This link might be better http://www.issd.org/...issociation.htm FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS: DISSOCIATION AND DISSOCIATIVE DISORDERS What is dissociation? What is depersonalization? What is derealization? What is dissociative amnesia? What are identity confusion and identity alteration? What is the cause of dissociation and dissociative disorders? How does affect dysregulation influence dissociation? How is dissociation different from hypnosis? What are the different types of dissociative disorders? What is the prevalence of dissociative disorders? What are treatments specific to the type of dissociative disorder? References (The stuff regarding animals was just a small subset of dissociative disorder links on that web site - unusual animal stuff)

Sounds like some sort of trauma and dissociation http://www.issd.org/...about-index.htm That society has some interesting links with surprising stories (but attention, some are quite gross and hideous), for example in this link https://scholarsbank....pdf?sequence=4 "Five cases of multiple personality disorder (MPD) are presented which include one or more animal alters of differing complexity. In some cases, the development of the animal alter could be traced to childhood traumata involving (1) being forced to act or live like an animal, (2) witnessing animal mutilation, (3) being forced to engage in or witness bestiality, or (4) experiencing the traumatic loss of or killing of an animal. Clinical clues to the animal alter phenomenon that emerge during therapy are (1) over-identification with an animal, (2) hearing animal calls, (3) excessive fears of animals, (4) excessive involvement with a pet, and (5) cruelty to animals. Therapeutic work with animal alters may be a helpful or necessary preliminary to retrieval of underlying memories about the torture or killing of animals or human beings, and can be essential to the integration of such memories and to self forgiveness." At any rate - be careful because working with people with these sort of problems could be dangerous.

How does an invisible man transform into invisible?

Patches? inspiring !

... and/or do the Dalai Lama's recent strong comments http://english.ntdtv...dalai-lama.html indicate some sort of mental illness on his part?

During that same timeframe the "Bank of China said Wednesday its net profits totaled 96.30 billion yuan (15.17 billion U.S. dollars) in the first three quarters of this year, showing a 21.52 percent year-on-year rise" http://news.xinhuane...c_131214239.htm Is this just a coincidence, or are the Tibetans just increasingly mentally ill ?

... and yet again China police shoot Tibetans, nun burns to death "BEIJING (Reuters) - A Tibetan nun in China burned herself to death on Monday a day after police shot and wounded two Tibetan demonstrators, a group advocating Tibetan self-determination said, the latest protests against Chinese rule of the Himalayan region. The self-immolation and the protests would appear to signal that anger is growing in Aba prefecture, a mainly ethnic Tibetan part of the southwestern province of Sichuan that has been the center of defiance of Chinese control. Rights groups say the unrest could lead to a crackdown in Aba, which erupted in violence in March 2008 when Buddhist monks and other Tibetans loyal to the exiled Dalai Lama, their exiled religious leader, confronted police and troops. The condition and whereabouts of the two protesters who were shot and wounded, Dawa and Druklo, were not known, the London-based Free Tibet group said. The Foreign Ministry said it had not heard of the shootings by the police. "Some organizations with political motives have been spreading rumors and it's not the first time that (they have used) this practice of misleading the public," the office of the ministry's spokesman said in a statement. "We hope everyone treats such information with caution." On Monday, a 20-year-old nun, Tenzin Wangmo, set fire to herself outside a nunnery in the same region, the ninth self-immolation this year in Tibetan parts of China, Free Tibet said. The nun had called for religious freedom in Tibet and for the return of the Dalai Lama as she set herself alight, the Free Tibet group said. Her death comes seven months after a Tibetan Buddhist monk, Phuntsog, 21, from the restive Kirti monastery, burned himself to death. As a result, security forces detained about 300 monks for a month. Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin last week criticized the Dalai Lama for not only failing to denounce the self-immolations but for playing them up and even asking people to "follow the example. He did not mention the Dalai Lama on Tuesday but said: "We believe that promoting and encouraging harm to life is immoral." Nine ethnic Tibetans, eight of them from Aba prefecture, have burned themselves since March to protest against religious controls by the Chinese government, which labels the Dalai Lama a violent separatist. The Nobel Peace Prize-winning Dalai Lama denies the accusation and says he wants autonomy and not independence for Tibet. The state news agency Xinhua said, citing officials from Aba's religious affairs bureau, said exiles were being the self-immolation attempts. "(They) showed signs of having been instigated by a clique jockeying for power in the overseas Tibetan community under the Dalai Lama," the news agency said. Xinhua report quoted bureau head Song Tendargye as saying that the Tibetan community in Aba was "disgusted" that a former "living Buddha" of the Kirti monastery in Aba had led prayer services for those who had attempted self-immolation. Free Tibet Director Stephanie Brigden said in a statement late on Monday her group had "grave concerns that greater force may be deployed if protests spread." China has ruled Tibet with an iron fist since Communist troops marched in 1950. But it rejects the criticism of rights groups and exiled Tibetans, saying its rule has bought much needed development to a poor and backward region."

Remembering a friend's photo - taken by a couple of Chinese girls near the Duomo in Florence with a Polaroid Instant Camera. It was very small (nowadays a $90 camera takes business-card-sized photos) but what a nice gift from total strangers - and my friends thought they just wanted my friends to take a photo of them (the Chinese girls). The really nice aspect of these cameras is that the photo can be given away immediately as a present and the receivers can enjoy the excitement of watching it develop. Interesting that this type of technology hasn't gotten cheaper over time: a Polaroid One600 Classic Instant Camera, "Just like your original Polaroid camera" costs over $200 nowadays and the film costs over $1 a photo! -- -- but it cost only $19.95 in 1965 !

... and again: China hit by new Tibet monk self-immolation "The 17-year-old from Sichuan province's Kirti monastery, the scene of repeated protests, shouted slogans against the Chinese government as he tried to self-immolate, the US-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) said. Citing Tibetans in exile with contacts in Aba town, where the incident occurred Monday, the activist group said the monk was immediately surrounded by security personnel who extinguished the flames, beat him and took him away. ... Barry Sautman, an associate professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology who studies ethnic politics, said self-immolations in Tibetan regions had been a "rare" occurrence until recently. "I don't think that we knew of any examples until recently, at least no examples that occurred inside Tibet," he said, referring to wider Tibetan areas. "There was one example of a Tibetan exile who immolated himself some years back. At the time, the Dalai Lama condemned the self-immolation and said it contravened the Buddhist idea of the sanctity of life. "So it's rather unusual for Buddhist monks in Tibet who are presumably devoted to the Dalai Lama to take this path." Many Tibetans in China are angry about what they view as increasing domination by the country's majority Han ethnic group. China, however, says that Tibetan living standards have improved with billions in Chinese investment." _____ The Chinese probably think that the Tibetans should be happy because their living standards have improved "materially" - so what's their problem, and why all the uproar ? Your thoughts?

If this had happened before the sodomy laws were repealed (June 26, 2003, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that all sodomy laws were unconstitutional in its historic Lawrence v. Texas decision, which also had an impact on the burgeoning same-sex marriage debate) this teen probably would not have been left alone with her attacker ... ... but with the way things are currently this type of an assault is no longer in the same type of "criminal" category as it once was - nowadays it is only considered "sexual misconduct" - which means that the boy faces less than a year in a juvenile detention center ... which means he'll probably only serve a few months, if that much. Which also explains why they risked keeping him in the same ward with her for two weeks after the incident: his crime was no "big deal" to anybody. And good luck with plans to sue the city - nowadays the boy's lawyer could argue that he was just trying to "love" her, to display a valid form of affection! In fact, nowadays one could argue that the girl is at fault for complaining as if she were "violated" and exaggerating the pain, the hurt, the anger, the sadness - is she truly justified in feeling such strong emotions or is she mentally ill? ... but as this confusing trend continues, what is happening to the mental/emotional health of our children - modern society - and the world?

The panic attacks of this 15 year old girl will probably last a lifetime Teen patient at psych ward was brutally sodomized, kept in same unit with attacker for weeks Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2011/04/25/2011-04-25_rage_over_psych_ward_sex_attack_on_teen.html#ixzz1Zc5aW7yy "The boy was arrested March 11 and charged with a criminal sex act. Still, for the next two weeks, the boy remained in the same ward with the girl, adding to her pain. Hearing her daughter whimper every day left Watson feeling shattered. "It took all the strength that I had to hold my composure," said Watson, who has filed a notice of claim and plans to sue the city for $20 million. "I didn't want her to see me break down and cry."" ______ ... So WHY doesn't she just take her daughter back home? "Watson said she doesn't want to remove her daughter from the facility because it will delay her placement in a state hospital for long-term treatment. Watson said her daughter, who loves to dance and play basketball, is still reeling. "Her smile used to brighten up a room," said Watson, inside the office of her lawyer, Martha Gold. "Now, I have to ask her to smile for me, and when she smiles, I can still see the pain, the hurt, the anger, the sadness."" No surprise there ...

Sounds like you might agree with Thomas Merton (Father Louis, a Roman Catholic monk who died in 1968) - upon hearing of 22-year-old Catholic Worker Roger LaPorte's self-immolation Merton wrote "What is happening? Is everybody nuts?" in his journal and sent a telegram to the Catholic Peace Fellowship withdraw his membership from that organization. After being reassured that the event was an aberration, that LaPorte was not a very stable person psychologically, and nothing that LaPorte had done derived from any spoken or unspoken policy of the Catholic Peace Fellowship movement Merton withdrew his resignation. Instead, Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh wrote a letter to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with another point-of-view: "The self-burning of Vietnamese Buddhist monks in 1963 is somehow difficult for the Western Christian conscience to understand. The press spoke then of suicide, but in the essence, it is not. It is not even a protest. What the monks said in the letters they left before burning themselves aimed only at alarming, at moving the hearts of the oppressors, and at calling the attention of the world to the suffering endured then by the Vietnamese." The practice of "sati" (female self immolation) was approved by Hindu religions for hundreds of years, up until the 19th century. And according to this article "Suicide, in any form, is strictly prohibited in Islam. And there is a great reward for Muslims who bear tyrant rulers with patience and trust in God Almighty. However, burgeoning inflation and hopelessness due to lack of education or job opportunities in many parts of the region, are adding fuel to the flames of an increasingly combustible situation. ... Bouazizi is being touted as a martyr and his deeds an effective means to an end. What is most surprising is that all of the self-immolations have occurred in predominantly Muslim lands and many were by Muslims. ... Bouazizi’s deed lives on in the hearts and minds of people willing to sacrifice their very lives for the sake of change." So, seems like Christianity is somewhat unusual by promoting Christian martyrdom while severely prohibiting Christian suicide and self-immolation (by physical fire).

Did you make it completely clear to her by saying "Grandmother, I am your granddaughter, the daughter of your son" (with your dad standing next to you, or with a photo of him and you together)? Older people tend to recognize the people they see most often, and in most cases nowadays that's probably the nursery home worker(s). Did you visit her very often before the dementia set in? A good idea is to carry a picture of you and your grandmother together - or better yet, you and your father and your grandmother together (along with other photos of her with extended family) - in your purse at all times to show her - and others! - that you are members of a family that you keep close-at-hand, think about and cherish - even when you're not together. Don't give up hope, older people have "good days" and "bad days", and if her eyesight isn't failing she might recognize you next time. If you used to do something special for her, like rub her neck, touch her cheek, squeeze her hand, or pat her arm in a certain way, do that again and she might react differently to you than a worker who is more aloof and distant. You might want to bring along something she gave you in the past - a necklace, scarf, whatever - and remind her how grateful you are that she thought of you when she gave it to you ... whether or not she remembers her gift to you, the thought that you sincerely appreciate (and have always appreciated) it will bring a smile to her face. If you have no material gift from her to show, explain to her how knowing her has helped brighten your life -- I used to remind my granny how nice it was to hear her sing while she ironed and did laundry, how much we grandkids looked forward to the strawberry shortcake she'd bake us on our birthdays and how delicious they were, how much I loved to smell the iris flowers and daffodils that she planted as we walked along the driveway to her home ... gratefully remembering special moments together will surely set you apart from the workers as her granddaughter.

No thoughts whatsoever on the subject of self-immolation? Here's an article that gives Details on ten acts of self-immolation for various motives One of these acts which received little publicity was "Hartmut Gründler was a German teacher from Tübingen, engaged in environmental protection. He opposed German energy policy and the construction of nuclear power plants. He protested against means to store radioactive nuclear waste. He handed out pamphlets in an attempt to educate the public about environmental matters that concerned him. He staged hunger strikes and all manner of non-violent protest trying to affect German policy. He even tried to open a dialogue with Federal Chancellor Helmut Schmidt. On November 16, 1977, (at the age of 47) Gründler burned himself in Hamburg during the SPD Party Congress, out of protest against “the continued governmental misinformation” in the energy policy, particularly concerning the permanent disposal of nuclear waste. Two days before he self-immolated, he made a flyer with the heading “Please pass on… Self-immolation of a Life Protector – appeal against atomic lie…”, and, speaking of himself in the third person, he wrote, among other things, the following: “Gründler calls his action an act not of despair, but of resistance and resolution. To the inherent necessity of greed of profit, of confidence tricks, of taking people unawares here, and the inherent necessity of inertia and cowardice there, he wants to oppose the inherent necessity of conscience.”" ______ According to Hartmut Gründler from Wikipedia, "Reactions and impact: The media hardly reported on the background." Why? He spoke the truth, and quite a few lives might have been saved if someone had listened - or had been allowed to listen --

Here's another recent article: Self-immolation spreads across Mideast inspiring protest "... At least 13 cases of people setting fire to themselves in protest have been recorded in the Middle East since Bouazizi, an unemployed university graduate, doused himself with petrol and set himself alight in the city of Sidi Bouzid on December 17. He was protesting official harassment of his street-side produce business, but his act quickly came to symbolize government abuse and the absence of economic opportunity. Tunisia suicide protester Mohammed Bouazizi dies RELATED: Self immolation and individual freedom 3 Egyptians light themselves on fire in protest - 1 dies In Egypt, at least six cases of self-immolation have been reported, including a man arrested last Thursday while trying to set himself on fire outside the Egyptian parliament in downtown Cairo. Over the weekend, a Moroccan man set himself on fire in Casablanca as did a Mauritanian man who set himself on fire and died in hospital on Saturday. In Algeria, four men have reportedly set themselves on fire. Even in Saudi Arabia, whose people are insulated from poverty and inflation by oil wealth, a man in his 60s set himself on fire in the town of Samitah. He died in hospital on Sunday. ..." What are your ideas - what's going on with these people ?