Guide for Newbies?

I was thinking that I've seen a lot of good advice for people just finding out about their DID, but it's all so scattered and spread out. I'm wondering if any of you would be willing to help work on a guide to having it all together, as a sticky post if the mods are willing. I feel like there is so much repeating about this very important question and I wonder how many are just lurking and don't want to ask.

I may start working on it myself, but I'm just a SO and we have a lovely guide for ourselves. I've seen some for DID on other sites, but they often aren't going into the questions we see here. Maybe find the top questions asked and answer those? We have an opportunity many of these other sites don't to find out just what needs to be said.

Don't we have that already, in the form of sticky topics at the top of the DID forum main page?

Anyway, newbies often arrive here without even the basic vocabulary. So, I like to encourage everyone to say a little about their subjective experience of DID in their own words; then we can offer the technical vocabulary that seems to fit what they are describing. This forum has so many contributors, many in therapy with very experienced therapists, that we represent a tremendous knowledge base.

I think it's a good idea, but a better introduction I think would be a book.

A group is more for hitting topics that are specific to the moment. Know what I mean?

What might be good and we have started and never done it is to do a post on a great intro books like Coping with Trauma-Related Dissociation.

I think all of us that have been around a while do love to help others learn, while at the same time working on our pressing problems. I know we have a thread like this.

Or do mean more of a what is DID sort of thing?

I looked over at what we have and we have the terms and we have a few questions on the cause of DID, but it's really sketchy in actual details.

Una+ wrote:Anyway, newbies often arrive here without even the basic vocabulary. So, I like to encourage everyone to say a little about their subjective experience of DID in their own words; then we can offer the technical vocabulary that seems to fit what they are describing. This forum has so many contributors, many in therapy with very experienced therapists, that we represent a tremendous knowledge base.

I feel the issue is that a lot of people won't do the first post. And most of the first questions seem to be along the lines of "Do I belong here?" It's kind of terrifying to post for the first time, especially on this sort of topic. Maybe a post on the ranges of ways dissociation shows, some sort of welcome here to encourage those who are afraid they shouldn't be here to pipe up?

tylas wrote:I think all of us that have been around a while do love to help others learn, while at the same time working on our pressing problems. I know we have a thread like this.

Or do mean more of a what is DID sort of thing?

We have some info on what DID is, but it's kind of vague and I love having the help on pressing issues, but I wonder if we could get more involvement from people if we had some sort of intro. I'm thinking the questions that pop up over and over. Things like: Does this sound like DID? with some explanation of the ranges of how DID can show. Or How can I find out if I have parts? with some basic explanation of leaving notes or asking inside or maybe just waiting and being welcoming. And of course, lists of books and things are always useful.

It just seems to me like the stickies we have right now have some info, but even the Q&A in the Resources post doesn't have a lot of info. I remember how scary it was to post for the first time, so I'm thinking it'd be nice to have a welcome and some basics.

Caecandy, I understand and basically agree with what you're saying. I find myself answering the same questions with very similar answers, customizing the response to the person of course, which is probably most effective for that individual, but there are so many basics. I guess I'm not sure if everyone agrees about the same things being fundamental so I've never pressed the point.

Here are some things I tend to repeat
1. communication with alters is key
2. doubts about what I'm hearing happened: we all have them, withhold judgment, comfort whoever talks about their pain
3. how to contact your alters

I'm not feeling confident about my judgment lately so I won't propose anything more. But the common needs out there push me to think about creating my own blog/web site. I've had a year's experience with this and would like, in part, to create yet another resource for people with DID, especially numbskulls like me who have a million clues that they have alters but somehow they miss the final critical conclusion "doh, I have DID!" That's probably why, if I happen to survive all this mess, I'll end up writing a book. Plus it would be cathartic.

Johnny-Jack wrote:Caecandy, I understand and basically agree with what you're saying. I find myself answering the same questions with very similar answers, customizing the response to the person of course, which is probably most effective for that individual, but there are so many basics. I guess I'm not sure if everyone agrees about the same things being fundamental so I've never pressed the point.

Here are some things I tend to repeat
1. communication with alters is key
2. doubts about what I'm hearing happened: we all have them, withhold judgment, comfort whoever talks about their pain
3. how to contact your alters

I'm not feeling confident about my judgment lately so I won't propose anything more. But the common needs out there push me to think about creating my own blog/web site. I've had a year's experience with this and would like, in part, to create yet another resource for people with DID, especially numbskulls like me who have a million clues that they have alters but somehow they miss the final critical conclusion "doh, I have DID!" That's probably why, if I happen to survive all this mess, I'll end up writing a book. Plus it would be cathartic.

With your writing skills, Johnny-Jack, I think that you would write a great book!

Hello Caecandy...

I can see where you are coming from with wanting a more comprehensive guide for newbies here. I think that could be helpful in some ways but in other ways it might leave some people feeling that they have to delve through a whole heap of reading before posting here... Then there would also be the problem of creating such a resource in that that would take a lot of time and effort and that after that, not everyone would necessarily feel comfortable with the way things had been said and worded and so they might feel that their personal experience had in some way been invalidated (maybe by being uncommon enough that it wasn't included or that it wasn't worded in a way that didn't quite fit their experience).

I think it is easier to have things open and a bit vague so that people feel that they can post here and express their own personal experiences (without feeling like it may contradict something in an information thread) and ask the questions that they feel personally relevant at the time.

There is a lot of depth of knowledge and supportive people here on the forum and the real value of that is that people have the opportunity to talk about the specifics of their situation and get feedback. I think if people are looking for more general comprehensive information about different aspects of DID, there are some great books out there which would serve as a good introduction. There are some threads listing these books here and any general questions or resources like this can be found using the search function of the forum.