Important Moments In the System (TW: sui+self harm mention)

Hi, this is my first post! I wanted to share an experience I had yesterday with one of my alters and to hear anyone else's stories of big discoveries when connecting with your system. I accidentally wrote way more than I intended so if you don't want to read all this, please feel free to just post your own experiences. I have never used most of the DID terminology before so please bear with me if it sounds awkward at any point.

Trigger Warning: Suicide and self harm, not descriptive

I guess I'd like to share a bit of my history first, to give context. I don't talk about my DID a lot to people because it terrifies me that it sounds made up or stupid and people won't believe me, but after reading through a lot of threads on here I know you guys will be able to understand, at least a bit. I'm sorry if this is so long, I guess I just haven't really been able to spill my experience too much on this.

My DID was especially severe throughout my teenager years. I had around 9-10 alters in total (it's hard to remember exacts). They went by names like Doubt, Childlike, Comfort, Basket, etc, but I learned later that these were almost 'code names' or 'temporary names' to an extent and they actually had/decided other names that I wasn't aware of until very late in. (E.g. there was one named Misery but I found out after years her name was actually Angel).

Things were extremely chaotic a lot of the time as it felt as though all of the alters had chosen sides. Either those that wanted to protect/live peacefully with me, the host, or those that sided with a dangerous Abuser Alter, Pointlessness, who was determined to kill me so he could "take over the body". There was also a few alters that, forever their reason, took a more neutral stance. One of them was an alter named Feline, who traded information between us all in whatever way he felt was most beneficial to his survival. He'd often tell me "It's nothing personal" but that he "had to look out for number one" and that I'd do better not to get friendly with him because he had no allegiances to me. But over time, we did get to know each other better, even though it was awkward in a way. He rarely was an alter who switched out to be in control, but there was one crucial time where I begged him to because no one else was around and I was terrified that if I got out of bed to go to school I would end up killing myself before I got there. He did that that one time for me and although he continued to say he was "neutral" after that, I couldn't help but feel like he wanted to be on my side.

There was a really horrible point when I was 15 when all of my alters except for one disappeared. Things had been spiraling for me worse and worse and my time with Pointlessness was getting more frequent, and often other alters weren't around to help me like they used to. One day I woke up and I felt almost completely empty. But I heard him; Pointlessness was still there. He was there so strongly it felt like he was at the end of my bed just staring at me and it was so terrifying. He told me he had killed all of them, all the others, and that now there was no one to protect me. I didn't know I had DID at the time, I never got help for it at that point and I had no idea what was going on so I believed him and it crushed me because I really thought all my alters had died. It was so painful and I hadn't told anyone else about them so it felt like all of a sudden all these people I knew were murdered but I couldn't mourn because they weren't real to anyone else.

A lot of that time period is warped and strange to remember, but I know I only lasted a few months before I tried to commit suicide.

Being alone with Pointlessness, almost constantly, was something unbearable. I was found before it was too late and brought to the hospital where I stayed in the child and adolescent ward for 3 weeks. After that there was a major shift. Pointlessness wasn't around anymore and I hardly ever spoke with any of my alters, but I think there had been some involuntary switching with partial amnesia here and there. I thought things were over for the most part, until a few years later, around when I was 19-20, when some of them came back, although rarely simultaneously. There was only 4 or 5 that ever "returned" but as the years went by, and I went to therapy and worked towards overcoming my depression and PTSD, sometimes I'd feel flickers of the others, I could feel how they fit into me and who I actually was, and overtime I felt more whole.

A lot of times there was just me. Sometimes that could be lonely. As I have grown to love myself more and more I don't feel as lonely anymore, and I know that none of them "died" like Pointlessness had said. Reading and learning more about DID has really helped in the acceptance of who and what they were, and the acceptance of myself as a real, whole, and true human being.

But one still comes around now and then, that being Feline. Him and Basket were the first to ever come back, which was peculiar since both of them played more neutral roles, although Feline in the end was leaning more with me, and Basket with Pointlessness. When Feline came back (about four years ago) we decided to call him Felix, as it seemed more appropriate. He said he went by Feline back then because of his skulking nature when interacting with everyone, but now that he wasn't "playing that game" anymore, a more "average" name was suitable.

For most of the past 4 years, if an alter has shown up, it's been Felix, and we've grown much closer than I ever would have thought was possible at 15 years old. When he first came around, when I was 20, it was during the worst depressive time of my life since I had tried to kill myself back as a teenager. I think it felt like, for him, that he was the wrong one that showed up. That I probably needed someone like Comfort (She had been what I can only attribute to a 'caretaker alter') or Exie (a more jovial, optimistic alter) to help me in the state I was in. But no one else came, and I think because of that we just had to learn to work together, and he ended up being a major support and friend to me these past few years. But I never fully understood who we were in relation to each other, where he fit into me and where I fit into him.

Although he's often a little grouchy and hard-boiled, there are times where he does get emotional with me. Sometimes angry at my willingness to "just give up", sometimes more relaxed and we can joke a bit, but yesterday we had this moment that has never felt the same before.

That brings us to yesterday:

I had been going over in my mind the events a few years ago that led up to me giving up on my dreams, in a sense. Felix has often helped me sort through memories and mental puzzles to get to the root of issues, and this was the same. I was saying to him that I was so grateful and happy to be living the life I was living now, that I had worked so hard to overcome so much, and that I wanted to go back to the things I loved years ago that I thought I was too much of a failure to pursue back then. I started to think about the old me, back then, as someone I actually cared for and loved, someone who hadn't deserved to face such cruelty and deal with self hatred on such a level. I started to see the old me in a light I had never seen before, ESPECIALLY back when I was her. I saw her as someone who had fought tooth and nail to stay alive, after downfall after downfall. She had dealt with a hell that the me I am now doesn't ever want to step foot in again. And she had done it, so that now I can live the life I'm living, be the me that I am, and be happier than I have ever been in my 23 years on this planet. I felt a gratefulness and admiration for myself that was indescribable.

And Felix... was crying. He's never cried before, not in front of me at least. But he was crying, gently too, with a real pain that came from his inside, a place that I never imagined could cry for me.

He told me: "It was so scary to see you like that. All these years, it's been so scary. And I thought I was going to die. I was so terrified of dying."

It felt like I was holding him. That for once, I was the one comforting him. I knew from the beginning just how much he had put survival first, but I never thought about how all those close shaves with death and suicidal idealization could have affected him. I had never realized just how traumatic it must have been, watching the horrible things I did to myself, and the incredibly dark places I had gone.

For years now, I have feared death. I have felt it looming over me, assuming that at any moment I was going to die somehow, even though I haven't had suicidal urges in a long while. The past few months it's been something I've been unraveling, because I realized it was causing a lot of anxieties in my daily life, and holding me back from doing the long-term things I want to do, so I wanted to figure it out and put that fear to rest. I've also wondered for a long time now, why Felix was still around, why it was him who hadn't integrated into me when he seemed to have no troubles of his own. Looking back at it now, it feels so obvious. As all of the alters served a purpose, as Pointlessness had imbued my self hatred and disgust to such a degree that his act of attempting to kill me was actually his own suicidal rage, so too had Felix served a completely opposite purpose.

I realize now that the strongest driving force for survival, the one who prioritized that for me more than anyone else (whether he knew it or not) was Felix. And I feel a love, and a wholeness, like I've never experienced before. Felix has come in for bouts and been gone for periods of time over these years, but I'm not sure what it will be like now, because I've never ever felt this way. There's a part of me that worries I won't see him again, that I'll miss him if he doesn't come to talk to me.

But, I think maybe it won't be like that at all. Felix is someone I love, who I know has a love for me of equal value. And that love fills me with this truth that he'll never be gone - none of them will. They are always here with me now whether I hear them or not. And that truth, above all else, is ultimately the thing I am most grateful for.

I guess... I wanted to share this with you because reading this forum has been so beneficial for me and I appreciate it more than I can say. I also wanted to hear if anyone has any stories they'd like to share about really groundbreaking, or touching moments with their alters. Stuff that's really made an impact in how you view yourself and your system. Thanks so much for reading, and for all that you do.