Dealing with incoming verbal information

How do you and yours deal with incoming information that is being said to you?
For me it's like I hear it but at the same time I don't. It's all jumbled up. I think different bits of the same information are being heard by different parts of me. Like I'll go away and then afterwards different bits will come back at different times. It could be hours, days or even weeks later.
Just wondering how other people with dissociative disorders process this kind of thing.

I've had to learn how to stop and listen, calmly, carefully. I've definitely gotten garbled comments or what seem like messages. I'll ask if anyone has anything to say. I'll say aloud sometimes, inside sometimes, that I want to know what was just or communicated said but that I didn't understand it all.

I have DID so I know that I'm dealing with alters of different ages and experiences. We often get a mishmash of thoughts, emotions, images, words, all jumbled together. My T has often said to ask inside, which I do. But the response I get isn't a nice clean answer, worded clearly by a calm adult, it's just not always decipherable. But inner jumble often has a feeling associated with it, a sense or an emotion, and I accept that as communication.

I used to read inner turmoil as a problem in communication but I've come to accept it sometimes as the essence of communication. I didn't used to know this but we experienced chaos and emotional turmoil often as an abused child, so hearing or receiving that now is sometimes the exact communication I'm seeking.

I've found the only hope for me in these times is to remain open, calm, receptive, inviting, alert. I listen carefully, I wait, I try to be patient. None of that guarantees clarity but nothing else works better so far.

If you're getting verbal information, it's coming from a part with verbal abilities. So addressing it verbally -- aloud, inside, or on paper -- makes sense.

Thank you for that.
I've tried talking to the different parts lately because I know they're there but I've not always had a line of communication with them. It's more like they talk through me and not to me, if you know what I mean.

My question was more about other people (not alters). Like for instance I got fired from my job last week. I was present for the disciplinary and I was fully listening and talking. My personality did change twice as I can remember but the information of what was being said to me by my manager wasn't getting through. I sat down afterwards and thought about this. I start remembering different pieces of information at different times. It's as it different parts (possible alters) are taking in different pieces of information and then I'm remembering it all at different times and stages and my reaction to the different bits of information are consistent with the personality who has remembered it.

This makes it incredibly difficult for me to react in certain situations because...well it just does.

Sorry I didn't make my question more clearer in the first place.

My T said that it is to do with dissociation. She told me to write everything down because the different little parts of me are remembering different things from serious conversations and they're waking me up in the middle of the night telling me what been said.

As Johnny Jack said, be open and alert.

The youngest in our system speaks but not often verbally. She does however play the piano quite well for her age, which I, Kalliope, do not even for our body age. My S/O and I were at the store looking at pianos and the youngest is co-fronting and and blending. The next thing I knew, I was standing at the checkout with some sheet music in my hand from an animated movie from a few years back. I do recall going to the movie and leaving the movie but I hadn't remembered a bit of it. I assumed I had fallen asleep. We got home with the new piano and set it up. I set the music on the piano and went to make dinner. My S/O sat and started playing the music instrumentally. Not singing, and broke down in tears. (I had told her the little one had chosen the music, hence S/O thought it would be nice to play it for her.) I came out and asked if she was OK? She replied in tears, "Have you seen the lyrics?"

She speaks in music when she can't verbalize. She can't verbalize well yet because she was forbidden to.

The song is called, "Let it Go." from "Frozen," if you are interested in reading them.

KalliopePS wrote:The song is called, "Let it Go." from "Frozen," if you are interested in reading them.

Oh me! I wasn't expecting that. That tickled me- in a good way! Back when we were able to use external avatars (we hope that comes back, when the site migrates to an updated version), I'd sometimes use Elsa as my- excuse me, 'Snaga's', avatar. And it's in the sig line.

Yes, oh my goodness yes, sometimes we just need to let it go, and see what happens. Many hugs.

Western, when I began reading this thread, and saw your OP, I suspected that was what you meant- hearing bits and pieces of things spoken to you. I.... don't know that it's my disassociation doing it, but that really popped out at me. That happens to me SO often. I mean, I don't have parts of me, repeating things back- not yet, anyway. But so often, things told to me just fall into a black hole. Or it's like I only hear bits of things, and then I have to ask the person, to repeat themselves, and I might have to be told several times, before I get it all. It's like my mind just won't stay still.

I'm not positive, but I think when Sammie or Sabbie is out, that they're actually better listeners- they have to think more, about responses- and they're more disorganised in their responses, then if I'm talking to someone- but they do seem to catch more of what's said, without the need to repeat. Like my s/o, she'll have to repeat something to me multiple times, and if we had a dollar for every times she's told me she told me something that I have absolutely no recollection of, well, I'd be able to retire.

But I've noticed when I'm in the back, and it's Sam or Sab, they tend to hear things the first time, a lot more, than I do.