[TrailRunner14]

Protector parts are always so hard to hear and connect with.

For me, they feel scary and I don't know how to approach them.

This part, for me, takes me away but I want to hear it and understand it.

It's important to me and it has helped me, even though I don't understand that.

My question is,

"How do you connect with a protector part that you are afraid of being connected with?"

There is the desire (analytical) to sort this out, but the fear of really knowing it.

I believe that I am fueling the protector part and trying to analyze and sort it out at the same time.

Does that make sense?

It sounds like a bind, but I don't really know how to work with it and understand it.

Just curious.

Thank you for hearing me.

[amandalouise]

Originally Posted by TrailRunner14

Protector parts are always so hard to hear and connect with.

For me, they feel scary and I don't know how to approach them.

This part, for me, takes me away but I want to hear it and understand it.

It's important to me and it has helped me, even though I don't understand that.

My question is,

"How do you connect with a protector part that you are afraid of being connected with?"

There is the desire (analytical) to sort this out, but the fear of really knowing it.

I believe that I am fueling the protector part and trying to analyze and sort it out at the same time.

Does that make sense?

It sounds like a bind, but I don't really know how to work with it and understand it.

Just curious.

Thank you for hearing me.

in my system the word protector alter was all of my alters. they were there to protect me from harm, from remembering the abuse I went through, to protect me from the elements, to protect me from my own emotions,... anything I was unable to handle they dealt with...

that said most of my system I had no awareness that they were there, I found out I had DID after I grew up and was in college. Those that I did hear I just assumed was normal and how everyone was.

After diagnosis my treatment providers and I did not try to connect with or hear the others that I was not already co conscious of. we just let them continue on doing and being what ever their sense of agency was. We (my treatment providers and I) felt that to force co consciousness with alters could do more harm then good to me. We chose the more natural approach of knowing when it was time for them to be co conscious (connect/ talk ) with me it would happen. not developing co consciousness (connection/ hearing/ talking / awareness) of those that didnt "connect" as you call it, did not stop the healing process for me. we just let them do what and why they were created.

[Amyjay]

Trailrunner I have read your post several times and felt a need to respond but I am taking my time to formulate my thoughts around this. I think what I am working on is similar and dissimilar to your experience.
About the word "protector"... do you mean a protector who is angry towards you? Do you mean a protector part who looks after hurting parts? The word could mean either depending on the context so I am not sure how to respond. Can you say more about what kind of protector part you mean? Is it an angry part, an abusive part, a part that keeps taking things away because he is protecting you from information or feelings? Can you say more?

[amandalouise]

wanted to add.. I had more problems with abusive alters or as some people call them persecuting alters and also called perpetrator alters. these alters of mine were real close to what my treatment providers called introjects (I also had/ have a couple of these)

my perpetrator/ persecuting alters were very strong, acting like the abuser, pushing my friends away, self injury if I tried to tell, suicidal, repeating words at me that my abuser said and did....

how we (my treatment providers and I) dealt with this was if they became a danger to their self and others I was hospitalized until stable again. While in the hospital we worked on finding the trigger (what caused them to do what they did) and then made treatment plans so that I could handle the problems that would trigger these alters to start acting up/ acting out/ set up emergency plans on what to do instead of acting on those self injury, suicide thoughts and others stuff.

[TrailRunner14]

Originally Posted by Amyjay

Trailrunner I have read your post several times and felt a need to respond but I am taking my time to formulate my thoughts around this. I think what I am working on is similar and dissimilar to your experience.
About the word "protector"... do you mean a protector who is angry towards you? Do you mean a protector part who looks after hurting parts? The word could mean either depending on the context so I am not sure how to respond. Can you say more about what kind of protector part you mean? Is it an angry part, an abusive part, a part that keeps taking things away because he is protecting you from information or feelings? Can you say more?

****This could be triggering. ****

There is a fragment that came up many months ago. My counselor and I were working through it with EMDR and something stepped in front of it.

My mind went blank.

We have not pursued it.

It has come back.

I won’t go into details, but the protector part is in between me and that fragment.

I can feel it and it is very strong to keep me from making sense or seeing that fragment for what it is.

There is much anxiety connected with it, the “seeing” it, but the analytical part of me won’t stop. It wants an answer. It wants relief. An answer.

There are fragments there for me.

Just snapshots that are disturbing.

My analytical part wants to sort things out to have peace.

Was it this or was it that? That’s a mild form of the question.

It’s painful to not know what the fragments are trying to show me and doubly painful for the protector to be doing it’s job.

[Amyjay]

Okay, thanks for sharing a bit more. I wonder if you have you tried communicating with that protector in different ways?
There are things I can't see. It happened in our last session... a part said something that was very firmly shut down by another part (like your protector I suppose) because we "cannot see that yet."
I wonder if your analytical part would be temporarily satisfied by analyzing reasons and ways of being for different parts of self? Finding out more about the roles of different alters and how to work with them may help. I find this book really useful. You can read some of the pages online if you click on "look inside". https://www.amazon.com/Coping-Trauma...d+dissociation

[Solnutty]

Ideas— maybe it’s the analytical part that needs attention and work, to be able to listen to and wait until the protector deems it a good time to shed light on that fragment? Does analytical communicate with protector at all?

[dlantern]

Benefits to alter come to mind find a way to gain safety....Good luck

[L.P.]

I try the best I can to not deal with them. Try being the key word there. But that's me and despite the fact I want answers for everything and I want them now, my leave it alone reaction is heavily steeped in past experiences. I have a total bias here and I know it. Really, that stuff is why I, on a personal level, am here and not the last host type people. They found out and shtf bad like. I'm not afraid of remembering... I am afraid of how the shock of that will impact me as a whole though. I can think I'll keep it together once I know, but I don't now that everyone else in my system is ready for that. And maybe I'm not either. I dunno. And I wouldn't until it was too late to undo potential damage.

I try to keep that in mind when I get to wanting to see what my bits and pieces are all about... those of us here now in my system doing this life thing, we don't know what that stuff was about even though the last group ended up knowing. It's still hidden to us and I'm pretty sure it is for self safety reasons. I have an idea about the bits, but I can't disturb that... even if my filter would allow it, I really don't think me and mine are stable enough for that.

When I do get to wanting to know, and I do get like that, I try to remember that stuff and think well, maybe if one day I will know, then maybe what I should do is redirect my energy to being more solid on my own two feet before trying to bring more stuff into the mix. I have so much on my plate already to deal with. I'm a mess of a person now without all that. Meh. But that's me. I'm not saying you are not in a place to deal, just saying that's where I am, so I redirect my energy. That's how I deal... I totally redirect and don't deal with my one protector type. I figure if and when we are ready, he will deal with us.

A/V

[TrailRunner14]

Originally Posted by L.P.

I try the best I can to not deal with them. Try being the key word there. But that's me and despite the fact I want answers for everything and I want them now, my leave it alone reaction is heavily steeped in past experiences. I have a total bias here and I know it. Really, that stuff is why I, on a personal level, am here and not the last host type people. They found out and shtf bad like. I'm not afraid of remembering... I am afraid of how the shock of that will impact me as a whole though. I can think I'll keep it together once I know, but I don't now that everyone else in my system is ready for that. And maybe I'm not either. I dunno. And I wouldn't until it was too late to undo potential damage.


I try to keep that in mind when I get to wanting to see what my bits and pieces are all about... those of us here now in my system doing this life thing, we don't know what that stuff was about even though the last group ended up knowing. It's still hidden to us and I'm pretty sure it is for self safety reasons. I have an idea about the bits, but I can't disturb that... even if my filter would allow it, I really don't think me and mine are stable enough for that.


When I do get to wanting to know, and I do get like that, I try to remember that stuff and think well, maybe if one day I will know, then maybe what I should do is redirect my energy to being more solid on my own two feet before trying to bring more stuff into the mix. I have so much on my plate already to deal with. I'm a mess of a person now without all that. Meh. But that's me. I'm not saying you are not in a place to deal, just saying that's where I am, so I redirect my energy. That's how I deal... I totally redirect and don't deal with my one protector type. I figure if and when we are ready, he will deal with us.


A/V

Thank you!

Your words are very real to me.

That protector is so focused on by my internal system. There is a part of me that can’t take its eyes off of it.

I don’t know if it’s from fear or trying to sort out who and what it is.

“What” is an important word.

My other parts feel like girls/female and this part doesn’t feel distinguishable. It feels more like an “it” or a thing.

I can’t really explain that other than that.

There was a friend who said that it was scared. It’s hard for me to sort that feeling out looking at it.

I want to put it in a safe (be where you are for Now place) but I can’t take my eyes off of it and tame the curiousness of analytical trying to sort it out.

Sorry if that was too much info.

[L.P.]

Perhaps it is an it. I happen to consider our said filter as more of a function than a standard human-esque individual in our system. My take on him is likely due to the fact that I do not believe he has ever been up front and center in this body of ours. That and we have several non human individuals so it's not all that uncommon for us. I digress. For me and my own band of merry misfits, those of us who do not and have not engaged life in this body, but did internal jobs, always seem to initially come across to others as enigmas, mysterious, and spooky as all get out, monolithic things.

Perhaps it is afraid. If it has a job unique to itself and has been doing what it does, it stands to reason it has been doing so for the benefit of the whole. It's there for a reason, mentality. There seems a few components to that; sense of purpose perhaps being removed, worry over not doing a good job keeping others safe should it's job be interrupted, change on it's own is generally disturbing... perhaps it could even be unaware of you all as independent human beings who have been living life. Who knows? Those are my own biases though; I have wondered such things about our filter. I have no idea how he understands life, if he understands life, or if he simply is.

As for the initial question about communicating with such parts. Oh, we had a function, a place holder if you will, who was able to communicate with us and chose to do so by showing up one day and spooking the system members who were living life during that time. Not the same as our filter, but it's the closest I got in regards to actual communication building with function type system members. I didn't build communication with E, that would be C.

If I recall correctly, what C did was make it clear to E that they were causing system wide fear due to suddenly finding out there was this creepy thing living silently along side us all those years. E being a protector type was disturbed to discover they were causing what they would fill in to protect others from. They did not know they were doing that. E and C built on common ground. They both wanted to look out for their own and protect those who needed it. Mutual respect came from that once C understood E meant well. The active system members trusted C completely. That helped. The time was right for it to. We had all these system members popping outta the woodwork back then and a lot of them were truly understanding it was not the past and trying to adjust to not being the job they always had been. Real change heavy time. E seemed to want in on that and tried to adjust their job to continue helping in the present. It took some time and slow movin steps to hear C tell it. I think it happened fast, only took a few months but patient never was a word anyone used when describing C. Intimidated is also not a word to be used when describing that her. Lol.

That was a lot of words to say maybe build it slow, steady, and on common ground and trust. Assuming, of course, the time is right for you and yours. But if your filter is anything like ours, it might just shut things down if it is not the right time, but I do have to wonder if maybe it is the right time since it did make itself known to you. That's a big deal. Big step. My take anyhow.

-Tay