When they say they don't see it

Have you ever been told "You say (or your file says) you have DID but I don't see it"? I hear that a lot, and there are some replies I have learned to say.

• Well, it's a good thing you don't see it! The people who see it most often are sex offenders.
• Well, of course you don't see it; you see me only _____ and only one of me shows up _____.
• You don't see it and yet I have been diagnosed with it. What does that suggest to you?
• That's okay, I live with it and I didn't see it myself either for a very long time.
• That's okay, someday you may learn to see it and in the meantime the standard of care does not require you to independently confirm every diagnosis, does it?
• Do you say that about other "invisible" conditions such as cancer, diabetes, anxiety, insomnia?
• Do you mean to imply I don't have it?
• What do you mean you don't see it? Don't you remember _____?
• What do you think it looks like?
• What do you mean?
• Hm, that's odd!
• Really?
• Huh.

I could go on, but you get the point, right? Their not seeing it is not your problem, it isn't even any kind of problem.

Feel free to use any of these that work for you.

If indeed ride the wave of the storm if this actually comes from external person pdoc etc. Try not to allow your therapist out prepare, so they don't feel replaced. Sometimes you are swooped in until you learn how to switch on demand it can seem like we are on the same things in our books. I have noticed complete opposite in mental health about time to dx's maybe that is reflection on our system maybe not. I have actually witnessed other folks in group get really handled and they didn't know what hit them. I actually wanted to ask them if they knew how therapist are. I think you need to whether the storm in mental health. I just get use to losing folks shouldn't have to be convinced especially when not in mental health unless it is a benefit to our communication.

Hi Una,

Thanks for the post. And thanks for saying it's not our problem.

One time, Host said back, "So you're going to penalize me for being too functional?"

And another time I said, "So am I faking too much or not enough???" That was a weird session because I'd been out the whole time so they were TALKING TO AN ALTER and saying "I don't see it." I'm thinking "If you don't see it now, you are never going to."

BTW our T now is really good. She can tell who's there and calls us by name.

Iain

i love the last one. thanks for sharing.

Iain, we had the same thing happen when Asti was fronting. so weird.

Some interesting replies here. I like this one.

Una+ wrote:[*]You don't see it and yet I have been diagnosed with it. What does that suggest to you?

At present I have been fortunate enough not to be confronted with a question like this. Being at a point in this journey when various members of our community are at different stages of accepting the situation we could envisage a situation where someone turns up and agrees that we don't have DID. W used to do it quite regularly.

On one occasion our last T said something to one of our teens implying that there was not an issue and the teen replied 'So what am I doing here, I'll just fxxxx off back home then shall I?' T was good and apologised for invalidating.

Also like 'So you're going to penalize me for being to functional?' from Iainetc

Shall remember that one for when we are holding it together a bit better.

I'm lucky noone has actually told me they don't believe it. TBH I keep myself away from people, and hide it until I know I can trust them. The hiding and pretending to be just one of us is really mentally hard. But for us it's safer that way.

Well, often don't see it does not mean don't believe it, only says the symptoms are not obvious, at least not with that person at that time.

Now, a psychiatrist or therapist who says they never, ever see it? I have to wonder about them. Are they perhaps having negative hallucinations each and every time a client presents with symptoms? That could happen. I have seen --- and others here have described --- so many mental health care providers go kind of mentally flatlined when things get weird.

IainEtc wrote:One time, Host said back, "So you're going to penalize me for being too functional?"

MDs

I guess no one sees it in us because we don't even have a formal diagnosis. We're still trying to find a therapist. It's good to be forwarned of what some "professionals" might say to us in the future.

- Cullen

I'm glad you posted this, Una, it's an important real-life issue to think about. It's also good to hear possible reactions for when we do expand whom we tell.

In our case I'd be shocked if someone I told said they weren't surprised, unless they were a practicing therapist or had some experience with known multiples. My system has been so covert for most of the life. The switching we do at work happens automatically between three adults. But Johnny does the vast majority of interpersonal interactions so we present as him. I wish we had been more florid or obvious. I wish we'd had reports from people about us acting differently at times because that might have helped us figure it out much earlier.

It's become obvious to me that even among fairly well educated people, knowledge about DID is at best incomplete and what is known is inaccurate. Whenever I've told someone, I always mention the childhood abuse. Not in detail but I want people to understand immediately that, for us, the multiplicity resulted from abuse and the two are inextricably linked.