The Communications and Marketing Committee aims to promote ISSTD activities and services, both internally and externally. It also has a role in promoting issues relating to complex trauma and dissociation in the wider community, targeting health professionals, other relevant professionals, and the general public. This includes improving the awareness of complex trauma and dissociation in the general community. This year’s projects and activities are outlined below.
Dissociative Identities Awareness Day
As part of promoting general awareness of dissociation, the Committee has a role each year in planning activities for Dissociative Identities Awareness Day in March.
This year for the first time we held a webinar for the general public. The Webinar was created to be a collaborative effort with other organisations which support people with DID and other complex trauma disorders and ISSTD was delighted to collaborate with Cathy Kezelman (Blue Knot Foundation – BKF), Anne and Lexi (Beauty After Bruises) and Jamie Pollack (An Infinite Mind). The webinar was well attended with 458 registrations, of which 300 attended live. The audience was very engaged with the chat field very active and many questions asked of the panel. Feedback was overwhelmingly positive.
Members of the public were charged a small donation fee of $10, with options to make more donations. The webinar raised $6, 200 dollars with the donations divided between the organisations.
We aim to keep working on activities to highlight this important day, and to make sure we have a voice in community education. If you are interested in being involved in planning for next year’s activities please see the contact details at the end of this article.
Fact Sheets for the General Public
Last year we launched our Facts Sheets on Dissociative Identities Awareness Day and they have been very popular. These present factual information in a user-friendly manner, without getting into too much professional jargon or labelling. Continuing on with the Facts Sheets, this year we are now developing a new Facts Sheet for family and friends who support someone living with a dissociative disorder. This facts sheet has developed from the Webinar and will be a collaborative effort with the organisations involved. In addition to this we also hope to develop a Facts Sheet on dissociation among children and adolescents. We are also really excited to let you know that the facts sheets are going to be translated into Spanish! We hope to add other languages as well. Clearly having multilingual resources is essential for an International Society. We are also open to ideas for other facts sheets in the future. Please email me on katemcmaughpsychology@gmail.com if you have an idea for a Facts Sheet that would be useful for the general public.
Other Projects
Our committee is involved in other projects that promote ISSTD activities such as promoting conferences and other educational activities among our networks. We work closely with ISSTD News to promote members of ISSTD and their activities. We also aim to update our Wikipedia page within the next year or so.
Looking for New Members or Interested Volunteers
Our Committee is actively seeking new members, or if you don’t wish to join a committee, we are also interested in people to help us out with our up-coming projects. Specifically, we are seeking:
Volunteers to Edit ISSTD Wikipedia Page
We still need members to join our small project group which is editing and updating the content of our Wikipedia page, which is, unfortunately often out of date or incorrect. If you have an interest in Wikipedia, or a desire to communicate information to the general public about complex trauma and dissociation, then this is a great project to get involved with.
Development of Video Marketing Content
We hope to have an ongoing project to develop short video materials to promote ISSTD and to educate the public and other professionals about complex trauma and dissociation. If you have an interest in video-based education, editing or production – come and join our committee.
Dissociative Identity Awareness Day 2022
We have a small project team to assist with activities for this day, but always welcome more members. We invite people to join who want to think creatively about how we mark this day, and to assist us in projects. Each year work for this project begins in October and goes through until mid-March.
Social Media Content ‘Spotters’
Do you love social media? Always checking out Facebook or Twitter? If that’s the case – we’d love to hear from you. We are after keen volunteers to spot content on Social Media and share with Headquarters. Our wonderful staff member Bethany Bjur programs all our social media posts, but she values input from members, especially members outside of America, to make sure our social media posts are international and culturally relevant to members.
So, if you are interested in joining our Committee and want to discuss this further please contact me on katemcmaughpsychology@gmail.com.