Interesting...

I never thought anything about being dissociative until in therapy my therapist started to suspect that and gave me one of those dissociation questionnaires.

After that we went into working with parts and I still didn't really know if any of it was real. I was like naming parts of myself that I had only thought must exist just from an analytical standpoint. Just focusing on times I felt different and stuff like that, but never really truly thinking I have DID or something or thinking that my parts were truly "separate" from me somehow.

It's interesting you mention automatic writing because that's similar to the way I had my first experience of feeling like there was really "another person" or a truly separate consciousness in my own brain and body. I was laying there one night writing in my journal a day after I had had some stressful experiences. Then as I was starting to get sleepy at one point I realized I felt like my hand was moving on its own. Then I started to really feel that way. I tried not to freak out because I'm a skeptical person but this was VERY REAL.

That part started drawing, not really anything in particular, just shapes and lines and stuff. But that prompted me to start asking questions since I was aware of dissociation. Then that part started writing back words to me and drawing smily faces and people.

Then suddenly I got flooded with HORRIBLE emotions for the next couple of weeks. They were intensely awful. Worst emotions I have ever felt. I felt so unsafe and utterly paranoid and intense waves of fear. I thought I was losing my mind or developing schizophrenia or something. I was afraid to even sleep thinking my body's gonna get taken over. This part was saying really mean aggressive things to me and seemed to truly hate me. I started to feel like I'm always being "watched" and it freaked me out. I thought this part was judging every little thing I'm doing and saying and even everything I'm THINKING.

My therapist tried to help me sort this out but it was too much stuff all at once. Well after a few weeks of that I calmed down a bit and realized the world hasn't ended. Tbh that whole time I kind of just was longing for the point where this other part of me would just disappear and I would be "fixed." IT was stressful to have to think about who this part is and what it wants from me or what it needs, I had never thought about things like that. I felt like I was losing "freedom" because I had to constantly pay attention to this other part of me. So I tried not to think that I really wished it would just go away.

Well only a few weeks after that my therapist abandoned me because I talked about my feelings.

Ever since then the inside was mostly quiet. I didn't think about it as much because I was more focused on coping with the loss of that therapist which was very hard for me to cope with. So I have not felt normal since then either. There's still a LOT of dissociation happening. I haven't even been very emotional since then. That's all I really know.

I'm of two minds about what I should do at this point. I know there's "more to me" and there is still a lot of dissociation. But part of me thinks the way therapy approaches dissociation is wrong and it should be handled in a more "organic" way focusing on living a fuller life. Then on the other hand sometimes I wonder if maybe that approach won't actually get me anywhere and maybe I'll keep feeling stuck unless I treat this as dissociation and go back to therapy etc. to do that inner type of work.

However since my trust in therapy was so shattered I have lost the motivation to go back especially since I can hardly afford it and there's not a whole lot of decent options in my area. It just feels like too much work only to end up disappointed again. I invested over 2 years and thousands of dollars into that one therapist only to realize that she was not a reliable professional. Then I saw another dissociation therapist for a year and that just didn't get anywhere. I'm frustrated and all I want is to have a fuller life but so many challenges stemming from the PTSD type symptoms are always weighing me down. The money that goes into therapy is not insignificant as that money could be used for other ways of developing myself and improving my life instead....

I feel like, does dissociation therapy actually make people better? Is there any solid evidence that it truly works? Ugh, I've become so skeptical of therapy and I feel so jaded about going back into that. I don't want to end up feeling emotionally dependent on some therapist again.