Mental disorders are common throughout the United States, and even the world, but the one I want to focus on today is one known as dissociative identity disorder. "Dissociative identity disorder, once called multiple personality disorder, results in two or more split identities." Dissociative identity disorder is one of the more commonly known mental disorders in the world. Though some cases of the disorder are the result of some kind of trauma, I argue that not all cases are this way. While D.I.D. is still being researched even today, it is still pretty vague in the mind of researchers. About 1% of the general population has been diagnosed with D.I.D. Over 7% of the world population have admitted to experiencing several symptoms of the disorder and 1/3 of people have had several out of body experiences while they were alive. While this all seems a bit shocking, we also have to consider the fact that there could be many more people who have this disorder and haven't been diagnosed.

Next is a short story I wrote, to kinda explain what having this disorder is like.

Two Souls

Two Souls

CRASH! BOOM! Lightning tore across the sky in bright flashes as the ground shook and trembled in fear under the mighty roar of thunder. Only two men stood in the parched, rocky landscape, both fitted with dark hair and slim bodies. One had light hazel eyes and wore a light gray drawstring pullover with the hood down as well as a pair of stonewashed jeans and white shoes. The other wore a pair of aviator styled sunglasses over dark eyes, and he wore a trench-coat over a white collared shirt tucked into a silver buckled belted pair of solid black slacks. His feet were clad in a pair of square toed shoes.

The two were circling each other, looking for an opportunity to catch the other off-guard. CRACK! They sky flashed and the earth rumbled once more as the men clashed together. Then there was a sudden darkness.

“Hello?” A foggy voice said as Rome's eyes slowly blinked into focus. “Are you okay, Rome?” This voice asked again, before the face speaking swam into focus. He was pale-skinned, had carefully brushed hair and wore a pair of squared glasses. His nose was a bit longer than most, but that didn't seem to bother him. “You zoned out again, didn't you?” He asked.

“Yeah, sorry about that, Lewis...” Rome replied smoothly before running a hand through his hair. “Just a lot on my mind lately.” Rome looked around and noticed they were in a large hallway, at school. The floors were tiled and the walls blocked, with waves of teenagers flooding in and out of classrooms. Lewis and Rome were standing by their lockers, which happened to be side by side.

SMACK! The sound of a hand making contact with skin caused Rome to blink and turn, seeing some jock smacking a girl. 'Don't you dare...' He thought inwardly, as if speaking to someone.

'And if I do?' A voice replies back to him from his head. 'What are you going to do about it? It's my body too, and if you tell someone that you didn't do it, they are just going to call you crazy.'

'I know we should say something.... But it's difficult. I can't bring myself to stop it.' Rome thinks inwardly.

“That just isn't right...” Lewis says with a shake of his head.

“Exactly what I was thinking.” Rome breathed out.

'Let me take care of it.' The voice says smugly.

This voice didn't give Rome time to answer, as by this point, this voice had already thrown Rome back and put himself into control, regardless of Rome's protests, right as the jock smacked the girl a second time. It was obvious that she was trying not to cry. The voice was behind the bully within seconds. “I dare you to do that again.” He challenged.

“Huh?” The jock said as he turned. He was easily a head taller than Rome. “Oh. What are you going to do about it, Shrimp?” He taunted.

Rome's body didn't have to voice a response after what he did next. Within seconds, the jock was knocked away from the girl and was pressed against the lockers, Rome's hands around his throat.

“Listen,” the voice started darkly as Rome's hair fell in his face and the bully gagged, “if I catch you hurting someone again, it will get very chaotic.”

'Stop! You'll kill him, and then we will both have a nasty situation on our hands.' Rome shouted into the voice's mind.

'I am Chaos, and I do as I please.' Chaos, previously the voice, stated, just as he threw the boy down and everything was cast in shadows.

Once again, the two figures stood circling each other, Rome with the pullover and Chaos with the trench-coat, as lightning crashed in the background of the barren world.

“It's my body, my rules. You can't just do whatever you want whenever you want!” Rome shouted angrily.

“I don't care, I have just as much right to this body as you do.” Chaos casually expressed back, a slight smirk of annoyance cast on his face.

“But we have shared this body our entire lives, and you have not once complained about me having more time out than you until recently. Why are you doing this?” Rome asked, gritting his teeth.

“Because your tyranny needs to be rebelled against. I'm tired of sitting around and doing nothing while you get to do everything!” Chaos yelled as he pounced at Rome right as lightning struck the two, and darkness clouded all.

Even a few months after the incident, Rome was constantly in conflict with Chaos, the two always fighting over who should be in control, Rome always being called some kind of selfish monarch or dictator. Rome didn't quite understand why. He was trying to be reasonable with Chaos about this. Chaos just simply wasn't cut up for a semi-civilized life.

'Maybe if you'd let me have control every so often, I would know how to deal with these things.' Chaos declared quite loudly in Rome's head.

Rome was sitting in his history class, having difficulty focusing due to Chaos being a constant annoyance and always battling for control. 'Give it up.' Rome replied sternly. 'I'm not giving you control again.' Rome sighed softly before dropping his head slightly and closing his eyes.

Rome was wondering through a forest, trees bright and colorful as leaves fluttered to the ground slowly all around, small animals running about in all directions. There were squirrels, butterflies, deer, and even the occasional rabbit. Everything was beautiful. Rome stepped into a clearing, and the environment shifted. The ground split and shook. The wind shrieked in his ears. The earth around him tore itself out of the ground and dissolved into dust as clouds suddenly darkened the sky. Lightning crashed and thunder growled as Rome looked ahead of him and seen the trench-coat of Chaos once more.

“Give me control.” Chaos commanded.

“No.” Rome said as his eyelids lowered in a glare as lightning flashed, a loud tear in the sky turning everything white.

Rome found his eyes splitting open just as a loud bell shrilled and the classroom swam into his vision. “Great...” He mumbled. “His resistance will be the death of me...”

'Well, I wouldn't rebel as much if you would let me take over every now and again,' Chaos grumbled in his head. 'It's my body too, you know.'

'Last time you took control, forcibly, I might add, you almost strangled someone.' Rome retorted.

'He shouldn't have hit that girl.' Chaos shot back as Rome rose from his seat and walked out into the hallway, a backpack slung over his left shoulder.

Rome simply groaned. He was tired of these constant arguments. 'Whatever.' He commented. He lazily drew his vision across the hall, freezing as his eyes glued themselves on a particular figure, a girl. She was slim with long, dark hair, glasses and beautiful hazel eyes. Rome had become absolutely head over heels over this girl from the day they met, which was a few years back, but had never been able to muster up enough courage to bring it up. Her name was Keira.

'If you like her so much, why are you so scared of telling her?' Chaos teased.

'How am I supposed to tell Keira how I feel about her? There is no way she will like a fruitcake such as myself.' Rome replied right before he crashed into Keira herself.

She squeaked as his weight and momentum brought them both crashing to the ground, knocking the air from his lungs. When he noticed the precarious position the two were in, he instantly rolled off of her. “You're lucky that you're my best friend, otherwise, I would have hit you for that.” She said sternly, a soft southern twang rolling off her tongue.

“Sorry...” Rome replied, or rather, Chaos replied, because he managed to use this moment of weakness to get out.

“What do I always tell you? Show that you're sorry, don't say tha-” She started right before Chaos kissed her where she laid, causing her face to shift to a cherry red; her eyes widening in surprise before closing slowly, her arms wrapping around him. Chaos chose this moment to pull away.

“Listen, I really like you...” Chaos trailed purposely. 'You're doing the rest, lover boy. I'm not doing this mushy stuff for you.' He thought to Rome as he sunk in and threw Rome back in control.

“You do?” Keira asked, the two now on their feet in the time it took Rome and Chaos to swap out.

“Ye-yeah.” Rome stuttered. “I just never could find the courage to tell you.”

“It's funny, because I've always felt the same about you...” She responds quietly, her face beyond the color of a tomato.

Rome blinked in surprise. He hadn't expected this at all. And did Chaos actually help him?

'I'd like to propose a solution to our problem. I scratch your back, you scratch mine, get it?' Chaos offers.

'What do you mean?' Rome asks him, a blank look on his face.

'Let me out to stretch my legs and get some activity, and I'll help you do things you normally couldn't.' Chaos supplied.

“Hello?” Keira asked. “Earth to Rome?”

Rome blinked, just now realizing that he was having a conversation with Keira before the voice interrupted and zoned him out. “Huh?” He asked.

“I was just asking if you, maybe, wanted to have a picnic with me this weekend, but I just remembered I can't cook to save my life, so...” She trailed off.

“You know I can cook..” Rome supplied sheepishly.

“Sounds great!” She responded with a grin. “Saturday at noon in the park?”

“Sounds like a plan!” Rome ended before they said their temporary goodbyes and parted ways.

'So, do we have an agreement?' Chaos asked.

'This is either the start of a beautiful friendship,' Rome started, 'or an unfathomable mistake.' Rome glanced around a moment, adjusted his backpack back into place on his shoulder, and smiled slightly. 'But sure, I'll bite.'

As you can see...

Living with this disorder can be a tough life, but it has its ups and downs. Sometimes we all have things we just have to live with, but that doesn't make them a bad thing all the time. Does it?