I believe that I understand what you are asking but I don't think it's a binary choice - i.e. self-supporting or requiring social assistance. I have always been self-supporting until recently, but it came at a very high price.

I would go to work and interact with the people at work. Sonseearae would go home and interact with the people around our home. Lori would find a restaurant or two far from either of those two places and mingle, making friends with the staffs. Eventually, our worlds would begin to collide. Waitresses at the restaurant Lori was a regular at would come to the casino were I was working, for instance. Suddenly, we had a problem - Lori is mute, I don't shut up. Our solution, we moved - usually within twenty-four hours.

We had a run fund and lived out of suitcases for most of our adult lives (over thirty years now), seldom unpacking the car completely. We've lived in forty states, and in some of those states we lived in twenty cities or towns or more. From Maine to Florida, California to Washington and everywhere in between.

Now suddenly, my physical health bit the big one and I can't work, can't run...now what? The only tools I have in my tool bag require me to have my physical health. Is it possible that, without my DID getting any worse, I've gone from self-supporting to needing assistance? Maybe.

That example I just gave though? I didn't realize that it was DID related before I couldn't do it any longer. That might seem silly, but it was just my normal, I didn't question it. Too, it was only very recently that I discovered that my choice in relationships was pretty much controlled by my alters. I guess what I'm saying is, I'm not always aware of the ways in which DIID (or any other physical or mental health challenge) effects my life because it is just my normal life.