moving on

I'm so sorry that people are being attacked so often. I wish it wasn't like that. We got attacked for trying to tell a musician that one of her songs really helped and hit home a lot because of the DID.

We've mostly found safe spaces in places dominated by LGBTQ autistic and ADHD people, but also admit that they are rather strange forums on Discord.

Vi

the thing is that we need a place where we don't have to be perfect. in the end, english is not our mother tongue. Without the general generosity to let mistakes slip there is no way we can join a nuanced conversation. People want every word to be exact and perfect. and they aren't. we sometimes write when we are tired. Some neurodiversity or LGBTQ+ places get equally upset with us when we don't know the right things to be the perfect ally. I am done with having to be perfect to be accepted. When intentions counts nothing because someone is more right. We really do want to help. And if people are upset, they can leave us alone and just not engage anymore. There are DID communities in my country that are more positive than the french ones it seems. But none of them has a real platform. those are just social media collectives.
I feel like we are moving on from a lot lately. We used to want to please so badly and now its just bleh. Nobody has to like us or even feel like our stuff is helping them. thats just the world.
Maybe it is the change in perspective with the new job where we do really important stuff in child protection, stuff that really matters and will matter for the next decade of local politics. not just online discussions for the sake of argueing. I don't have that kind of energy. And I don't see the point.

I totally agree. It kinda feels like climbing a ladder: if you want to keep moving upwards you need to let go of the lower ... "ladder-stairs".

Another image that I found which helps is the "seasons of life" one. Life has "seasons" which means that something can be good for you for a time, then you need to let it go to welcome new stuff/people for a while, and so on.

Like you said, it's okay, it's life. That's how it is.

Other than this place the only other place we acknowledge our did is tumblr but we arnt part of the did tags because syscorse gets very nasty, instead we have just created a pool of mutuals we follow who also have did who also don't engage in syscourse. Did is not our main topic of discussion but we know if we wanted to chat about it our mutuals would understand.

Congratulations on the career progression. Perhaps you can find a mentor career wise who doesn't need to know about your did but can still give that parental feeling byproxy through the encouragement and guidance career wise? My partner found a father figure in an elderly biker they just hang out together for bike rides, the old biker is teaching him maintainance and just generally being encouraging. Even though the little doesn't get to be front for these (cause you know littles and driving don't mix) he still gets to watch and hold onto that feeling that this old guy is proud of him.

It is quite impressive to see how capable we are, given the proper circumstances. Our volunteer job is so good for us. It comes with irregular work hours. Sometimes we are out of house for 20h within 2 days and sometimes there is nothing but a zoom meeting for 2 weeks. but we managed 20h without falling apart entirely. the kids are so brave. they usually just fall asleep 5 minutes into the story we put on for them. But in the more quiet times we catch up on nice things. Still absolutely not like holding down a 9-5 job. But there is a significant improvement. It also impacts our self-esteem noticably. We always knew we could do great things. But now we finally get to do great things and that is something totally different from just knowing. maybe self-esteem is the wrong word... it changes the mood. We are no longer in boreout. we have challenges, exciting meetings, we meet cool people and hear about intersting things. It satisfies our curiosity like nothing has, lately. having this fraction of a job is just so good for us, it is hard to express. It feels like a major shift in our life happened. After 9 years of survival and struggling. there are glimpses of thriving.

It makes me so happy for you all! It feels so good when we start glimpsing what thriving means and feels like. Once we got a taste for it, we never forget and always keep chasing it.

Which is completely logical because thriving is the healthy way of living.

Good job everybody!

just a sign of life
Our life has changed so much over the past couple of months.
Doing the volunteer job And trauma work And trying to finish the book project is taking up all our capacity. The work feels really good. Productive. And like we will be able to have an impact and bring change. It gives us some new people to engage with, new thoughts to ponder. It also brings up new topics for therapy. Having more of an actual life is helpful. It's like we've been on hold for a decade. we are super exhausted most of the time but happy.

We're so happy for you!

I totally understand the feeling of "being on hold" and I'm so super happy for you that you feel unstuck now!

This year has just been wild. These are the first real free days in ages. No emails from our volunteer work, no duties except taking care of ourselves and ending the year well.
It is amazing to see how one relatively small choice can turn daily life upside down. We have grown so much and learned a lot. About things that are not trauma-related. Real life things. We just returned from a team building weekend and there is still some amazement about the role we have in that group and the way we can contribute. Especially since we only recently decided to be more present as ourselves in the outside world and speak our mind. I don't remember the exact time we read it, but the book The fearless Organization by Amy Edmondson really changed a lot in our system. It teaches that everyone in a heterogenic group of people is important and nobody can hold back the special knowledge or skill they have, otherwise there will be something missing in the process. We stopped holding back. for real. and here we are, leading political workgroups and re-working political papers.

Our clinic T left the clinic. We are relieved for him. The new clinic boss is a witch with no interest in real people or gentle treatment. Big fan of DBT, which kind of says it all in my opinion... We knew he was in a terrible situation there and we are glad for him that he got out. he works in private practice now... it is just way too far away to go there for treatment or even just interventions. I asked about video options. It is hard to let him go without the option of working together again. Especially since our usual T just doesn't have the same kind of firm hand to guide us through trauma work. We would really need him for trauma work... At the same time... the clinic cut so much of the program there that it wouldn't have been a good place for trauma work anymore anyway... I can just see that we will be utterly stuck with our memories if he cannot offer some alternative way to see him every now and then for just a session. It worries the adults here senseless. We can't take care of hurting Littles the way they deserve. We try so hard to make it work with current T... but it takes so much to move her to action and then she seems hesistant to follow through at every corner of the process. So we get hesistant and then she stops and we aren't getting anywhere. I really really miss the firm hand he always had. We only had to express a wish and consent once and then we would firmly guide us through. It always felt so safe and not wobbly at all. Not trying to talk badly about our T. But you know the situation. It's been like that for years... just not an ideal fit. good enough for a lot of work. possibly not good enough for trauma work. The feeling of being painfully alone if there is no option of him maybe taking over during her vacation time. that would be a legit option if he was willing... I really don't know what we will do without that hope.

we are editing part 10 of 10 1/2 of the book project. Things got so busy that we could barely work on it for weeks at a time. We might or might not finish it this year. But it shouldn't take too long now.