1st Edition
Our House: Making Sense of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Our House tells the story of a child who has experienced something that children should never have to experience. It introduces the reader to the people who arrived to help them cope with the bad things, in the house that they all share.
Accompanied by beautiful and gentle illustrations, the story takes a non-threatening approach to demystify dissociative identity disorder, using the metaphor of a house to explain what it is and how it develops. Our House can be read by individuals, or used as a treatment tool to stimulate discussion, and is suitable for all ages. It includes additional guidance which explains the metaphor in depth, as well as advice regarding dissociative disorders and signposts to further help for both individuals and professionals.
Bringing clarity to a complex issue, this is an invaluable resource for survivors of trauma and for those who support them, counsellors, psychologists, social care workers and other professionals, as well as family and friends. An accompanying guidebook is also available, offering further information, resources and activities, and page-by-page insights into illustrations from the picture book. Both books can be purchased as a set.
Who is this book for? My Life is Like a House … An Overview for Grown-Ups Our House Dissociative Disorders When DID is Severe Symptoms – and what not to do! DID – It’s very real Further Help: For Individuals Further Help: For Professionals Additional Sources
Biography
Lindsay Schofield is a Consultant Psychotherapist with a private practice in Surrey, England. She has worked in private practice for two decades, providing treatment and support to individuals and couples, helping them with a wide range of emotional and mental health challenges. A specialist in trauma and dissociation, she has dedicated thousands of hours to learning about working with survivors of complex trauma. With a strongly relational and collaborative approach, the Picture book and Guidebook were born out of desire to make the complex clear and bridge divides wrought by traumatic experiences and misunderstanding. Lindsay has written and delivered her own workshops in the UK and internationally, and provides supervision to practitioners working in different contexts, clinical and pastoral. She is accredited with the BABCP, the BACP (Senior), the ACC (Supervisor), the NCS (Senior/Supervisor) and the NCP (Senior). In her spare time, she enjoys a menagerie of animals and nature.
Cassie Herschel-Shorland is a freelance designer, illustrator, and artist. She works predominantly on increasing access to the diverse history of places, objects, and people’s associated stories. As an active tutor Cassie is also passionate about supporting mental health and wellbeing through creative workshops often in museums, galleries, or libraries; encouraging people to explore and illustrate their own stories.
Cassie has BA(Hons) in 3D design, post graduate certificate in illustration and a Master of Arts in historical illustration. She is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
This book takes a complex condition and way of being and it explains it in a highly effective, yet simple, visual way. Those who are coming to terms with their own DID, or trying to explain it to others, will find this book easy to read and understand whilst providing clear explanations.
Francesca & Parts
This book is great! It tells people about trauma and DID and how it helps us. The pictures stop it being too scary.
Reilly & Molly & Parts
The field of trauma and dissociation has been waiting for this book! Pictures reach deep into us in a way that words rarely do. They bypass hurdles and filters and allow a connection of the deepest level. Here we also have words that help linked to the art in a combination that helps children, adults and families and all the professionals that work with them.
Dr Valerie Sinason, Poet, writer and retired child psychotherapist and adult psychoanalyst. Founder Patron of the Clinic for Dissociative Studies and President of the Institute for Psychotherapy and Disability; 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award ISSTD
I am delighted to welcome such an accessible resource to help demystify the frequently denied and sensationalised condition of DID. The pictures and simple text of the everyday can be readily understood and will go a long way to helping those struggling with a DID diagnosis or its effects, and those supporting them.
Dr Cathy Kezelman AM, President Blue Knot Foundation – National Centre of Excellence for Complex Trauma; lived experience survivor.
This is a wonderful book, and a great contribution to this field. The illustrations do an extraordinary job of conveying the reality of dissociation, how it's created to help the child survive, and how problematic it can be. Developed in picture book format, I would recommend it for all ages. It's profoundly helpful to be able to conceptualize something challenging and complex in such an easily understood manner. The additional Guidebook is an excellent compilation of knowledge and resources for survivors, their families, and professionals.
Dr Lynette Danylchuk, Past President ISSTD, 2019 Lifetime Achievement Award ISSTD
This is a lovely book that is two-fold: a concise understanding of the dynamics of dissociation and a lovely pictorial story of how a child is impacted by trauma. It helps to make what is often confusing for the child and those around the child comprehensible!
Frances S Waters, Author of Healing the Fractured Child: Diagnosis and Treatment of Youth with Dissociation, past president of ISSTD, & Chair of ISSTD Faculty Director of Child & Adolescent Psychotherapy, Training
This book is a wonderful resource for survivors, their allies, professional and members of the public. With moving pictures and thoughtful text, this book brings to life the inner world of people with DID.
Dr Michael Salter, Scientia Associate Professor of Criminology, Postgraduate Coordinator UNSW Australia
This little and beautifully illustrated book is so accessible for individuals of all ages who want to know about DID and related conditions. That is important because DID usually feels so complicated, mysterious, and strange. Also, because people who have DID often experience themselves in child self-states or as having other "not me" child self-states in their body/mind. It is good when the person with DID can understand information from the perspective of all of their self-states, not just one.
Built around the metaphor of a house, the book takes us through how DID develops in response to bad things happening, which a person may or may not remember. The illustrations are wonderful and communicate on an emotional level as well as aiding understanding. They also make difficult messages easier to hear.
I recommend this book for people with DID or OSDD (Other Specified Dissociative Disorder) who want a compassionate understanding of themselves. Also recommended for family, friends, and for therapists who want to help their clients.
Dr Fiona Kennedy, Director, GreenWood Mentors Ltd., BA (Hons) M Clin Psych D Clin CPsychol AFBPS CPsychol, Fellow BABCPThe concept of a picture book and accompanying guidebook is novel in the treatment of DID, providing a road map that is easy to navigate and a landscape that is well defined and refreshingly clear. Both books empower survivors, inform and reassure practitioners, whist gently supporting loved ones. The books are meteoric in their achievement, a timely and imperative gift to the field of complex trauma and worthy of prime space in every therapy room.
Michele Leslie Jowett, ESTD Newsletter, December 2021
Lindsay Schofield’s two volumes offer an invaluable vade mecum for clinicians in contemporary psychiatry and psychotherapy faced with the challenge of engaging with DID in the way that the many patients with this condition deserve.
Gordon Barclay, British Journal of Psychiatry Bulletin
