An Alter's Nostalgia Trip

A month ago, Jeanette experienced a trip down memory lane when watching Pixar's latest feature, Turning Red. Jeanette never turned into a red panda, but the movie was heavy into the teenage culture of 2002, the year she turned sixteen.

Starting in 2007, when Jeanette was twenty-one, she did not seem to be around as much, unlike when she was a child, teen, and young adult. Therefore, I was not feeling what she was feeling, at least not as much.

When this body watched Turning Red, I felt Jeanette reminiscing. For those who have yet to watch it, the movie featured a thirteen-year-old female protagonist in 2002, and it was heavy into the teen culture of that time. Jeanette turned sixteen in 2002. Therefore she was able to relate.

I miss how things used to be. I don't know why Jeanette was active as a child, teen, and young adult, but now that she is an adult, it's rare that I feel her and therefore was thrilled to feel her reminiscing.

I felt like I had a second chance, or at least the opportunity to experience life through a female seventeen years younger than myself.

Does anyone know why there would be a change upon her becoming an adult?

Hi Arik,

I'm sorry to hear about Jeanette. My alter, Prince, was the first one I knew about so for awhile he was kinda nearest and dearest to me. Over the last year he's gone a lot more silent and I can't feel him nearly as much. It took me a therapy sessions to realize why. He was the main trauma holder in an adult situation that we're no longer in. He felt (and still feels) his worth only went as far as how he was helping that particular situation. Since we're no longer in it, he gets real depresso espresso. We're working on it.

Perhaps Jeanette is having a hard time coping with growing up in some way? I hope she'll come to you when she's ready.

I don't know if Jeanette is the trauma holder. She might be. I know that my inner world created a parallel to my situation. Everything in my life can be summed up by the death of Jeanette's dad and her mom abandoning her and her sisters for six years. With that parallel created, an alter, Jeanette can then tackle those traumas.

FinneganThePup wrote:Perhaps Jeanette is having a hard time coping with growing up in some way?

Other than she is no longer a child prodigy, a role she embraced, I don't know why she's having this much trouble with adulthood.

I tend to see the subjective age of an alter as a symbol of their average maturity level emotionally-wise. As an example, some of my emotionless alters /parts are older than the body. Some heavily traumatized ones have "infinite age" because of how tired of life they feel. Others, who have a very low level of emotional maturity, feel like children.

Jumping into adulthood might mean she "levelled up" in some of her skills?

All I can say is that my inner world is almost indistinguishable from the physical world. In short, alters have a date of birth (Samantha was "born" on May 25, 1980, Jeanette on January 26, 1986) and grow up via time progression.