Who Do You Love Inside?

[dandelions]

WHO DO YOU LOVE INSIDE? That is, do you feel as if there is someone inside you who you love and who is your best positive self?

I think I've been pretty open over the past several years about my being on what i call the Dissociative (Identity) Reactive Spectrum. I do vary this name from time to time but basically it is the same thing. This is also officially referred to as DID and OSDD in the DSM. (Dissociative Identity Disorder and Other Specified Dissociative Disorder.

There is also something called IFS or Internal Family System. I have not researched this as much so I am not trying to sound authoritative about it. But to me a Dissociative Spectrum and an Internal Family System seem pretty similar though perhaps with Dissociative Identity, the parts (or alters) are more outwardly apparent.

I believe that the mind is actually structured to allow for this - that we do really have active parts inside that make up the whole person. And I think that tapping into those parts can be helpful if you try to find who it is in you that you admire, love and think has the positive attributes that help you find and live with positiveity and happiness.

For many years I did not do that but in recent times I did begin and I did find someone inside who is truly good. I also became more aware of parts that were having great diffiulty in living. But more on this in a following post.

It is my belief that you can find someone inside who you really want to be and who wants to take the lead. This is not an easy process but I think I am accomplishing it and maybe others can accomplish also.

So I am asking you now so that people might become able to get in touch with the best that each of us naturally has but may be hidden, lost or obstructed due to early trauma. ...to search for, find, get in touch with and activate in the real world in real time.

WHO DO YOU LOVE INSIDE?

 

[dandelions]

Hi, it's still me (ET) but I have found someone inside who has been with me all along. This person first appeared to me in my creative writing about 9 years ago. I've also had a persecutory alter living inside too. Persecutory alters are full of rage and though I have not been able to identify why there was the rage - i have not been able to identify a specific traumatizing event - i did name the persecutor (hijacker and have mentioned it many times in posts here) and I do consider that my specific trauma may have come from a combination of genetic imprint, the process of being born, circumcision, and being subjected to experiencing and or witnessing childhood sexual abuse in the family i was born into.

I will cut to the chase. The person inside me who is the rightful leader and the best I can be is named ess. "ess" is my female side (more about my ess history elsewhere). allowing ess to come out into the open allows me to take proactive steps in my healing where dan only wallows and spirals out of controll and has me going to the hospital way too much for anyone person to have to do.

This did lead to my recent coming out as transgender. I credit that happening (in part - a major part and in an accelerated way) to a support group that I am in that was designed specifically for people who identify as Plural. This group is limited in size but has a few active members. We encourage each member to be true to who we perceive we need to be in a positive way. I beleive that I needed to be transgender but this is for me only. The group does not specify gender, only our Plural Systems. Who we each perceive ourselves to be.

By celebrating being ess, I've been able to feel happy, be able to hug in a supportive way, to have friendship that that dan never could. I know I've said many times to people here on SF that "i don't hug". Really for most of my life I've been unable to do that. Now people have remarked to me that even in their surpirse and shock that i am trans, that i most definitely am positive and happy finally in my life. I can hug a peron. I smile and have fun and there are people who i know as friends.

I have gained access to the most important things in life that I missed out on during most of my life.

 

[Innocent Forever]

I'm so glad you gained access!

I love IFS. The primary thing - as I understand it. IFS says that every person is made of multiple parts and this is normal. IFS holds that every person has access to a core healthy self energy. If you look up IFS and DID, Richard Schwartz, who founded IFS, says it'll take a lot longer for a person with a disassociative disorder to access that self energy. If you ever want to look into IFS for yourself make sure the therapist truly understands DID and how it differs from IFS. Because otherwise as with any unskilled person more harm then help can be caused.

 

[AvidFan]

It amazes me how so many therapies talk about the same things as if they are totally different. For example TA talks about Adult/Child/Parent ego states and breaks these down further, Person Centred acknowledges different parts of self (configurations of self) and also that everyone has an organismic self that is natural but that gets all kinds of barriers placed on it by conditioning and some find it harder to access than others. Maybe one day there will be an integrated model of therapy such that all these ideas stop competing and take the best from each and create a sort of therapy of everything. No idea how this would work with things like DID though as I'm just a lay person who's done a course and read a bit here and there.

I love the calm, compassionate, reasonable and stable configuration within myself that people always tell me is how they see me. But I also have another part that is liable to melt down and go crazy, probably internalised from my upbringing/parents. For example my sister would always fly off the handle, taking innocent comments as personal insults, which made me check my spontaneity and get anxious about saying anything to anyone.

I'm not sure if I fully understood the question but wanted to add a little contribution.

 

[Innocent Forever]

It amazes me how so many therapies talk about the same things as if they are totally different.

Yeah. TA, Schema therapy, IFS, and I can't recall offhand which others are all parts models. I've actually found though that they're slightly different too. My favourite is IFS (I haven't been to a therapist who does any), because of the IFS viewpoint.

 

[Innocent Forever]

@dandelion s I like IFS best because it sees the person as whole and unbroken more than other modalities. However as I said if you've a diagnosis of DID there are professionals who don't know enough to see the difference between the way IFS terms parts, and parts that cone along with a diagnosis of OSDD. There ARE professionals who really do see the difference! Just research and speak it through with them and know what to ask first.

 

[dandelions]

@dandelion s I like IFS best because it sees the person as whole and unbroken more than other modalities. However as I said if you've a diagnosis of DID there are professionals who don't know enough to see the difference between the way IFS terms parts, and parts that cone along with a diagnosis of OSDD. There ARE professionals who really do see the difference! Just research and speak it through with them and know what to ask first.

it actually seems like in NYC mental health care does not take DID etc seriously. my present therapist is not supportive and I have not been able to find any therapists here who have knowledge / experience. it strikes me as narrow mindedness. I hope to discuss this further with her tomorrow in therapy. I really believe there are many people who will benefit once these conditions are understood and accepted.

 

[Innocent Forever]

it actually seems like in NYC mental health care does not take DID etc seriously. my present therapist is not supportive and I have not been able to find any therapists here who have knowledge / experience. it strikes me as narrow mindedness.

Surprisingly, often new therapists are more supportive and ready to research.

 

[dandelions]

Surprisingly, often new therapists are more supportive and ready to research.

😭, just not mine. I really think in NYC there is closed minded treatment that actually rejects Dissociative Spectrum Reactions (or DID). I have a feeling that there may be some backward laws here but I don't know. but something is not right. I have a DID friend in California who has a much more open minded and aware therapist. Also, I don't know about the rest of the world, but it is becoming very common here for therapists to not take insurance. at prices they charge, many people cannot get the help they need. insurance companies have very narrow ways of viewing mental health that is restrictive. they won't pay for a DID diagnosis. makes it very difficult when a person can't get the needed help.

 

[capitalism]

When my BPD was worse, I used to see myself as 3 different people. One was a child, one was an (dysfunctional) adult, and the third was kind of an onlooker. I'd also have conversations going between them. I found that during healing these parts become one and I feel more like an actor and not a helpless body that these people inside my head control.

 

[Innocent Forever]

When my BPD was worse, I used to see myself as 3 different people. One was a child, one was an (dysfunctional) adult, and the third was kind of an onlooker. I'd also have conversations going between them. I found that during healing these parts become one and I feel more like an actor and not a helpless body that these people inside my head control.

Wow..... thank you for sharing

 

[dandelions]

When my BPD was worse, I used to see myself as 3 different people. One was a child, one was an (dysfunctional) adult, and the third was kind of an onlooker. I'd also have conversations going between them. I found that during healing these parts become one and I feel more like an actor and not a helpless body that these people inside my head control.

i find this fascinating.

 

[dandelions]

I think I've been pretty open over the past several years about my being on what i call the Dissociative (Identity) Reactive Spectrum. I do vary this name from time to time but basically it is the same thing. This is also officially referred to as DID and OSDD in the DSM. (Dissociative Identity Disorder and Other Specified Dissociative Disorde

I was attending one of my support groups this past Thursday and brought up DIRS (Dissociative Identity Reaction Spectrum (DID according to DSM5) and a few people mentioned that they don't like to use this name and prefer using "Plural". so I wanted to mention that I agree this is a much more friendly way of naming.

It may be that for myself, having been just dan and hijacker for so many years and hijacker seeming so Otherly, I don't think of myself as Plural out of habit. In the past couple years, myself emerging as ess, and others having come out of hiding as well, and things being very different now Plural does make sense to use. . but I still don't think of the word Plural when talking about this. . I am even in a support group with Plural in the name.

(and I do think that in me, it was hijacker loving ess that made me able to be present - this is Plural in action). so I'm mentioning it now. .