Can everybody hear?

So my T asked me the other day if everyone can hear our conversations each time. I thought about it and said, "sometimes" but I'm really wondering about this. I'm still new to figuring out whose all in here. My parts write to me in my journal after therapy so it appears they hear.

Is there a way to have a private conversation without everyone hearing? And conversely is there a way to make sure everyone hears?

I'm looking forward to meeting people here as I'm a fairly lonely person in the outside world.

Thanks -- broken butterflies

It's a bit of a toss up for our system. Whoever is near the body can often hear what's going on, or parts of what's going on outside. It also depends on our specific abilities. Some of us in here are able to "read the minds" or intent of others inside (accessing their memories/thoughts). As far as private conversations go in here, it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't, depending on what the conversation is and who's involved. We've been able to successfully pull off surprises for some members of our system, and other times, I can say/do one thing and suddenly half the system knows about it.

We have our own rooms and houses within our inner world. If a private conversation has to be had, we will go somewhere where we can't be heard.

It's nice meeting you, and feel free to pm us if you ever want to chat.

Interesting question. I would imagine that, as I'm aware they have conversations with outsiders that I have little or no awareness of, they can also talk to each other without my knowledge.

For the most part, I'm co-aware of what's going on, although I may not technically be in physical control when an alter is out. My primary alter that I'm for sure aware of has full access to my memories, but it is selective when it comes to me accessing his. So it seems reasonable that if he wanted to, he could have a private conversation/event without my knowledge, although I hope that's not happened without a truly good reason. I haven't found any way to block him out of a particular episode, however. As a Protector, I'm not sure I would feel comfortable not having him available if the need arose.

Brokenbutterflies wrote:So my T asked me the other day if everyone can hear our conversations each time.

This is a frequently asked question and the stock answer is: probably not, but you should always assume someone is listening. Beyond that, it gets into a collection of techniques known as "talking through". Here are some old threads in the DID Forum on the topic:

How do you to talk through the host to an insider?
Not sure how to manage this
Overcoming strong amnesic barriers

You and/or the therapist can make a general address to all other parts, asking them all to go inside and not listen to something. Or, conversely, for all parts to listen up. Results of doing this will tend to vary, but often are quite good. The key here is to always treat all parts with respect.

Not everyone is exactly present to hear or see what's going on, but everyone old enough to be able to express it can recall anything after the fact -- except sexual events, flashbacks or emotional breakdowns. They actually could recall these things if they try but they don't. In fact, they push away memories or pictures of any one of these.

There's also a significant growth of ownership of events that happened. So a young alter might find themselves saying something like "I got an email at work about that" when it was me who got and read it. It starts out as a shortcut explanation, the quickest way for them to clarify a fact for my personal assistant (who has DID). There's usually a little jolt after they do that, sometimes a correction like "John did that, not me" but they also realize there's some truth to what they just said. But this who did what mixup is growing and they're getting used to it. Almost everyone here now understands there's a we in addition to an "I"

It seems that not everyone can listen and react at the same time. When multiple parts do try to crowd into our consciousness simultaneously we tend to have a brain crash and have to "reboot" with just one of us.