My partner has D.I.D. and gotten worse lately...

NEED ADVICE. My partner and I have been together a little over 2 years. We've been in a long-distance relationship for the entire time (different colleges and states), and don't get to see each other often but talk on the phone/text/skype/im everyday. Before our romantic relationship began, we were best friends for 5 years. A short time after our relationship began, we both came to learn about his D.I.D. He would get especially aggressive and defensive with me and say horrible things at times, or get entirely apathetic and distant at others, then snap back to himself like an entirely different person without becoming distinctly different alters.

He suffers from a history of being sexually, emotionally, and physically abused so his D.I.D. can be very severe as it was originally developed during the sexual abuse.

Previously his alters came out in 3 main personalities. One was an older serene woman, the other was himself as a child that was tense and defensive, and the last was a very cruel and harsh man with a thicker London accent who liked to terrorize me. (his original self is from a different part of England}

Last June 2013, he was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and had it removed. For a short time the doctors believed his tumor caused all of the D.I.D. but then they found the tumor had returned in Fall 2013. He was raped again in August 2013 but thankfully they alters did not flare up again nor did his behavior until October. He was again being agressive and distant, without any distinct identity/alter change, but not like his normal self. They found the tumors had returned but diagnosed them as beign. And he managed to get back to his old self.

His D.I.D. started to come out in new ways after he switched therapists in late November. He had a new alter I hadn't seen before, or that became more dominant than the previous three that was a version of his abusive Father, that verbally abused and harassed me. He went through a large amount of treatment with his therapist from January through February where they found electro-shock-therapy and dark contacts kept his Alters from taking control of his life since they were so destructive to his original personality from living his life. He was given Seratonin pills to help his alter driven depression-however all they did was make him aggressive and distant and want to end our relationship and his relationships with all other people. Once he stopped taking them though (through desperate convincing on my part) he became his old-self once more and repaired his relationship with his friends and me.

Through-out March he was doing great, made wonderful friends, and was his old self with me again, happily planning me to move in with him after I finished college this coming May 2014.

He was assulted as a "prank" by some of his roommates friends in the end of March and it set off a large amount of his defensive and distant behavior again, however there was no visible alter this time, as he kept telling me he was himself and not an alter. No distinct personality, and he seemed to remember everything and not be losing time at all, although his anger and defensiveness was very much like his Father or London Man alter. He would berate me, attack me, break up with me, and reconcile with me all very coldly multiple times. I finally convinced him in this aggressive state to go and get more Electro-shock therapy where the doctors discovered his tumors were no longer begin and growing and were pre-cancerous and blamed his aggressive personality on it.

One doctor put him on anti-swelling medication for his brain and he suddenly became his old-self again, crying and apologetic that he had been "a monster" in the past weeks. The doctors began him on Chemotherapy and he was again acting like himself. The plan was for me to move in with him once again, once he was able to get a new apartment as he was currently working out of state. Until then I would stay with my own toxic parents for a short time.

However they lowered his Chemotherapy dose and he suddenly started to get the same means of defensive, and explosive anger again. Once again he's randomly broken up with me. I struggle with depression myself and what seemed to set him off is when I started talking about my eating disorder and he flew off the handle after prompting me to talk about it and then when I said I felt sucidal he started declaring over and over 'we're done we're done, you're my ex don't ever contact me again' again in his aggressive harsh tight voice, and very spontaneously. It was cruel, like his alters, and telling me I should just go to a mental hospital instead of move in with him, and telling me I most likely had memories of repressed sexual abusive due to all the issues I have (he has a B.A. in abnormal psychology). Again very much like the Londoner personality however while still retaining his own identity and memory, except acting nothing like himself.

The only disagreement we had even had recently when he was back to his normal self, was I found he'd been lying to about how he had scheduled sex change surgery. I was very concerned just because many of his Alters had often used *trigger warning- sexual self harm* sexual torture to harass himself such as trying to multilate his genitals *end trigger* or telling him because he was a male his rapes were not valid. I told him such a surgery was something to wait for until the tumors were gone and his D.I.D. was under more control, so that he knew his choice to have surgery was entirely his own. He took this as me being transphobic when in the past, with both of us being pansexual I'd told him I'd love him as any gender. Forcunatly he canceled the surgery for now since he is so mentally ill at the moment to make major decsions. I even apologized if I made him feel invalid but told him I just thought it would be wise to wait until the chemotherapy got rid of the tumors entirely.

Right now I don't know what to do. He's done similar things before suddenly broken up with me without much prompting, and only days before being very content and loving and happy with our relationship. And then within a few days ago say he was wrong and apologize saying he was scared and didn't mean those things. He's still got the tense, harsh, voice on from the last I heard his voice but that was 2 days ago. He's not anything like himself and is extremely defensive about information, and does not seem very happy about anything even his job which he normally loves.

Can alters manifest without being different people? Can an alter be convinced he is the host with the same name, age, everything? Is there a method I can do to try and check? I've been doing some studying and am starting to think I'm bumping up against his "Protector" alter that reacted in fear to having his protection of being a validated rape survivor threatened (as he may have considered the surgery to be a means of validating himself as a rape victim since he's said before only women are treated seriously as rape victims.) Yet I am confused since he still seems to have the same memories, name, and everything as the original and not in a black-out.

Does anyone have any advice how I can get on this protectors good side while we are in a long distance relationship? And he won't even answer calls right now, only texts and instant messages. I would appreciate any advice or stories of similar experiences. I don't know how to get back to the original or even just my friend right now who seems to be in lock-down. He is extremely on edge about sharing any personal information and does not want to hear my voice at all and keeps harshly telling me I am his ex (a term he's never used before and usually more eloquent than that which again leads me to think of an alter). He even canceled his trip to come and see me next week for my birthday in NYC, and keeps saying he is "not comfortable" with being in NYC right now and won't say anything more when I keep trying to assure him it is safe, and he can just see me as friends and there's no reason to be afraid.

I don't know what to do but am scared of losing him since it's clear something is going on whether it's tumor or alter related. Sorry this is so long I am terribly distressed and worried.

I would just like to say that delaying transgender surgery was a good choice. Did you know that it *trigger warning - has an extremely high suicide rate *end trigger* after surgery, as often doesn't address psychological expectations of happiness and resolution?

I would also like to say that you sound very supportive. Make sure that you are addressing your relationship needs and don't use his DID or tumors to excuse what sounds like an abusive pattern of behaviour interspersed with some better periods. He is lucky to have you, but make sure you stay healthy and happy. It is very hard for sick people to be strong for other sick people.