If the abuse continues, additional alters are created as needed. 1 Dissociation itself is a common experience. Most people have observed mild dissociative episodes in which they lose touch with their surroundings. Examples include daydreaming, highway hypnosis, or losing oneself in a movie or book. The abuse memories contained within the alters are not typically accessible to the dominant personality.
Control then passes back to the dominant personality or to another alter.
This may be sensed by one alter or by the host as if there are entire blocks of missing time. One of the reasons was that MPD was being thrown into disrepute by many people giving phony demonstrations of alter switching during television talk shows. Their cure for MPD is to isolate the patient from the therapist and mutual support groups. The appropriate method of treatment is to exorcise the demons. Finally, a few individuals believe that MPD is a naturally occurring phenomenon, and unrelated to childhood abuse or creation by an iatrogenic process.