I think I may have met my first alter. It was incredible.

It's going to be interesting actually trying to talk to someone inside my head when I have no idea how to make that happen....

I don't know where to begin. I'm imagining that I'll wait until I'm feeling a strong emotion and try to communicate with where it might becoming from? Or when I start dissociating from the pain try to talk to who might be in control of that process? I'm figure something out. I'm usually pretty good at figuring myself out, but I'm also pretty good at stumping myself and giving up out of frustration. I have never eeeeever been one to continue trying something that frustrates me, when I try something I'm not immediately good at, I stop trying it. When I feel frustration, I do anything and everything to not have to feel that way. Frustration is probably the worst emotion I can imagine. Because you have to feel it to get passed it or lessen it... Not my forte, that's for sure. A good explanation of why I don't have any hobbies I had to work on. The only hobby I've got is video games (raised on them from a 3yr old girl) and being online on the computer.


So, this will be interesting.

alienbrit3 wrote:NegativeZero, that was very interesting. I can't quite relate to it, although, depending how I'm feeling, someone is in the back of my head either telling me to proceed with the negative things I'm doing (for example, when I stuggle with self-injury, someone may say "JUST DO IT, HARDER, AGAIN!" and things like that. On the contrary, if I haven't eaten in 3 days then it's almost a motherly influence in the back of my head telling me that I need to get up and eat something and that it will be okay when I do. I wonder if those are two different alters? I'm still figuring this all out.

We have alters like that in the system as well. The one was so harmful we had to lock her away somewhere. She can still run her mouth but she cannot take over and do anything really bad. The one who reminds me about self-care has been with me for...pretty much forever. She's more like a younger sister to me than anything else.

They sound like they could be different alters, but they may not have "come out" yet. It's a lot to figure out right when things are new, but you'll get the hang of it eventually. It's a work in progress.

I'm curious as to how I'm going to find out the names of my alters... I'm imagining that I'll be switched to a specific alter and realize it and the name will come from within them and I will feel it? Or will the alter actually be in control and come up with a name and I'll be aware of it. That's probably how it works, huh?

I think the first thing I did was think about my past. Memories of watching other people 'run the show'. i.e. from 10-13 Sonja fronted. Always smiling and happy and positive, etc. At 13 the littles came out, having dissociative flashbacks, etc, and niva came to be. Our lives changed drastically - from the 'perfect' girl to the psych ward within 3 months of Sonja not fronting anymore. Also, we (Aiden was very much on board here! Though I wasn't aware at the time!) looked at different situations - certain people described me very differently than other people did! (i.e. co-workers vs teachers vs friends vs family vs therapists). We started making a time-line and charts and tried to figure out who was fronting when, looking for patterns, etc. Who fronted in the summer vs the winter. Who was fronting when I was doing well vs poorly. When I was in AN relapse. When we were socializing vs alone. When we did homework. Etc, etc.

The way we found was easiest for us to communicate was walking 'alone' in nature. Eventually the communication would happen. I'd ask who was there, and those who were and wanted it to be known responded. Usually somebody else would front and I'd ask questions from the back/outside. Objectively, it was me thinking questions to whoever was fronting, and them responding out loud. Sometimes it was all in our head. Hearing them. Just knowing that it was not my thought/feeling.

As for names. Most of them told me their names. (i.e. while vandalizing bathroom walls in school it was always signed 'niva'). I named little n 'jane' at first, because she wouldn't talk to me. So like 'jane doe'. After a few years she finally told me that wasn't her name. She shares my name. So big N and little n we are. Sonja named herself (though never in public). Cedar named herself (and everybody knew her as such). ninchen was our childhood nickname.

[some of] Your alters likely share your name, so naming can also be about differentiating between you all - choosing your own.

Most of what I learned was through listening, not through 'figuring it out'. Trying to figure it out was the first step though.

alienbrit3 wrote:I'm curious as to how I'm going to find out the names of my alters... I'm imagining that I'll be switched to a specific alter and realize it and the name will come from within them and I will feel it? Or will the alter actually be in control and come up with a name and I'll be aware of it. That's probably how it works, huh?

With mine they told me what their names were--I had no hand in naming them. Eventually they may come forward and tell you their names. In the beginning they may be too shy to just yet. Sometimes they share your name. Sometimes they don't have one--I know people whose alters have no name, no gender, no nothing, because they don't feel it's important for them to be identified. And others go by letters, like A or X. It all depends on how your system and the ones in it work.

Also keep in mind that what happens with one person doesn't mean it'll happen to you, or happen the same way either. Some people's systems work different, and that's okay, so please don't worry if your system ends up working differently. It's all based on your needs in the end, so whatever works best to help you is how your system will be. Hell, different alters, for example, could tell you their names via different means. Maybe it'll just come to you, like a thought in your head. Maybe you'll see it written down. Maybe they'll outright tell you. It all depends.

As niva said, listen and be open to them. That can help in aiding communication. You might not be able to "talk" to them just yet, but give it time.

Oh yeah, I also wanted to say that some people find it useful to journal - to ask the others to write as well. This didn't work for us. Little n was pretty much the only person who wrote, and it was always the same.

Hmm, for names, most of them were told to me in the form of a thought that I had no conscious control over, and I would test this by trying to name them something else. It usually resulted in this resounding sense of 'no', like I was wrong, and so try as I might I couldn't change their names. For others, they named themselves while they were 'out', and left it written down somewhere. Clear, for example, would always write his name if he happened to have a pen in his hand at the time, and so one time I came back around and found his name written on my hand and the entire alphabet written up my arm. Nox changed my online pen-name to what they named themself. Some I had originally "created" as fictional characters years ago, but I couldn't understand why I had no control over who they were or what I wanted them to be or look like. Some named themselves even then, but one in particular I don't have the memory for so I'm not sure. All I know about him is that the character created with his name was not him, and at some point he adopted the name and aspects of the appearance so that his presence wouldn't seem threatening or odd.

I think it's different for everyone, so maybe just allow yourself to be open and receptive, just totally honest with yourself and not worry about judgment or being silly. And see what happens?

I may be a "new-be" as this is my first time on this site or any support site but I am probably the oldest with MPD/DID site as I am nearly 67. Every year my birthday coincides with my darling daughters death by suicide at 39 on my 60th birthday. As her death was so tragic and unexpected I prefer to celebrate her life. She was gorgeous with red highlights in her hair and huge green, not hazel but truly green eyes. Cheryl may I say her name?) was a school teacher and had a gorgeous 19 year old daughter named after me. I probably shouldn't say my name, I don't want to accidently break any rules before I get started but I was the first to hold her In my arms after coaching Cheryl through childbirth and she honored me by naming her baby girl with huge brown eyes, after me. Cheryl probably had an undiagnosed psych condition because she was sharp as a tack but would occasionally look at me quizzically or with utter surprise at me being in her home and demand to know who I was and what I was doing there!

Shades of my past. People always knowing me by different names and claiming I had done things I would never do (like dancing on a pool table at the Moose lodge) where I was a member in good standing and considered myself pretty conservative. I found clothes in my closet I wouldn't be caught dead in and sometimes looked in the mirror at my ribbons and bows and pig tails & suddenly realize I was dressed like a little girl But I felt like a little girl and wanted to get my baby doll and curl up in a warm blankey on the couch and suck my thumb & watch cartoons. I found cigarette butts with red lipstick on them and I neither smoked nor wore red lipstick. I was a good "Mormon" wife that obeyed all the protocols and couldn't imagine who had been in my house! I would find money I didn't have or lose money I did have. When people called me by different names I either thought perhaps they had seen the baby sister Susie who had been tragicly taken from me because at 3 years old I didn't take good enough care of her in my mother's long unexplained absences. My mother put me through a horrible ritual to prove it was my fault she had had to kill her before whoever I told of her absences would find out and take her away. She made sure I would continue to steal food without getting caught to feed my 2 year old sister Marlene or she would be forced to do the same with her. I always looked for 'Susie not wanting to believe she was really dead. Our adoption at 5 & 3 came on the heals of Susie's adoption elsewhere t age 2. Family and Children's aid society as they were called back then was understaffed and had nowhere to put we other two. Adoptions were sealed so I could never really know if she was alive or dead.

I started splitting very young. I created "mousey" who was so small she could scurry behind the food racks and steal milk from the ice box at the produce and meat market on the first floor. (we lived on the third) without being seen by the "bad man with. the bloody apron". Likely the butcher but in my mind the blood was from killing children he caught stealing food! I would steal quarts of milk from a neighbors back porch (the kind in glass jars with paper lids and the cream that rose to the top (before homogenization) and (no racial slur intended but) was chased with a broom by a lady who looked like Aunt Jemimah screaming at the top of her lungs! Sometimes the bottles dropped and broke and sometimes I got one home to feed to baby Susie. The milk, (if any, in our ice box) was always curdled because our Mom never came home in time to add ice. I remember she never washed diapers just hug them on a clothes line in the bathroom and put the dried peed ones back on Susie. She often left her in the bathtub naked so her pee would just run down the drain. It was a big old claw footed bathtub and the edges cut into my belly as I tried to climb in and hold little Susie and feed her. She never had so much as a blanket to cover her and the hard cold tub was the only cradle she ever knew. I was only a baby myself,caring for two younger babies. I never considered "if" I was going to do something to cover for my mother, just how and when I would accomplish the impossible. When our mother returned hours or several days later, she would grill me like the Spanish Inquisition to determine if I had told anyone anything. I was not allowed to cry even when she broke a large wooden spatula over my bare backside. She then switched to a clear blue plastic hair brush that held up to the punishment better than I did.

Well, I have said quite enough for my first entry. What I want you to know is somehow with God's help we all get through this. I believe becoming multiple (though not to my awareness for many many years) saved my life. I know it allowed me to save the precious part of myself that has continued to love and allowed me to love my own children. I have 4. 3 on earth and 1 in heaven. Thanks for letting me vent and I hope I have been able to convey to some of you what it feels like to be multiple and you may see some of yourselves in me. At least you will know you are not just plain "crazy"! As I am sure you know multiplicity is not insanity, just a highly contrived coping mechanism developed in early childhood by horrificly abused children (before age 5 while the personality is developing) that have the saving grace of being highly intelligent and very creative and developing a way to survive the unsurvivable. Be proud of yourselves and God Bless. Me We +33 (how many alters I have that have not yet integrated). It seems like a never ending process but I started with 117 definable personalities and through both spontaneous and purposeful integrations am making progress--down to 33 and counting down!

niva wrote:Oh yeah, I also wanted to say that some people find it useful to journal - to ask the others to write as well. This didn't work for us. Little n was pretty much the only person who wrote, and it was always the same.

We do this. It used to be just little bits and pieces in my regular paper journal though, but once I gave them an actual blogging space, they've seemed to really enjoy that. I think for them it not only validates their existence to me, but it shows others that they're here too.

Drawing and art in general can also be useful too, but journaling is a great way to communicate, especially with alters whose voices you can't hear all that well yet.

Hi me we +33,

Wanted to welcome to this site. Don't want to drift away too much from alienbrit3's post, but wanted to say you mentioned very nice things:

me we +33 wrote:I believe becoming multiple (though not to my awareness for many many years) saved my life. I know it allowed me to save the precious part of myself that has continued to love and allowed me to love my own children. ... As I am sure you know multiplicity is not insanity, just a highly contrived coping mechanism developed in early childhood by horrificly abused children (before age 5 while the personality is developing) that have the saving grace of being highly intelligent and very creative and developing a way to survive the unsurvivable.

I'm truly sorry for what you went through as a child, and for the suicide of your daughter. I'd like to comment on so many things you said. I'm glad you, all of you, were there, helping, from what ever made sense at such young age. Thanks for sharing your story.

Sea