About autism and dissociative disorders

Looking at the theory, it might be better to say 'severe or fragmented hyperfocusing' such as on a single feature of something as opposed to hyperfocusing on a whole thing.

I don't know how much I understand or buy into the theory, but at least it makes a lot more sense than the 'extreme male brain' theory.

All I can say is that autism seems to be primed for trauma since just existing can be traumatic.

TriForce...I hadn't realized how much of a crutch music has been for us until yesterday. Since childhood, I always had to have something in the background and most of the time it was music. Mother had the same thing. She had to have something going on in the background so that she could focus. Often she put on the same set of movies over and over again.

I've occasionally had to tell friends 'I love that song, but can't stand the original' and explain that the singer or arrangement of the original was physically painful and I couldn't listen to it. We have multiple playlists going too and some of them are different depending on the alter who uses them when they're out.

It kind of explains why some hosts couldn't 'see' how untidy a room was when we lived with family and they would say 'look at the state of the place how can you live with everything so disorganised!' but that particular host would not see that..it was not 'their job' ...they had usually completed their goal - maybe they were out just to do homework and organise that....so this would trigger another one forwards to deal with the situation of apologising/making excuses and making sure the house was tidied to our fathers standards.

'Juno' carries our mothers memories of tidying up/housework chores which is probably why Yuna see's how untidy things are as soon as she comes out (as they're always blended) more than I (Kit) do. I tended to come out to take care of a specific thing then return inside in the past without engaging with the hosts coming out before or after me, but only knew of a few human insiders and the changelings.

I shared this information with 'the elders' and asked them what is the purpose of the changelings? I am told their original directive for Child Host Bobby (as they were originally) was to absorb fear and emotion like a sponge and act as a filter between Bobby and the outside world so they could 'turn down the controls and find a way to cope with it' It seems its the changelings that create the 'social masks' who act as a filter that life hits first giving Bobby more time to process and make sense of the world!

It has been confirmed that Jay existed from a much younger age and was one of the best mimics/social mask alters in the system. Although she hasn't always carried the name 'Jay' obviously (she literally just selected that to post on here that first time but as agreed to keep it for this board) but has been out 'acting as host' for many years responding to both the original birth name and the legal name after it.

I'm told no new 'social masks' have been created after Maddie dissolved and us 'insiders' started to come forwards to 'play host' as and when needed.

This is really the first time I am beginning to actually understand 'our own system' and how and why it works and has done for over 50 years! - K

I can certainly see the issue of specialist parts to deal with the various activities within our own system, and I think it has to do with the autism. Now that Agatha is back in the system, it feels like there's more impetus to eat properly and be more active. She also thinks we should paint our nails again.

Something that I have begun to wonder about is how much an autistic system might find it easier to latch onto fiction and weave it into the system. You mentioned the changelings were there to absorb emotions like fear, and that was something I remember a lot of from the original Star Trek series. A lot of non-coporeal beings which 'fed off of' or 'absorbed' emotions.

I know that our system has eight demons, four humans, three shee/elves/fae, two vampires, one valkyrie, one dragon and one cyborg.

ViTheta wrote:I can certainly see the issue of specialist parts to deal with the various activities within our own system, and I think it has to do with the autism. Now that Agatha is back in the system, it feels like there's more impetus to eat properly and be more active. She also thinks we should paint our nails again.

Something that I have begun to wonder about is how much an autistic system might find it easier to latch onto fiction and weave it into the system. You mentioned the changelings were there to absorb emotions like fear, and that was something I remember a lot of from the original Star Trek series. A lot of non-coporeal beings which 'fed off of' or 'absorbed' emotions.

I know that our system has eight demons, four humans, three shee/elves/fae, two vampires, one valkyrie, one dragon and one cyborg.

The original series would have been about when we had a black and white TV when Bobby was still young. Bobby tended to view TV like it was 'really happening somewhere else at that moment in time' as of course there were no VHS, DVD recorders etc then so you either watched it then or missed it!

They had an obsession with Spock and the complete control they appeared to have over their emotions. In fact over all the ST series usually the ones that became Bobby's favourite was one who was alien, robot and didn't 'understand humans'...Spock, Data, T'Pol, Seven (of Nine) etc

They liked the episodes that focused on them learning about people...Data and his 'emotion chip' was one such episode within TNG Movie that also has both Kirk and Picard in.

We only have human and changeling but the changeling of course can play any part the littles wanted them to be..they have been Aslan, Falcor (the big dragon from movie 'The Never Ending Story') Mythical creatures from any films or video game franchise or simply the spirits/reincarnations of past loved ones for those who need that. Only those of us who 'grew upon the inside' can see them (even those now older). Thea and Maddie never could. There may have been others who were simply social masks for 1 or 2 events then just disappeared in the early years when there would have been no memory of them between switches.

I'm not sure why they were created that way..possibly to protect the entire system during the busiest time of our lives (with expectation to work and act as a 'normal adult' etc)???

I can only assume us humans left now were the 'original core characters' throughout most of the life?

Our favorite characters in Star Trek are also Spock, Data, Seven, T'Pol, and now Una. Add into that, we adore Jadzia and Ezri Dax because those two are joined Trill and have different (past) personalities in them. In the recent series, Sylvia Tilly was accidentally written as autistic, and once the creators knew, they started making sure that her representation was more accurate and less played for laughs. For context, Una is and was the First Officer of the Enterprise when Pike was the captain. She also is very logical and very in control of herself. Our gatekeeper Queen started out as someone analagous to Data, but is now more akin to one of the iterations of the Borg Queen. A recent version of the Borg Queen was more kind and human, but still cybornetic.

Oddly enough, Kiera, our dragon alter, traces her current form to Falcor and beyond into other Asian stories, folktales and myths.

But to loop back, I do hope that we find out more about how autism and DID can feed off of each other.

ArbreMonde wrote:The hyperfocus is found in ADHD too, so I really do not understand this "monotropic" hypothesis. Especially since very dissociated persons tend to be less able to multitask (because they have a lower mental level) and integrated persons tend to be better able to multitask (because higher mental levels).

"Hyperfocus" has to do with dopamine levels: it is the neurotransmitter deciding if you can start or finish a task, how much you are focused on it etc. and when its levels are doing whatever they please, you can end up unable to focus on something you really want to do, unable to start a task, or, unable to stop a task and therefore, "stuck" on a task.

That. For me, with diagnosed ADHD, high tendencies to go into hyperfocus, and a lot of difficulties with tasks switching, I realize now we're almost totally integrated that dissociation had made those symptoms far worse, specially if it implied switching between alters. Now we're 3 alters left instead of 15, it's so much easier to be flexible... we still doesn't have "NT levels" of flexibility, but it's better than before.

And I have a family who isn't good at all at respecting my need to have time to "disconnect" from one task in order to be able to "connect" to another task. It was traumatic for me, and as I still live with my mom, I still have fight responses when she interrupts me or put pressure on me to change tasks more quickly.

It doesn't seem to be coherent with action systems either. Dissociation tends to "stuck" alters into their action systems and makes it difficult to switch from one to another.

Also, every child needs a time to "disconnect/reconnect" and "multitasking" isn't a thing even neurotypical brains are good at. There are a lot of psychological testings showing the performances of the brain go down when multitasking or switching task too quickly. It's what society pressure us to do, but not what our brains are made for. NT people are just less bad at it than ND people. So I'm pretty certain there are NT people out there with systems organized to switch rapidly on cues too, because they couldn't cope with what they were asked. This organization may very much be more rare for NT than ND systems, but still...

Another thing I don't understand is their statement about their system being function-oriented, with precise tasks and roles and activities for each alters. I mean, that's basically how "full" DID with multiple ANPs works...

I've noticed that neurodivergent systems tends to be quicker and better at developing cooperation and organized themselves, but to me, it seems it's because we're thinking in a "problem-solution" way, rather than the "emotion and ego" way used by neurotypical people.

I don't know what to think about all of this... I would have liked to have the sources of the author of the videos, to better understand it.

ViTheta wrote:Something that I have begun to wonder about is how much an autistic system might find it easier to latch onto fiction and weave it into the system.

Fictive introjects (and introjects in general) seem to be more present in autistic systems, yep. Some explanations I see would be : using alters also as a way to better understand the outside world, making the difference between the self/the other people being more difficult because of emotional sensibilities, the tendency to empathize a lot with everything, including animal, plants and objects...

There is also the fact that having autism often leads to social isolation, which left only fictional characters to really relate too + relationships and characters in fiction are easier to understand : they are often archetypal, there are tropes, relationship patterns, the directing can gives us cues, foreshadowing to know what to expect, etc. For a child who has trouble with social cues, all of these can make fiction way easier to understand than reality.

Dwelt wrote:I don't know what to think about all of this... I would have liked to have the sources of the author of the videos, to better understand it.

I'll be honest, I'm not sure that we have any good theories about why autism or DID come into being. I did look up monotropism and autism, and read the Wikipedia article about it, but I'm not sure how much I buy it either. I know that I need a long disconnection time in order to switch directions, which can be an issue when my friends have ADHD and go 'ooo, shiny.' This doesn't take into account the need to sometimes switch out alters in order to cope with something outside. We've been avoiding doing certain chores because people randomly come into the more public spaces of the house and switching alters is difficult.

But, I had thought I'd share it since it seemed on topic.

Dwelt wrote:Fictive introjects (and introjects in general) seem to be more present in autistic systems, yep ... For a child who has trouble with social cues, all of these can make fiction way easier to understand than reality.

I can certainly understand that. I know that when I was really little, I would escape into stories to cope. I started creating my own characters in my early teens when I was back out in the world a bit more. I'm the one who wanted to read constantly. Plus, fiction is all scripted. When you write fiction (as I do) there are certain tropes, archetypes, interactions, and actions involved that are very different from reality. Plus, authors have to state how a character feels. Looking back even to our teen years, I would write 'inner dialogue' for my main character. These were different voices telling her what to do. She would hold conversations in her head.

So, yes, I can certainly see it. And sorry to end up on tangents in this thread.

I can only speak for how our system has worked and bearing in mind hosts had no undertsanding of what Autism meant exactly until our late twenties and didn't discover the term DID until our mid 40's and have never had therapy specifically for DID in our lives...the Physical Body is now 53 and our situation is this...

pre onset of physical disability:

some of us saw the body as 'our body'
some saw it as 'my body' when they were in it ie actively 'fronting'
some saw it as 'the body' regardless of whether they are fully fronting or not!

AFTER a substantial amount of physical disability occurred (going from being fully mobile, ride a bike, hop on a bus, walk everywhere etc to wheelchair user, only been able to walk a short distance with walking aids, lots of pain and fatigue to deal with)

some who previously saw it as their body then rejected it and see only their 'younger self body' as theirs and the new 'disabled' physical body as 'the host' regardless of who was in the driving seat! ..ie the body became 'the host' rather than the alter in the pilot seat AFTER substantial physical disability occurred. They chose to remain inside and some have never fronted again since the onset of 'Maddies' neurological problems (as they see it) which started early 30's.

Despite no therapy the system does learn itself from situation so after this last stroke

everyone worked together on the inside to reach Yuna stuck on the outside as soon as possible
once we could we started to come out in shifts to relieve her of feeling left 'stuck out here alone'
Other than a few incidents mainly from some affected by paranoia the severe mood swings created everyone has been united in the goal of 'recovery'
Everyone now understands even IF THEY FEEL the physical body isn't 'theirs' we are ALL responsible for looking after it because it's our only way to 'get about' and 'express ourselves' in the outside world.

Everybody voluntarily came together to create the sanctuary farm in a 'safer area of the brain'..that had less likelyhood of being severely impacted by another stroke so

we knew where everyone was
no one was separated or left isolated
and the changelings could do their best in the moment to shield 'The Sanctuary' to save as many as possible should another occur.
Memories are spread across everyone within the system now so should one be injured/damaged ..all the memories they carry are not lost as others 'have a copy'.

Jay then created a unique dilemma, as she arrived obviously having not received 'The Update' but also without the negative associations of what a 'stroke' meant, what we had been through to get this far and what we had been told re prognosis for the future.

Do we update her so she shares all memories including then the same possible 'negative placebo affect' or do we wait and see if can take us to the next level of recovery if she believes the 'injuries are temporary' and recovery is possible as it would be if a fully mobile person had just broke a leg? (remember we were fully mobile when Jay was last out fronting, she has clearer/recent memories of how to do stuff than many of us who have years of memories of coping with and having to compensate for neurological difficulties).

Would being Autistic and having inner beings with abilities a NT person may not believe in, give us an advantage?
Is our ability for very single focused aims going to give us an advantage?
Can the power of inner belief make a 'real world' physical difference?


Sorry that ended up longer than intended!

I do not think that being autistic might have influence on the abilities of the alters.

However, I have the opinion that being autistic and hypersensitive and behaving "like an animal" sometimes and hyperfocusing on stories, myths, TV shows etc might:

- encourage the development of animal-like alters
- encourage the development of "no-emotions" introjection alters (robots, Star Trek Vulcans...)
- encourage the development of fictive introjections as a whole
- encourage the system to function in a problem->solution kinda way with more inter-alter solidarity and support
- therefore, an intuitive tendency to figure out by oneself a lot of therapy elements such as cooperation, building an inner safe space, re-parenting of the child alters, "repairing" the memories of trauma by re-playing them with a better outcome, etc.

Our inner world is quite detailed and strangely despite the 'dislike for change' has evolved over the years.

The changelings often seem to take ideas from films as solutions to help the 'human hosts' ..like Bobby they see (or saw...they understand now) TV as something that really happened to someone somewhere in the moment we were watching (not understanding it was a film set and a script acted out & pre-recorded) so I guess interpreted that as a 'real solution' for the insiders to deal with the physical host body suddenly having more limited capabilities.

eg after watching the first Avatar movie that was released after our mobility difficulties had started a similar set up was created where as soon as we came out of the 'driving seat' (ie sat in the wheelchair) we could be in a similar world to Pandora where we could immediately run about as we had in the younger body.

It was a great 'release' for insiders who had fronted to do something in the outside world..(mostly to spend quality time with the RL dog when the host was home alone) but 'Maddie' as a social mask could not access the inner world ..instead she'd have gaps of memory missing for the time others had fronted to play with or cuddle the dog. (possibly we we are all intensely attached to the dogs we have owned but remember much less of other daily events from those era's except 'being with our dog')

It's possible her reporting the memory issues to doctors led to the original misdiagnosis but we didn't know the word DID anyway and of course never 'came out' when Maddie was doing hospital visits, so still no-one would would have made the connection at the time between 'others' coming and the gaps in Maddie's memory.

It is better now it's only 'insiders' taking turns and we are all connected again there is much less feeling of 'watching yourself', not feeling real, not knowing who we're supposed to be etc. But we've only achieved that cos we live alone and we were able to drasticly reduce external demands on us due to 'Maddie's disabilities' and then 'Yuna's stroke'

..because we very rarely hear anyone address us by the legal name (either full or shortened nickname) none of in particular 'see legal name as me' especially now we all have our own nicknames and can do much more in the inner world than the outer one, so we just take it in turns to 'do a shift' like the body is a 'workplace' we each go to do a couple of shifts then go 'home' (to the inner world)...I guess NT people /therapists would consider that 'very dissociated' as no ONE alter is seeing the legal name/body as 'their identity/body'?