u/notjuststars

Obviously, the identities formed due to DID are a big indicator of the same trauma that caused them or the means by which that was coped with. But idk whenever I see people talk about DID they talk about the multiple personalities, when I honestly think that’s not as significant (at least to me) as the dissociation?

I have parts formed by trauma, with different personalities, opinions, appearances, beliefs. But I could have gone through that same trauma and just split into identical identities but with different memories, because I did not get this disorders because of the identities, I got it because I couldn’t cope with what was happening to me.

I’m having so much trouble explaining myself here but I’m hoping someone understands. It’s the compartmentalisation of it. Identities are as unique as each person’s fingerprint, so everyone will cope with trauma slightly differently and develop different personalities depending on what their brain felt was necessary.

But all of us have problems with dissociating, with memory and amnesia, all of us have problems with CPTSD symptoms to some degree.

When the public perception of DID just focuses on identities, to me it feels as if someone was purely focused on what visual hallucinations someone with schizophrenia experienced, instead of other hallucinations or delusions or disorganised thoughts or coping with reality or treatment or anything else.

My identities matter to me and should matter to no one else. What should matter is the dissociation, the CPTSD symptoms, the rest of it.

Trigger warning for medical abuse.

I had a patient yesterday, a child. He needed bloods drawn, and the condition was serious enough that this had to happen. He only communicated through sounds, no AAC or anything.

I know he had to have his bloods drawn, and like with other non-compliant children when we are completely out of other options (anaesthesia/drugs are not an option) we hold their arm still and let their parents hug them to comfort them.

It made me feel so guilty. I know, I should feel bad whether the child was autistic or not but all I could think about was that we have different nociception, and that if I was in the same position, if I was overwhelmed, would people hold me down? And he can’t communicate what it is that is acutely distressing him, if it’s the tourniquet, if I’m holding his too tight, if the needle hurts unbearably bad, if he’s scared, it’s his arm, his head, whatever. We’re deliberately upsetting him beyond his means of communication and then hoping we communicate right.

And then there’s the other thing, that if a child can’t communicate and obviously doesn’t have capacity, it becomes neglect not to take care of them, right? I am not going to out this patient by saying what the bloods were for, but it was serious enough that their regular doctor ordered these bloods, knowing what it would do to this child. So my options are traumatise a kid until he no longer has capacity to communicate, or abandon the kid until he’s in so much pain he can’t communicate.

Afterwards he seemed okay and I gave him a sticker but I felt sick. Perhaps I’m just sensitive to taking away the agency of autistic patients but still. I know we treated him like any other kid but its more complicated than that, and it’s just too close to home.

I think I see too much of myself in him which is a problem. I know what he is feeling, but the difference is I can communicate it, and it is worse because I do nothing with that.

I’m sorry. I just need to vent. I mask well enough that everyone at work just thinks I’m weird, no one assumes autism. But I’m one bad day away from being about as communicative as that child.

I obviously don’t want this to become a vent, but I’ve been meaning to talk about the emotional abuse of every action you do getting a bad faith interpretation. I’ll start with an example of the opposite: sometimes, one of my family members deliberately leaves the house slippers in the door. Despite the fact it could be a tripping hazard, he actually does it out of courtesy, so that anyone who needs the house slippers before entering that room has them, which is why I actually don’t mind the habit. I know he would never deliberately trip someone.

The bad faith interpretation is that he deliberately left the shoes there to trip someone up, instead of either assuming good faith or just asking. And the type of abuse I’m talking about is just doing that but for everything? A cup left out = deliberately making a recently cleaned room messy, accidentally zoning out and staring at someone = you hate them and have a problem with them, feeling sick = you hate their food and think it’s disgusting, etc etc etc.

I don’t know if this falls into the realm of paranoia, because it also extends into other people’s behaviour, such as assuming someone hates you because they told you that you didn’t have to help them when they were hosting you in their house.

I really want to describe this to my therapist but I don’t know if there’s a word for this behaviour and I can’t seem to describe it without this long winded explanation (I’ve journalled this but it pretty much comes out the same).

What is this called?

I work in a hospital. The child had a chronic health condition. She was under the age of 10 and needed a blood test. I had blood testing at that age and I know it doesn’t hurt that bad, but she was a kid who was scared and she was wailing and trying her best not to scream. Her mother was empathetic but firm about the test because she really needed it.

And I was doing fine, but about halfway through I just sort of remembered that at that age or a bit younger, I got threatened to have my teeth broke in if I cried like that, like if I sobbed out loud. I’ve cried silently since, even now the most I can seem to manage is just breathing in a bit loudly. And even when the kid was crying she was talking to her mother through tears and her mother was talking back, she didn’t have to shut up or anything. idk, it wasn’t anyone’s fault but the mother was so empathetic, it was something about the way she was holding her daughter and the fact that the daughter actually pulled into her because she was scared that just kind of got to me.

Idk. I get like that about a lot of kids in my work and I wish I wouldn’t. Like a teenager or even an adult will come in for an appointment with their parent because they need support, and I’ll act completely normal, but in my head I’ll remember taking myself to those appointments, even and especially when I was scared.

I want to work with kids in my career and loads of people tell me I’d be suited to it but I’m too ashamed to tell anyone that this is the reason I think I’d struggle.

Sorry for the title, I don’t know how to phrase it.

I swear I’ve done the work. I have an identity now, I have self-respect which I had to fight from the ground up for, I have opinions and values that, when I’m calm, I’d do anything for.

But in practice, my most mild opinion that I firmly believe can be pushed over by people arguing with me, and I don’t know how to fix it. I know this is somewhere within distress tolerance but I just don’t know, none of the tools I have seem to work for it, I can be as logical and reasonable as I want but the second I meet an argument I fold.

Today I tried an experiment. I posted a non-inflammatory post on my alt account, in a community that is receptive and positive, about something I believe in. One comment argued against it, a handful agreed but made points that slightly undercut the message.

I nuked the whole post. I don’t want to think about it. I don’t even know why, my logical brain tells me that what I am saying is empirically true and backed by evidence and that obviously, none of these comments (not even insulting or aggressive btw) are going to crawl out of my phone and attack me, but I’m just so afraid. I want it to stop. I didn’t want people to argue with me, even though I posted it with the explicit intention of getting both agreeing and disagreeing views (the point of the experiment).

Please tell me there’s some DBT skill I can use here. I’m scared that at work, I’ll present an argument, and someone will reasonably disagree and I’ll instantly undercut everything I say

Couldn’t figure out a gentle way to phrase the title so sorry if my tone is off, but it’s basically just that. This isn’t a callout post on anyone it’s sort of just a PSA. This whole thing is /nm, I’m autistic so my tone comes off weird sometimes

Different systems will work differently, sure, but if you are traumagenic/disordered, you can’t fuse from trauma. The whole idea of structured dissociation is that trauma causes more dissociation, not less. When two alters fuse in a CDD, it’s because of the integration of dissociative boundaries (it’s also why two alters can merge together but other alters might not be able to). In other words, this is not something that can happen to traumagenic/disordered systems.

This is not to say this cannot happen. Most of the time, when people say this, they say that it happened to ‘cope better with the traumatic event’. Traumagenic systems are not nearly as straightforward, but other systems, such as mixed origin or willogenic, can absolutely have that happen.

But it borders on dangerous to tell someone who may have new alters and new dissociative barriers following a traumatic event that that is not the case. Traumagenic systems are already potentially vulnerable in these spaces, so we have to be careful that we are not applying information that is accurate to different system types to systems that are at the risk of destabilisation because of that advice.

Sorry to double post. I’m aware this might be removed but the truth is I am asking this for later in recovery rather than earlier.

I don’t want to seek out people when I’m lonely, just because that’s not always an option and when it is, it puts me at risk as people who you don’t know who want to assuage your loneliness often don’t do so with good intentions. I want to learn how to manage myself, but loneliness isn’t exactly a crisis, so most of my crisis management skills don’t help. I’m grounded, aware, and feel safe, but I just also feel lonely.

Also, I tried looking for DBT skills for this, but DBT appears to be for missing someone, but I’m talking about just feeling lonely. I’m not seeking anyone.

But I feel there must be something I can do to deal with the loneliness rather than just ride through it. Sometimes going out helps scratch that itch for me, but sometimes it amplifies it. The root cause of the loneliness appears to be the sense of isolation, which I understand won’t go away until I’m further into recovery.

Also sorry for the way I type. I hope this makes sense anyway

I know this post will make me sound really bad, but right now, someone I know has just lost someone they loved. The loved one was not known to me. Instead of feeling bad for their loss or wanting to support them, I want to run away because I am scared if I am near them they will hurt me. This is based off a childhood experience of nearly the exact same thing.

I want to say my reflex is to support them and help them, but it’s not. I’m scared. I can grit my teeth and fight through it to be there for my friend but I’m embarrassed and ashamed of my reflex feelings. And I’ve done enough journalling and introspection to know that this is always my reflex. At the point where I think I am in danger, I will literally do anything to get out of it. All the values, morals, and identity I worked hard to build disappear.

And I know normal, healthy people also feel like this but I guess I feel bad because for me, it feels like defaulting to how I always am. This is my natural state. But I don’t want to be like this naturally?

I want to know if there’s a point in recovery where my first and only thought isn’t how I can keep myself safe, but actually how I can behave in a way that aligns with the morals and identity I fought for. And how I get there

Seriously, i feel like i’ve tried everything!!! Similar names in meaning, names that are closer to the values of that part, names with the same letter, names that sound the same, names from the same region, nothing!!!!

And she wants a name. I know some parts identify with a personality trait or a colour or something, but she explicitly wants a name, but just hates her current one and hates everything else we suggest :,)

How can we do this?

We’ve been doing some actual mapping as we finally feel stable enough (I know this isn’t the point of the post but the key, for us, seems to be doing the mapping/journalling in a very unobvious place; that way, the parts who don’t want to confront this don’t have to, which seems to prevent it from being very distressing or prevent distressed alters from deleting/burning things).

The point is we were operating uhder the assumption that this one part was very feminine and very rooted in our culture’s traditions. We have not been focusing on identifying everything and rather just focusing on managing CPTSD symptoms rather than putting names or even descriptors on these states of mind. The thing is, I don’t think a part who matches such a description exists? It’s possible I simply don’t have access to that part and that’s fine, but while mapping, we realised that she can perfectly be accounted for by two other alters being coconcious, as everything about her seems a perfect blend of the two, and it accounts for the continuous memory she has with those parts.

Is this a thing that can happen? I’m sorry if I’ve done a poor job explaining but these are not my memories. Also, is it better or more conducive to recovery to think about that blended version as a part of her own, or just not do that and think about every part seperately??

Sorry if this is the wrong subreddit. We have dissociative/amnesia barriers between alters. Our alters are strongly culturally influenced.

One alter at home, A, is influenced by our culture. She speaks our mother tongue, prefers to dress that way. She likes media from our home country, and misses it dearly.

The other alter, B, comes out at work, likely due to some safety thing (we are visible minorities) but she is very strongly British. She has a strong accent, only speaks english, is very comfortable in her identity this way.

They are opposites. Generally I don’t make any effort to “control” who fronts but at work, B always fronts and then unless B stays and we don’t interact with anything that triggers A, we lose time

There must be a better way about this?? How can I get the best of both worlds in this regard, and have both of them front in their own time??

Bit embarrassing to admit but the instances where I actually felt better by being comforted after something bad happened since I was a kid probably could be counted on one hand. As a result, I’ve always skirted away from comfort or even support, just because it makes me uncomfortable.

Since I’ve been doing a bit better, though, support is easier to accept, and there have been several instances where I actually identified that I would feel better if I was comforted in an upsetting situation. I have people I feel safe enough to reach out to, but every time I try, I just feel… nothing?

My body reacts like it’s abuse. I dissociate, like I can feel the feelings in my body but I’m not in it. I don’t know what to do. I feel confused, and upset, and sometimes disappointed because I expect it to go better. I feel like I need to comfort that person, so I quickly kneecap anything I say to make it hit less hard. Sometimes, when I say something that’s really important to me and it gets glossed over, I feel very upset, even though I understand they have no way to know the significance.

I don’t know. I struggle with vague stuff so specific instructions would help me here. What do I do? How should I feel? Do I ask directly for what I need, or is that weird? What about when I’m seeking out the idea of someone being able to accomodate my feelings without me having to tell them directly, or if I feel unable to verbalise those feelings?

How am I supposed to feel when it happens?? After I get comforted, I usually feel a bit isolated because it never seems to help

This isn’t even abt the ED, I just want to preface that this isn’t recovery weight and this is actually a couple years since I got better from the worst of the ED. So a lot of stuff about recovery weight gain doesn’t apply here.

I got sick and have been really nauseous every time I eat for ages. It was to the point the doctor was worried I had cancer or something severe. Turns out I didn’t, and I responded well to the medicine, which means I’m no longer concerningly underweight.

I should be happy about this. The crazy bit is, until I stepped on the scale, I’ve been feeling good about how I look (something I can’t remember the last time I felt). I’ve been doing strength training and pretty much ignore weight loss when I work out, and I actually have muscles I can use now. I feel better about how I look than I did. And if anything, it’s a good sign that I put on muscle and didn’t even notice that my weight had changed. I feel healthier, I am healthier.

My heart still sort of sank when I saw it. It’s not even bad, it’s a perfectly healthy weight. My clothes don’t need to change. It’s genuinely a good sign, and a relief seeing as the next step would have been invasive diagnostic testing to see if I had something really concerning.

How do I not freak out about this? I should feel happy, or at the very least, neutral. I’m healthy, I’m not cold all the time, I can think clearly, I don’t hyperfixate on calories and food. I can eat whatever I want, I don’t feel awful and nauseous. But my first thought when I saw it was still how I needed to restrict myself now

This is good. How do I not freak out

I’ll be discussing physical abuse briefly for context

When I was a kid I didn’t scream or yell or beg or even cry loudly when I was hurt. Actually usually I was supposed to be quiet so it was counterintuitive to. The thing is, as an adult, I’ll wake up from nightmares pleading or apologising. That’s something I never did, I can say that with assurance, so why would a flashback make me act that way?

Or, I was doing some part work and this kid always seems to brace for worse things than what happened. Like for example I was never hit with something heavy, but someone will hold something a certain way and I immediately assume they are going to hit me with it hard. This never happened, so why is this an association I’ve made?

Something else weird, at the age I was, I wouldn’t have been speaking English anyway. Or speaking at all (I was old enough but I wasn’t supposed to in that situation ). But when I get like this, I speak English and I default to it.

My reactions seem more overstated than they did then. I didn’t used to flinch so easily. Loud noises never used to upset me so bad or make me react the way I do (when I was a kid I would just cover my ears, now instead I get upset to the point of tears, something I never used to do).

I don’t understand. My reaction isn’t a flashback, it’s not how I behaved in the traumatic memory. If something triggers me, why is this the behaviour I exhibit instead of that? Where has this come from?

A while ago I went on a lovely day trip with some friends, and at the time (during) I actually felt sort of bad because it felt like I had one foot out of reality despite how great of a time I was having. Now, though, it’s one of my fondest memories and I remember the feelings really vividly.

I worked really hard for my university place. I didn’t really react beyond maybe 15 minutes of relief when I got in. All until the end of my second semester where it all hit me and I was so happy I was borderline giddy.

I was in a minor car accident a couple years back. I felt the adrenaline, was a little giggly, didn’t really feel fear. The idea of bursting into tears after that sort of experience sounds crazy to me. After, I’d actually remember being quite stressed and tense.

I guess I don’t mind because I know I will get to feel those things at some point, but how do I get rid of that ‘one foot out of reality’ feeling??

Relevant info is that I wear a hijab and am the only one out of my four flatmates who does (for the sake of clarity, they can be A, B, C and D). My flat is student accommodation, we’re all in our 20s.

When I got my flat I requested for a flat with other muslim women/hijabis if possible. It wasn’t, but the organisers compromised and gave me a flat with these 4, who also requested a girls-only flat and didn’t want any guys. I know my beliefs are for me and that’s it, but on the first day we met, they had already been living here and explained they didn’t really want any of us to have any male guests over without warning. I told them that was fine.

B, C and D have always done this. They don’t have guys over, and maybe the 1 time they have they gave me a bit of warning and I didn’t mind because I don’t care so long as I don’t get surprised. A is another story. A has this habit of taking calls with her brother? boyfriend? cousin? all the time in the kitchen/living room.

I don’t actually care about the calls, B, C and D call guys all the time, family or friends, and also have video calls, but the difference is their laptop is facing them. A puts her phone in such a place that everyone who is in the kitchen is visible.

It’s not even about the hijab to be honest. Today I wasn’t wearing a bra (because I was in my flat), in my pyjamas with my hair out and I walked into the kitchen to get a snack and said hello to A and asked about her day when I look over and there’s just some dude in bed lookingat me. A doesn’t say anything. Idk who he is, there’s a language barrier so I don’t even know if he says anything about me. He’s just staring. I don’t know what to do so I just continue like he’s not there but I didn’t like it because I had to walk directly in front of the phone multiple times.

I don’t wear a hijab at home. I wear tiny T shirts bc they’re comfy and shorts because it’s hot, and because I’m surrounded by women so I don’t need to worry about a guy I’ve never met looking at me funny or having an opinion. I asked for a womens flat because I want to be able to wear those things, and everyone else can take their calls just fine??

The reason I think I might be the asshole is because it is the communal area, and ultimately this isn’t what we’ve discussed. I’ve got a brother who I also sometimes call while I’m there, although I usually switch off the video, but I get wanting to talk to people especially if you’re homesick, but I don’t know.

WIBTAH if I said anything, even if this isn’t what we initially agreed on? A, B, C and D are all already friends so I doubt any of the others mind, so it’s not like I can call a group meeting or whatever. I’m moving out in like 3 months so idek if it’s worth the fuss.

Before anyone asks, the sugar rush doesn’t seem to be normal because I asked my friends and they don’t know wtf I’m on about. It’s not even a lot of sugar, but eating something sweet actually gives me energy instead of making me feel a bit sleepy after a regular neal (which is normal). I only noticed this because a few times, instead of a full meal I decided to eat the snacks in my desk and while normally I feel like I am 5 minutes away from needing a nap, I literally felt great. I could focus, I was alert, I could have done a workout because I felt energised.

On the other hand, after a regular meal not only am I sleepy but I’m still hungry. I just ate a whole shawarma (about 500cals, reasonable protein) and I am so hungry I could still eat more. I ate my damn protein so what does my body want??

And I realise these are both blood sugar issues so I’ll add that I’m not diabetic, I’ve been tested for it before and I’m fine, and I also have a lower but healthy BMI (19.1 last I checked)

Seriously what gives??

Me (20F) and my friend (20NB) are medical school, which sounds tough because it is but also.

Initially when they were talking about the occasional all-nighter, or cramming in the library, I thought it was fine? But it’s got to the point where they will get antsy when we spend too long getting coffee before we go to the library, as in a five minute delay will have them anxiously pacing in the cafe. I talked to them about this, they genuinely don’t see it as a problem, either. To them, everyone is doing this, but we have friends who are part of student groups or even just have better habits.

And I’d even understand it if they’d been putting revision off to have fun and now they’re in trouble due to their choices, but they literally haven’t even been doing that, they have been revising constantly and now they’re doing extra revision and they’re still this anxious.

I talked to them about reasonable habits and also the fact that there’s an upper limit to what you can revise in one session, like you NEED to go on walks, go outside, take in fresh air between sessions. Even stretching in your room is better than nothing. You need to eat properly, you need to be seeing something other than your flashcards. And actual real life doctors have better work-life balances!! They’re allowed to double-check things between patients, they’re allowed to ask for help. no one can just memorise 5 different textbooks and repeat them verbatim, our college doesn’t even need that, our professor assured us like 5 times that he wants application of knowledge, not verbatim answers.

I think they need a hobby. I can’t think of one way to say to tell them that they need a hobby that doesn’t make me sound like a dick. It sounds mean whenever I try, but being gentle isn’t working because there’s only so many times I can tell them to take a deep breath and try and take it easy or to come on a walk with me or even to run errands, because even if you’re somehow too busy to take an hour break you should still be able to do your groceries? Being gentle isn’t working, which is why I phrased the title like that because all I can think is to tell them that they genuinely need 1 hobby outside of school that they do. Even if it’s adjacent to medical school (like our medical school has their own sports teams, so they’d still be surrounded by medics).

I don’t even know. I asked my sister, she said it would be a bit of a asshole thing to say, especially because finals are coming up. I’d argue I need to say the asshole thing because finals are coming up but whatever. WIBTAH????

So for reference I’m on the milder end of mild, and I’ve been sick since I was 13, so I don’t really have a frame of reference of what is normal so I often feel bad for taking accommodations I’m entitled to, because I feel like this disease “barely affects me”.

Nope. Turns out with all the pacing I just forgot what normal people can do.

Like one thing I tell myself is that if I can go to the gym, it means I can function. And I can go to the gym, actually! Provided I have no major events in the 3 days before and 3 days after, and that I have no activity that lasts past 8pm the night before, and that I can rest for the rest of the day, as long as I only work out for 1 hour or less with long breaks (like 5-10 minutes) between exercises, and as long as I never exceed my capacity for what I can do, and as long as its not the winter or autumn and I’m not otherwise in a crash or experiencing a worsening of symptoms I can go to the gym. And I guess that just seems so normal to me that I forgot what other people can do?

Like did you know people go to tbe gym for HOURS, and they do it every day???? I was in a subreddit and someone mentioned that they work oht for two hours every other day. Like what???

It’s all sorts of things. I got so used to my accommodations I forgot how normal people live. Like I never use a backpack anymore, I use a suitcase because I can’t carry a backpack up stairs or walk with it very far. And people carry packs for miles!

People can just do things. My friend never takes the bus, she walks to save money, and that would put me in a bed for a week and make sure I can’t walk anywhere for a month. People can just walk up hills! They decide to go to a restaurant and do it, no 3 days of advance needed. Missing a bus stop isn’t a big deal. Extra stairs are inconvenient, not a need to urgently locate the nearest lift. People don’t need to worry about their body failing them because they had an argument. I’ve literally fallen asleep immediately after arguments before, even mild ones without any shouting because it takes so much out of me. People can work, sitting down, for HOURS at once.

Idk. I’ve been beating myself up for needing help because I’m “not sick enough”, but actually I’m not healthy. I can do things because of all the insane pacing, I guess I just forgot other people don’t need the insane pacing.

Tl;dr: turns out you’re still sick even when you’re managing the disease

This is definitely a reparenting thing, but I haven’t quite worked out how to do this. I’m also autistic so I’d appreciate really clear instructions

I’ve had a fantasy of being rescued from the abuse ever since I was a kid. When I was old enough to read it was book characters, but even when I was younger it was benevolent teachers or doctors.

The thing is, it never happened. I got out. I’m not being abused, I’m not even unsafe. I’m actually quite lucky. Even more than that, I’m not a child anymore.

In the fantasy even when I have it now, I’m a kid. And its a really hard pill to swallow for that kid part of me that not only that this rescue didn’t happen, that it physically can’t happen. I’m as old as the rescuers I imagined, now.

I don’t know how to reparent this wound. This isn’t like not going to disneyland as a kid, this is the fantasy that literally kept me going through childhood. When I was 11 or 12 I realised for the first time it would never happen and I cried really hard then, but also sort of compartmentalised it.

It makes me upset in a very nonspecific way even when I’m writing this. I don’t know how to deal with it, the fantasy feels like it literally predates my personality. I still want it so bad, and it’s not even something I can replace, like I have lots of teddies now because they make me feel better but I can’t do that for this.

How do I soothe this???