Housewife afraid of messing up the status quo

The "downloads" of body sensations from the past are preliminary flashbacks. Flashbacks typically start as body memories then over time more detail comes through: emotions, visual still images or movies, sound, odors. BTDT.

The rest of what you describe are passive influence phenomena. You describe some co-presence, limited co-consciousness, blending, and talking through. Yes, you are moody and complicated. Your moods can change in a flash. You can also seemingly push a mood aside momentarily or talk through it as if it were a curtain. Your husband is correct where it counts: he has noticed and is aware of some of your evident symptoms. For some but not all multiples DID does present as this distinctive quality of moodiness, with only occasional amnesia.

Isn't it weird to hear someone else in your head denying that he (?) hears voices talking to him or has other people in his head? This is so weird and so normal. So now you know that if you concentrate you can hear him and he can hear you. I bet he doesn't realize yet that you can hear him. Next time you hear him telling himself it is all BS, try replying "No, it is real. Wake up and pay attention. Talk to me." Won't that shock him? Heh heh! You could try a gentle approach: "Hello. I can hear you and I know you can hear me. Let's talk. My name is ___. What's yours?"

This is so astonishing, but ok, I can handle it! Thanks for the reality check, Una+. You've been a sanity saver here. Now back to my regularly scheduled activities. Hope you have a pleasant day.

Nondescript wrote:Fishtailed Chimera You are right. I can be thankful he is trying. And this little ordeal is not the biggest thing I've ever been through. So I need to just carry on. btw I think I read in another thread that you are in the midst of wedding planning? Congratulations!

Yes, I am and it's an interesting trip with all the headvoices lol but I think I'm reaching a balance again even if they're all making me constantly forget to phone the dress people. I think they're a bit unsure about all this measuring that's going to have to happen and being a little protective but it's frustrating the hell out of me XD

FishtailedChimera wrote: I think they're a bit unsure about all this measuring that's going to have to happen and being a little protective but it's frustrating the hell out of me XD

I hope you get through it with minimal distress, and if possible, enjoy the process as something to remember in this special time in your life.

So much is happening. Thank goodness my therapist is so excellent. My husband is starting to understand, too.

I am not sure where to post this, so I'll post in my own thread. I seem to be one of two alters that are very prominent. (I might be wrong about the number. Or even that it's me! So confused these days.) In real life, the two of us often switch a lot, like mid-sentence. But it's not always like that. I guess we are mostly co-conscious (meaning watching each other act), but I had no idea he existed and he didn't know about me, I think. I just knew I felt like a man quite often. Life is very patchy for me. I can't read his mind but I think maybe he can read mine at times. (Lately sometimes I'll make the assumption I know what he is thinking and it always turns out I am wrong.) It's hard to communicate with each other, though, on purpose. I was able to hand over the keyboard and have him answer an "interview," though. (It seems like I am some kind of doorway.) He seems like he is the most accessible of any of them, or that he should be because he is usually next to me. I can sense his presence and a few days ago he took over bodily completely separately from me and I was far enough away to see him in a way. Before two weeks ago, there were hints here and there. Now the hints are every five seconds, but I still don't know much.

I think we may be similar in terms of our belief systems and knowledge base and emotional skills. I may just be making assumptions here. But what is the point of having two alters who are so similar? Just having a slightly different set of memories/POV? Or is it that my mind/brain just copes with everything by having different people for things? I have been trying to figure out what "makes" him come out. He does deal with awkward situations (like those caused by switching or disorientation) by coming out front a lot. And he seems to have to do with my ability to communicate somehow. I don't really get it.

I want to know him better. It is crazy that there is so much of me I know next to nothing about.

The two of you sound a lot like me and my guy Alter 2! The two of us differ a lot in point of view and attitude. I think he is an introject of my father's most obnoxious qualities! I guess I used to be an introject of my mother's social facade, before the fusions. Alter 2 and I handle daily life and work and we have the same sexual orientation (we both like men) but we are definitely not very similar. If we were, we would have likely fused together spontaneously long ago. I, correction we, expect that a fusion will happen. That is our goal.

You two are not similar, as evidenced by the fact that you (host 1?) are wrong about what you assume he (host 2?) is thinking. You are projecting yourself onto him, and the whole point of DID is he is not you. Projecting is normal; everyone projects. You are imagining he is similar because you don't know him yet. It's like falling in love: we feel we have so much in common with the shiny new other person. But in time we find out that is not really true and the other person really is an other.

Everyone has parts they don't know very well, if at all. DID is special only in that at least some of these parts are conscious at least some of the time, are more or less self-aware, and are able to take executive control of the body more than once. This more than once is important. In times of extreme threat many people who do not have DID describe experiencing a brief possession state during which an otherwise hidden part of the self takes over and saves the day.

I am sorry to assign handles to your parts. It is rude but how else can I be clear? Each of you reading this, how would you like us to refer to you?

What a reply you offered, Una+! I love its directness.

Una+ wrote:The two of you sound a lot like me and my guy Alter 2! The two of us differ a lot in point of view and attitude. I think he is an introject of my father's most obnoxious qualities! I guess I used to be an introject of my mother's social facade, before the fusions.

Interesting! I couldn't begin to speculate on the source of myself or anyone else. Maybe in time these things will become more apparent.

Una+ wrote:Alter 2 and I handle daily life and work and we have the same sexual orientation (we both like men) but we are definitely not very similar. If we were, we would have likely fused together spontaneously long ago. I, correction we, expect that a fusion will happen. That is our goal.

Before this whole DID thing became apparent to me, gender issues were a huge focus of therapy. Alex, this other part of me, actually lived as a male and changed the body's name for a time during young adulthood, after a lifetime of gender dysphoria for someone. It didn't work very well, though, and in the end it was decided to give up on expressing gender accurately in favor of surviving without all the social complications of being trans. I even forgot that this was an issue at any point!

How do you think you will cope with incorporating Alter 2's masculinity into yourself? Alex never really demands that I make outward allowances for his gender--he accepts the body's role as a woman. But he feels so strongly male to me when he is fully out. It always makes me self-conscious that others know.

Una+ wrote:You two are not similar, as evidenced by the fact that you (host 1?) are wrong about what you assume he (host 2?) is thinking. You are projecting yourself onto him, and the whole point of DID is he is not you. Projecting is normal; everyone projects. You are imagining he is similar because you don't know him yet. It's like falling in love: we feel we have so much in common with the shiny new other person. But in time we find out that is not really true and the other person really is an other.

At the end of the move Being There, Peter Sellers offers an explanation of how he knows there's no God, "it's simple, I find that when I pray, I am merely talking to myself." For all my years of denial, I would occasionally try to have a conversation with inner parts in case there were inner parts, and I would be clear that I was making it up myself. It turns out that I was making it up, and it is usually harder for me to talk to inner parts than that.

I am a bit of a control freak in life, and this whole experience of trying to get to know Alex is showing me how not in control I am of this process.

Una+ wrote:Everyone has parts they don't know very well, if at all. DID is special only in that at least some of these parts are conscious at least some of the time, are more or less self-aware, and are able to take executive control of the body more than once. . . .

It's true, I know. I think what disturbs me is that there are other "minds" that I can actually contact, yet I haven't succeeded in it much yet. I think because I find it upsetting. And I still sometimes am afraid that I am "making this up" and when it comes out that I am making it up, my husband and therapist and I would be disappointed in me.

Una+ wrote:I am sorry to assign handles to your parts. It is rude but how else can I be clear? Each of you reading this, how would you like us to refer to you?

I'll have to figure out a name for myself. Thanks for pointing this out.

Well, here I am a couple of weeks after things started to "wake up." Before it happened, I was doing fine, even slowing down therapy because I seemed to have done what I needed to do. Now here I am, having all kinds of dissociative symptoms and the beginnings of flashbacks and feeling like I am just holding on until the next therapy appointment. It's hard to focus on my daily life with children, and my usual responsibilities are barely getting done (which happens periodically... I never was the most consistent housekeeper). Plus some key parts of myself seem to have shifted and I'm not my usual self.

I feel "mentally ill." It's been a long time since I've had this sense of myself. I had re-vamped my self concept to be more like a wounded warrior or something. Now I feel like a tattered princess which kind of makes me want to gag. (Prior sentence not mine.) And I feel like something is happening to me that is very different from what my usual mom friends go through. I realized how much I had "translated" their daily concerns to be the same as mine so that I could feel normal. But I have been having dissociative symptoms all along, just mislabeling them. I discreetly asked some friends if they experienced any of these things. Clearly only rarely, if at all. I have to remember that no one looking at me can guess what's going on. Even if they did guess, most people are too busy with their own lives to mind or care. My big news would be only of passing interest to them. Still, I feel like hiding more than anything else. And that is so not like me.

I have had DID all along, so there is no reason realizing that I have it needs to disrupt my functioning so extremely. Between processing what's happening and dealing with all the headaches and weird feelings and bodily sensations, I feel like I'm losing. I'm not being amazing.

Stepping back to have perspective, this is a big deal in a way and would take anyone some time to adjust to, especially when my husband is being so weird about it. (I think he's coming around. Poor guy. He's a scientist and just doesn't register any concept of inner experiences well.) Let's hope I do adjust.

Situation normal. Seriously. You are doing just fine. You are in what is called in the technical literature a "DID crisis" as your system wakes up and the host becomes acutely aware of reality. A DID crisis seems to be a DID version of a spiritual emergency (sensu Grof and Grof, 1989, Spiritual Emergency: When Personal Transformation Becomes a Crisis) and it will pass. Generally the results of personal transformation are good.

Una+,
How amazing you would reference that work. As a 19 year old I visited the UMass library and borrowed that thesis, read it, and concluded that what had been happening to me for the past 5 years was explained by it! (I may be wrong that it is this exact work--I thought the title of what I read had "kundalini" in it and was written "a long time ago." Maybe to a 19 year old, 7 years is "a long time ago.")

Thank you for your comforting and normalizing reply.

Nondescript wrote:Well, here I am a couple of weeks after things started to "wake up." Before it happened, I was doing fine, even slowing down therapy because I seemed to have done what I needed to do. Now here I am, having all kinds of dissociative symptoms and the beginnings of flashbacks and feeling like I am just holding on until the next therapy appointment. It's hard to focus on my daily life with children, and my usual responsibilities are barely getting done (which happens periodically... I never was the most consistent housekeeper). Plus some key parts of myself seem to have shifted and I'm not my usual self.

I feel "mentally ill." It's been a long time since I've had this sense of myself. I had re-vamped my self concept to be more like a wounded warrior or something. Now I feel like a tattered princess which kind of makes me want to gag. (Prior sentence not mine.) And I feel like something is happening to me that is very different from what my usual mom friends go through. I realized how much I had "translated" their daily concerns to be the same as mine so that I could feel normal. But I have been having dissociative symptoms all along, just mislabeling them. I discreetly asked some friends if they experienced any of these things. Clearly only rarely, if at all. I have to remember that no one looking at me can guess what's going on. Even if they did guess, most people are too busy with their own lives to mind or care. My big news would be only of passing interest to them. Still, I feel like hiding more than anything else. And that is so not like me.

I have had DID all along, so there is no reason realizing that I have it needs to disrupt my functioning so extremely. Between processing what's happening and dealing with all the headaches and weird feelings and bodily sensations, I feel like I'm losing. I'm not being amazing.

Stepping back to have perspective, this is a big deal in a way and would take anyone some time to adjust to, especially when my husband is being so weird about it. (I think he's coming around. Poor guy. He's a scientist and just doesn't register any concept of inner experiences well.) Let's hope I do adjust.

Nondescript,

I don't have the experience Una does to say this is normal, but this is exactly what I have been going through for the last 3+ months. I don't know how many therapy sessions I have sat in and whined about the fact that I can't seem to function anymore and it shouldn't be that way and my T has just smiled and said that she is seeing improvement and it will get better (and get worse and get better again). I have entirely lost the ability to go grocery shopping, it happened gradually but I cannot go into a grocery store without totally losing it. I don't know why...but my husband does the grocery shopping for right now. Other stores are difficult and I avoid them too, but not like a grocery store.

Last week was really difficult for me. In the course of it I realized just how much I was fighting the switching now that I was aware of it. Today I have made an effort to just relax a little and let come whatever. I have had my best day since late April. I have switched today, a lot, I have felt it, but it has all worked out. And, I only had on blip where at the doctor (my daughter broke her toe) where I was asked a question in mid-switch and my answer came out garbled. My daughter (14 and knows) gave me a smile and just told me to take my time. For the first time I can see how I can be functional and DID, and that was really hard for me to get before.

You are not alone.