a question if that's ok ?

Hi, I havn't been here for a long time, have been kind of trying to sort myself out but things arn't going too well. We have known for a long time that there is more than one of us and tried explaining it to our t, however, it seems that really we are not supposed to know that each other exist, to us and how we work, that seems strange. I understand that alot of people arn't aware until they are officially diagnosed by someone else. We didn't know there was a name for how we are, to us it's just normal, one big mess because there are so many disagreements but it's still normal. Is this weird ? feeling even more confused than ever now and we feel like we have to try and hide how we are but that means there is really no point to therapy. So we'd be really grateful for peoples honest opinions even if it's not the answer we are hoping for.
Is it weird ?
thanking you in advance for any replies

We DIDers have many different experiences. I heard someone talking in my head for years and thought it was normal and later on was surprised to learn that others didn't. Due to life stresses and some spiritual experiences my alters who had remained unknown started to surface. I still didn't see that as a big problem. It was only when one of them got suicidal that I was hospitalized and diagnosed. I was aware of some, and totally unaware of many others.

It was only when things began to unravel that I was made aware of the blocks of lost time. I was 44 at that time. Little did I realize that an alter named Mamma Jude had pretty much raised my children, another alter had been the one to get me away from an abusive husband. My group of alters had helped me get through life. Due to depression and the emotional wounds of my childhood I was a loner with no family so my world was very small. No one to question or even notice the diffeences between alters.

My experience may not be exactly what they write about in text books but that's unimportant to me. I was a victim of SRA, the DID saved my life. And in the past 17 years I have met many other folks with DID and no story is alike. Please don't doubt yourself if you don't fit what some Dr or book says it should look like.

So many of my alters held terrifying memories and needed therapy to overcome what had been done to them. I even had to go to a de-programmer to get free of some of it. Mine was a faith based therapy and it worked for me. As they were healed, I was healed.

Even in my healing I don't match what many so called experts say should be the goal. I have four alters that chose not to integrate and we live in harmony. For years the goal of the experts was total integration. Well, that's my choice, isn't it?

When my system unraveled it was due to being triggered and then the floodgates opened. I had prayed for years for it to be revealed why I was such an emotional mess and boy, that prayer was answered. I'm thankful for a wise, loving counselor who worked so hard with me for almost ten years. The truth was revealed. It was scary and painful and chaotic but the healing was there. I wouldn't give up. I wanted to be free to have a more normal and productive life.

Not every therapist is trained or right to work with patients who are discovered with DID. Finding one who is can be a challenge. They are the problem not us! We don't need to hide our truth to please them. We'll only get sicker if we try that, in my opinion.

Hope something I've shared is helpful to you. Our reality, our tuth is what it is no matter who chooses to believe or not.
Judy and company

Judy and company

THANK YOU
for writing your experience and this post most of all....I have and can not tell you how much people try to squeeze there mold into a one size fit DID box to dx themselves sometimes!!! YOU CAN'T myself included..I think sometimes (from personal) experience it's our way of trying to escape having to deal with the fact that we have this (illness) I feel it's a gift (not at the present) but I know it's saved our lives...SO I appreciate you bringing awareness to this issue...I think it's important to do research and to definetely get t's or dx's from dr.s who specialize in DID trauma and go from there too...Cuz allot of t's will dismiss it or cast it off as something else allot of times...Anyway's I just appreciated how well put your post was and I cannot put my thought's out like I want to write them there way to scattered as you can totally tell but anyway's thank you,
MC

thank you so much Judy and company for taking the time to post and also for sharing your story, it has been very helpful to hear someone else's story so thank you again

thank you also MC for your comments

i blocked off all awareness of being split until sometime in my early 40's when my counselor recognized it and began to work with me as a multiple.

for several years i fought the dx and had really strong denial alts who's job was to deny we were multiple. i too experienced satanic ritual abuse and these abusers did such vicious things to me as a small child that i had to hide even from myself or go insane or take my life.

i feel like i have two versions of my life as a child. i had a boring, quietly unhappy childhood, in which i had no idea i had any kind of abuse. but by 18, i wanted to die so bad it scared me. i was 29 before someone looked at me one day and said, "you did know you were abused, right?" then my second life history began to trickle up into my memory and old memories began to have added information in them with an even darker explanation.

my counselor learned how to work with did'ers on me and her other clients. i've been working for 14 years trying to get healed of the nightmare of my life since infancy. no one helped me but this counselor and one other person who believed me. my own husband will not believe that i am a did'er. he denies my past and my healing has taken 14 years partly due to the stress of trying to not switch/be any other alter around him. it is exhausting. but, both of my daughters believe me. they saw me switch over and over.

bottom line: i believe that did is a gift, a certain bent of mind that enables us to escape the hell we are thrust into thru creative dissociation. when i finally accepted that i am who and what i am, i have healed so much more. . i am now grateful and less afraid. i will be able to get by in life. i hope things get better for you too soon.

leslie and her pixies

thank you leslie and pixies for sharing your story, hearing of others experiences makes me feel less alone, if that makes sense.
thanks again

yes, queenie123, what you say makes complete sense. i like to hear people's stories, even though they are sad and i feel bad for others who are DID, because it is pretty lonely being this way. even with a comittee in my head i feel very alone much of the time. also, i feel like i learn things from people who can share their story and experiences. it is helpful when people have the courage to share about their lives - though i know it is very hard for people to talk about painful things.

leslie and pixies

I think each person has there own story and we each need to find a T that will work with us on the things we need to work on. Our host is Diana. She doesnt listen to our comments, thoughts or ideas. She prefers to pretend that we don't exisit. This is painfull to some of the Clan members who only strive to help and protect. We have no memories of the past truama that made us this way. The part that held such memories is long gone and never heard from. We often think that part died many years ago. We continue on caring for the little ones and watching the ones who would cause Diana harm. Ort T is working with Diana on self esteem. Lately she has asked why no one but Diana has been to see her. The truth to that is that things have been stressfull and Diana has greatly benifited from seeing her T. If someone else were to have gone then Diana would have missed out. Our T does not doubt who we are nor would she ever want us to hide from her.

As for you knowing of your system; There are no rules to DID that says you are not supposed to know about each other. In my oppinion it makes healing easier if you know and accept each other. To say your Dx is not real because of your knowlege of each other is absurd. It simply means that you are more open to total healing. Diana still refuses to speak to us and even has a hard time awknowlegeing us when one of us helps her out. The only good thing is that when she looses time she does not freak out. She simply moves on as if nothing happened. Many times she is not even aware that she has lost time unless it is brought to her attention.

The way you feel is not weird. There are many who feel as you do. It is simply normal to them. There too are those who feel as Diana does and deny that we exisit. This too is normal. There is nothing wierd or wrong for either you or Diana. It is simply how you feel and that is that.

I hope some of what I said brings you some comfort.
Denise of the Clan

While most DIDers do not know that their alters exist at first, they are aware that some thing is not right with them or within them (I knew this at age 12 - dx at age 30)... and their are some DIDers like me that they are 90% aware of what their alters do, but we are not able to stop them.

IMO - I say the reason for T is to integrate your alters as much as you can so you can get back to the original YOU the YOU that was born - ONE!

I went from having 15 different alter (and a few small pieces) to just me and my close counter part Carol..... I could not have done this without eight straight years of T.

[quote]
<<<<<<<I wanted to be free to have a more normal and productive life.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>



I woke up one day,in the morning,to find a stack of business papers and to continue on what I thought I was working on. The only thing left to do was, a few more meetings and my signature. There was a very,very large amount of money involved.I have lived below poverty all my adult life.This deal, had thrown me into a state of shock and I was re-living a trauma unconciously.I tried and tried to do business for the rest of that day,but the thought process for business was not there. I had switched back to survival mode,inwhich my business part was created to get myself out of survival mode.Bottom line,no deal and there I was.....what happened?....why cant I do business anymore? It was there yesterday......

Now, this incident was before my diagnosis. I had already started a type of spiritual practice(prayer,montra,creator,God,whatever works,something).

Then, the serendipitous event occurred. I was on my way overseas,to go to work,when I went to get a physical in 2004, for the job.I was screened for ptsd,and it came back positive, as a few times before(this was not the first positive ptsd screening).It was suggested that I talk to a professional about the ptsd.I did and then I was reffered to another.

On May 29, 2004, I had an appointment with a Board Certified Expert in Traumatic Stress(B.C.E.T.S. Ph.d.).By this time, I had seen psychiatrists,therapists,psychologists,group therapy..(whats wrong with me)......etc.

I walked into her office and sat down.At this point in my life, I was willing to try anything.We greeted and she asked me if I was ready.My thoughts at that time were,here we go again,tell the stories, re-live the incidents and endore the pain,AGAIN.

The barrage of questions were then fired.I really did not have a chance to answer the questions,because she is a expert in d.i.d.

What I remember from that point on was,coming out of a blackout,crouched down in a corner of the office, in a puddle of tears to her voice saying ,doug, come back. She then asked, "who was that",and for the first time in my life,I had heard my unconcious speak,aloud,through me.

With all those years of therapy,(since98),this bcets specializing in d.i.d.
diagnosed me within fifteen minutes.

I found the problem in May of 04, since that time, I have been focusing in on the solution..................because....................

I want to be free and have a more normal and productive life
[quote]

I can't thank you all enough for sharing your own experiences, I am kind of 'wow' at the moment and you have no idea how much you have helped me, a big big thank you from the bottom of my heart

Reading all these has been good for me/the system as well. at the moment I am a bit spacy from it all.
I also go in and out of awareness of the voices depending on "who" I am at the time. One does not believe she is DID so she doesn't know when the destructives are preying on her. We all know various things and function in various ways. Sometimes it surprises me the things I know, since I have no recollection of obtaining the info. Even now I am watching tv as I type, and I know the host cannot do that - never learned more than "home row" on the keyboard.
It bothers me that somone might tell you it is "wrong" to know of the other parts. Did T say that specifically? Or has that thought been gathered in as an assumption? (I ask becase I just learned that I do this - survival mechanism, of course). I am in year 6 of therapy (not all with the same T) but I think I am finally in a good place. It took this long to know the others were not a good fit for me. My system has 14 parts give or take and some pieces. Several interact, some are there only when no one else can function. Some are destructives... one blocks the others. I'm losing any thread to this... T's goal with me is not necessarly "one person", though if that happens, of course that is fine too. But the others were very angry at that notion. For T and I, we are working toward ending self destructiveness and arguments - having the alters all on one page working together.
Best to you,
Kiya