What's in a name anyway? - your views please?

Zor wrote:ysical body)



Here's like my best take/guess on these. IDK how "accurate" or "good" the answers are, but it's like what I think.

1) IDK about "original self" and the "Structural Dissociation" model kinda says there is no such thing... we kinda grow from "parts" to form a "complete self"... but Zor, our host, totally IDs with body and name.


6) For us, that depends on what you mean "be themselves" again. Cuz if you mean "be singleton" - sorta kinda if there's a total and final fusion thingy, where all parts are merged back to a single-like self... but that would change the person too from what we understand, keeping parts from each person in the fusion. And if it's just integration, closely operating cooperative co-existence... it's a whole diff game.
So, I guess "sorta kinda but not really" is my best guess. Cuz you CAN, but it'd be mixing with other parts, so NOT the same... but sorta like it. IDK.

{\Pixie/}

Hi Pixie

Thanks for answering. I guess its possible that one just identifies with the 'original body' (that is before it experienced deafness Pre-16, or any other issues later in life) and they are 'seen' as the original self by other alters? ..

I don't think I mean in the sense of a 'full singleton' (if such a thing exists!) but there are memories within of a self that believed they were the OS but who was aware they had 'characters' who 'took over' sometimes. (we only learned the term alters after finding this board) To parents these 'characters' were seen as imaginery friends and beyond a certain age we were discouraged from 'pretending to be them' but then we were also told to copy other kids from school to learn how to behave 'normally' and fit in!so I think what actually happened was the OS (or one believed to be the OS) who had the ability to 'imagine these characters' was only allowed to do that in her bedroom and the characters based on the 'normal kids' were the one's who ended up 'going to school'! The one who believed they were the original child was still able to 'be themselves' at home.

As the body got older there was more of an awareness of a 'Social mask' that came out when others were about, in order to be more accepted to help them get through school.

At some point though this changed and the 'social alter' became the one up front most of the time both in leisure time and during school/work hours maybe because our college was residential? and also at university we lived in halls of residence so they couldn't as easily 'switch' without it being noticed and because the first 'full time alter' believed the then changed legal name was theirs.

Maddie also believed our screenname/social media name was her real name and that was her name and life - again they had no sense they were 'part of a system' and I think with the earlier alters that were developing in childhood they were seen as 'just characters that we played in certain situations'.

There was originally that same kind of awareness Donna had in her book that there was a self but it was so overloaded it disappeared and Willie and Carol (and other alters) jumped in depending on the task/situation. During the 'breakdown/meltdown' we experienced between Thea having had a long time 'up front' and just before Maddie we experienced this again, with a self but others jumping in briefly as and when needed.

It happened again after the death of our eldest dog and Maddie's incident (the allergic reaction she refused to go to hospital for triggering the adrenaline rush). After that the child alters became known to us and alters aware of each other for the first time. The alters came out deciding what they wanted to do with all our free time as we now lived in isolation and they weren't needed for us to cope with 'going to work' etc. But it was like the alters were timetabling their time in the body to cover for the OS being completely absent if that makes any sense?

Maybe what we see as the OS is what you see as 'the host'? But there was once a stronger sense of 'I/Me + characters who only helped out when needed' (for appointments/social events) If that makes any sense?

Hi, reading your last post to Zor I think that's where it gets different.

From how you describe you have an autistic core self who couldn't interact so imagined you could which created personna to deal with interacting.

For me it's definitely trauma and except perhaps Mandy who was created to try to keep an innocence alive and Sue (a construct the twins use when staying asleep to communicate or if they don't like someone outside) all other of my alters were not deliberately created. They just appeared.

I know my parents knew about them and used them to manipulate in abuse because of the last incident of my father. It was pieced together when No-one came back. I said I was going to the police and threatened him. He said "Karen.... You're No-one" No-one woke up with a disoriented rough idea of what happened, told him when she worked out what happened she'd use it against him. No-one and Beth had extensive conversations by then as themselves with our first bf which impacted the control the parents had through the alters. But No-one was absent till a year or two ago and when she came back that got pieces together and the police were called.

My alters are just there. They all feel they are most important or their needs are until about 12 years ago when we realised to do anything we had to work together and not have our own agendas. To cooperate. They weren't created for specific roles. They just are there so to speak.

That's where I think it's different. You could do like your book you're reading and work at living alter free. If I did that eventually one of them would take over, sabotage whatever I'm doing and remind me they are not going anywhere, why they exist and how they are just as important - which they are.

Much love and care,

Sarah

Sarandipity wrote:Hi, reading your last post to Zor I think that's where it gets different.

From how you describe you have an autistic core self who couldn't interact so imagined you could which created personna to deal with interacting.

For me it's definitely trauma and except perhaps Mandy who was created to try to keep an innocence alive and Sue (a construct the twins use when staying asleep to communicate or if they don't like someone outside) all other of my alters were not deliberately created. They just appeared.

I know my parents knew about them and used them to manipulate in abuse because of the last incident of my father. It was pieced together when No-one came back. I said I was going to the police and threatened him. He said "Karen.... You're No-one" No-one woke up with a disoriented rough idea of what happened, told him when she worked out what happened she'd use it against him. No-one and Beth had extensive conversations by then as themselves with our first bf which impacted the control the parents had through the alters. But No-one was absent till a year or two ago and when she came back that got pieces together and the police were called.

My alters are just there. They all feel they are most important or their needs are until about 12 years ago when we realised to do anything we had to work together and not have our own agendas. To cooperate. They weren't created for specific roles. They just are there so to speak.

That's where I think it's different. You could do like your book you're reading and work at living alter free. If I did that eventually one of them would take over, sabotage whatever I'm doing and remind me they are not going anywhere, why they exist and how they are just as important - which they are.

Much love and care,

Sarah

Thanks I think maybe in childhood they may have started off intentional to meet the pressure to act like other kids and 'fit in' but the one's I'd guess had been childhood imaginery friends have never existed again beyond Thea.

Thea was definitely triggered beyond conscious control and so was Maddie, both developing after 'traumatic life events', both took over daily life for many years and even when the circumstances they have evolved in had gone/improved many years later, 'outside events' would still trigger them back beyond our control. eg Maddie being automatically triggered by the doorbell. when the doorbell was replaced with a video intercom that had a different noise and we could take time to see who was there before deciding whether to answer we've found we had more control.

At the minute we seem to be 'more Kit' than anyone else.I don't know if thats cos the menopause is ramping up the autistic sensitivities again (ones we had been able to get more control over in our younger years) or someone inside has just got 'old and cynical' and fed up with people messing us about and having to work so hard to fit in. The body tires quickly these days.

I think because of the isolation and lockdown Kit has been able to feel more confident about coming out without having to worry about interaction whereas she had previously only been able to come out in the bedroom or when we were able to get to more remote locations with a dog. She's had more time to explore and grow cos we don't have to switch to rush off to work or anything daily anymore.

Maybe Kit's modelled herself on our favourite childhood memories and thats why she gives others a feeling of 'an original self' in there? or maybe she was the 'child that got left behind' because she wasn't 'normal enough' and she's just been able to grow up over the years on the inside living through the other 'ANPs? (I'm guessing Thea & Maddie would have been classed as ANP's).

I thought Kit had never 'been out' when Thea/Maddie's friend was about but recently we remembered been sat on the doorstep of the friends house with a cup of tea watching the sun come up and stroking the neighbours cat, then slipping back upstairs. That memory is in Kit's memories not Thea's! In Thea's memories are the friend coming in to the bedroom with a cup of tea and signing morning and asking if we fancied going shopping (for that same morning!).

I think we need to see if people will write their memories from over the years, maybe we can work it out that way.

Thanks for your help

p.s Kit says she'll be back soon to answer your private message. She's struggling with people wanting to meet up as lock down ends, cos she doesn't want to have to deal with it!

Wow... what a brilliant collection of posts! That sure was something to read, thanks all!


Fascinating stuff...


We find it interesting how all of those questions had such philosophical depth to them all too...and have been pondered by Humans for thousands of years!

We don't have time to write our replies, apologies for that, but it's got us thinking...yes, gosh!

Our little addition would be to say that we now see things as 'Self', which includes the totality of Body, Mind and Soul, as well as the entire Unconscious, bits of collective (all Humans) Unconscious and Aura... that is what lives and experiences 'The Life'. The 'personality' or 'personalities' is just a small part of that huge Being of Self. Like, 5% maybe, if that?!?

Pastella
(and All)

sleepingwolf wrote:Our little addition would be to say that we now see things as 'Self', which includes the totality of Body, Mind and Soul, as well as the entire Unconscious, bits of collective (all Humans) Unconscious and Aura... that is what lives and experiences 'The Life'. The 'personality' or 'personalities' is just a small part of that huge Being of Self. Like, 5% maybe, if that?!?

Pastella
(and All)

you see I'm sure there was for us originally an 'I' that only saw themselves as an 'I' which also included the physical body. There are memories from English class at school and we didn't refer to ourselves as 'we' or say 'the body'.

When young we'd say 'do you want a drink' meaning 'I'd like a drink' but that's an autistic thing.. echololia we repeated without reversing the pronouns when applying to ourselves. But we did learn the concept of using 'I' appropriately eventually.

So there was originally a sense of I, then suddenly there were 'others' in there! Maybe its the memory playing tricks on us and what it's actually highlighting is the age we were starting to develop an understanding or feeling that these 'others' were more than just imaginery friends? We didn't even know autism existed back then let alone DID, then for years thought it was 'part of the autism' as we'd read Donna Williams (first book) book years ago without understanding that she had DID on top of the autism. Just finished her second book and she doesn't specifically mention DID in that one either, but does on her website.

KitMcDaydream wrote:you see I'm sure there was for us originally an 'I' that only saw themselves as an 'I' which also included the physical body. There are memories from English class at school and we didn't refer to ourselves as 'we' or say 'the body'.

I used "I" to refer to myself/ourselves for my entire life until I found out about the alters 3 years ago. I never used "we" or said "the body" because I was sure I was ONE PERSON. So remembering that you referred to yourself as "I" really doesn't imply anything about there being an original "I."

Now that I know about the alters, I can see there are some who are very, very young, and have clearly been around since very early in life. Also, the difficulties in our basic ability to relate to another person speak to very early relational trauma. We can fake it, for sure, and most people don't see how much we're hiding, but we never let others see us fully (except as much as we can with the T).

KitMcDaydream wrote:

Sarandipity wrote:Hi, reading your last post to Zor I think that's where it gets different.

From how you describe you have an autistic core self who couldn't interact so imagined you could which created personna to deal with interacting.

For me it's definitely trauma and except perhaps Mandy who was created to try to keep an innocence alive and Sue (a construct the twins use when staying asleep to communicate or if they don't like someone outside) all other of my alters were not deliberately created. They just appeared.

I know my parents knew about them and used them to manipulate in abuse because of the last incident of my father. It was pieced together when No-one came back. I said I was going to the police and threatened him. He said "Karen.... You're No-one" No-one woke up with a disoriented rough idea of what happened, told him when she worked out what happened she'd use it against him. No-one and Beth had extensive conversations by then as themselves with our first bf which impacted the control the parents had through the alters. But No-one was absent till a year or two ago and when she came back that got pieces together and the police were called.

My alters are just there. They all feel they are most important or their needs are until about 12 years ago when we realised to do anything we had to work together and not have our own agendas. To cooperate. They weren't created for specific roles. They just are there so to speak.

That's where I think it's different. You could do like your book you're reading and work at living alter free. If I did that eventually one of them would take over, sabotage whatever I'm doing and remind me they are not going anywhere, why they exist and how they are just as important - which they are.

Much love and care,

Sarah

Thanks I think maybe in childhood they may have started off intentional to meet the pressure to act like other kids and 'fit in' but the one's I'd guess had been childhood imaginery friends have never existed again beyond Thea.

Thea was definitely triggered beyond conscious control and so was Maddie, both developing after 'traumatic life events', both took over daily life for many years and even when the circumstances they have evolved in had gone/improved many years later, 'outside events' would still trigger them back beyond our control. eg Maddie being automatically triggered by the doorbell. when the doorbell was replaced with a video intercom that had a different noise and we could take time to see who was there before deciding whether to answer we've found we had more control.

At the minute we seem to be 'more Kit' than anyone else.I don't know if thats cos the menopause is ramping up the autistic sensitivities again (ones we had been able to get more control over in our younger years) or someone inside has just got 'old and cynical' and fed up with people messing us about and having to work so hard to fit in. The body tires quickly these days.

I think because of the isolation and lockdown Kit has been able to feel more confident about coming out without having to worry about interaction whereas she had previously only been able to come out in the bedroom or when we were able to get to more remote locations with a dog. She's had more time to explore and grow cos we don't have to switch to rush off to work or anything daily anymore.

Maybe Kit's modelled herself on our favourite childhood memories and thats why she gives others a feeling of 'an original self' in there? or maybe she was the 'child that got left behind' because she wasn't 'normal enough' and she's just been able to grow up over the years on the inside living through the other 'ANPs? (I'm guessing Thea & Maddie would have been classed as ANP's).

I thought Kit had never 'been out' when Thea/Maddie's friend was about but recently we remembered been sat on the doorstep of the friends house with a cup of tea watching the sun come up and stroking the neighbours cat, then slipping back upstairs. That memory is in Kit's memories not Thea's! In Thea's memories are the friend coming in to the bedroom with a cup of tea and signing morning and asking if we fancied going shopping (for that same morning!).

I think we need to see if people will write their memories from over the years, maybe we can work it out that way.

Thanks for your help

p.s Kit says she'll be back soon to answer your private message. She's struggling with people wanting to meet up as lock down ends, cos she doesn't want to have to deal with it!

I know mine or at least one definitely started off as an imaginary friend. It's possible the imagination of a child is an extension of their own psyche. If healthy development happens then they become part of the psyche not disjointed or fragmented. If healthy development is stopped for some reason they still become part of the psyche but their own entity. I think that alot. Or ghosts. Ghosts is my second favourite theory. But it's not very scientific.

Sarah

TheGangsAllHere wrote:
I used "I" to refer to myself/ourselves for my entire life until I found out about the alters 3 years ago. I never used "we" or said "the body" because I was sure I was ONE PERSON. So remembering that you referred to yourself as "I" really doesn't imply anything about there being an original "I."

I used we all the time without knowing unless someone said "is that the royal we" since I found out I made myself say I. Sometimes I still use we but I consciously think me and the person I'm talking to so I don't beat myself up.

The guy I worked with who seemed to have DID used we all the time. All the time. But English is his second language so it could be that, I dunno.

I never said "the body" till I realised in therapy 12 years ago I was experiencing body memory. Then I thought perhaps the body has a seperate memory. The therapist explained the body does tell us stuff, like stress can be a pain in the neck to someone but to someone else a pain elsewhere - for me it's sore throat. Probably I think even singletons have body stuff like this, their body tells them stuff.

I is language and doesn't imply an original self. Language depends on many things in how it's used... Understanding of the language, if learnt by mimicking or understanding, if used consciously or subconsciously without thought - which is difficult to know really and most would say it's subconscious probably but I believe there's a conscious element because I catch myself and make sure my intent and we have banned prases like "to tell the truth" or "we..." When refering to something just we did or "don't..." Negatives are banned due to the subconscious not hearing negatives so child parts avoid getting confused. We have alot of rules, our rules are in we though so they apply to everyone. But externally the tulle is "say I instead of we"

So yeah language as a clue could be complex especially if a part is setting the rules and you are unaware of it for example.

Sarah

TheGangsAllHere wrote:
I used "I" to refer to myself/ourselves for my entire life until I found out about the alters 3 years ago. I never used "we" or said "the body" because I was sure I was ONE PERSON.

Now that I know about the alters, I can see there are some who are very, very young, and have clearly been around since very early in life. Also, the difficulties in our basic ability to relate to another person speak to very early relational trauma. We can fake it, for sure, and most people don't see how much we're hiding, but we never let others see us fully (except as much as we can with the T).

ah ok that would explain how I could grow up thinking there was 'only me' until other alters became more obvious (as social expectations became more than the 'I' had the skills for)..and would explain why looking back there would 'appear to be' an original self before others became more prominent.

Our 'difficulties in the basic ability to relate' though would have come from the autism and developmental delays. which may also account for why our understanding of having 'the others' came so late in life and us being unable to verbalise it.

Thea and Maddie mastered the superficial social skills enabling us to succeed with college and work etc and both incidentally also always believed they were one person when they were fronting. That seems to have been the secret to success! Everybody knows they are a multiple now and none of us have a really strong instinct to work together.

The only time our system really seems to pull together these days is to make sure we appear as expected when there is a threat/possibility someone may discover 'our secret' (of multiples within) incase they believe they should notify someone and we'd get locked up. Then we suddenly develop the acting skills of an academy award winning actress and somehow always manage to 'pull it off'.

We believe this fear stems partly from being told as a child to keep our 'imaginery friends/world (as they saw it) a secret and witnessing a boy up the road (who had schizophrenia) get taken away by police to be locked up and drugged for life! (or so we were told) and from actually suffering a breakdown and ending up in a unit in our late 20's/early 30's and the memory of over hearing someone saying 'she can always go back if it (moving into the flat) doesn't work out' I think thats why Maddie evolved denying the autism when we got chance to move again. We seemed to have reached our 40's before Kit reached a stage she started doing more research on autism and felt once again we I (or she) identified with that more than anything else...but no-one here knows we are autistic or have come from a unit (so they can't track us down and make us go back) so Kit felt she could only 'come out' in the house when no-one was about.

This may also had added fuel to the 'secret/original self' theory that has to spend their life living 'in secret' through the other alters who come out when other people are about who the system feels needs convincing of 'our normality'!

'Nothing to look at here just a normal middle aged women with a few mobility issues', nothing that getting older wouldn't explain' kind of thing! Sometimes we feel like a secret agent deep undercover and no-one mustknow we had another life somewhere as someone else or our cover is blown and we get sent back to base (ie the unit in our case, now rampant with covid-19!)

This may also explain the desire to return to a less complicated stage of life before all these other alters took off!

Sarandipity wrote:
I used we all the time without knowing unless someone said "is that the royal we" since I found out I made myself say I.

Sarah

We always used I as usually it was the 'social front' answering texts anyway. Kit seems to use 'We' more but learned she'd get away with it because people would assume the 'I' they were texting was including the dog(s) so if they text to say 'How are you' they'd get "we're fine thanks' if it was Kit answering. Then continue with what the dog had been doing or something. 'we've been to the lake to see the duckies' , so other person knows we wouldn't go all that way by ourself, we only go there to walk the dog(s). tbh as we used to use 'you' anyway as a child to mean 'I', I think they see it as an 'autistic quirk' more than anything else! (for those that know), other 'normal NT outsiders' just assume I mean me+dog!