Found Deceased CO - Gannon Stauch, 11, Colorado Springs, El Paso County, 27 Jan 2020 *Arrest* #53

[Kiranerys]

Didn't she originally post that on her own Facebook?!

Which means she thought she sounded good in it for a hot second.

She did.

 

[Niner]

Hi, @Niner, I recall that same info as well. Info must have changed since your records. As you know I went by linked article on previous page


"The trial will begin with two weeks of jury selection, where the prosecution and defense will work to select a 16-person jury for the trial, four of which will be alternates."

Jury trial for Letecia Stauch, accused of killing stepson Gannon, scheduled to begin

It's been over three years since 11-year-old Gannon Stauch died, and on Monday, the jury trial for his accused killer and stepmom, Letecia Stauch, is scheduled to begin.

gazette.com

That could be that my notes are old - I shall change them to 16 jurors - and thanks!

 

[arielilane]

Gruesome details of Gannon's murder. Justice is coming for ya, Gannon!

Additionally, you don't need to change your story if you're telling the truth. Warning: graphic details.

Letecia Stauch’s preliminary hearing reveals gruesome details of stepson’s murder

COLORADO SPRINGS — Blood spatter and a murder weapon were just a few pieces of evidence discussed in a preliminary hearing for Letecia Stauch, the stepmother arrested on murder charges in connectio…

www.fox21news.com

According to arrest records, Stauch gave law enforcement several stories as to what happened to her 11-year-old stepson, including sexual assault, kidnapping, a bike accident, and her initial report of simply failing to return home after visiting a friend.

 

[arielilane]

Bump for those interested in Jury Selection

Jury Selection Begins March 20, 2023

Click Here for Webinar Info

Colorado Judicial Branch

www.courts.state.co.us

 

[arielilane]

Justice for Gannon Stauch: Timeline to trial

(EL PASO COUNTY, Colo.) — The jury selection process and trial for Letecia Stauch, the woman accused of killing her 11-year-old stepson, Gannon, will begin on Monday, March 20, 2023. The presentati…

www.fox21news.com

(EL PASO COUNTY, Colo.) — The jury selection process and trial for Letecia Stauch, the woman accused of killing her 11-year-old stepson, Gannon, will begin on Monday, March 20, 2023. The presentation of evidence will follow on April 3.

Police arrested Stauch on March 2, 2022, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Stauch is charged with the following:

• Murder in the First Degree (Child Under Twelve – Position of Trust)
• First-degree Murder
• Child Abuse Resulting in Death
• Tampering with a Deceased Human Body
• Tampering with Physical Evidence
• Crime of Violence (8 counts)
• Attempted Escape

 

[GoJacks]

Bump for those interested in Jury Selection

Jury Selection Begins March 20, 2023

Click Here for Webinar Info

Colorado Judicial Branch

www.courts.state.co.us

How long do we give it before some idiot streams it on YouTube and it gets shut down ?

 

[10ofRods]

A lot of folks with an interest in dissociative disorders working with patients did have a psychoanalytic background, in the past. You only have to read pop psychology treatments like Sybil to see that. More recently, the work being done has more of a focus on things like neurology. It's less about Freud and dream analysis and more about the changes in your brain on a physical and chemical level due to trauma. van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score is a good example of this.

Early days of them working with Lewis, they really obviously wanted to get either an EEG or an MRI for LS... can't remember which it was, or if it was both. I suspect she wanted to try to get brain scans of her in different states. It's a known phenomenon that with genuine cases of DID, often different system members will look different in scans. It's been done by different folks working with DID patients for almost as long as they've been studying it in the modern age. You can see it done in the reality series 'Many Sides of Jane'. The other thing they like to do with different system members is complex personality tests, the MMPI and such. They also use tests specifically designed to show rates of dissociation, like the DES (though that one isn't used often now, it's been replaced with other, more accurate tests). I would expect that minus the scans, they had her do a bunch of testing of that kind.

Here are some articles about brain scans being done on patients with DID.

Computers can 'spot the difference' between healthy brains and the brains of people with Dissociative Identity Disorder | Website archive | King’s College London

A systematic review of the neuroanatomy of dissociative identity disorder

Hippocampal and Amygdalar Volumes in Dissociative Identity Disorder

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17588928.2012.669750

MOO

I don't think we can gain a general view on what the psychoanalytic/ego psychology school has to say about DID from reading the pop books, although certain the Sybil psychiatrist (? she was certainly a medical doctor but went to medical school so long ago, I'm not sure how the residency system worked - she did do psychoanalytic training, as was common in 1939). And of course, Dr. Wilbur didn't call it DID.

I work in this field (recruiting normal controls and specifically diagnosed patients for radiological studies and bloodwork). Or at least I did, before COVID, I think I'm done now. And you are absolutely right - the SPECT and fnMRI analysis is where it's at right now, although on my side, I'm still interested in genes. It's really hard to get funding for the number of studies that could be done, but UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute has some money (the big money is in other areas right now, such as dementia).

Thank you for the links. The King's College study is intriguing, but I'd love to see them put a number of other related diagnoses into the study (such as Histrionic/hysteria) and see what happens with the computer modeling. Computer scored a 75% in finding differences (with 50/50 being chance). I suspect similar brain things may go on in other disorders, is what I'm saying.

The hippocampus and amygdala issues have been known for decades (even back when we were using CT scans and calipers to measure). DID and Borderline PD share the same pattern of smaller hippocampus/amygdala (according to your link). My point is that the two disorders can present very similarly, which is where the controversy is. More and more personality disorders are being found to have underlying physiological/anatomical/genetic underpinnings.

I personally think LS(Tee) would be borderline, of the two diagnoses that feature the hippocampus/amygdala issue (but I'd also like to see a total brain scan - Antisocial PD is associated with hippocampus/amygdala and right pre-frontal cortex abnormalities. I figure if I had to guess, I'd add in the right pre-frontal cortex issue for Letecia Stauch.

But distinguishing between DID and Borderline via scan is difficult right now. I do not think she has amnesia for anything, btw. I think she's using the standard playing deck that I associated with the Borderline PD.

IMPE and IMO.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

I remember when Gannon was first missing and the Sonic movie was just hitting the cinemas, I hate that they have had time to make and release a second movie in the time it's taken us to get to this point where the trial is finally about to start.

We have been here from that first day Gannon, first hoping we were wrong and you would be found safe, although deep down we knew it wouldn't end that way, and waiting here ever since for your justice to come. Its on its way sweet boy and we will all be here for you.

Yes, so many of us have been here since day one. I remember scanning the drone videos for hours that first night looking for any sight of him. Cause ya know he was a runaway…yeah right. I’m fixin to get mad just thinking about it. That’s why I had to run away from this thread for awhile. Too dang painful. It hurts to read about him and I find it hard to swallow trying to keep tears in cause my heart begins to hurt. Anyways, I’m thankful so many have remained loyal since that first night. A lot of us lost a lot of sleep that first week.
Here’s how it all began…

“We always send pictures to Albert when we are out and about or when he is away. That can be scanned for actual time verification.”

 

[Kiranerys]

Yes, so many of us have been here since day one. I remember scanning the drone videos for hours that first night looking for any sight of him. Cause ya know he was a runaway…yeah right. I’m fixin to get mad just thinking about it. That’s why I had to run away from this thread for awhile. Too dang painful. It hurts to read about him and I find it hard to swallow trying to keep tears in cause my heart begins to hurt. Anyways, I’m thankful so many have remained loyal since that first night. A lot of us lost a lot of sleep that first week.
Here’s how it all began…

“We always send pictures to Albert when we are out and about or when he is away. That can be scanned for actual time verification.”
View attachment 409786

Yes! And even the picture she chose for the poster was carefully selected to sell her lies, and make it about her.

My very first instinct when I saw the thread that day was that she killed him and I know I was far from the only one.

I remember how much you put into it back then, and all your mapping trying to find where she could've left him.

We will be here to see her get what she deserves.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

The judge allowed for this change in plea without first having the results of a sanity evaluation, and court filings obtained by Inside Edition Digital show that 13 months later the defense still has not provided that paperwork to the court.

The affidavit alleges that Letecia told investigators that on the night Gannon disappeared she had been violently raped and assaulted by a man whose name, she claimed, was "Edguardo." After that assault, Letecia claimed that "Edguardo" allegedly kidnapped Gannon.

Letecia declined to have a nurse examine her for signs of sexual assault according to the affidavit, and also told investigators that after the assault she thoroughly cleaned the alleged crime scene.

Authorities eventually convinced Gannon's father, Al Stauch, to record his calls with Letecia according to the affidavit.

Al had been in Oklahoma for military training with the U.S. National Guards when Gannon went missing, leaving his then-wife Letecia to care for his son and daughter, Laina, as well as her teenage daughter, Holly.

The couple were no longer living together when Al agreed to EPSO's request to monitor his calls with Letecia.

Those calls feature prominently in the affidavit.

The affidavit alleges that in one 48-hour period Letecia said the following:

• "When EPSO came to the house on January 27, 2020 the abductor was still in her residence and that she tried to signal the EPSO deputies that there was somebody in the residence."
• "She was raped by [a man] at her residence, and [he] abducted Gannon. She knew [the man's] identity because she saw a paper and his identification card fell out of his pocket that had his name on it."
• "[A man] followed her from Petco, and at some point, was laying in the middle of the road in front of a car. When Letecia stopped to avoid running the man over, he jumped into her car and made her take him home and raped her."
• "Letecia and Gannon were near County Line Rd / Hwy105 in northern El Paso County on January 27, 2020. Gannon is riding a bicycle in the area and fell off, hit his head, and was then abducted by [a man]."
• "Letecia stated that the blood in the corner of Gannon‘s room was a combination of hers and Gannon's. In this explanation, she stated that the abductor anally penetrated her and Gannon with an object. Additionally, she was tied up at some point in the abduction, and the abductor was still present during the EPSO visit that night." 

Murder Trial Starts for Stepmom Who Said a Rapist Abducted Stepson

On March 17, Gannon's body was discovered in a suitcase under a highway bridge near Pensacola, Florida. Authorities believe Letecia Stauch drove cross-country to dispose of her stepson's remains.

www.insideedition.com

 

[Megnut]

I'm afraid we may find that she abandoned him twice before returning home with him. Once behind the pet mart in the area where LE moved their command post to and once near that pond that they searched with the submersible. She brings cruel to new low.

The trial hasn't even started and already I'm exhausted (by her).

JMO

 

[imstilla.grandma]

The reason for the two-week long jury selection process is due to the likelihood that many potential jurors will be unable to be present for the entirety of the six-week long trial, as well as expected difficulties with jurors being exposed to previous media coverage of the case, according to Judge Gregory Werner.

The lack of the second sanity report put Stauch's trial in jeopardy as 4th Judicial District Attorney Michael Allen indicated at the pre-trial readiness conference on March 9 that not having the second report prior to trial was a serious complication.

Allen said that if the report was not received before trial, the prosecution could move to exclude the expert conducting the sanity evaluation, who was referred to as "Dr. Lewis" throughout the hearing, from testifying at trial.

Allen said not having the report borders on "bad faith" from the defense's expert.

"This is a disrespect to court deadlines," Allen said. "I've never seen anything like this."

Werner, who shared Allen's frustrations, gave a hard deadline of Wednesday evening, March 15, for the second sanity report to be filed.

"Convey to your expert that it's not a suggestion, it's not a guideline ... it's a deadline," Werner said. "If she (Dr. Lewis) wants to testify here in this case, it has to be done (by the deadline)."

Court records show that Stauch's defense attorneys filed a report, the contents of which are unknown, to the court on Thursday.

Jury trial for Letecia Stauch, accused of killing stepson Gannon, scheduled to begin

It's been over three years since 11-year-old Gannon Stauch died, and on Monday, the jury trial for his accused killer and stepmom, Letecia Stauch, is scheduled to begin.

gazette.com

 

[10ofRods]

Thank goodness someone is finally listening. And, more importantly, funding research.

And bless those athletes, and their next of kin, who are donating brains to help researchers study CTE. Without a way to test for it in living subjects at this time, those donations are going to help so many people in the future.

MOO

There are tests that can be done on living subjects and can find evidence of CTE long before death (neurologists are getting better at finding early changes):

I just want people to know that the differential diagnoses between various memory problems (and impulse problems) can indeed proceed with some clarity between the various brain damages. There are few treatments, but behavioral interventions vary a great deal among the various kinds of brain problems.

LS(Tee) in my opinion does not have any kind of cerebral trauma as far as we know and if her hippocampus and amygdala are tiny or damaged (as with DID and BPD), that would be interesting - but I suspect there are several other diagnoses that show similar results.

I don't think I'll live to see genuinely helpful treatment for these neurologically atypical or damaged patients, but there have been some amazing progress in animal studies with stem/nerve cell transplants. I just don't think the work of the hippocampus can be fixed by repair, though, sadly.

I do think it likely that LS has an atypical brain, though.

IMO.

 

[cujenn81]

I don't think we can gain a general view on what the psychoanalytic/ego psychology school has to say about DID from reading the pop books, although certain the Sybil psychiatrist (? she was certainly a medical doctor but went to medical school so long ago, I'm not sure how the residency system worked - she did do psychoanalytic training, as was common in 1939). And of course, Dr. Wilbur didn't call it DID.

I work in this field (recruiting normal controls and specifically diagnosed patients for radiological studies and bloodwork). Or at least I did, before COVID, I think I'm done now. And you are absolutely right - the SPECT and fnMRI analysis is where it's at right now, although on my side, I'm still interested in genes. It's really hard to get funding for the number of studies that could be done, but UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute has some money (the big money is in other areas right now, such as dementia).

Thank you for the links. The King's College study is intriguing, but I'd love to see them put a number of other related diagnoses into the study (such as Histrionic/hysteria) and see what happens with the computer modeling. Computer scored a 75% in finding differences (with 50/50 being chance). I suspect similar brain things may go on in other disorders, is what I'm saying.

The hippocampus and amygdala issues have been known for decades (even back when we were using CT scans and calipers to measure). DID and Borderline PD share the same pattern of smaller hippocampus/amygdala (according to your link). My point is that the two disorders can present very similarly, which is where the controversy is. More and more personality disorders are being found to have underlying physiological/anatomical/genetic underpinnings.

I personally think LS(Tee) would be borderline, of the two diagnoses that feature the hippocampus/amygdala issue (but I'd also like to see a total brain scan - Antisocial PD is associated with hippocampus/amygdala and right pre-frontal cortex abnormalities. I figure if I had to guess, I'd add in the right pre-frontal cortex issue for Letecia Stauch.

But distinguishing between DID and Borderline via scan is difficult right now. I do not think she has amnesia for anything, btw. I think she's using the standard playing deck that I associated with the Borderline PD.

IMPE and IMO.

I agree 100% with this assessment. I think she may even have been diagnosed with borderline PD by the doctor in South Carolina. I think her argument is going to be that something traumatic happened that triggered some kind of dissociative state. I’m willing to bet she’ll try to pull a Jodi Arias and claim she doesn’t remember how or what exactly happened to Gannon. I would be astounded if such a story swayed the jury, though. Because (like Arias) her actions leading up to the murder clearly point to premeditation.

 

[Murphy1950]

I agree 100% with this assessment. I think she may even have been diagnosed with borderline PD by the doctor in South Carolina. I think her argument is going to be that something traumatic happened that triggered some kind of dissociative state. I’m willing to bet she’ll try to pull a Jodi Arias and claim she doesn’t remember how or what exactly happened to Gannon. I would be astounded if such a story swayed the jury, though. Because (like Arias) her actions leading up to the murder clearly point to premeditation.

When you speak of Borderline and Dissociative, are these physical defects in the brain, chemical ???

I have learned so much on these pages and grateful to all who post. When I was growing up, you would hear of someone having a “nervous breakdown.” I never believed much in all these personality disorders until a loved one went manic for about 6 months. I thought people made these conditions up to get out of trouble.

Riding out the mania was quite an adventure in learning. A term popular in the late 60’s, Beatlemania finally had meaning. What I am curious about is I know my loved one was totally out of control and felt no remorse or regrets at the time, there was no reasoning with him. Later it was different.

Mania is a chemical imbalance; at some point you are going to come down. Is that true of most the personality disorders? I do wonder if someone like LS has any regrets, guilt? Or is she still absorbed in her hatred for AS and LH. Is it possible she believes her own stories? Curious what others think.

 

[Seattle1]

When you speak of Borderline and Dissociative, are these physical defects in the brain, chemical ???

I have learned so much on these pages and grateful to all who post. When I was growing up, you would hear of someone having a “nervous breakdown.” I never believed much in all these personality disorders until a loved one went manic for about 6 months. I thought people made these conditions up to get out of trouble.

Riding out the mania was quite an adventure in learning. A term popular in the late 60’s, Beatlemania finally had meaning. What I am curious about is I know my loved one was totally out of control and felt no remorse or regrets at the time, there was no reasoning with him. Later it was different.

Mania is a chemical imbalance; at some point you are going to come down. Is that true of most the personality disorders? I do wonder if someone like LS has any regrets, guilt? Or is she still absorbed in her hatred for AS and LH. Is it possible she believes her own stories? Curious what others think.

I know very little about widely distrusted dissociative disorders (DID) except that many people who are clinically diagnosed with dissociative disorder also have coexisting diagnoses of borderline or other personality disorders, depression, and anxiety.

I've posed similar questions re. physical, chemical, or character over the years-- especially in cases involving young males where we often suspect schizophrenia.

What stuck with me was the explanation that there are basically 3 clusters of personality disorders (A, B, C) used to group the main disorders including:

• Paranoid personality disorder. ...
• Schizoid personality disorder. ...
• Schizotypal personality disorder. ...
• Antisocial personality disorder. ...
• Borderline personality disorder. ...
• Histrionic personality disorder. ...
• Narcissistic personality disorder. ...
• Avoidant personality disorder

And the main difference between schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia is that schizotypal is a personality disorder while schizophrenia is a psychotic disorder-- a serious mental illness that affects how a person thinks, feels, and behaves, and seems like they lost touch with reality.

I'm not doubting there are adequate arguments that personality disorders are also serious mental illnesses but this is just the way I've personally tried to differentiate between personality and psychotic disorders, and where many personality disorders seem rooted more in the brain's "wiring" and are not typically helped by medication (i.e., chemical).

Definitely not a schooled answer to your question @Murphy1950 but just my accumulated opinion from similar cases, and knowledge of many friends and family that have struggled with Rx-resistant personality disorders and/or depression.

We have many members on this forum with professional experience that I hope will guide us through the expert witness testimony to match the defense. MOO

Is the Problem Chemistry or Character?

Some conditions are temporary forms of dysfunction; others are faulty wiring.

www.psychologytoday.com

Schizophrenia

Learn about schizophrenia, including onset & symptoms, risk factors, treatments and therapies, how to help a loved one, & resources for more information.

www.nimh.nih.gov

Personality disorder

Personality disorders are conditions in which an individual differs significantly from an average person, in terms of how they think, feel or relate to others.

www.nhsinform.scot

 

[iamshadow21]

I don't think we can gain a general view on what the psychoanalytic/ego psychology school has to say about DID from reading the pop books, although certain the Sybil psychiatrist (? she was certainly a medical doctor but went to medical school so long ago, I'm not sure how the residency system worked - she did do psychoanalytic training, as was common in 1939). And of course, Dr. Wilbur didn't call it DID.

RSBM

I was clumsy in my wording - I didn't mean that you could get an idea of what the psych community as a whole thought about DID from pop psychology books. I meant that of the earlier books published for the popular market (not for academia) on MPD (as it was called before DSM III), a lot of the books were written by (or written about) psychoanalysts working with these patients. My source is my own bookshelf. I own probably ninety-odd titles, published from the fifties to the present day? Of those psychoanalysts, the most famous is certainly Wilbur, who became so because of the publication of Sybil. Later, it's different, and (by maybe the mid-eighties?) the psychoanalysts kind of fade away, replaced by modern talk therapists of various different schools.

Because of my own dissociative disorder, reading about others living with dissociation has been something I've done on and off since I first found in my high school library a) in a book of spooky stories, a section about Doris Fischer, and b) a copy of Sybil. My collection ranges from the absurd and highly fictionalised to very raw and beautiful personal accounts written by systems themselves about their experiences. It probably seems an oddly specific interest, but it's taught me a lot about the endurance of human beings and how they can grow past and beyond trauma, something I make my own effort at, every day.

MOO

 

[iamshadow21]

When you speak of Borderline and Dissociative, are these physical defects in the brain, chemical ???

RSBM

To take it down to the brass tacks, trauma changes your brain. Whether it's a one off, big trauma like a severe car accident, a rape, or being held at gunpoint, or repeated trauma like childhood abuse, domestic violence, treatment for and the experience of a serious illness like cancer, being caught up in a war (whether as a civilian or combatant), etc.

We can see these changes in biochemistry and in brain scans, between healthy nontraumatised brains and traumatised brains. The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk has sections with images taken from scans, you should be able to get hold of a copy from a library or ebook service with ease, if you're interested.

Your brain (wonderful thing that it is) essentially rewires itself in response to trauma to try to help you survive. Which is great! But can also leave people with lasting responses that are geared for trauma, not for going to the supermarket. So, people will end up with symptoms like hypervigilance, anxiety, phobias, flashbacks, and dissociation. Your brain is trying to warn you that the world is a dangerous place that hurt you before! You'd better watch out!

Trauma gears you up like a firefighter entering a burning building. Fireproof clothing, oxygen tank, mask, axe. But the firefighter can take off all that gear when he just wants to live his life. Living life with a traumatised brain is like clumping round in all that gear, waiting for the roof to fall in, when you're just at the dog park on a nice spring day. Retraining your brain to let go of those trauma responses, to rewire the brain yet again, is some of the hardest work a human being can do. And it doesn't end. A bad experience can default you back to those patterns. The work to keep yourself healthy is perpetual.

Trauma early in life can create an array of changes that line up with certain diagnoses. PTSD and dissociative disorders. There's a strong correlation with trauma and Borderline, too, that is being researched. It isn't as simple as, is this psychological, is it chemical, is it structural, is this congenital or genetic, because the answer, generally, is yes. It isn't one thing or another, it's everything overlapping.

Now, I am not a psych, I am a human with my own trauma, so take everything I've said above with a big whack of salt. There are others on this thread who I invite to correct me if I have erred who have degrees and careers in this field. Listen to @10ofRods , this is very much their area.

MOO

Some articles that might be of interest:

Traumatic stress: effects on the brain

Both Your Body and Brain Are Different After Trauma. What to Know

The Role of Trauma in Early Onset Borderline Personality Disorder: A Biopsychosocial Perspective

Trauma-Related Dissociation and the Dissociative Disorders:: Neglected Symptoms with Severe Public Health Consequences

 

[10ofRods]

When you speak of Borderline and Dissociative, are these physical defects in the brain, chemical ???

I have learned so much on these pages and grateful to all who post. When I was growing up, you would hear of someone having a “nervous breakdown.” I never believed much in all these personality disorders until a loved one went manic for about 6 months. I thought people made these conditions up to get out of trouble.

Riding out the mania was quite an adventure in learning. A term popular in the late 60’s, Beatlemania finally had meaning. What I am curious about is I know my loved one was totally out of control and felt no remorse or regrets at the time, there was no reasoning with him. Later it was different.

Mania is a chemical imbalance; at some point you are going to come down. Is that true of most the personality disorders? I do wonder if someone like LS has any regrets, guilt? Or is she still absorbed in her hatred for AS and LH. Is it possible she believes her own stories? Curious what others think.

It's far too complicated to discuss here.

The brain scans shown above are not subject to understanding without some background in medicine, biology, etc.

Mania (manic) is NOT a personality disorder. At all. It is the most genetically pre-determined mental illness there is (vast majority of sufferers have one of the known genes that cause it - some have more than one).

In theory, personality disorders were invented as a category because they are not supposed to be genetic, but even from Freud's time, there's been intelligent questioning of that premise. Now we know, for example, that "Antisocial PD" does have discernible issues upon brain scan (not in all, but in most). There's a lot of literature on this one disorder. All the other PD's are now being looked at carefully. Most often, the results are that genes and upbringing are both responsible.

"Nervous breakdown" was what people called anyone who seemed to be "losing it" in modern parlance. Now, we understand it's way more complicated than just a simple reaction to circumstances (which is what most people meant by "nervous breakdown," as the term implies.

Personality disorders and bipolar are very different. Bipolar has many forms, as well (some more persistance than others). It can be chronic or (more often) remitting. Personality disorders are every day. They do not cycle like Bipolar - BUT life events can make it seem so.

Mania is both chemical and anatomical, IMO.

No one knows much about whether severely disordered people like LS experience regret (depressives who commit crimes surely do). I don't even know how to study regret and can't think of anyone who does.

At any rate, both the Axis I diagnoses (like Bipolar) and Axis II (personality and other supposedly acquired disorders) can behave the same way in any individual.

"Mania" is used in many senses, but Bipolar (Manic-Depressive in past parlance) is not the same Trichotillomania or Beatlemania (which is not, of course, a psychiatric problem at all - it just means screaming and trying to get tickets for the Beatles, and fighting with one's girlfriends about who is the cutest Beatle).

IMO.

 

[10ofRods]

When you speak of Borderline and Dissociative, are these physical defects in the brain, chemical ???

I have learned so much on these pages and grateful to all who post. When I was growing up, you would hear of someone having a “nervous breakdown.” I never believed much in all these personality disorders until a loved one went manic for about 6 months. I thought people made these conditions up to get out of trouble.

Riding out the mania was quite an adventure in learning. A term popular in the late 60’s, Beatlemania finally had meaning. What I am curious about is I know my loved one was totally out of control and felt no remorse or regrets at the time, there was no reasoning with him. Later it was different.

Mania is a chemical imbalance; at some point you are going to come down. Is that true of most the personality disorders? I do wonder if someone like LS has any regrets, guilt? Or is she still absorbed in her hatred for AS and LH. Is it possible she believes her own stories? Curious what others think.

It's far too complicated to discuss here.

The brain scans shown above are not subject to understanding without some background in medicine, biology, etc.

Mania (manic) is NOT a personality disorder. At all. It is the most genetically pre-determined mental illness there is (vast majority of sufferers have one of the known genes that cause it - some have more than one).

In theory, personality disorders were invented as a category because they are not supposed to be genetic, but even from Freud's time, there's been intelligent questioning of that premise. Now we know, for example, that "Antisocial PD" does have discernible issues upon brain scan (not in all, but in most). There's a lot of literature on this one disorder. All the other PD's are now being looked at carefully. Most often, the results are that genes and upbringing are both responsible.

"Nervous breakdown" was what people called anyone who seemed to be "losing it" in modern parlance. Now, we understand it's way more complicated than just a simple reaction to circumstances (which is what most people meant by "nervous breakdown," as the term implies.

Personality disorders and bipolar are very different. Bipolar has many forms, as well (some more persistance than others). It can be chronic or (more often) remitting. Personality disorders are every day. They do not cycle like Bipolar - BUT life events can make it seem so.

Mania is both chemical and anatomical, IMO.

No one knows much about whether severely disordered people like LS experience regret (depressives who commit crimes surely do). I don't even know how to study regret and can't think of anyone who does.

At any rate, both the Axis I diagnoses (like Bipolar) and Axis II (personality and other supposedly acquired disorders) can behave the same way in any individual.

"Mania" is used in many senses, but Bipolar (Manic-Depressive in past parlance) is not the same Trichotillomania or Beatlemania (which is not, of course, a psychiatric problem at all - it just means screaming and trying to get tickets for the Beatles, and fighting with one's girlfriends about who is the cutest Beatle).

IMO.

RSBM

I was clumsy in my wording - I didn't mean that you could get an idea of what the psych community as a whole thought about DID from pop psychology books. I meant that of the earlier books published for the popular market (not for academia) on MPD (as it was called before DSM III), a lot of the books were written by (or written about) psychoanalysts working with these patients. My source is my own bookshelf. I own probably ninety-odd titles, published from the fifties to the present day? Of those psychoanalysts, the most famous is certainly Wilbur, who became so because of the publication of Sybil. Later, it's different, and (by maybe the mid-eighties?) the psychoanalysts kind of fade away, replaced by modern talk therapists of various different schools.

Because of my own dissociative disorder, reading about others living with dissociation has been something I've done on and off since I first found in my high school library a) in a book of spooky stories, a section about Doris Fischer, and b) a copy of Sybil. My collection ranges from the absurd and highly fictionalised to very raw and beautiful personal accounts written by systems themselves about their experiences. It probably seems an oddly specific interest, but it's taught me a lot about the endurance of human beings and how they can grow past and beyond trauma, something I make my own effort at, every day.

MOO

I don't think they were replaced by "modern talk therapists" as I know many psychiatrists from that era (and still know them) who are still active in the field - and they now have a more biologically oriented paradigm. Freud didn't rule out biology and Paul Ricoeur argued that Freud was heading toward a theory of brain defects/zones of the brain affected.

Modern psychiatrists understand that "talk therapies" (including ego psychology/psychoanalysis) are important, but that ruling out brain dysfunction is more important. That includes both anatomy and physiology of the brain (both affected by both environment and genes). It's the toughest problem in the known scientific universe, IMO.

Dissociation is a healthy response to trauma (compared to the alternatives) and many of us travel your path. Indeed, being on Websleuths allows me to zone out/disassociate/forget many other things that would otherwise be on my mind. Watching TV is a mild form of dissociation. Dissociation is insisted upon and encouraged in many cultures, which is one reason I am not fond of singling it out as a psychiatric symptom. It's like saying anxiety (by itself) is a problem. Anxiety is a gut feeling that something is wrong and one must act (it's only a problem if it's persistent, and for no reason).

I am on the fence about DID - but I truly appreciate your viewpoint.

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Above is my opinion.