I feel like I am drowning - now panic attacks :(

Adam has been coming out in bits and he even walked for the first time the other night. But we've been focusing on Little John because he's older and has taken to Jack and, well, there's only so much time in the day. We're trying to age him, to see if that's possible. Interestingly, we asked him if he misses the mother or the father and he says no. He may be the least damaged alter and even he doesn't miss them. That just says it all.

Both toddlers are bothered by the others' thoughts they keep hearing in the head. Virtually all of us have shaken our head when they want to get rid of the inexplicable voices or want to get someone who's co-conscious away from us. Thoughts of what the abuse might have been also disturb them, especially Little John who can understand English. I still little clue how to reach the little wolf-dog. He doesn't seem to like the voices talking to him in the few times he's been here,just triggers him more.

I think my toddlers do respond pretty well to magical protective thoughts so I'd say keep doing them. I don't know if he feels he's still under water, but I think it may eventually be important for him to be in the body and realize he's not now underwater anymore, he's in the here and now. Maybe you can suggest he open his lungs and breath when he visits?

That's a good idea. I just took my kids to Harry Potter and I wondered who would come out to watch and it was Baby Smirk! He kept getting scared. I kept telling him its just a movie. So he comes out and knows he is not under water. I sort of thought it was a cycle he kept going through for all these years. Mother holding him under the water, struggling, then waiting for it to all happen again.

I read that child alters are something like child-like psyche trapped in adult psyche, which is why they can understand big words. Why can't they talk or read then? Is it us just expecting them to do less than they really can.

tylas wrote:I read that child alters are something like child-like psyche trapped in adult psyche, which is why they can understand big words. Why can't they talk or read then? Is it us just expecting them to do less than they really can.

I certainly had no prior expectation of any kind. So far my Alter 1 does not talk. Perhaps cannot talk. I don't know why. I don't know how much Alter 1 understands of the world, but I do know that Alter 1 often follows what I read.

If only I had taken abnormal psychology in college; I might have figured out then what was going on in my head.

Thats how my tiny ones are too - like baby smirk. They frown or get scared when I read a trigger word, but they don't talk.

I read that child alters are something like child-like psyche trapped in adult psyche, which is why they can understand big words. Why can't they talk or read then? Is it us just expecting them to do less than they really can.

I've read that and I wish it were true because it would make things easier but so far it doesn't ring true for me. My core doesn't understand much except the simplest words and images, I've tried. The wolf-dog doesn't understand words at all so far. It wasn't triggered by a film scene of an grotesque alien child being drowned. After I shifted my perspective and started seeing the humanness in the baby and thought of my core's drowning image, the wolf-dog was triggered. Jack gets puzzled daily by words I don't even think of as big words but are ones he doesn't know and he stumbles when repeating them aloud if I'm talking to him from inside. He has learned to read more quickly but only when I'm really close. When I'm not, he seems as slow as a kid his age.

It feels much more to me like these alters are the actual person I was at that age, frozen in time, and teleported to the present. Most of my alters went into deep freeze and were not around at all so maybe it's different for someone whose child alters have been with them more or less continuously but who just haven't aged. They don't seem to be child-like psyches to me, they appear to be children. This may be different for everyone.

Hi Jack...

I found out more about Baby Smirk. Wicki M had been drowning him since he split at about 9 months old. I don't know if my Mother was drowning me at that age. But according to Wicki M, the Mother near=drowned her many times between the ages of 6 and 8, but never meant to kill her just punish her.

I thought I would mention that since you had a similar experience.

** triggers **

My DID mother's vicious alter drowned me very early, before age 1 perhaps. This caused my first split. My gatekeeper told me he recognized that the core Adam's fear and emotions weren't stopping the abuse and the life was threatened, so he separated, took over the body, and promptly feigned death. The mother's alter was so scared that she quickly pulled the body from the water. She then or soon stopped the drowning. My guess is that this abuse is a repetition of what her own mother did to her but I can't be certain. Was your mom DID or what? What ever happened to time-outs? Drowning as punishment, jeez.

Can relate to the drowning thing, tylas and jack.. It's hard when there's flashbacks to that. And we definitely can't relate to littles being like child psyche in adult psyche, they can't understand big words or words they just didn't come around. I have littles that have no idea what a computer is; it needs to be explained to them. They're stuck in a stage of development, closed off parts of my mind stuck in childhood, with the exact same train of thought as I apparently had at that age (and with the mentality and memories of that split off part). Child psyche in adult psyche with understanding big words and things - I really think that's more like the regression a regular person would experience. Regressing to a stage of childhood; but still knowing the big words and how to tie shoe-laces and things.. Not with DID, at least I've never seen or heard of it with anyone. Except if the dissociation-walls aren't too high and there's a lot of co-consciousness, but then again, that's the bigs helping out, isn't it? Doesn't really count either.

Dimensional wrote:Child psyche in adult psyche with understanding big words and things - I really think that's more like the regression a regular person would experience. Regressing to a stage of childhood; but still knowing the big words and how to tie shoe-laces and things..

Sorry to change the subject a little, but now I'm confused. So, regular people regress to a childlike stage sometimes too? When I've been in the child mode, I remember it was like I knew what the big words were and could think them in my head, but somehow I didn't think I could/should say them, like they weren't my words.

dividedtruth89 wrote:

Dimensional wrote:Child psyche in adult psyche with understanding big words and things - I really think that's more like the regression a regular person would experience. Regressing to a stage of childhood; but still knowing the big words and how to tie shoe-laces and things..

Sorry to change the subject a little, but now I'm confused. So, regular people regress to a childlike stage sometimes too? When I've been in the child mode, I remember it was like I knew what the big words were and could think them in my head, but somehow I didn't think I could/should say them, like they weren't my words.

Sorry, didn't mean to confuse anyone! Maybe I expressed myself the wrong way. What you describe sounds like the dissociation walls aren't high, though- I've heard of littles feeling that way. They knew big words because I knew them, but they weren't "their" words, so they didn't feel comfortable using them. I don't know how it works for you, but it sounds like a not-too-heavily dissociated child-mode you experience. What I meant though- yes, regular people (well, mostly really sensitive people), can regress to a childlike stage sometimes. Usually when confronted with something emotional as well; but they still have their knowledge from their lives and everything, and don't only know the big words, but use them and feel like they're theirs. It's more of an emotional childlike-state for those people than anything else, it doesn't take over their being completely. I hope I explained better, really sorry, didn't mean to confuse anyone