***Triggers: Mentions of destructive behaviour, an EP, some defined roles***
Hello,
I am Isabelle. Bit strange really, to be writing this, but I feel like we might be in some trouble. One of us is... really making things difficult. I have had to take steps to isolate her to write this and make sure that no hasty, lasting harm comes to us. Three of us are collaborating writing this.
Just to give a bit of history, there have always been more than one entity in this body. The body was not in alignment with our female gender at birth, so that was corrected. We are extremely fortunate in this regard. However, the misalignment was probably the instigating factor in there being more than one personality here.
We had to do this to survive, because then exceedingly few took children seriously about their self-identified gender identity Even fewer than now. Ridicule from family and friends made it impractical to do anything about this situation until the body was older, leading to different entities being in control at different times.
None of us remember any severe trauma, which has been a contributing factor to avoiding seeking support. We do not want to insult those who have had much worse situations. There was some borderline verbal abuse when we were children, and what feels to us like emotional manipulation or something from extended family, but we are unable to trust our feelings about these situations.
Dissociation has always been the mechanism to mediate functionality during periods of high stress. We were in therapy six years ago and disclosed that there was a multi-faceted system in place to our therapist. She acknowledged these dissociative patterns and had begun to try and open up dialogue with several of us. Unfortunately, that situation came to an end because of insurance problems. We have not been back to a therapist since.
We have had a period of relative harmony, where we were able to switch pretty smoothly without it being disruptive or all that conscious of it – maybe even fairly blended – but various factors over the past couple of years have lead to a great deal of stress, depression, and social avoidance. However, about a year ago, someone understood my situation without me having to explicitly state it. This really set off being conscious of the switching again, and it has been becoming more pronounced over the past few months. There does not seem to be a core or host now, or a sense of summation, but different entities who assume control in different situations.
I am writing now, because the most volatile of us is behaving in concerning ways. She holds metaphorical guns to our heads to drive perfection, especially in our professional life. Dizzy is intelligent, strong-willed, extremely demanding, hypercritical, very paranoid, disposed towards guilt, and the most prone to extreme behaviours (extreme sports, self-injury, overexertion, etc.), especially when she feels irritated, dissatisfied or betrayed, which are all being felt now.
I don't know what to do. I am afraid she will hurt us all—if not physically, then mentally or socially—especially the littles. I have to take care of them. Maybe we just need to talk with others about managing these situations. I need to calm Dizzy down somehow. I would not ordinarily post things so quickly, but I fear that Dizzy will delete this if I do not.
Thank you for listening.
Isabelle et al.