your meaning of co consciousness

Before I ask anything else, I think I should first explain how I understand the origin of dissociation and DID. I see dissociation/ DID as an automatic defense mechanism whose origins are in childhood. It is automatic, spontaneous, and occurs without the consious awareness of the person who expereinces it. When dissociation occurs at a time before a childs personality and separate essential sense of self have been been developed, it can lead to DID.

Both dissociation and DID are defense mechanisms , protective unconscious reactions to trauma that is so severe and threatening that it cannot be tolerated or accepted by the child's mind. This defense mechanism is then reenforced with a continuing need to protect oneself from further incidents of trauma or later in life when the memory of the original trauma is triggered by some association directly related to the trauma. Smells, touch—visceral things seem to be the most common triggers in my own experience.

Vocabulary and meaning different things with the same words can make our sharing messy.
I want to ask you about what you call co-consciousness. when you use this term are you referring to now being aware of what it was that your alters expereinced , that is, the initial traumas that automatically created them? Or is it something else? I read and wonder if some of you mean that more than one alter is present in your awareness at one time/specific moment?

i'm personally not sure what 'real' co consciousness is. and i'd also think it's experienced different from person to person. also not sure if you are meaning more to get answers from specific people or not.

i experience a blending with mine now. it used to be more along the lines of how i have understood co consciousness, having an alter with me and knowing it, being able to talk to them at that moment, hear them, kind of like they are beside me in a way, etc. compared to where they might otherwise be more in the background, distance, etc. where i would get more just feelings from them, etc.

for me now, the blending aspect is not what i'd consider co-conscious as it has changed to where i don't know 'who' it is but can feel their feelings and other things but not be able to link it to any one specific.

as far as knowing what traumas or situations caused each one to develop, that is not anything i've ever known. i can remember some traumas but do not know when each one of the others came along. i don't expect to know that ever either as there is a lot still kept from me.

Thank you for your answer. I beleive you are quite right when you say it is expereinced differntly from person to person. You have given me something more to consider which helps in a greater understanding of DID.
Take care. hugs to you

Great question. It has to be different from person to person. For me it can mean awareness of feelings that arise that have nothing to do with what is actually happening. I mean feelings that are totally off-the-chart disproportionate to the situation at hand. Also, it can be awareness of a memory that I do not claim to be mine, but obviously happened to "me" as a different part.

It can also mean hearing a response to something different from what 'I' am thinking and knowing where that comes from.

Hope this helps.

Co-consciousness for me was when any one of us was out and present in the world and simultaneously able to converse (internally) or be aware of what others were saying internally.
Here's a tricky concept: I only know what it was like for ME - I do not know what it was like from my alts perspectives. Did they even have a perspective on this? I don't even know.
There MUST be co-consciousness all the time at some level because how else would a particular alter be triggered by an external event? There must be some communication / co-consciousness going on somewhere. Maybe?
Let's say hosty person was out and about in the world and some trigger for alter q happened... either alter q had to be consciously aware of the external trigger event (otherwise how would he/she react to it?) or the

Okay someone tells me (co-consciousness of some form right there - I hear the voice in my head, but don't know who it belongs to) says yes they have to be aware all the time because they have to be able too get out BEFORE it gets bad so they have to be keeping an eye out for anything that could go wrong and if they see anything then they come out so we don't have to see it.
So there ya go. Co-consciousness to me is THAT - communication across the great divide.

This is really interesting. Are you saying because of the way parts can function to meet external needs and situations, that suggests there is already a form of co-consciousness? This makes sense to me. It seems more often the case that the ANP/apparently normal part doing everyday living is the last one to get the DID memo!

Not dxd DID. Don't meet full criteria. PTSD complex. DDnos or whatever they are calling it now, BP2, BPD, GAD, ADHD. So I have experienced periods of complete amnesia splits, co consciousness, and some intergration? It all ebbs and flows how it wants to. Some info/ Input is very welcome, but some is just distracting, then some parts I pray keep whatever memories they hold to themselves forever. There are just somethings that I never want to recover. When I feel these parts I do not know their secrets but I can fell their pain and panic. One I have been dreaming with for over a month. She is small and lonely. She has helped me understand a lot of the internal conflicts, but is also aware that I don't want her secret and she don't want to share it cuz she is afraid I will stop coming to play with her Now I don't have to dream to access her. She speaks to me while awake and I do have times when I physically experience feeling like her. I get scared panic attacks cry and rock in closets over unknown fear, but it pasts generally in an hr or less. to all our brave little ones out there.

Sherri: Co-conscience is so weird that it seems to defy logical sense so much that I'm amazed as to how it works for us. We've been co-conscience the whole time and didn't know it, but you have to know our history being now age "48". Co-con is different to everyone I imagine.

In our head, we have a conference room where we all pitch ideas, arguments, thoughts, direction, commands,...etc. in this room we do all our thinking...the conscience room.

In the past...as a single shared conscience, we assumed that the voices of the others were part of our individual thinking, being unaware of others but only of ourselves. It wasn't till recent that we came out of denial and seperated ourselves, recognizing each other as other personalities. Once we did this...it became obvious to us.

We maybe co-con, but still amnesiac to a certain point....that is we really don't know what the other does during the day because the memories stay with that other. We are always aware and ready to be triggered out to do our job, but since the conscience is always aware and present, its like who presents takes it over and we just watch...ready to present or help think in a sub-conscience state. Its so freaking weird.

If we weren't aware, we would be so losing time. We lose memories and time does fly, but its in smaller increments like hours to a day or week. Some are missing decades and years.

We experience memories that fade, coming too and be doing something but not surprised... well, most of the time, body fights, watching others operate the body, like I said....it's FREAKY, lol.