Alter in love was a mystery to me

Yeah, I can see how integration can work well for some people. I wouldn't know how to integrate without my therapist so it's pretty amazing the way it happened for you and Teen Girl. What's holding you back from doing it do you think?

carpediem46 wrote:Yeah, I can see how integration can work well for some people. I wouldn't know how to integrate without my therapist so it's pretty amazing the way it happened for you and Teen Girl. What's holding you back from doing it do you think?

Spontaneous integrations are described in When Rabbit Howls (Chase) and A Fractured Mind (Oxnam), but the descriptions give no clue to how it is done. I guess this is a process our minds intuitively know how to do, when we are ready.

What is holding me back is fear. Fear that if I integrate with my Alter 1 I will not be able to contain Alter 1's feelings for the man. That fear could be misplaced, though. In January, a few days after I experienced my alters again for the first time in 30 years, and before I knew anything about DID, I had an incredibly powerful lucid dream involving the man and merging and birth of . . . the unknown. The dream was not vague, but its meaning was a mystery to me. The only thing I was sure of at the time was that the dream was not about sex nor did I feel called to leave my husband. Now I think the dream portends my integration, which can happen only after awakening. The man was the trigger for my awakening.

Ah, I see. I haven't read When Rabbit Howls yet, but I have ordered it. I need to get round to watching the united states of tara too.
Do you mean, your worried if you integrated it would feel more like the feelings were your own, even when their not? I mean, I know with teen girl you said you still hold her characteristics and it would be scarier to feel like they are your emotions instead of them being placed within an alter (sorry if I have that wrong or it sounds confusing). Also, what from what you've said I'm guessing you mean the overwelming feeling of their lust for him.
Have you told a therapist about your dream, or tried to find out what it may mean online?

Integrated, Teen Girl and I are one. Her formerly dissociated, "other" feelings now are my own feelings. It is the strangest thing, and I am deeply impressed that all this came to pass before I knew anything about DID. What is described in books by clients and therapists alike matches what I experienced.

Yes, I can hold Alter 1's feelings at arm's length now, sometimes even shut them out entirely, but when we integrate that won't work anymore. Also, that's just another kind of denial and dissociation, isn't it? I need to deal with this in some other, more constructive way. I don't know my Alter 1 well and I am cautious. I did relate the dream, and my thoughts about the dream, to a therapist. The therapist made no comment. I may try again.

Yes, it is really impressive that you and her managed to do that.
That's what I suspected you were worried about Alter 1. It could mean you are denying these feelings a lot too, but it would be harder for you to distinguish that they're Alter 1's feelings and not your own, which could cause problems.. have you spoken to your therapist about that?
Maybe you need to get to know Alter 1 & 2 more first before you try integration, as it might cause problems in the form of overwelming feelings that you didn't know you would get. I think it would be a good idea to ask your therapist about the dream again too.

carpediem46 wrote:Yes, it is really impressive that you and her managed to do that.

I am impressed not that we did it, but that it seems to work pretty much the same way for all systems.

carpediem46 wrote:That's what I suspected you were worried about Alter 1. It could mean you are denying these feelings a lot too

Yes.

As you say, Alter 1's known feelings are a problem for me and Alter 1 may have other, equally powerful feelings that I don't know about. Once we have integrated, all feelings will be my own. Alter 1 is a part of me so really those feelings are my own now, they just don't feel like they are my own.

I think it's really important to try communicating with alter 1, whether it's by yourself or through alter 2 before you integrate or it could cause you a lot of hurt in future.

Hi Una+
So I've got there.
What did you want to discuss?
Apart from my therapist "suspecting" DID I don't have thought much about the question(s).
I guess we should start a new thread.

Hi Oldfrenchie! Wonderful to see you here. Yes, please do start a new thread and share what has been going on with you. Many readers here are farther along than either of us.

I have been reading NOT "Just Friends" (about recovering from infidelity) and Switching Time: A Doctor's Harrowing Story of Treating a Woman With 17 Personalities (this took 18 years, but she was the therapist's first and only DID patient and a facade type of alter, and he was a "wait for it" kind of therapist, so they got off to a slow start).

I have a new therapist, someone who is inconveniently far away but has prior experience treating DID. I feel that she gets it. Big step forward. Huge. I have been moving very fast and I think the fast pace will continue.

So-called 'made' emotions are a fact of life for me. Today I did something my Alter 1 has been wanting for months, ever since I first thought of it. Simultaneously, I felt elation, love, gratitude, hope (Alter 1) and compassionate sorrow (myself). What Alter 1 wants seems likely to end in heartbreak. As I was driving home thinking about this, someone threw a monkey wrench in the works. I was driving calmly down a steep hill toward an intersection when suddenly "I" threw the transmission into reverse. Hello!? The engine stalled, of course, so the power to the brakes and steering quit. The next few moments were tense but I managed to stop before the intersection.