Am I the only one?

Hello everyone.


I came here, just like everyone I suppose, to share my story and beg for support.


My question is : Is the disorder I'll talk about DID? Or is it something else? Above all, if it's not DID, what is it?


Here is, as plainly as possible, my case:
I am a 29 years old woman, married and quite happy. I have a PhD in Workplace Psychology (so, I am not a therapist, I am a Human ressource Manager, please note the difference) and I have a halftime work in the work safety area.

I have many reasons to think I've been facing DID issues for 12 years now.

I went through a very traumatic event at the age of 17, including unwanted sex in a morbid, unwanted place. I only remember half of this event. I just woke up the next morning at home, with no memory of how I got there. Wary, I chose not to say a thing to my parents. Problems of memory loss, hours, minutes, or entire days appeared after this event. I never hand any problem of this sort before.

After those moments of amnesia, I found my surroundings altered. I found objects around my room moved from place to place, drawings I couldn't remember drawing, undefined texts scrambled on notes. I began panicking and forcefuly hiding it all to my parents, by fear of being rejected, or mistrusted. I spent a pair of very lonely, confused and painful years. I had small alcohol issues.

This time lasted until my first year of Psychology at the University. I hear about DID, and had a close look at the symptoms, recognizing most of what happened to me. I began looking closely at the drawings and notes instead of hiding them away in fear. And after a time, I came to understand those were from "me", in another state of consciousness.
This other state of consciousness was calling himself "Peter". He was a teenage boy, and did not understand what was happening to him.

For "Peter" saw my female body in a mirror and, unlike any other alter, understood somehow that this was not his body. He understood he was a boy in a female's body, that something was wrong, and asked questions on his notes. "Who am I? Why am I here? I want to go home!"
I woke up woth those notes, and, absurdly but truly, I started to note answers and leave them for "myself" to read.
I began to communicate with my other via notes, for I had absolutely no way to hear his voice in my head, as I read many DID patiens do. When I am here, I am fully myself, the one I have always been, only with parts of my memories unreadable.
When "Peter" was there, he was fully different, remembering details of my life in flashes, but mostly not remembering a things except his own memories.

I learned fast how would therapists cure the disorder, but, still hiding in fear, I chose to keep it for myself again. My parents were used to my lunatic self since I was 17, and when they saw Peter, because they of course did, they did not ask questions.
The interesting fact is that "Peter" accepted the fact that my family called him by my own name and answered to that name. He was aware that he was in someone else's body, someone else's life.

He somehow understood he was an alter. Did it ever occured to any one?

From this time on, and for nearly ten years, I've been living with it. And coping quite alright.

I have only one alter, always the same, coming back when I'm experiencing angst or stress or high fatigue. After years of self-mutilation (4 years of recurrent cutting on the forearms with a sharp cutter) and anger, Peter seems to be in peace with what he is. Again, unlike other alters, he seems to learn and change. He lives and tries to hold on with the awareness of having no body of his own. This is most confusing to me. I have read no DID witness talking about that.

My husband, and most of my friends are aware of my condition and provide effective support. My parents are oblivious to the situation by my own choice. I think they would be saddened by learning about my trauma and disorder 12 years later. I also doubt they would believe, or understand me. They are very pragmatic people.

Peter is still there. I manage to keep my job, my social life and my couple precisely because Peter wants to collaborate. He is not in opposition with my life and my choices. He is aware of my existence, my relation to him and calls me "his mother".
He talks friendly with my husband who takes care of him. Most of my friends, after a time to get adjusted, find the situation positive, and talk to Peter friendly too. They even came to like him.

At this point, my initial question makes sense. At the beginning, DID as a diagnostic made no doubt.

Is it still now? Is an alter who know what he is and accepts it still an alter?


Please help me and tell me what your experience makes you think.



Regards,
V.

Hi V. Welcome!

What you need to remember about reported cases of DID is that those are just a small fraction of the cases and what holds true to those cases does not hold true for other, or even most, multiples. For many of us we lead fairly normal lives (at least to those outside of our systems we appear "normal"... whatever "normal" is ). The function of DID is to be hidden so many people don't pick up on it. Though you've probably found that once you tell someone they tend to have a reaction of, "It makes sense now!"

Many of us are very aware of our others and some of us have no communication with them whatsoever. For some of us it involves writing back and forth, as you have done, because we can't verbally communicate and for some of us, we can verbally communicate.

All of my system are aware that they are one of many in this body. All of them learn, grow and evolve. Not only is that not uncommon, but a positive thing.

There is no "cure" for DID and don't let old texts have you believe otherwise. More and more, now, therapists are veering away from the idea of integration (as it does not hold for long and, for some of us -my system included- would do much more harm than good) and are helping us all get to a place of cooperation and fluid communication. Peter being happy to cooperate is a good thing.

It sounds like DID to me, but I'm no doctor. Just a fellow multiple.

Hope this helped somewhat!

-Leigh

Yes Peter is definitely an Alter.

I have four active alters, three of which are adults.

From what I think, Jay has been around the longest. Hes 20 years old and I am 25. He and the others refer to me as "the boss". At first we did not have contact at all, I was not very aware he was around, but as time went on I grew more aware of him. Now we have full contact with each other and we are most often co-conscious with each other.

-Jay-
I know very well what Peter has gone through. I used to be very angry about my existence. I didn't know why I was here in this female body, or what purpose I had being here. It made me angry for a while, I was confused and unhappy. The more time went on the more I learned. I found that I inhabited a body with another person who seemed to need help a lot, reluctantly I would help her because if I didn't help things seemed to get worse. So I helped and I learned and I grew more aware of things, finally I learned how to make contact with this partner of mine. The boss started to read up on disorders that could explain what it was we were going through, we both wanted answers. I read along with her about D.I.D. I realize now why I am here. I am here to protect her, and keep her safe and also to keep our system in order and take care of the others. Thats why she is the boss. What ever make her happy I will try my best to make happen. Some alters may never realize their purpose, but I do. After a while I started to notice other were with me, soon their were many like me, not all of them understood their purpose either, but I helped them realize what was going on. Some have come and some have gone and now we are down too about four alters, but these four aren't going anywhere. I have also formed a relationship with her husband, I love him as much as the boss does. The others are coming around to him as well. We are all trying to be one big happy family lol but there are still kinks to work out and problems here and there. I will always do what I can to help.

You see me very relieved!

I am glad to learn "Peter" is not alone. I am sure Peter will be glad too.
In my story, Peter has nearly hiw own life, you see, by the means of Internet.


He has many profiles on various Community Websites, mostly artistic, since the art of drawing is our common passion.
Peter has his email adress, his own favorite forums, and so on. At the beginning, Peter barely talked, he groaned and pointed out what he wanted. After ten years, he learned a perfect english and french, and talks fluently (and friendly, as I mentioned. this is absolutely no depressive or angry alter as I heard of, on DID websites)
By the means of those websites, he has come to talk to people, who think Peter is only one, real person. Those online friends are unaware of my existence, wich is paradoxal, but possible by Internet.


How do we manage the picture thing? Well I have the luck to be rather androgynous. I am tall and broad-shouldered. And with the help of Photoshop and make up, he can turn himself into a fine young androgynous guy. He even meets some success among girls on those sites. This, I must admit, I had a hard time accepting, and you can imagine how hard it was for my husband.

But even that, we did cope with quite fine.

With medication monitoring blood pressure and heartbeat, I can somehow control the triggering of Peter. Not exactly, but let's say, I can make predictions about the day in the week when Peter will appear.
So, peter can even get out as "Peter" and actually meets in real life the people he talks with on those sites . He uses breast binding methods, just like Female-to Male transsexuals. For some people, you see, there is only him.

Peter has very much of his own life. This is helped by the fact that I (and my close friends) have only one alter to deal with and take care of. I understand those things are impossible for someone with a system of 5 ou 10 or more.

I can say today that "we" are quite happy with this situation. But what do you tink? Is it going too far? Is it nonsense, absurdity? It has become my normality, so, I couldn't tell. Maybe you could, then.

Jay has his own myspace and online life, where there were people who believed he was his own single person and so on. He even has pictures of himself, obvious not what e really looks like, but what he likes to call his preferred self image, what he views him self as in his mind to help cope with what he looks like. Not long ago he decided to tell some of his very close friends the truth about his situation, most handled it very well, and they support him. As far as Peter's situation as long as it works for you and your husband as well as Peter then I don't see any real problems. I think Peter should know that there may be a slight chance one of his friends could find out about who he is and it may upset them, like I said most handled knowing the truth about who Jay is but not everyone. So as long as he knows how his actions could effect people then it should be okay.