Resources for Family, 'what is DID' sort of thing

I think telling other people... especially family...is so brave. I just tell people I have crippling depression and for some people I'll say that plus PTSD. Then again when it comes to family I try not to have much contact anyway.

We don't really have much of a choice with our family. We've been pretty close up till now. There are two small family businesses, the sister is more involved but the mother has some ownership involvement. We're supposed to be the manager/bookkeeper for both the businesses. And we do pretty much all the work for one of them.

So we have a lot of ongoing contact with the family. And when our previous host disappeared and V1 got thrust out front, it was impossible to keep things a complete secret.

V1 is slowly figuring out how to do the bookkeeping, V2 helps wth some of the less-challenging responsibilities. Unfortunately programming was part of our job, but neither of the Violets have Stephanie's talent for computers. Maybe someone else in here does, but they haven't come forward yet. So we've not done much (anything) with that part of our work in two months now...

So far it feels like the mother views us as something between nasty symptoms that need to be purged, or interlopers who've replaced her kid. We don't know yet how the sister thinks of us. We're pretty sure though that what they both want is for us to all go away and Stephanie to come back and go back to the way things were before. Which is never gonna happen.

(Actually the mother has directly told me this twice, "I wish you'd disappear and Stephanie would come back." -V1)

They used to walk all over previous host, take advantage of her, dumped all the responsibilities of the business on her, and treated her like a bit of an outcast because she was 'different' (i.e. never married, no kids etc). At least that's how it felt to us.

So we feel like we have to make an effort, educate them, hopefully get them to understand that the dynamic has to change - we're no longer able to just give give give, now it's our turn needing support and help.

After they have time (week or two? month?) to digest the 'flyer' we're making, if they still won't come around, then that'll be the end of it. We have to focus on our own needs and healing and we can't do that and keep giving them energy and support at the same time.

Sorry this got a bit bitter and ranty.

V1 & V2

Just told my mom. It was surprisingly hard for some. It wqs used against us the sane day . but shes taking as best as she can and I feel better to have someone to talk to outside of over posting on this board.


But at the same time its REALLY hard for many of us to have her know. Makes it real. And it hurts.no one wants anyone to know theyre "crazy".

Some of us are super bold and feel empowered by talkinf abiut it.


Not sure I'm ready to give mom resources

We had some family stuff yesterday, and I ended up spending most of the day with the mother. I gave her our 'brochure' then we talked for...well it seemed like an hour, I dn't know how long it really was.

Felt like progress. I think she's gone past the "wish you'd all go away except the one I know" stage. Not sure she's got as far as an "accepting all of you" stage yet.

I don't think she's read the thing yet but hopefully she will read it, and then we can try talking some more.

-Violet (2)