Stuck

First of all, I just found this website tonight. It's refreshing to see a place where we can openly discuss our experiences with people that REALLY understand.

I found out about the others about 2 years ago. For the first several months, I made progress on recovering some memories, but never the really bad stuff. To be clear, I want to remember. Well, some of us want to.

It's not my intention to run over any of the others, or go too fast, but I am frustrated nonetheless. Was there anything in particular that helped you regain some of the tougher memories? For example, I have tried EMDR several times, but I feel like I'm getting desensitized to it.

And yes....I'm working with a T who is experienced with DID.

What I've done is breaking off (all)contact from abusers, toxic friends and creating a safe place. The flood gates kinda opened with that.

After that, working with protector parts, stopping abusing interjects from continuing the abuse inside and keep the little ones safe. Building a relationship with them, being the parent they never had, so they can release their memories.

Welcome to the forum. It's a really nice bunch of people here so I hope you enjoy getting to know everyone here...

Borg's advice is good. I can't think of anything to add at the moment. If you haven't done that stuff Borg mentioned yet, I'd start with working on those things first. You've already got a therapist, so that is really good. I think focussing less on getting at the memories and more about problems in your environment and system that you already know about, that will help you to stabilize things so that it can free up some of the memories eventually.

All good advice. I have a couple of hangups to work through. One, I am not one of the emotional ones and I've had some trouble connecting with the others.
the second and possibly more complicated part is what I think was done to me by my mother. If it's true, and it s looking likely, I need her to stay completely away during this process and quite possibly for good. It's just that I don't have direct memories. Just flashes and some things said by alters. I'm running out of excuses to tell her why we can't talk or see each other.
Did any of you have to stop a relationship like that with incomplete or possibly inconclusive info to work with?

I broke off contact with my parents for over a decade. Not because either of them were my abusers, but because their denial and complete inability to deal with my emotional and psychological reality was making it impossible for me to create internal stability and safety. Basically, I wrote a letter to them, stating that I needed time and distance while I tried to work through issues related to the abuse. They didn't try very hard to pursue me, which I believe was a reflection of how afraid they were of what I had to say. I did try to re-engage about 3 times over that decade, but each time, they demonstrated that they were unable to deal with whatever being confronted with the reality of the abuse brought up in both of them, and I had to back off each time.

It was definitely awkward and unpleasant, but I still don't feel like I really had an alternative that wouldn't have been damaging to me. The memories that were coming back to me were all fragmentary and I was having a tremendously difficult time believing myself, but my reality was that when I didn't believe myself, everything got a lot worse.

Does your mother know that you are dealing with abuse issues at all? Does she even know that you are in therapy?

I have framed it around it being a disorder that I have to deal with and am being treated for. I have not confronted her. I also believe she has DID. she would do and say terrible things one day and not remember the next. She had several distinct personalities, most of which did not like me.
what did you do to help yourself believe?

I am sorry about your mother!

What did I do to help myself believe? Frankly, it was a continual struggle for many, many years. I slowly gathered information about my family and got more and more corroborating information that indicated that both parents came from very unhealthy families with lots of different types of abuse. I worked hard to create safety and security for myself, because a lot of the denial had to do with my fearing that fully believing would be too much for me to take and would do me in. I wrote extensively in a journal, whenever I needed to process anything. In the end, that is what finally convinced me. I looked at my entries over a period of several years and saw that all of the most important elements were there from the very beginning in a very consistent manner. If I had been making it up, things would have shifted over time. Ironically, it was the bizarre details that I had forgotten getting in those first flashbacks, but had written down and then had gotten again several years later, that finally allowed me to really believe myself. Taken alone, they seemed so strange that it seemed that they couldn't possibly be true, but taken together, it seemed clear that I was having flashbacks of something that actually happened.

One of the journal writing techniques that seemed to help me a great deal was to list out all of details that I was getting in flashbacks. Even though they were fragmentary, when listed out together, I realized that I had a more complete picture than I had realized at first. I then would go through and put them together in categories of what I was pretty sure happened, what I strongly suspected was real, what I had my doubts about, and what I suspected was a distortion. Looking back on them, those lists have proven to be be pretty accurate.

But really, I cannot agree with Salted Lipstick and Borg more that safety really is the necessary basis for all of this work. Internal and external safety.

The Cat's Meow wrote:I looked at my entries over a period of several years and saw that all of the most important elements were there from the very beginning in a very consistent manner. If I had been making it up, things would have shifted over time. Ironically, it was the bizarre details that I had forgotten getting in those first flashbacks, but had written down and then had gotten again several years later, that finally allowed me to really believe myself. Taken alone, they seemed so strange that it seemed that they couldn't possibly be true, but taken together, it seemed clear that I was having flashbacks of something that actually happened.

Wow, this is really helpful. Now that you've said this, I can recognise the same thing in some of my journal writings. I think this will help me to have the motivation to keep journal writing because a lot of the time I feel unmotivated to keep trying to slog through it all and to write things down.

partyof5 wrote:I have framed it around it being a disorder that I have to deal with and am being treated for. I have not confronted her. I also believe she has DID. she would do and say terrible things one day and not remember the next. She had several distinct personalities, most of which did not like me.

Sounds a lot like my mother. I believe she has DID too.

partyof5 wrote:If it's true, and it s looking likely, I need her to stay completely away during this process and quite possibly for good. It's just that I don't have direct memories. Just flashes and some things said by alters. I'm running out of excuses to tell her why we can't talk or see each other.
Did any of you have to stop a relationship like that with incomplete or possibly inconclusive info to work with?

Yes, I have had a relationship like that with my mother too. I don't have a whole lot of memories with her in them. In fact, I probably have my most lack of memory when it comes to thinking about my mother. I have cut contact with her a few months ago and it has been the best thing I have ever done for myself. I feel so much better for not having contact with her, I'm not even sure why exactly. I think one of the others made sure we argued with her first. Then we just said we needed some time away from her for a while to work through our therapy. We hadn't told her about our exact diagnosis. The argument just made the timing a convenient "out" to stop talking to her.

You could just say you need some time away from her for a while to work through your therapy. If she won't accept you respectfully asking for some time away from her, that in itself would be worrying that she wouldn't be equally respectful of your wishes.

Some solid advise given.

One, I am not one of the emotional ones and I've had some trouble connecting with the others.

I can relate to that. It's really a struggle at times, and I do inadvertently hurt their feelings at times, or I'll trigger them, I have my triggers and they have theirs. So now that more are awake, I have to be really careful about what I do, so not to trigger them. I really think that just trying to connect or respecting their perspective makes a difference with them.

If she won't accept you respectfully asking for some time away from her, that in itself would be worrying that she wouldn't be equally respectful of your wishes.

This is so true.

I kinda view all relationships, family or otherwise, one you want to be in because you enjoy the presence of the person, rather than one you feel like you should(justify, be bullied in, obliged or guilt into)be in.

I wish you the best.

I'm starting to get it. Create a safe environment. I think I have repeatedly sacrificed my 'safe environment' to avoid uncomfortable situations.
The information from my journaling has been consistent, but I struggle to believe without having a good, solid memory to go along with it. And having no corroboration from family makes it even tougher. Well, I do get flashes of these things, but have been unable to hang on for very long. Usually, just for a few seconds.
Btw, the feedback is much appreciated.