Single asks about shifting

DID is structural dissociation. It basically means mind that is in pieces or parts or what ever term you use about it. But it is well known fact that if you try to fit DID parts to boxes like ANP or EP, boxes might be too small, and you can't make them always fit. And you don't have to. Theory is there to explain things, not define people, same way than diagnoses are just ways to try to describe problems people have. In a way they're not true, they're descriptions. You can not have wrong kind of symptoms, because they don't fit under a dx, but the dx fails to explain everything. Theories too are just that, they're theories, and they don't work 100% of the time, and the fault is not in the patient then.

In haunted self they explain one way how parts with both sides in them can be born.

I can't define parts in our system ANPs or EPs either, they're way too complex to that, and seem to clearly have both sides inside themselves. I mean, we have DID inside DID, and ANP- and EP-parts in that system (Jules' system). It can not be true, if Jules can only be ANP or EP. Theory is not fully ready, because there's still things it can't explain. But structural theory is not a therapy model. It is theory like evolution is a theory, or theory of relativity. We know theory of relativity is not all there is in universe, because there are things it can't explain.

andiKirkwood wrote:the structural therapy model is in phases.
phase one is symptom reduction and stabilization
phase 2 is treatment of traumatic memories
phase 3 is integration and rehabilitation

we tried it when we first got diagnosed and it didnt work for us. we got the first phase done but the second phase unstabilized us, had to go back to first phase. we also had the problem that our alters were not ep and anp's all of us can be normal and all of us can be emotional. putting us in those group names didnt work. never did phase three. couldnt get that far cause we had to keep starting over.

No, you are misunderstanding this the same way than you were misunderstanding dissociation is same thing than switching -thing. There are different therapy models, and they're based on different theories. Theory is still not the therapy model. There can be 10 different therapy models based in structural theory. What is problematic in therapy you do, is that it is not based to what DID is, but to theory of how people without structural dissociation are. And you do have structural dissociation, if you have DID, because that's what it is called.

3.phase therapy model is supposed to work like that. You stabilize, and then do trauma work. Then you stabilize again. It's not meant to go from phase 1 to 2 to 3, but after first finding stability, move up and down on that scale based on what's needed. I don't see any reasons why parts should be put into boxes ANP and EP to do that. You don't move back to stabilizing because you don't know what some part is. You do it when you start to get unstable because of trauma work you do with them.

If the work you do with alters is the same than in your therapy that did not work, then it shouldn't work now either, should it?

You have trusty relationship to your current therapist, and the T you worked with before, you probably didn't. Because good Ts don't tell clients how their parts are supposed to be. Clients tell T that info, never the other way round. That's the difference, to be heard.

Thanks for your posts floralie, very well said.
I hope its like floralie says for you andy, that your T listens to you and your telling her about your parts and how they are, not the other way around. It worries me because from what I read your T is telling you a whole lot and im not reading you anywhere in here or in the relationship with your t. Its all about the T and ifs and how great it is. I would like to get to know andy and the others.

I wrote this before I saw Floralie's and Allcoulors' responses, so I'm not sure it says anything new, but I'll put it out here anyway.

andiKirkwood wrote:the structural therapy model is in phases.
phase one is symptom reduction and stabilization
phase 2 is treatment of traumatic memories
phase 3 is integration and rehabilitation

we tried it when we first got diagnosed and it didnt work for us. we got the first phase done but the second phase unstabilized us, had to go back to first phase. we also had the problem that our alters were not ep and anp's all of us can be normal and all of us can be emotional. putting us in those group names didnt work. never did phase three. couldnt get that far cause we had to keep starting over.

First of all, those phases are not a "structural therapy model;" There is a theory of structural dissociation--that's one thing. And then there is the 3-phase treatment model for complex dissociative disorders--that's another thing.

You are correct about the phases, but it is totally common and normal to need to keep going back to phase 1. That is not a failure of the model. In the ISSTD guidelines, they talk about how phase 2 can be destabilizing and there is a need to return often to phase 1. It's not supposed to be a linear progression. And getting to phase 3 often takes many years.

How long have you been seeing your therapist? I've been seeing mine for almost 2 1/2 years, and we are still mostly in phase 1, with occasional forays into talking about past trauma.

Our system also does not have clearly defined ANPs and EPs--I don't think that's uncommon either. Like Floralie said, it doesn't mean that one can't use the 3-phase model.

I agree with Allcoulors. I would like to get to know you, Andi, instead of always hearing about IFS and what's wrong with other theories and treatment models.