Lived Experience Forum

[Maggie]

@Faith-and-Hope Yes.

[Maggie]

This song is for you @Faith-and-Hope https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kluRNKKST00

[Faith-and-Hope]

Thank you @Maggie ..... that is so beautiful.

I consider that my strongest sub-personality is a peaceful warrior ......

I have come home from a Saturday church service earlybto honour our Saturday family breakfast, so I need to go and sort that now. I will be back afterwards.

💜

[Faith-and-Hope]

Hi @Maggie .... I'm back .... 💕

I guess what I want to ask you is when you realised you were living a plural life (if that term is okay with you ?) .... or whether it was something you feel you have always known.  Was there a vivid point of realisation ?

[Maggie]

@Faith-and-Hope I didn't know to start with as I guess it was always there and I thought everyone was the same. Does that make sense? In the convent the switches were picked up and labeled but that was all in those days. Then I realised something was odd, strange and I saw an interview on tv Trudy Chase I think, and bang, fitted like a glove, but did nothing. I was seeing a psych who didn't believe in DID, so again it was left. When I totally crashed when my husband left and I was admitted to hospital, one of the littlies decided to introduce herself to the psych. Problem solved regarding labels but put in the too hard basket. I got lucky with my social worker and slowly the pieces are coming out but not together. Am I answering your question or off on a tangent..?

[Faith-and-Hope]

Absolutely answering the question @Maggie.

I am aware from my reading that some psych's don't believe in DID ..... and issue meds to try to solve the problem ??

Do the littlies have names that they introduce themselves by ?  I am wondering whether someone could be switching imperceptibly, and you only know that there is a difference in mood and values and personality, but they are still identifying as the same person .... not announcing in any way that they are a different entity ?

Maybe that is too hard to answer if it is outside your experience ?

[Maggie]

@Faith-and-Hope All mine have names, I stopped counting at 60, realising numbers don't matter. They are also male and female. They have different likes interests and opinions. I actually see the person like my most recent arrival is 5 yrs old. Long dark uncombed hair, a pinafore about four sizes too big and doc Martin boots. I see it like the latest tv when they are somehow in the room with you in body, that's why I don't agree with the term DID, it's not pure dissociation that I personally experience. I made a big mistake in watching the Hollywood versions which scared more than helped. I'm guessing, but only guessing, that identification will only come with safety. You said your husband would only hurt himself, not anyone else, that's me also. I would never deliberately hurt anyone, but I have damaged myself considerably. I'm trying not to overload you. Tell me to back off if necessary, I can be very obedient.lol.

[Faith-and-Hope]

My husband, in this altered mindset, is hurting others through an intense need to control ..... like an ownership ..... but of course he doesn't / can't see it that way.   And he switches to being playful, charming, loving .... while the person is captive to his wishes, if that makes sense, becoming hostile if they are uncompliant.  This appears to be a pattern within his family though, so I am assuming a personality disorder rather than plurality.  

WH wasn't like this before, although there were attempts at this sort of behaviour early in our marriage and we had to sort them out, because I wasn't prepared to live with them.  At the time I thought it was learned behaviour from his family environment. 

And he has issued a threat, hyperthetically, against anyone who would harm one of his kids .... which I have to presume was part of a delusional state.

Wow .... 60 .... ❣️   Do you find it difficult to give them all time ?  It might not work that way .... I imagine all are busy within the same internal space in their own ways .....

I found it hard to connect with the DID label too .... it's not a comfortable fit to my thinking either.

Please let me know if I am challenging any of your boundaries unintentionally ....

[Maggie]

@Faith-and-Hope No you aren't challenging my boundaries at all. Have you looked at narcisstic personalities?

controlling etc. my visitor fits perfectly.

60 sounds a lot but some share their story and move into the background while others are out and about most of the time. Xstitch helps block the voices and we discuss things so they don't feel neglected. I had to draw the line with full footy matches, as I'm not the slightest bit interested. Now we watch the last 1/2 Hr, happy campers all round. It took years to pull down the wall that I had put up thinking they were out to get me. But I realised they came to save my life, why would that change now. I've seen some talk on tv about having a cleaner personality, I wish. I just have traumatised kids, and I move with that like any human being would. I've pushed for intergration, and worn myself out, it's not happening with me. Maybe I started too late?

I hope you realise how fantastic you are. You must care deeply ( you would say love) your husband so much, I have no doubt he cares (loves) you right back. That will bring you both through this, but you have to self care big time, even vanish for the occasional weekend if possible. 💜💜💜💜💜💜

[Faith-and-Hope]

I have heard talk of ocpd in the background of my son's treatment @Maggie .... and that seems to fit, but I don't think it's all ..... narcissistic is registering with me too .... but not as he used to be before .... I think .... 

As a workaholic, and working with his family, I am wondering whether he was developing in all these different directions, and at home we were only being introduced to a part of him, a part that is only fleetingly here with us now, and the parts of him that flourished under his work conditions Have takes up primary residence .....

You can probably see by the way I am talking that it feels like I am dealing with multiple personalities in the one person, and Multiple Personality Disorder used to be the name for what has been re-labelled DID ..... I guess that's where the Internal Family Systems model might explain it better .... and that we are experiencing switches between sub-personalities associated with ocpd, narcissistic pd, or other  just as daunting pd's.

This version of my husband doesn't love me I think .... I think he can appreciate that we did love each other, and that I was a good mother to our children, but he is competing with me in the "parenting" of them now, which is part of this strange mindset.  They are adults, but he is treating them as much younger, and their behaviour has become regressive in response to being captive to his controlling behaviour.  They are being invalidated, which is where our son is now under psych support.

He is swinging between co-parenting with me, tolerating me, and treating me as an adversary.  Two days ago I learned that he is considering us separated, but sharing a life .... presumably but not stated openly ...... that that is supposed to be for the benefit of the kids.

Its too big for me to be able to sort out, and his eating disordered regimen rules our daily life patterns, now more in the background since S2 came into needing therapy, and the psych's are involved.