Such clear awareness that these individual named alters are there is aprt of what I find so upsetting.

Clear awareness is upsetting. When I started to realize what was happening and would be aware that a part was coming forward, it freaked me out, it was like someone was slipping into my skin. And the really odd thing was that they felt more completely real than 'I' did, if that can possibly make any sense.

Also, my dissociation was always just something that happened with me and that I later become aware of.

I, who finally got therapy, had no idea dissociation was happening. If I had, I would have gotten help decades earlier. It has taken quite a while to understand, from a lived perspective, what it has meant over the years. I have a lot of loss to grieve. It has profoundly affected my vocational expression, relationships, memory and ability to self advocate.

It is not a fun circus act or carnival ride. It explains so many frustrations over time, including not understanding and feeling the movement of time in my life.
That is something I wish people would talk more about. Time distortion is a documented component of dissociative disorders, DID especially.

As for the calling out parts, I have never been able to do that and believe me, there have been times it would have been extremely helpful to be able to. Most of the time, a part with the needed skills seems to step in and get things done, but only as a response to external necessity. Though, now, I can "talk" to a part that I know to be in distress based on what has emerged in therapy.

I have NEVER been able to make a choice from a solid inner sense of self. I have good instincts for survival. That is not the same as knowing what you want or like and going for it. My insides are in perpetual conflict that has been immobilizing.
If "talking" to parts can help, I'm totally on board with that.

But drama? No thank you. My own flavor of this dissociative thing is to be extremely private. The basis of my survival over the years was to NOT draw attention to what was happening, apparently. All the parts can and do function under the given name, which I/we have always detested. The whole point was to keep going and stay hidden. All the most precious parts of "me" were hidden to be kept safe. And of course, the ones who were out and about are also precious.

Wow, I've gone on too much. Sorry. Really good thread you started.