My t also does IFS, although not as strictly as Rainbow's seems to. I've never heard her use the terms "child part" or "teenage part"- maybe she knows that would be a bit of a turn off for me. She does speak of the "protective part" or the "vulnerable part". At first, I balked at this idea too. I felt, like Ellie May, that I am all one person, not bits and pieces of a whole. However, I have come to at least accept the fact that these labels are useful as labels if nothing else: they are agreed upon terms that she and I can use to refer to a specific phenomena.

It's also true that these "parts" are not pathology. The big CEO who is a **** at work but gentle and loving with his family (or vice versa!) is still the same guy 24/7. But, wouldn't it be valuable for him to examine this dichotomy in his life? To be curious about why he acts in these different ways? Both behaviors are perfecly normal, and perhaps utterly necessary, but he could learn something if he acknowleged them.

That's how I came to accept the idea of "parts".