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Looking for perspective

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Looking for perspective

Postby eiritw » Sun Oct 07, 2012 4:18 pm

Hi. So as far as I currently know I am not multiple, however I had a dissociative experience that I'm struggling to understand and I'm wondering if anyone here can offer insight. I've been doing a bunch of research on this stuff but I'm still not sure. Wall o' text incoming!

My background is that I'm a survivor of childhood physical and emotional abuse. I am diagnosed Major Depressive Disorder, Recurrent, Severe w/o psychotic features (although I do hallucinate on occasion), Generalized Anxiety Disorder, and I'm autistic. Dissociation has been a part of my life since forever. I've struggled with identity my whole life (I'm also transgender which made that even worse), often feeling as though I had no identity, seeing a stranger when I look in the mirror, etc. And I've sometimes felt like I have different aspects of myself that go beyond just modulating my behavior and speech based on context. My only experience with lost time is from childhood though. I don't remember a lot of it, especially my abuse. I just have enough fragments and images that I know that it happened. There was also one instance where my sister went to my parents, crying and insisting that I hit her, but when my parents called me down to scold me for it, I had no idea what they were talking about and could only remember the time before and time after I supposedly hit her - in between was a total blank.

So on to the experience I'm having trouble with. My dad sent me an email in which he said some extremely triggering stuff. I went to the bathroom and while I was in there, I dissociated. Derealization happened first, followed by depersonalization. Then I heard an internal voice saying "Erika? Erika? C'mon Erika. You can get through this." It was not an audio hallucination, it was definitely within my mind but also definitely not self-talk. I very clearly and distinctly perceived it as coming from someplace not-me. Either they or I exerted enough motor control to send my arm, which was hanging at my side, clumsily swinging forward until my hand made contact with the tub. I'm not honestly sure who did that. But that bit of reality testing toned down the derealization.

Then the entity that was talking to me before took over. The thing that makes me very skeptical that this is actually DID is that this entity and myself seem to share memory - I had no lost time here. I remember them feeling very calm (whereas I was so triggered and upset there's absolutely no way I could have calmed down that much so quickly), and very warm, and very confident in me. I remember them thinking, "This is good. Erika's going through a lot of pain right now and she really needs and deserves this break." Although I'm aware of this, it feels like if anything I still had a residual process running to listen to my mind, while the rest of me was not there. The process of me coming back & the entity fading back to wherever it came from was fuzzy and I really don't understand what happened.

This is the only time that I can recall that anything like this has happened. That's another reason I'm skeptical that it's DID, because everything I've read says that it almost always begins at a very young age. So I'm not sure how to explain it. I'm also afraid that I may have pushed myself into this - that because I know and interact with some multiples online and so I'm aware of it, that maybe there was some subconscious process of deliberately going down this road to cope with stuff, and therefore I'm "faking" it, or it's not legitimate.
Autistic, GAD, MDD, C-PTSD.
UnDx: DD-NOS/DID possible. Getting evaluated soonish. Erika, Rachel, Michael.
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby tomboy24 » Sun Oct 07, 2012 5:23 pm

There is not much accurate information out there for DID unfortunately. Even the information that is out there may not apply to everyone, and so it can cause confusion, as it seems to have done in your case. From what you have written, it seems extremely possible that you have DDNOS/DID, and you should not write it off, but instead look into it further and perhaps wait to see if anything resonates with you.

DID does not have to start incredibly young. Granted, we have heard Kat's voice since as long as we can remember, but we were more like a paper split in half. If other events in our life had not happened when the body was 10 years old, then the paper would have been taped up and eventually made whole again- of this I am certain. We had a rather good life until the body was 10 years old, and our abuse did not begin until that age. Our life was not "normal" by most standards, no, and there were events to cause the partial splits, but nothing before the age of 10 to cause a full, entire split. Kat was considered an imaginary friend/sister during childhood. She seemed real because, well, we were young and at that age, anything can seem real. But she did not truly become "real" or a full split until the age of 10.
However, it is different for different people, especially people who experience other dissociative symptoms such as depersonalization or derealization. Even things such as major depression and post traumatic stress disorder can make dissociation easier than, say, for a person with no "problems". If a person already has dissociation tendencies, whether or not it is from DDNOS/DID, it will make it easier for them to fully dissociate over time as a defensive mechanism, no matter what age or point in their life. Think of it this way: it is easier for glass to break when it is already cracked than it is for glass to break when it is still completely whole and undamaged. People may have cracks in their glass without knowing it, and then later on that can cause the glass to break into different pieces. So dissociating with other personalities does not have to start when you are a baby or anything like that. The thing about DID is that it a very personal disorder. There are guideline main symptoms to help people consider DID as a possibility for them, but they do not have to apply to everyone and they often do not. As it is often said, with DID, anything is possible.

You do not have to lose time or black out either to have DDNOS or DID. We do not lose time or black out, ever. We have recently discovered this, actually. Cassandra, our host (the main person out, usually unaware that they have DID at first), detested knowing things that happened out of her control so much that she convinced herself that she did black out in an attempt to not remember distressing events. She has recently realized that this was a coping method she used because she did not want to remember things that alters have done outside of her control. She has come to accept the fact that in reality, she never does lose time or black out, and she can remember everything that happens even when she has no control over her body whatsoever. Granted, some memories may be "fuzzy", not as clear to her, or may be missing details, but overall she remembers and is aware of everything that happens. Now, some of the alters who take turns being "out", such as myself, may have slight time loss because we were not there to know what is happening "outside", but we do not black out or anything. The only time loss anyone has in our system is due to the fact that they were not "up front" to be aware of what was happening. If you think of your body as a car, there is the driver, who is aware of everything, but then there can be passengers who can look out the window and also be aware of what is happening, though they are not in control of the car. The only "time loss" we experience is when we choose to not be a passenger, or we may choose to "sleep" in the car, or we may choose to not pay attention to what is happening outside the car. I do hope this makes sense to you.


If you have truly pushed yourself into this, you would not have heard that voice say your name and your arm would not have moved on its own accord. People who push themselves into this do not have things happen outside of their control at first, they have to work to make themselves believe that this is real for them before that can happen. You have not done so. It takes a lot of conscious effort and work at first to cause your mind to believe something such as DID is real for you when it is not, and you have not done any such work (unless you are omitting that). Simply talking and interacting with people who are multiple will not cause such things to happen.

I do hope you will stay here for a while. Perhaps read around and see if anything resonates with you. Not to sound egotistical, but I have heard that many of our posts have helped people in the past and that many people have found they can connect to a lot of what we post about, so feel free to search through anything we have posted. You may also feel free to privately message me or anyone else under this username (tomboy24).

~Rain
| Cassandra; Kat/Kataki; Rain/Riyoku; Shay/Shadow; L.C. & Luna; Ray; Cassie; Lynn |
| Prism |
| Marie; Valera; Phenix (Rebel); Dallas & Damone; Kyra; "Blank"; Bridgette; Cassidy |
| "Hannibal"; "Big Ryan"/Ryan; Keith/"Little Ryan"; Kuro |
| Hawk ; The Doctor |
| Aurora (mermaid), werewolf, silent one, black ponytail, Kichijoten, The Master |
| Maiingan |
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby aquavitaesystem » Sun Oct 07, 2012 6:49 pm

as you are probably aware (from knowing me outside of this forum), i only "lose time" temporarily when mera is in front, and our memories trickle over to each other (although this can take hours, sometimes even a whole day).

she also frequently takes control of just a few limbs in order to stop me from doing something harmful or make me do something beneficial (or to engage in our sexual relationship...)

i think your experience was totally valid, and you're not "tricking yourself", or what have you.

yesterday me and mera both found two new people, mabel and gus.

um... let me copy and paste my description of events from my tumblr.

yesterday, mera went exploring in our headspace while i slept. it’s a three-storey house, with the top housing our bedroom and computer and some books, the middle being the rest of the books and a bdsm room that she set up, and the downstairs was a mystery.

she found out that the downstairs was a kitchen and a table with some chairs around it.

when she walked over to the table and chairs, she started hearing a small girl’s voice saying “please don’t hurt me i don’t want to be hurt anymore please don’t hurt me i don’t want to be hurt anymore” over and over again.

she knelt down, stayed about two feet away from where the voice was coming from, and said “i won’t hurt you, and i’m going to stay over here. what’s your name?”

(at this point she started feeling blowdarts enter her goo substance stuff so she just altered her consistency so they pass through like water)

she walked out of the corner slowly and said “ma… mabel…” before immediately going back to chanting her chant.

“who has hurt you before?”
“i don’t know them… but lots of people like to hurt me… i seem to be good for it…”

at this point she was close enough to mera that mera asked if she could stroke mabel’s hair, and mabel said yes. when she did it, mabel’s chant sort of got way quieter and eventually she just started crying rather than repeating it to herself.

upon that happening, the person who was shooting blowdarts at her jumps down from one of the ceiling beams and demands to know who she is and where they are.

she tells them who she is and where they are, and asks what their name is.

they step into the light to reveal a hooded, stockily-built figure with an androgynous voice. “i’m gus and i try and stop others from hurting mabel as best as i can.”

i don’t remember what happened after that for mera, perhaps she’d be able to tell you all.

but last night, i decided to go and see them for myself. going downstairs, i noticed that the table was moved against the wall and the chairs were in a kind of fort shape.

i began walking towards where gus came down from and mabel ran up to me and tugged at my skirt the way children do when they want attention, and she immediately began saying “i don’t want to be lonely i don’t want to be hurt anymore” over and over.

i asked why she’s lonely, and she said “lots of people seem to like to talk at me, but it makes me feel even lonelier”, before resuming her chant.

i picked her up, held her close in my arms and said “you can come upstairs and talk to us at any time, there’s no need to be lonely any more”, at which point her forehead touched mine and suddenly a ton of memories entered my head.

it wasn’t a slow trickle of memories like me and mera have where it takes a while for us to remember what the other has done. it was a sudden rush that made me lose balance and fall over onto the floor.

but suddenly i remembered the majority of laura hurting me (which i had previously been unable to recall), a ton of recent catcalls that i thought had stopped happening since i’d embraced being hard femme (and had concluded that i seemed too confident+threatening to be catcalled anymore), and a few nights where she’s cried herself to sleep while outside when i thought i had fallen straight to sleep instantly.

gus walked up and started saying that they try to protect mabel but sometimes she disappears and comes back saying people have hurt her more, and they can’t protect her then.

at this point i’m beginning to fall asleep, so i tell them that i’ll see them today and that they should come upstairs if they want, and we’ll make the room bigger and give them some beds of their own. but mabel said she likes it down here but could she maybe have something soft to sleep on? so i kind of… conjured a really padded sleeping bag for her. gus said that they don’t need to sleep, and so i left them both to go to sleep myself.

when mera told me about them i thought maybe they were walk-ins from someone else (because i was trying dreamwalking with a friend at the time), but the fact that i met them before doing anything again and the fact that mabel has memories of things that i was previously unaware of… they’re undoubtedly a part of our system.


of course, with me and mera's discovery of mabel and her protector yesterday, i now know that i have some other people who *do* cause memory loss, but me and mera are still the "main" ones. we're actually very closely connected - i realised we can communicate to each other via thinking when we talked to each other about our body getting sleepy when i was downstairs and she was upstairs.

anyway. yeah. there's my opinion on this!

to sum up, i guess: don't rush to conclusions, explore this, maybe try and talk to this person some more. if you can dissociate at will or meditate (or a combination of both), that can help - it's how i found mera! (i suspected she existed because of a few similar experiences, and losing time when i was with friends - we didn't share our memories until i knew she existed, because there wasn't a space in my brain allotted to her memories. i like to think of it as this - our memories go into an external drive, and we both have write access to our own folders, and read access to each others'.)
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby eiritw » Sun Oct 07, 2012 8:23 pm

Thank you for your reply! I'm a little concerned that my therapist didn't really explore this with me when I mentioned it to her. She instead focused on breaking down the time between when I got the email from my dad to when the episode started to see what led to it. Which was great, but I would have liked to hear what she thinks about DDNOS/DID as possibilities. I'm kind of afraid if I bring it up next time I won't be taken seriously about it. Maybe I'll wait and see if I have another experience I can bring to her to show a pattern.

The metaphor about the cracked glass makes a lot of sense. It's also interesting to hear that it is possible have some shared memory or awareness. In researching this I read a lot about the lost time, separate memory, not recognizing people, finding yourself somewhere and not knowing how you got there, etc. I haven't really had those experiences, other than some lost time, as I said, and that's a major source of doubt.

And no, I've definitely done no work to try and convince myself that I have DID; instead, the experience I had simply happened, and I've been worrying about it nonstop ever since.

So right now I feel like DDNOS/DID hasn't been ruled out, but I will keep reading, keep trying to learn and keep an open mind. What happened might be an isolated incident and never happen again, or it could progress - I really don't know yet.

edit: I'm having trouble trying to perceive clearly what is going on up there or map anything out, because I'm having lots of brain fog and "buzzing" that obscure everything. It feels as if there's massive internal conflict going on that is happening on a subconscious level or at least that I'm not able to see at this time. I'm keeping an eye on the situation though, so to speak, and when I have a moment where it clears up I'll do my best to see what I can gather in case it starts again.
Autistic, GAD, MDD, C-PTSD.
UnDx: DD-NOS/DID possible. Getting evaluated soonish. Erika, Rachel, Michael.
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby eiritw » Mon Oct 08, 2012 12:20 am

aquavitaesystem wrote:to sum up, i guess: don't rush to conclusions, explore this, maybe try and talk to this person some more. if you can dissociate at will or meditate (or a combination of both), that can help - it's how i found mera! (i suspected she existed because of a few similar experiences, and losing time when i was with friends - we didn't share our memories until i knew she existed, because there wasn't a space in my brain allotted to her memories. i like to think of it as this - our memories go into an external drive, and we both have write access to our own folders, and read access to each others'.)


Hello there! I did get your message on tumblr but I'm glad you came here too. I have definitely been considering trying to deliberately induce dissociation in order to explore this further. But I haven't been sure if that's a good idea, or a dangerous one. I think it's probably a good idea, though. Either there's someone else in here, or there isn't, and the goal should really be to seek the truth rather than avoiding it just in case. I have been having trouble trying to do anything though, because of the brain fog I mentioned.

edit: Just completed an experiment. Laid down, shut my eyes, tried to dissociate. It took a little longer than I expected but I did it. An image came into my mind of standing on a beach. The sky was overcast and everything was damp so it must've just rained. I saw two other people standing near me, a man and a woman. I'm not sure who they were, if they were people or aspects of myself or what. They were both wearing a leather jacket, and at first I thought they were both smoking but it turned out only the guy was. The woman started walking towards a beach house about 150 yards away, and suddenly the man had a motorcycle and drove off. I followed the woman into the beach house. I tried to talk to her, but she was silent. The only thing she said was, "You don't want to go down this road." I let go of control, so that I could no longer move my body, and asked her to take over to prove that she was real. She just kept standing there, leaning against the kitchen island, looking out the window at the waves. Then I started to panic a little bit, because nobody still had control of my body and I have traumatic memories related to being restrained. So I was unable to stay there and keep trying to engage with her and had to force myself back into my body. Worked my way back in starting with toe-wiggling and gradually moving up, then felt a rush of dizziness, and came here to type it all up. So I still don't know; this experiment was inconclusive.
Autistic, GAD, MDD, C-PTSD.
UnDx: DD-NOS/DID possible. Getting evaluated soonish. Erika, Rachel, Michael.
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby aquavitaesystem » Mon Oct 08, 2012 8:30 pm

I let go of control, so that I could no longer move my body, and asked her to take over to prove that she was real. She just kept standing there, leaning against the kitchen island, looking out the window at the waves. Then I started to panic a little bit, because nobody still had control of my body and I have traumatic memories related to being restrained. So I was unable to stay there and keep trying to engage with her and had to force myself back into my body. Worked my way back in starting with toe-wiggling and gradually moving up, then felt a rush of dizziness, and came here to type it all up. So I still don't know; this experiment was inconclusive.


Kit did the same thing when she first met me. I didn't know how to take control at will, and was unable to. We talked some, but she quickly couldn't hold onto dissociating at will, and fell back into her body. It took a while to be able to communicate properly at all.

-Mera
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby eiritw » Mon Oct 08, 2012 9:38 pm

aquavitaesystem wrote:
I let go of control, so that I could no longer move my body, and asked her to take over to prove that she was real. She just kept standing there, leaning against the kitchen island, looking out the window at the waves. Then I started to panic a little bit, because nobody still had control of my body and I have traumatic memories related to being restrained. So I was unable to stay there and keep trying to engage with her and had to force myself back into my body. Worked my way back in starting with toe-wiggling and gradually moving up, then felt a rush of dizziness, and came here to type it all up. So I still don't know; this experiment was inconclusive.


Kit did the same thing when she first met me. I didn't know how to take control at will, and was unable to. We talked some, but she quickly couldn't hold onto dissociating at will, and fell back into her body. It took a while to be able to communicate properly at all.

-Mera


OK. I definitely want to keep trying. It seems like attempting to communicate and coax her (or the guy I saw) to take the driver's seat is how I'm going to figure out if they're people, or just subconscious representations of something in my dissociated dream-state. If they are people I strongly suspect that the woman is who took control during the event in my OP. But more exploration is needed. I tried dissociating at will again today but a specific spot on my brain started tingling strongly in a way that kept me from going very far in. Thanks Mera :)
Autistic, GAD, MDD, C-PTSD.
UnDx: DD-NOS/DID possible. Getting evaluated soonish. Erika, Rachel, Michael.
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby tomboy24 » Tue Oct 09, 2012 3:47 am

This sounds like it could be very progressive for you, and I am happy that so far, it has seemed fairly easy (compared to others' attempts). I am afraid I cannot reply as much as I wish to right now, but I wanted to let you know that I am still listening and the more you share, the more possible it becomes to me that you have DDNOS or DID. One thing about "isolated incidents", especially with dissociative symptoms, they are usually only isolated if you allow them to be. If you explore further and do not simply dismiss it as being an "isolated incident", then more often than not you will find that more incidents will follow. Though it may be a complicated road at times, in the long run it will be healthier for you, and you will have the pleasure of learning about yourself.

~Rain
| Cassandra; Kat/Kataki; Rain/Riyoku; Shay/Shadow; L.C. & Luna; Ray; Cassie; Lynn |
| Prism |
| Marie; Valera; Phenix (Rebel); Dallas & Damone; Kyra; "Blank"; Bridgette; Cassidy |
| "Hannibal"; "Big Ryan"/Ryan; Keith/"Little Ryan"; Kuro |
| Hawk ; The Doctor |
| Aurora (mermaid), werewolf, silent one, black ponytail, Kichijoten, The Master |
| Maiingan |
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby eiritw » Thu Oct 11, 2012 11:20 pm

I talked to a friend about it, and she thinks it's just my psychotic features becoming more prominent. So there's two possible explanations as far as I can tell:

1. I'm psychotic. When I have intrusive thoughts that feel like other people talking to me inside my head, they're just hallucinations and nothing more. I'm falling into a delusion that I have alters, but I do not actually have them.

2. I have DD-NOS/DID. I actually have alters.

The question is how on earth do you tell the difference? As I asked her, how do you tell what's real and not real inside your own head?

I tried going back inside to contact them again, and I met the two people I saw before in a cafe in a little seaside town by the beach we were at earlier. We were able to talk a little bit more. Then we went back to the house and sat down in the living room. I once again tried to get one of them to take over. Then things got... interesting. From here out is where I'm really not sure if what happened was psychosis acting out and I'm just losing my mind, or if it actually happened the way it seemed to. I mean, either way I'm obviously very screwed up at this point, but I just wish I knew what the truth is.

I laid down on the couch (in the beach house, not in reality), and I felt... it's hard to describe, but something happened. And my body's eyes suddenly opened, and it felt random stabbing pains and very disorientated. As far as I could tell, the guy was in control. Apparently his name is Michael. He started talking out loud, in a deeper voice than me. And the woman (I think it's Rachel? I have to verify that still) and I spoke back to him in the beach house, and we basically had a big argument. He swore a lot at us and insisted that I'm not DID, I'm just crazy, I'm just making all this up because I'm pathetic and want to avoid taking responsibility for my life. Basically vocalizing every self-doubt I've had in the most hurtful way possible. "Rachel" did her best to stick up for me, while I mostly just laid on the couch and listened.

I finally got tired of it and tried to grab the reins back, but almost immediately after I did, it felt like a tug-of-war for a few minutes and neither of us were able to speak out loud, although we both tried to. I won and that was the end of it, although both of them have continued to pop up and say stuff in my head at various times during the rest of the day since then.

And it's just killing me that I have no clue whether I'm just delusional and compulsively making $#%^ up, or if any of this is actually real. I feel like I'm living in a Dali painting, everything is distorted and none of it makes sense, and I just want it to end one way or the other. I mean, I like Dali's paintings as an observer but I hardly want that to be my lived reality! Sigh. :(

edit: I also identify a LOT with this thread, for whatever that's worth.

edit2: I just had a memory come back to me, of the first time I felt like I was losing my mind. It was about 10 years ago. Just like I have been now, I was finding myself drawn into conversations with an "imaginary" voice intruding in my head. I would walk across the Michigan State campus after dark, talking out loud to the internal voice. Anyone who saw/heard me probably thought I was crazy for sure. It went quiet for years after that though, which is why I forgot about it.

And I just... I can't figure out why I would want this. I don't think he was right, I do want to be responsible for my life, I do want to have a job and be able to support myself and have stability. And I don't see what good can possibly come of all this. And from that it follows that it makes absolutely no sense that I would want it. So either I have a self-destructive streak at odds with my conscious wishes that I can't control, or it's real in some way or another (be it psychosis or a dissociative disorder), and either way I'm in trouble. :/
Autistic, GAD, MDD, C-PTSD.
UnDx: DD-NOS/DID possible. Getting evaluated soonish. Erika, Rachel, Michael.
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Re: Looking for perspective

Postby tomboy24 » Fri Oct 12, 2012 5:28 am

I am not a professional, but I do consider myself well-researched and knowledgeable, and from what you have said, this is how it seems to me:

It IS NOT psychosis. Your friend is mistaken, and it actually angers me that they suggested that. I have read about far too many cases where DDNOS/DID is misdiagnosed for psychosis, or similar things such as types of schizophrenia. So be wary of that.

If it was psychosis, you would not consistently receive responses when trying to make contact. You would not meet these people inside your head, you would "meet" them in the "outside world", you would be hallucinating them as real people. (Those types of hallucinations can happen with DDNOS/DID as well, but again, you would not be consistently meeting them in your mind if it was psychosis). You have done NOTHING to convince yourself that you have this, and even with psychosis, a subconscious doesn't just decide one day to believe it has DDNOS/DID. While psychosis deals with delusions and false beliefs, it does not tend to manifest itself into believing you have alters/other personalities. Nor does it manifest itself into making you believe alters are taking control of your body (as you seemed to have experienced), and it does certainly not manifest itself into memories that "come back" to you that would further explain and help this EXTREME possibility of you having DDNOS/DID. Usually it deals with delusions of real people in the outside world, usually false beliefs consist of having illnesses (such as cancer. Not so much disorders such as DDNOS/DID), and delusions about who you are- not about having more than one of you, especially not consistently.

From what you have posted, I would say you have DDNOS/DID. The body experiences, the memory that suddenly make sense with everything, the fact that your voices are consistent and have body images inside your head, everything fits with DDNOS/DID.

Not only that, but people with DDNOS/DID almost always experience denial, and they continually question themselves and try to find other things that it could be. People who subconsciously have convinced themselves that they have DDNOS/DID, or "want" to have it, do not experience this. They have no doubts, and will declare that they have it. They also usually have no problems with sharing that they have it, and other such actions. People with DDNOS/DID can get to the point where they have little doubt, or no doubt, but 90% of the time it takes a lot of work and a long time. You are questioning this a lot, you have no desire to have DID, and you are not jumping to conclusions. This helps prove to me that you have DDNOS/DID.

I know I am not exactly your friend, but I hope you take my words with more weight than you take their words. You have so much proof right in front of you that this is not psychosis, you are not faking this, your subconscious is not making it up, and you should definitely consider the fact that you (more than likely) have DDNOS/DID. Definitely stay here- I believe it is helping you a great deal. Keep trying to make contact with your other parts (possibly alters- with DDNOS, they're not fully split alters, so I tend to call them "parts"). Eventually, something will happen that you cannot deny or doubt. But be aware- denial is strong. Things can repeatedly happen that you think you will not be able to deny or doubt, and then you'll find yourself doubting it once again.
Here are some threads you may connect with and that may help you make sense of this:

This one deals with strong denial, arguing, and anger. It may be the most triggering, so please read with caution: http://www.psychforums.com/dissociative-identity/topic97494.html

This one deals with denial, but also has many supportive replies, and should not be as triggering: http://www.psychforums.com/dissociative-identity/topic98729.html

This one has song lyrics you may connect with, and deals with an alter of our's, Shay's, struggle to be recognized (Just so you know, Shay is mute and very possibly Autistic. Cassandra, our host (the main person out, and the one who usually does not realize they have DID until later on), has trouble accepting that this is possible and that her existence is real): http://www.psychforums.com/dissociative-identity/topic97158.html

This one deals with realizations, memories making sense, and the strength of fear and how it can cause separation between one's self, as well as cause denial: http://www.psychforums.com/dissociative-identity/topic98709.html

I hope everything becomes more clear for you soon, and know that you are always welcome and supported here, DID/DDNOS or not.

~Rain
| Cassandra; Kat/Kataki; Rain/Riyoku; Shay/Shadow; L.C. & Luna; Ray; Cassie; Lynn |
| Prism |
| Marie; Valera; Phenix (Rebel); Dallas & Damone; Kyra; "Blank"; Bridgette; Cassidy |
| "Hannibal"; "Big Ryan"/Ryan; Keith/"Little Ryan"; Kuro |
| Hawk ; The Doctor |
| Aurora (mermaid), werewolf, silent one, black ponytail, Kichijoten, The Master |
| Maiingan |
tomboy24
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