New here... Question about organizing system info

Hi,

I'm new here. We've been reading a few posts the last week, and decided this would be a good place to join. Not really good at introductions.

I have DID. We've been working with our therapist for about 6 years now, she's great. I've known about some of my parts for quite some time, but never knew I wasn't like everyone else. I thought everyone was like me. It took me a few years with current therapist to accept that this was something more.

Anyway (not good with intros).

I also have a chronic illness. So therapy work has been really unorganized and piecemeal, basically, to fit around my treatments and the body's health.

Because of this, we are sort of lacking the whole communication part of learning to work together. We were doing daily meetings and there were plans to start individual information pages, but that all got put on hold for a few years while the focus was on the body.

Right now the system is kind different than usual. Things are quieter, a lot of parts are what I call "hibernating" - just active inside - while we continue with treatment for the illness. But there are about a dozen or so that are still active.

We just discovered an unsafe part in therapy. This is freaking everyone out. It's hard to explain, I'm sure people here would understand, but I'm still struggling with how to explain it.

Our therapist suggested we spend some time regrouping, get back into daily meetings, rules, etc. I'd really like to have system maps and the individual information pages done. Especially since new parts are seeming to pop up while the usual active ones are keeping inside for now.

I'm getting stuck on what to ask for in regards to information? Name and age, of course. But what else is helpful?

I do know a lot about some of them, but it would still be nice to have everything all together in one place. I was thinking of doing it on the computer for privacy, and because then I can email things to our therapist.

I guess I'm just lost with what information would be most helpful for understanding how everything and everyone works.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
spinningwhirl

I don't know how helpful I can be, but when I'm trying to get to know my alters I know it helps if I think of it as if I'm meeting a new person for the first time. Ask their name, age and just random things like favourite colour, if they like books, movies, tv shows (if they've seen any) what their hopes and dreams are, if they have a song they like or a specific time of the day or year. Then maybe ask them things that relate a little more to you all as a whole or your life. "What do you think about such and such a person", "When was the time you were happiest"

Hopefully you get my drift and I actually made some sense. I found that once I started asking the random questions, other things just naturally lead on from it. Basically start a dialogue any way you can. Maybe if you feel comfortable with it you could even ask a few of them to come out and type you a quick blurb about themselves, ask them to write down everything they consider makes them 'them' and see what happens.

Dark.

I've been far more passive in getting information probably because I spend a lot of time in the space known as denial. So I just try to "listen" and things pop up at random moments. And if I am not sure who is feeling a certain way, I might ask or try to find out. But I never pressure. But that is me, and I as a whole don't like to have someone pressure information out of me.

The names just popped out. And sometimes I get information from images and sometimes from words. I feel like having an open mind (not how the term open mind is usually used, but more physically open if that makes sense) and information flows.

Sam