[MoxieDoxie]

between you and your T for when you are suicidal? Do you two have one? Have you discussed it?

[fille_folle]

Last time I was feeling really bad, we made a safety plan. I agreed to call her, my pdoc, or a hotline if I felt like I might harm myself beyond the usual self harm - in a way that threatened my life.

[Amyjay]

We haven't discussed it.
I figure (you can use "we" for "I" here) if I am ever genuinely in danger of suicide then I would be pretty determined to do it and wouldn't let her know about it anyway, because she would potentially ruin my plans. If I were genuinely suicidal I wouldn't want that at all.
On the other hand if I am not so suicidal that I can talk to her about it then I don't need to talk to her about it because I am not truly "suicidal".

So no point in a suicide plan for me.

[MoxieDoxie]

Well I have a part that does not want to die but when that part takes over me it becomes an epic battle for survival and sometimes I feel I am going to lose that battle. That part gets the plans in place, even makes doctors appointments to get more drugs for the stockpile.

So when that part dissipated I discussed this with T and that part scares the hell out of me and is going to kill me. I said I do not want to die and I want to live my life and see where it goes and to please keep me safe.

He said to start I had to get rid of my stockpile but a panic rose up inside like a feeling of being trapped. I said I could not do that right now. Also communication between him and I but I said if I felt he was going to call the police on me and have me dragged inpatient I would never call him as I would rather be dead then go through that humiliation. Anyway hopefully it will not come to that.

He discussed that perhaps that part is a young part and as with children do not understand that dead means dead and there is no coming back and that perhaps it just wants to be relieved of the intense emotions to be shut down and not dead.

[Amyjay]

I have an alter who can become very suicidal too. She is triggered by some non-specific things and also some very specific things and when triggered out she (used to be) hell bent on completing the act. She would research the means, create the means, set the plan and time, get rid of "evidence" (personal possessions like journals etc) and get all the affairs in order. (This is the determined to die part. No way would she release her grip or let anyone else out to stop her. She had a plan and her destiny was to carry that plan through to its completion). Then she would walk right up to the point of the act itself and -

- switch.

Every single time. And we would have to deal with the destroyed stuff and the given away stuff and all of that. But not be in the least bit suicidal anymore.

I think it must be an internal safety switch. (Either that or this is hell and there IS no escape).

Anyway we've learned not to fear it. It's just like a firefighter part, right? In us we have learned the safety valve exists. We can let that part do her thing, she needs to do it, and we will all feel better once its done. Maybe we just have a lot of faith in that one who switches in as the safety valve. She has our back.

[MoxieDoxie]

Originally Posted by Amyjay

I have an alter who can become very suicidal too. She is triggered by some non-specific things and also some very specific things and when triggered out she (used to be) hell bent on completing the act. She would research the means, create the means, set the plan and time, get rid of "evidence" (personal possessions like journals etc) and get all the affairs in order. (This is the determined to die part. No way would she release her grip or let anyone else out to stop her. She had a plan and her destiny was to carry that plan through to its completion). Then she would walk right up to the point of the act itself and -

- switch.

Every single time. And we would have to deal with the destroyed stuff and the given away stuff and all of that. But not be in the least bit suicidal anymore.

I think it must be an internal safety switch. (Either that or this is hell and there IS no escape).

I lost a lot of stuff because of it. I sold stuff, gave away stuff....so that it would be less stuff that the living had to deal with. I would stop buying things like clothes as it was pointless. The dead do not need clothes.

[Betty_Banana]

My therapist and I never really had a plan in place but we did talk about it some.His thinking was since my DID system was developed for survival that it would do what was necessary to keep me alive.He didn't seem to worry about me committing suicide even though I worried about it often.I guess he was right though since I'm still here.

I think it's a good idea for everyone to have a plan,just in case.I know It would have made me feel much better about the whole thing and I would have stressed over it much less if there had been one.

[MoxieDoxie]

Im so nervous about our appointment Friday.......He is so good at getting other parts to tell him the truth.

[Amyjay]

MoxieDoxie, it seems like it would be really good to talk about this stuff with your T. You are in therapy so you can get help to heal. He is there to help you heal. You can do this.

Let us know how it goes?

[Betty_Banana]

So how did the appointment go?

[MoxieDoxie]

Originally Posted by Betty_Banana

So how did the appointment go?

You know it has been real challenging the last few days with Kate Spades and now Anthony Bourdains suicide.

He did not address anything regarding suicide or a plan. He just wanted to work on containment imagery and using the EMDR light bar to also do containment.

I have a hard time with containment.

[Amyjay]

MoxieDoxie do you and your T work on developing containment strategies together? That might be helpful to do.
My T and me and working on stage 1 of therapy for DID, still getting to know the system and develop containment strategies in preparation for the more indepth trauma work of stage 2. At our last meeting we shared something we had done, we had made colored circles (to represent firefighters, managers, exiles and self parts) and on each written the name of one of the alters we know so far. She asked more about the firefighters (I should have known she would do that from the videos I watched about Ts needing to identify and work with the firefighters first!) in particular she focused on a strongly suicidal part. She asked a lot about what triggers her, what she does, when where why etc. So I guess even though I said earlier that we wouldn't consider making a sui plan with our T our T might be on to that anyway.

[MoxieDoxie]

Yes we did containment today. Always have had trouble doing containment but he saw I was shifting in session (I have clear signs, light sensitivity, pressure on the right side of my head and right eye, feel like I want to go to sleep) and so he walked me through, step by step, asked me to take that pressure feeling in my head, put it in the container, seal it, walk it to the garbage and watch the garbage men take it away.

Very weird how it dissipated. Everything lightened up. It does not work like that out of session I have tried.

You talk like you did IFS. I have experience with IFS and have explained to him my firefighters and managers and exiles.

Anyway he has gone after my Bulimic part. Amazing that I have not been Bulimic in 3 weeks with no sign of it. I do not know when or how he got that to go away. He said we gave that part a voice and it was heard. I do not remember giving it a voice but whatever I am glad that is gone. Phew....20 years of dealing with that crap.

[Amyjay]

I only read about IFS last week. I found it really helpful to think of my alters in terms of firefighters, helpers, managers, exiles etc so made some colored circles to share names ages and roles of my alters with my T.

That's really awesome about your bulimic part!