Despondent

I'm over it really. I've had enough of being we. Cant seem to find motivation for anything. Tried doing some of my dolls today which I usually enjoy. I haven't done any in about 3 weeks because I just haven't felt like it. I really didn't feel like it today either but thought I would see if I felt better once I got started. I didn't. I worked for about an hour or so and then stopped with a massive stomach ache. I packed up and headed for the couch for a rest. My stomach has stopped hurting now. I think it was just someone inside not happy doing dolls. But I can't find motivation to do much else either. Every time I think of something to do, someone inside says they don't want to do it. I feel really flat and despondent. It all seems to hard.
I lost the plot at my husband yesterday. I was getting frustrated with everything and felt, as I still do, that I am not achieving anything. He is doing all the hard work and I feel useless. It all boils down to me feeling like I am not good enough. I don't achieve enough, I don't do enough and I am not good enough.
I feel a bit like I am not able to do anything. I cant even get the motivation to clean. It is all very frustrating. (My husband was very supportive by the way.) I feel a bit lost really.

Dont always trust Tara

This post is birthed from a question my son asked me last night. He was asking me if I am experiencing co-consciousness yet. Am I seeing Alters outside my body to talk too?

I was in shock, where did he get that from? He tells me from the TV series 'United States of Tara.'
If you have not seen the show, Tara has DID and is portrayed in a way that can make many multiples quite upset. It is of course quite hard in any movie to try and portray what is happening in someone's head. In United States of Tara, they have chosen to show the times when Tara becomes co-conscious as times when her Alters appears in front of her and talk to her. Previously, she would lose time and another Alter would take over the body. As she becomes co-conscious this changes and she doesn't disappear when they want to talk to her they merely appear in front of her.
I had known what was happening on the show but I had never really thought how it would be taken by someone not familiar with DID.
So just to clear it up. I do not see my alters standing outside my body talking to me. I am largely co-conscious, so I often hear them talking it me in my head and even arguing with me, if need be. I can switch several times in an hour and I don't need to change my clothes every time that happens. In many cases you wouldn't even be able to pick when it is happening. Sometimes a blink is enough for a  switch. 

United States of Tara, and other shows on DID, can be a great starting point for conversation and knowledge, but please do not take them as gospel. They are merely a Hollywood interpretation and adaptation for the screen. If in doubt, as a multiple.

Multiple language

I was having a very interesting discussion with my Therapist today and I am interested on getting your opinion on it all.
We were discussing how my system works and integration. I mentioned the post on here from a few days ago about being one of many parts of the whole, not the core member with many alters who are a part of me.

As we were talking I realized that the language I have been using all this time was actually making it harder for me to express and understand my system. As a Multiple, like most multiples, I was raised and grew up in a society of Singletons (non multiples). We therefore learn and use the singleton language to describe ourselves and our experiences. (part of this I think is that we don't learn any other terms and part of it is that we want to be like everyone else so we use their language too.)
Little things like referring to myself and 'I' instead of 'we'. Now this can often be a choice by multiples in regard to what they most feel comfortable with, or what is socially acceptable. But it can also change the way people see you and how you see yourself. When I use 'we' I feel I am acknowledging that we are a group of personalities running the one body. When I use 'I' in can infer that I am the one in charge and therefore the one you shall be speaking too. If I use 'I', it can also infer only one Alter is here or I am discussing only my specific needs or beliefs as one alter of the system.
Now don't get me wrong I am not suggesting that every multiple start referring to themselves as 'we' instead of 'I'. I consider this to be personal choice and it may vary between situations and alters. But I am saying that maybe we need to reconsider some of the language we use and how it affects our system.
Are we acknowledging our multiplicity? I know this can be a very dangerous thing to do in the open and not many multiples want to be openly known for their disorder.  But in forums where it is safe, with people we trust, are we just following on with singleton language that really doesn't serve us best.

 I know I am not expressing this the best, the pieces I am wanting to share are just not coming to my memory at the moment.
My mum asked me the other day, after reading my posts on here about my new flashbacks and abuser memories, if I was feeling better now? It is a strange term. I am functioning better in my day to day life again, and I am not spending hours a day vagued out in dissociation and grief. But is that better? I had merely switched to an alter who could get on with life. The pain and grief was still very present and real. It all just meant she (my mum) just couldn't see it as much now. It was still there. 'Feeling Better' to me would mean working through the pain and grief in healing until it didn't have the devastating affect on me that it did originally. Feelings are transient and can change with the switch of an alter. They are either close to the surface or buried again. Ultimately to my singleton mother, yes I was feeling better. But the reality is that nothing had changed except which alter was running the show.
To my mum who reads my blog, don't take this personally, but as you know we really didn't have time for me to discuss this with you on the phone.

I hope this makes at least some sense, please let me know if you have any thoughts on the matter.

Triggering food.

In discussions with my Therapist today she gave me a very helpful tip on how to eat food that is triggering me. Thought I might share it here in case it can help someone else.
Because of the abuse I went through, I have a lot of trouble eating certain foods. I can even start eating them and then half way through, cant stomach them. It is more to do with the texture than the taste, and I will feel very nauseated until I can't stomach any more food unless it is something dry like bread.
My Therapist recommend eating food Mindfully. For those of you who are not familiar with mindfulness I will give you a quick run down.

Most of the time when we eat, or do many things really, we are not fully aware of what we are doing. Our minds are on other things. We often watch TV while we eat, talk on the phone, or drive. There are many things to take our mind off of what we are doing. Have you ever taken time to stop and enjoy the food you are eating. Take a mandarin for example. Do you quickly peal it and toss it in your mouth? Most of us do most of the time, and if this is something triggering we can easily get lost in that.

Next time you eat a mandarin, or any food really, take your time and savour the experience. Calm your thoughts, smell the mandarin, look at the skin, its colour and texture. Peel it feeling how the skin breaks in your hand. Feel the juice spray on your fingers. When you eat it, take it one piece at a time. Eat it slowly, let the flavours linger on your tongue, notice the different flavours. Is it sweet or bitter? Juicy or dry? Enjoy it, experience it, savour it. Don't just pass it over as eating food.
When it comes to triggering foods, the same principle applies. being fully aware of what it is when you are eating it. It is not that horrible thing that happened many years ago. Stay in the moment and feel every part of the mandarin. This should help to take that triggering affect away from the food. It may take time but it should work. I haven't tried it yet, but will keep you informed on my progress.
 If you have any other ideas on Food triggering, please let me know.

Ten reasons I didn't tell I was being abused.

This is from an article written by Carolyn Spring who is part of PODS, Positive Outcomes for Dissociative Survivors. PODS is run out of the UK and is a very valuable resource for survivors. They can be found in the internet or through Facebook.

Ten Reasons I Didn’t Tell

By Carolyn Spring

 1. No-one asked.

Maybe if someone had asked me a direct question, I would have given them a direct answer. But no-one ever did. I sidled up to a teacher once in my PE kit and stretched out my hands, but she didn't see. Or at least, she didn't ask. I looked deep into the wonderings of the Avon lady but she never wondered out loud, and never to me. I tried sitting next to my friend's Mum on the coach on the school trip to London, but she only talked about the traffic. It wouldn't have mattered if the Doctor had asked, because my Mum was always sitting right next to me and I could only semaphore nakedly with my eyes. It wasn't worth the risk anyway. Never mind.

2. I didn't know it was happening.

It's difficult to talk about something that you don't know is happening. The day child, the night-time child; the indoor child, the outdoor child; the happy child, the unhappy child. If only they could have met: there would have been so much to say. The necessity of dissociation at the time makes it difficult to communicate apart from the dysfunction of fragmented emotion. My communication with a world that didn't listen was through illness, pain, sleepwalking and the occasional outburst of bizarrely inappropriate behaviour such as chasing down an old couple who got it wrong at a T-junction and nearly pranged me in my mother's car; I didn't understand why I suddenly wanted to kill them for just an innocent mistake, and they certainly didn't. After they pulled in terror into a police station car park to evade me, I returned home hot-faced and confused. I didn't know I was reacting out of transference because I didn't know what had been happening the night before (and I certainly didn't know what transference was).

3. They told me not to tell and I wanted to be good.

It might seem odd to want to be good by not telling, but adults had told me not to tell and being a child I had no rational powers to determine if they could be disobeyed. I wanted to be good. Good in order to be safe – yes; but good to be good. I didn't want to be like them. I wanted to be good. And I had been told not to tell. So telling would have been disobedient, naughty, and bad. And I wasn't going to do that if I could help it.

4. They told me not to tell and said they would kill me if I did.

It might seem reasonable to believe their threat but as adults I suppose we would tend to dismiss it as just that – a threat – and rationalize that a child could know no better than to believe it. But it wasn't just a threat. When you have seen them kill another child your age – perhaps your age, perhaps even younger – you believe them utterly when they say that they will kill you. You believe without questioning that they will know if you gulp too loudly in assembly at school. And you live every day with the knowledge that it will be your turn next and there is no point – ever – in planning too far ahead. Telling would only quicken the suicide.

5. There was no-one to tell.

When you look around the playground, you can't be sure if you have seen those faces elsewhere, in the terror of crackling candle-light; you wouldn't want to tell someone who might tell that you've told. And the adults in your life – the teachers, the nit nurse, the friends of your parents – were they there, are their faces fire-flickering familiar? There was no-one, afterwards, to help clean up the blood; there is certainly no-one – no-one – to tell.

6. I deserved what was happening.

It never occurred to me that this might not be so. It has always happened, as long as memory has stretched backwards; it will always happen, as long as anticipation stretches forward. Its genesis is in my soul-intrinsic evil; good things happen to good girls and there's no experimental parallel universe in which to test out alternative hypotheses: this is reality. Words that form the wallpaper of my mind, whispered or commanded or bellowed by my abusers, tell me it is so, and it is so. I deserve it; I have caused it; I am it.

7. No-one would believe me.

They said no-one would believe me. An itchy cloth against my mouth, eye-stinging smells, rushing head ... I can't remember what happened next, so who will believe me? At school I write stories, paint pictures: fantastical, allegorical, metaphorical, but never (assume the teachers) true. They don't believe I'm not hungry (have another potato), don't believe I don't want to play out (out you go anyway), don't believe I'm feeling poorly (there's nothing wrong with you), so why should they believe about knives and sticks and ropes and ditches and water and dead? Of course it's not true. Those things don't happen to anyone we might know. And certainly not in England.

8. No-one would have done anything about it.

If a group of adults can stand and watch while you are raped and not intervene, what makes you think that anyone else will help? And if, having tried once, maybe twice, to tell one, maybe both, of your parents, and having been shouted at, and smacked, then tortured, for doing so – what makes you think that anyone else will do anything to stop it?

9. I didn't want anyone to know.

I am Bad, Unspeakable, Filthy and Vile. I do things that only adults do, I have murdered, I am shit. I don't want people to hate me. I don't want to go to prison. I don't want to be rejected. I don't want to be so naughty. Why would I want anyone to know about the things that I can't even bear to know myself?

10. I didn't have the words to tell.

Just once or twice I saw some kind eyes, eyes that seemed to lean right into me and offer peace, safety, warmth. And I tried to lean back into them, to tell, to speak, to say. But I didn't have the words. I didn't know what the problem was, I didn't have a lexicon. And back, back in time – reaching through the cot with pleading eyes of terror – I didn't have any words then and I couldn't even point. By the time the first brave crude words started to come, the kind eyes had leaned away and the moment was gone and the moment would not return.

Two of us.

This is a piece written by Two of us during Bridges on Friday.


I don't want you to know me.
I don't want you to see what is happening inside me.
I want you to leave me alone.
I want to hide behind this wall where I feel safe and know my own being.
If you come in you will hurt me.
I don't want your pain,
I don't need your fear,
I just want you to go away.
I am safe in here hiding.
You are far away and cannot hear me.
Don't touch my skin,
It isn't me, you wont feel me,
you wont know me.
It is just my fortress wall.
I live deep inside its protective walls.
Be gone and leave me here.

I am not what you are looking for.
It is too far for you to come.
Be gone and leave us to be alone.
You are not me nor I you.
We are not the same.
My world is dark and unyielding,
yours holds sunshine and freedom.
Be gone and live in your freedom,
and leave me to your hell.
I am not you
nor should I be set free.
This is my life, chosen or not.
Leave me to be.
Don't know me,
don't push me. 
I cannot let you in.
Please let me be.

Parts of a whole.

Many times my Therapist will say that my Alters are just parts of me. She does this to try not to encourage the idea that they are separate entities from me. They are merely parts of me. I understand her logic and the thought process behind it, but there is a better way. We (the alters) are part of the whole.

Let me try to explain. The first statement can very easily seem to be inferring that my therapist is talking to the main or core alter, and is therefore referring to the other alters as merely extra parts to the core or main person. 
But as multiples, we are often not aware of who the core alter is, who or where the original person is. Just because we look the same every time you see us DOES NOT mean you are facing the same alter every time. Many of my alters have similar voices and mannerisms, and you would be hard pressed to tell the difference unless you knew me really well. To me, every alter is me, and every alter considers themselves to be important and running our life. There is not a main alter that is 'THE ONE'. You may see more of one alter than others because these are the alters that handle certain situations, like socializing. But that does not mean that you will never encounter any of the other alters that live in this body. We switch and change as need arises. We are a cohesive group that runs this body, and to every single one of us - We are the one!
So next time you say "oh that's not her!" think again. That is me, it may just very well be someone else in control of the body than you were expecting. We are all me!

Impending Doom

Something that is common amongst trauma survivors is impending doom. I am struggling with it today. Because we have known so much ongoing trauma, it is hard to accept when good things happen. When life is going well and I am happy, it is very common for me to get a deep feeling that something is about to go wrong. Something big, like I am going to die.
Many years ago, while still in the depths of severe depression, I was dating. I had met a nice guy one day and a few days later flew interstate to spend time with family. The whole time I was away he was in contact with me saying how much he wanted to get to know me and missed me. I was feeling very accepted and wanted. When I got on the plane to come home, I was 100% sure we were going to die in a plane crash on the way home. Life was too incredibly good, so something bad had to be about to happen. I couldn't imagine life getting any better than it was at that time.
Since then life has improved immensely and so has my state of mind, but the fear of something bad happening when life gets good, is still with me. It is almost paralyzing and I just want to sit in a corner and hide until the bad thing comes. It tarnishes the good things that have been happening.
Imagine a child enjoying playing or being with friends, when the abuser comes along and insists the child  goes with them. The child gets abused. This sequence happens repeatedly and it doesn't take long for the child to learn that good times are always followed by bad things. Before long it is in-ground into their belief system. Don't get too happy or the bad things will come. At worst we may even die. It even makes me less inclined to have good times, because I don't want the bad stuff to come.
Ultimately I need to get used to good things happening, and accept that life will go on and in most cases good things can continue to happen. It is a big thing to relearn.

Struggling

I am struggling today with this new flashback and abuser. I find it hard with new memories like this. It is always hard to know what to trust, especially in the early days. There is a part of me that wants so much to be wrong and to have made it all up, but at the same time I want to be able to trust what I am feeling and hearing. I cant picture this person like this, mind you I did say that about one of my other abusers, and that has proven to be very real. It is just so hard, I don't want it to be real, I don't want to have to deal with this. Child abuse is such a horrible topic. Why does this happen? I keep asking myself, why would he do this to me when there were so many other people around who he could have chosen. What was different about me. I don't want to remember this, I don't want him to be involved in this too. I am not sure which is worse, what he did or that it was him. I feel betrayed. I feel so alone and lost and hurt. I want to go away, I want the pain to come out.  I don't want to feel like this.

I am stilled.

The peace of the night is broken with another flashback. But this one is different, this one shows a new abuser. Someone I had only heard suggested to be quietly once, but I did not believe. But now the truth stands before me, and I feel the wrenching of its pain. Tears run down my face, they keep running, This is all so deep, so well hidden, so unlikely. So unreal.
My 'friends' hid this well from me, they have taken to my deepest place and held it there, until now, when we are safe. He is gone, he has passed, he can not harm me now. But it seems the damage has already been done. I cannot speak, there are not words to say. It has changed my world, I can never be the same from this. I am stilled, I am silenced. Maybe it is time to heal. I do not know. I am broken.

Lost memories

As you can probably tell from my previous post I was not feeling to good today. My husband and I decided to get out for a few hours for a drive. We just headed south to see what we could see. We came across a beach I never knew existed, about and hour south of where we live. As we approached the foreshore my Alters started to chime in. "you have been here before, this is where the H family used to bring you". The place did not look at all familiar, but in a strange way I kind of knew they were telling the truth. The H family had baby sat my sister and I after school from when I was about 7years old to about 11 or 12. I have one memory of going with them to their shack, but it was at night and I was going to bed, so have no idea of what the rest of the house or surrounding area were like.
I spoke to my mum this afternoon and mentioned it to her and she laughed that I didn't remember it. Apparently we went there a few times. I don't remember a single thing about the place but that one memory. Even as we walked around the beach today nothing seemed familiar. It is the strangest feeling to be in a place that you know you should remember but there is nothing.
We walked along the rocks and found a spot with hundreds of small shells and pebbles. My 'littles' were so excited. I sat down amongst the shells and rummaged through to find the prettiest ones. As much as they all wanted to come out and play at once, it was hard. We don't like to be seen that way, as a little child in an adults body and we are very guarded about letting them come out. They were forward enough to enjoy the fun and to collect some shells for later.
My memories must be locked up pretty tight to not come out even when I am in the same place. What was I feeling there, did I feel safe there, which alter was there for that time as a child and why don't they come forward now? I saw a shack like the one the H family used to take me too, I only know this because my alters told me, again I don't remember it. It is a strange feeling, a very strange feeling. Its like its some else's memory that I have been told about but have no personal recollection of. I remember so little of my life, even events in my late teens are gone. How much more is locked up in the mind of a scared little child?

Undertow

Life goes on as usual, I am achieving things and getting on with life. Slowly my Alters are introducing themselves. I feel like life is progressing, I have a great bunch of people around me for support and I feel like I am part of something good.
But underneath there is an undertow of self hatred. I have had enough of being me, of living my life. I don't want to do it any more. I hate myself. I don't want to be this way. I hate the brokenness I feel. I don't like that days are such a challenge. Some days I just want to spend the day in bed and hide from everyone.  I am angry that this has happened to me. I want to be able to go to those who have hurt me, and hurt them back. To make them pay, to make it so they know what they have done.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cu7QvOQKcKk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTTjLxXFg0k&feature=related

They haunt my life, they have too much affect over my life. Some days it just gets too much. I live this way because of them. some days it is just to hard to smile.
But on the outside you would never know.

The Role of Denial

Most of us see denial as the enemy to healing. It seems that we can't heal unless we face what happened to us, and to a degree this is very true. But denial has a purpose too, as I discovered yesterday while reading 'The courage to Heal' by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis. (quoted below) It is not any easy book to get through in the healing process, but it is highly recommended.
Survivors can go to great lengths to deny what happened to them. We can pass it off as a dream, or minimize its affect on us by saying, 'it wasn't much and it didn't have much of an affect on me'. I would rather have believed I was crazy than to believe the truth. Maybe my mind is just perverted and it thinks up these things by itself. It is hard to reconcile the people in our lives doing these things to a child, especially when they are people we love and trust.
But denial does have a purpose:

"Denial gives you a respite when you cannot bear to align your self with that small, wounded child for another minute. It allows you to go to work, to make breakfast for the kids. It is a survival skill that enables you to set a pace you can handle.
Often in the beginning stages, belief in your memories comes and goes."

I know for me, when I first realized how real it all was, I would find it too hard to accept for days on end. Having Alters helps to hid the truth, but ultimately things like body memories reveal the truth. Its OK to take time away from the trauma. Its OK to not be a survivor or a multiple for a day. Its OK to just let it go and get on with life for a while. It will all come back to you when you are ready, as it has many times before. We need to pace ourselves and remember we are building a life, it will take time and patience. Patience with ourselves.  No one, survivor or not, wants to hear about horrible things being done to a child. So it is OK for you to take time to accept the truth of what you have been through.