Johnny-Jack wrote:IFS states that everyone has parts and that there is a central "Self" that the parts are subordinate to. Conflating parts with alters would be inaccurate. This is why this book is so important, it teaches a therapist with knowledge of IFS how and how not to apply what they've learned to DID.
There is no "Self" alter in DID -- unless you happen to have an alter named "Self."
Treatment guidelines for DID states that all parts are alters -- including a host who may be present in therapy and perhaps skeptical about having DID. Treatment also recommends that a therapist treat all alters as equally important to the person.
To be considered an IFS Certified Practitioner, you only have to complete the IFS Institute's training program, which costs around $10K. The IFS Institute is part of a corporation that is valued in the billions of dollars. Not necessarily a negative but it certainly gives me pause.
As a system that didn’t all discover they were a system or all the 'tech speak’ until we were in our 40’s we’ve found the sometimes conflicting information very confusing.
To us ’THE self’ is just who the outside world see’s as the ‘personality of the legal name’ and that changes as we’ve aged so we have several who identified as the ‘self’ in the decade that they were the one at front the most and who the outside world interacted with.
so we have a subgroup of alters but at different ages (some have chosen a new system name some still idenfity with the birth name) these are all basically the same personality at different ages, the one who was always host when talking to outside people and answered to the legal name but they are split between ’social mask hosts’ ie they did school, college, work etc (able to act ‘more NT' in public) and ones who did ‘home life’ and maybe only came out either home alone or only with close family members. (more shy/autistic self)
then there’s the alters who act as ‘secret companions’ they have often been a changeling that could take whatever form was needed. There have been many forms over the years and we know there’s definitely more than one as we’ve had more than one appear simultaneously with different alters (some who were out front at same time some were inside). None of these are ‘versions of self/host’
We have never gone down the therapy route..though we do have an autistic diagnosis it was the one time ‘Bobby’ agreed to appear in front of a complete stranger in public (in front of a psychologist to be assessed as autistic) because it was a better alternative than them misunderstanding and thinking we were schizophrenic and us ending up on medication or in ‘mental units’ for life (they aren’t nice or safe places in our country). Bobby denied any interest in anything imaginative answered everything extremely literally and their natural skill with the visual-spatial puzzles and photographic memory meant we passed with flying colours as definitely autistic! I believe Kit was blended with them to do the speaking as Bobby at that time (presenting alone) was still non-verbal but the answers were Bobby’s.
At the time Kit knew only about Bobby, Phoenix & Little Susie ...the previous NT host ‘Thea’ (who had got us through university) had disappeared…it seems this was due to breakdown/autistic burnout. (though Thea never had any idea she had ‘others’ or that she was autistic at the time).
Maddie was the last ‘external host’ who had no idea of the others the entire time they were the host, they had a breakdown and never fronted again after the death of our last dog who she saw as her assistance dog because she seemed permanently ‘locked into’ the point the body had experienced severe mobility problems and had needed a wheelchair.
I don't know whether this would be considered DID or OSDD we definitely have some level of dissociation going on but it could be be because I believe we have both Autism and (Inattentive) ADHD and ‘Bobby’ part has intense Hyperphantasia and can lock us into their fantasy world for hours at a time. They also enjoy creating more Tulpa for the inner world (mainly animals).
I think its only having a dog that lets us keep ‘one foot’ in reality to make sure we meet his needs for walk, attention play etc as we all love animals and have always related to them easier than other humans!
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