dealing with anger enough that I recently went through a workbook on anger. Also reading another book on it. It’s kind of nice to work on anger in the present – anger about now. Even if some of my anger relates to my childhood, etc, it’s a little refreshing to work on it like anyone else would. Trying to cope with anger like everyone else. They aren’t books for people with DID or anything – just regular old books! for anyone dealing with anger issues.
The workbook is faith-based and is called “The Anger Workbook” by Carter & Minirth. The other is called “The Dance of Anger” by Harriet Lerner.
when i brought up the question at the group, i was looking specifically for tools for coping with DID. it’s so hard for me to believe that there isn’t something available along the lines of the ADHD workbook, or the various workbooks for other types of issues.
not that i think there is just one way of solving things, but i feel like i wind up spending a lot of effort coming up with tools to cope with the specifics of DID. not the trauma-related stuff, because there *is* a lot of stuff out there on that… more of the “how do i establish communication” or “how do we organize all the different parts getting to do the things they need to do” or…. that kind of thing.
different tools people can use for mapping their system, or for having a daily meeting, or exercises for communication.
yes, there are tons of books on dealing with trauma, and i have a ton of them, and have read more than those. but sometimes, it’s about deciding who gets to choose the flavor of ice cream, and who gets to decide what to do with the day… not because of trauma, but because we don’t have good communication.
workbooks i’ve found helpful, if people are looking for more trauma-specific stuff:
“getting through the day” by nancy napier
“the courage to heal”
“amongst ourselves” (this one is the closest to the DID workbook i’m looking for, but i’m just needing something slightly more advanced at this point)
i’ll list other books if i think of them.
O ya – a DID workbook. Anyone out there care to take this challenge up??! Someone need a book to write? How about trying to create a useful DID workbook?!!
Well, won’t that be interesting to see – if one day there are workbooks out there for DID.
i’m actually thinking of getting people to help me write one. my thought is: if we each write down all the things that have been useful for us, then people can look through and be like, “oh! i hadn’t thought of trying *that*, let’s see if it works for me!”
i’ll post here if i figure out a way of people working together on this (i’m thinking a forum, but i want to make sure i can make it really clear that it’s a different thing than the support forums, since there are already plenty of those around).
but back to books that *already* exist:
has anyone read The Family Inside: Working With the Multiple? someone recommended it to me, but i can’t tell whether it’s a workbook type of book, or more narrative. well, from the comments, it seems like it’s more narrative, but if it’s got useful exercises, i might get a copy anyways.
Chapter 1
I’ve just been diagnosed with DID! Now What?
And have symptom checklists and the DSM-IV definitions. Get a few testimonials of people’s experience when they were first diagnosed, how they felt, etc.
😉
PS – I haven’t read “The Family Inside” book. Sounds interesting tho’.
if anyone is interested in helping to write a DID workbook, i decided to start an online forum so people can work together on doing one. there isn’t much there, but as people add their bits and pieces of stuff that works for them, i think it will become pretty useful.
here’s the link (if it works) workbook.copingincrazyville.com/forum