dissociative identity disorder

The mug is broken

~ KJ ~ 11 Comments

You drop your favorite mug. The handle breaks. It’s a clean break, so you grab some glue and dab it on, let it dry, and your mug is good as new again. You can’t even tell it was ever broken.

This time, you drop your favorite mug and it’s not such a clean break. Instead of just the handle, the mug breaks into four or five pieces. You try to glue it back together. It looks good, but it doesn’t hold water so well anymore, slowly leaking through the smallest cracks. So you repurpose it, you put it on the shelf so you can still admire it every day. It still lives on.

Now imagine that same coffee mug. It has taken a plunge from seven feet high onto the hard linoleum floor and broken into a hundred pieces. Chunks of porcelain here, flecks there. You can’t even tell where the pieces belong, they’re so broken.

Some pieces have to be thrown away because they have been so damaged from the fall, they can’t be saved. That leaves empty spaces in the mug, holes that cannot be filled. That means the mug has lost its purpose, because with all of those holes, the mug won’t be able to hold any water.

You make a wholehearted attempt at gluing the mug back together. You take your time, you glue the pieces back with precision. But as you’re trying to fix it, it breaks even more.  As you focus on putting the pieces together on one side, the pieces you glued on the other side are coming undone. Nothing seems to be coming together right. None of the pieces are fitting back together like they’re supposed to.

Then you realize there’s too much missing, too much irreparable damage done. You can’t save that mug, no matter how hard you try, no matter how much time you take, no matter how much patience you have. It’s all a fruitless effort. You need to give up on it. It needs to be thrown away.

Because even if you spent all the time in the world gluing that mug back together piece by piece, there’s not any glue in the world that could ever make it whole again.

I cannot be whole again.

Schizophrenic

~ KJ ~ 4 Comments

“I don’t have DID today.”

It’s a line I give my therapist often. I don’t want to talk about my parts or the inner world or the dissociative chaos that is my life. I don’t want to talk about how broken I am.

But that’s not enough for her. She always has to push me further. Then I shut down. Completely. Because that’s what any perfectly normal person would do, right?

I know it’s not good to deny my reality. I know that by denying my DID, I am denying my parts as well. I know that makes everything worse. But I still do it. Deny, deny, deny.

Then, one time, my therapist asked, “well, how do you explain your symptoms?”

I thought for a minute, wondering what symptoms she could be referring to, since I have so many.

“Maybe I’m just schizophrenic.”

The voices I hear, they are not my parts. They’re just hallucinations. Those feelings of depersonalization? That’s just distorted thinking. My memory problems? The cognitive deficits of schizophrenic disorders. It all fits.

Except it doesn’t. The voices I hear are my parts, the depersonalization is part of my dissociation, and my memory problems are because my parts hold those memories for me. I know that already. I’ve known that since the beginning of my diagnosis. So why do I continue to deny it?

My therapist seemed perplexed by my answer. Why would I want a disorder likely more stigmatized, difficult to treat therapeutically, more debilitating to some? “You would rather have schizophrenia?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“Why?”

Then the truth came out. “Because then I wouldn’t have to acknowledge all of the trauma.”

Schizophrenia is largely chemical, an imbalance of dopamine that is treated with antipsychotics. It can happen to anyone.

DID, on the other hand, is caused by severe trauma. There’s no chemical imbalances, no pills I can take to make my symptoms go away. I am broken, a type of broken that can’t ever be fixed the way it should be.

So yes, sometimes I wish I had schizophrenia rather than DID. Sometimes I wish all of the abuse I went through was just a delusion. Sometimes I wish I could just take a pill or three and quiet the voices and be able to get through the day in peace.

But I can’t.

Denial is making it worse, but accepting the truth is just too hard.

We didn’t kill daddy

~ KJ ~ 3 Comments

I have been handling my father’s death quite well. I didn’t really grieve at all. I think the majority of my grieving was done long before my father died. I didn’t need any time off, I didn’t need to memorialize him in any way. He’s dead. Alright then. I’m going to go home and watch TV now.

With that being said, I tend to forget that I am not just me. I am many. While I am handling my father’s death just fine, younger parts are not handling it well at all.

Someone thinks the police are coming for us. Every noise, every knock, every police car we walk past on the way to work is the police coming after us. Why? Because a little one thinks that he killed daddy.

I have to stop and explain that we did not kill daddy, that daddy was sick for a long time and that’s why he’s gone. It’s not our fault he’s gone. We didn’t do anything wrong. The police aren’t coming after us. We are not bad. And I go through the same speech so many times and the paranoia is still there, the need to internalize blame is still there.

And then another part keeps asking to go the heaven to be with daddy. So then I try to explain that we can’t go to heaven because we are here on earth, and we have things to do here first. I really want to say that daddy is not in heaven, because daddy is a horrible person, but I have to remember that I am dealing with innocent younger parts whose beliefs don’t always align with mine. They don’t understand things on the level that I understand. They don’t really understand loss the way I have had to learn to understand it.

I’m already exhausted as it is, and this inner chaos just adds to it even more. I’m not good with people. I can barely handle myself, let alone a bunch of other parts. I can’t soothe myself, let alone soothe others. I don’t know what else I could say to them to help them understand what really happened. I don’t know how to keep it together for them when I can barely keep myself together.

How do I parent children when I have no idea how to parent?

Smile, it ain’t that bad.

~ KJ ~ 16 Comments

On my way to therapy this morning, a man I had never met before stopped me as I was walking and said “just smile, it ain’t that bad.” Part of me wanted to slap him in the face, but I chose instead to keep on walking so I could get to my appointment on time.

Smile. I have smiled before, in the few moments of genuine happiness. But happiness is not something that comes easily to me. I’m not the kind of person that can force fake emotions. I can’t just smile if I’m not really happy. I am aware that a lot of the time, I look sad, miserable, and worried. Because I am sad, miserable, and worried.

I’m not smiling now, because my mind is racing with anxious thoughts about school. What if it’s too hard? How am I going to get the text books I need? What if they find out about my DID?

I’m not smiling now, because I’m worried about how I’m going to pay my rent next month, how I’m going to stretch my grocery budget so I can feed myself until September, what bills are going to have to be put off for next month, and what credit card I can max out so I can get my bus card.

I’m not smiling now, because I’m exhausted from work, a job I am lucky to still have because I get so stressed out sometimes that I dissociate and have trouble getting my work done.

I’m not smiling now, because I’m tired of constantly living in fear of my mother. I’m tired of having to calm younger parts and convince them we are safe, when sometimes I can’t even believe that myself. Fear takes away any smile.

I’m not smiling now, because I feel so alone. Even when I am surrounded by people, my ability to trust others is so shattered that I live in a constant state of fear of people.

I’m not smiling now, because I sat through my therapy session earlier this morning and cried as my therapist talked about inpatient hospitalization. Because I am a mess. I’ve been dissociating so much that I don’t even know when and if I am ever fully here anymore. Last week was so bad, that people were actually scared of me. And I don’t remember a thing.

I went to therapy last Thursday and barely remember what happened. Apparently it was obvious that I was not present. That seems to be the theme of my life lately. Not present.

I saw the concern on my therapist’s face. I tried to listen to what she was saying, but my mind was just going to other places.

The sinking feeling in your heart when you know your best isn’t good enough.

The hopelessness you feel when you realize you can’t be helped.

All of these things went through my mind. I’m not good enough at life. My therapist can’t even help me. She wants me to go to a hospital, and they’re not going to be able to help me. Then what? I can’t even miss work. I can’t afford it. This is a lose/lose situation.

Despite my doubts, I understand where my therapist is coming from. She is concerned that one little thing will happen and push me off the edge. Next month, when I start school again, it just may be too much for me to handle. I am on a roller coaster ride and she cannot ride with me. She can’t be with me all day, every day, to deal with issues as they come up. And even though I am (barely) managing that on my own, it’s not going to be that way every time. I am headed for a breakdown.

So no, I can’t smile. And yes, it is that bad.

Fall down, get up. Drop out, get in.

~ KJ ~ 11 Comments

I still remember the day I got the call that I was accepted into grad school. It was such a happy day. I had such high hopes for my future. I was so excited to finally interact with people who were understanding and shared the same interests as me.

And then six months later, I dropped out of grad school because someone (or multiple someones) reported my DID and my blog and all of a sudden, my abilities came into question.

I didn’t just lose my place in grad school that day, I lost my dream. My wish of becoming  a counselor was ripped away from me, trampled on, shit on, and set on fire. All because I struggle with a mental illness.

From talking with others, I knew that going into the counseling field would be difficult for me. I could not be open about my DID, but that is impossible, considering my name is forever tied to DID through my professional writing. I didn’t feel like I should have to hide who I am, and unfortunately, many in the mental health field are not accepting of people with mental health issues themselves.

So instead of putting myself out there to be hurt again, I took a different route. I applied to different programs, still connected to psychology, but not focused on the counseling aspect. Quantitative psychology, neuropsychology, and experimental psychology – all programs that got my interest, and all programs that so many in the counseling field would never, ever consider because they find the science of psychology too difficult.

I have been stressing out for the last couple of months, worrying that I would not get into a program, and if I did, that I would not be able to start until next year. I found an experimental psychology program I really liked, contacted the head of the department and asked if he would still consider me for the fall semester (the deadline was already up months before). I scurried to get everything I needed in, rushed to take the GRE as soon as I could, wrote a different essay for each program I applied to, and waited the last few weeks with a tremendous amount of anxiety.

I got my acceptance letter just a few days ago, my first choice school and program. I’m starting in the Fall semester. I will even be working with my first choice mentor, conducting research in the area of affective neuroscience and environmental impact on emotional development. Basically, I will be focusing on the biological and environmental bases of emotion, and what causes emotions to “go wrong”.

Hopefully, no one will feel the need to use my diagnosis against me this time around.

 

Freedom, Part 2

~ KJ ~ 10 Comments

It has been one year now that I have been free.

In the beginning, I didn’t think I was going to make it this far. I had limited finances, no job, no family, and no friends. I sat in my room the first few days and just got lost in my thoughts. I told myself I would enjoy freedom as long as I could, and then kill myself once I ran out of money. I had very low expectations, a lot of fear of the unknown, and a lot of anxiety about the world.

Many people don’t understand it when I say I ran away from home, that I escaped. Regular people just move out when they change locations. But I never had that ability. I ran away and ran towards freedom.

But even then, I could not run away from my mother’s programming. Even though I was physically free from her, I carried the same beliefs about the world that she had trained me to believe. She wanted me to believe the world was a scary place because that is how she kept her control over me. And when I moved away, I still thought the world was out to get me.

As the weeks went on, I started making small achievements. I took the bus all by myself. I crossed a busy highway. I went to the mall. I had conversations with strangers. I went to the grocery store and picked out new foods. I sat on my porch at night and looked at the sky. While these all sound like everyday things, they were not to me. They were things I was never allowed to do by myself.

Within a week, I started therapy. I already contacted my therapists before I even made my escape. They were ready and willing to help me. Therapy started out fine, and then all hell broke loose. After one month here, I dissociated so badly that it took two therapists to bring me back. That was when I got my official DID diagnosis, and I’ve continued therapy ever since. It’s been a couple hundred hours, thousands of dollars, and a whirlwind of emotions, but it has allowed me to be where I am today.

Within two weeks, I got a job. I had a couple of interviews lined up, but I decided to go with the first place that wanted me. In the long run, that ended up to be a great decision, because the people I work with are some of the most understanding, amazing people I have ever met in my life. The night before my first day at my new job, I ended up in the hospital. My PTSD was severe and I was admitted to the psych unit for a few days, without a phone and without a way to contact my job. I thought for sure that was it. I missed my first day and I was a no show. But they understood, and within 24 hours of being released, I started my new job, the job I still have today.

Within six weeks, I finished my thesis on mother-daughter sexual abuse. I received the highest grade of 99. With that, my undergraduate career was done with. I graduated with high honors and a 3.9 GPA.

Within two months, I was hired as a writer for a mental health website, writing about the disorder I was still in denial about. It was a challenge for me in many ways. Taking the position meant that I had to be public, and up until then I was completely untraceable and off social media entirely. It also meant that my name would be tied to DID forever, and that my diagnosis would be public record, so to speak. I decided to go for it, and even though there have been some trials, I am happy with my decision. I have grown a lot through my writing, and have learned so much from others as well.

Within six months, I got accepted into graduate school and started my first semester. I went on to take the CPCE and score above the national average. I ended my first semester attaining a 4.0 and a lot of praise from my professors.

Within six months, I also started PAFPAC. I knew it would take a lot of time and effort, and even though I wish I could be doing more for the organization, it’s there for those that need it. I haven’t been able to do much as far as advocacy, but our Facebook support group continues to grow and helps survivors connect with others.

It hasn’t always been good and easy. I also broke my foot (which did not heal correctly and still leaves me in pain), I was hospitalized a few times (PTSD and panic attacks), I quit a job after four days because I had an emotional breakdown (I couldn’t handle seeing so many happy families), and I had to drop out of graduate school because someone reported my mental illness, via links to my blog.

Looking back, I can’t believe all of this (and more) happened within one year. I never expected to be where I am today. I am still standing. I am healing. I am helping. I am writing. I am telling my story.

And I am free.

I celebrated the day in my own way. I baked brownies and shared them with my coworkers. My getaway driver came down and we went to the movies and went out to dinner. My roommate got me a bouquet of flowers. I ended the night by deciding, on a whim, to get a fish.

I named him Freedom.

We’re both in better places now.

He’s not there

~ KJ ~ 2 Comments

Many times over the past few weeks, I’ve seen my father.

It’s not really him, of course. He doesn’t know where I am. But my mind seems to be playing tricks on me to make me think that it is him. I’ve seen him on the bus, at the mall, and on the street. Different men, each strikingly similar in appearance to my father.

It happened earlier today, as I was walking through the mall to get to the bus stop. I could have sworn I saw my father sitting in a chair in the middle of the mall. The man had the same hair cut and color as my father, the same weird slouch, the same sunglasses. I scurried past and continued to look over my shoulder, making sure he wasn’t following me. The man, a total stranger, but in my mind, he was my father.

Each time it happens, I go through a weird back-and-forth reaction process. I  panic on the inside. At first, I let myself get lost in the panic and let it simmer, leading to inner chaos and unsafe feelings. Now, I try to immediately reassure myself that it is not him, that we are safe here and no one can find us. It’s not a cure, that’s for sure, but it keeps me from totally withdrawing or dissociating out of fear.

On the other end of that fear, is the desire to run up to these men and ask them if they are my father. It is something I have (thankfully) not managed to give in to doing, but the want is still there.

It doesn’t make much sense to me, simultaneously fearing someone and wanting to approach them. I don’t understand where that impulse is coming from. It feels like a confused child’s way of reaching out to her father. And I am a rational, 30 year-old adult who does not want to speak to her father ever again. What a contradiction.

Is it paranoia? I don’t know. Maybe there are just a lot of men that look like my father. He’s not atypical in the least, so it’s not a stretch to say there are many other similar men out there. But why haven’t I noticed them before? Why is this happening now, all of a sudden? And why do my reactions have to be so complicated?

The loss of safety

~ KJ ~ 7 Comments

I am still living my life as a runaway.

I am still living my life in constant fear.

Every time the doorbell rings, I panic. Sometimes, I freeze. Other times, I barricade my bedroom door and hide in the closet. Never I am able to just see who is at the door. The thought alone is terrifying. Why? Because I am so afraid that my mother will be at the door. I’m so afraid she will find me and take me back to prison.

Many times I go to therapy in fear that my mother will find me there. I’ll sit on the chair at the farthest end of the waiting room. I’ll sit on the farthest end of the couch in my therapist’s office. The farther I am away from the door, the more time I have to hide.

Every time my phone rings, I am overcome with panic. She’s found out I told. I’m in trouble now. I worry that any number that appears on my phone could be hers, so I don’t answer. I never answer.

Every time someone calls me by my birth name in just such a way, I am filled with fear and anxiety. Nothing good ever came from being called in that way. It has always been a precedent for pain.

Every bump in the night startles me awake and I freeze with fear. She’s coming for me. I’m never safe. Because I never felt safe as a child, and I’m reliving that still as an adult. I am still, in many ways, a scared child living in an adult body.

I thought it would get better by now, but it hasn’t. I live on high alert. I never feel safe. I have never felt safe a day in my life. Why can’t I get past this? I am in a better place now, but am I really? My feet are in safe zone, but my mind is still locked away in prison, and my mother holds the keys.

I’ve been trying to work through the fear and safety issues in therapy, but they are still coming up. My therapist wrote me a note to help me remind myself that I am here now, and away from that hell. I carry it in pocket everywhere I go.

You are safe now.  You got out.

You survived places and people that were physically and emotionally dangerous, and it made you feel that the whole world was dangerous — that you would never be free. 
But with your adult understanding and resources, you proved that philosophy wrong.  You escaped, and you are now free.

Those who harmed you are not here.  You are separate from them.

If they were here, you could lock the door and tell them to leave.  If they didn’t listen to you, you could call law enforcement and they would make them leave.  You have power now.  You get to make the decisions.  They can’t hurt you anymore.  
You can find safe environments and surround yourself with safe people.

You can care for yourself and protect yourself.  And you should.

Every day, you can choose freedom again.
When the world feels frightening, remind yourself that you got out.  And you are safe now.

How can I feel safe when they took that sense of safety away from me? They stole it. I need it back.

 

Polyfragmented

~ KJ ~ 13 Comments

I have been avoiding my DID again. Sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously. In therapy, the topic has barely been brought up because I always have so many issues going on, that managing my DID drops down on the priority list.

I think that it is clear, given the events of the last few weeks, that DID is a problem, and a problem that isn’t going away.

My therapist used a metaphor of a daycare to explain what was going on inside. There are some daycare centers that are clean, organized, running on a schedule, and everyone knows what to do. Then there are daycare centers that are a mess, with no planning in place, children running around screaming, and poop on the walls (I contributed to that part).

My system is like that second daycare. There’s no order, just chaos. My parts are running around, confused and out of control. The caretakers have left the building. It’s a mess. My system is a mess. But it doesn’t have to be, and I know that. I am just so incredibly exhausted from life that I don’t have any energy left to work on myself.

My therapist asked about my long-term goals, if I wanted integration or to live as a multiple. The choice was completely up to me, and my therapist has worked with people successfully on both sides. I hadn’t really thought about it enough, because I still like to wake up and tell myself I don’t have DID, so then I won’t have to think about these things.

I just want to be normal, but I’m pretty sure that ship has sailed at this point.

At one point, my therapist asked me how many parts I thought I had. “Dozens, hundreds, thousands?”

My immediate (denial) reaction in my head was well, I don’t have any parts.

I found myself say out loud, “hundreds…”, but not as an answer. I was surprised that hundreds was even an option. Why does this woman think I have parts at all?

Before I could finish my thought statement, my therapist confirmed, “Hundreds? Okay.”

She said it like she wasn’t surprised at all that I would have hundreds of parts. She confirmed it like it was a normal, expected answer.

I quickly jumped on the defensive. “No, no, I don’t have hundreds of parts. I’m not polyfragmented. I’m not that bad.” Polyfragmented DID results from prolonged, systematic, severe trauma. I didn’t go through that. My life wasn’t that bad. I don’t have any parts. I am not broken. Having that many parts means you are just that much more broken. I’m okay.

I can’t help but wonder why my therapist was so quick to accept my statement as reality. Does she think I am so broken? Does she know more than I do?

I don’t want to be fragmented. I want to be whole.

The return home, Part 3

~ KJ ~ 4 Comments

I think my head-banging and a large iced coffee may have ended up saving my life.

By the time I got on the train, my headache was excruciating. I just sat there the whole time, looking at the seat ahead of me. I couldn’t read. I couldn’t listen to music. I couldn’t think of any of the ways I could have fucked myself up by knocking on my mother’s door. I couldn’t do anything.

By the time I arrived and my friend picked me up, I was exhausted. I took a pill, which helped a little bit with the pain in my head, but it was still very much there. I decided to pick up some food and just stay in while my friend went out for a few hours. I was still processing my emotions from earlier in the day. I wrote for a little, trying to get out some of my feelings. Then I just laid on the couch and stared at the ceiling, in some sort of numb state.

Despite my exhaustion, I couldn’t sleep well. I ended up passing out after midnight and waking up some time after 3 AM, unable to fall back to sleep. The massive headache was still there. In a few hours, we were out the door and on the way to the test site so I could take my GRE, which ended up being a disaster. I was running on no breakfast, very little sleep, and a massive headache. I think I read each question three or four times and I still didn’t understand half the shit that was being asked. I sat there for four hours completely mentally dead. I couldn’t even answer all of the questions in time. I’m not even sure I really cared.

I walked to a coffee shop to wait for my friend to get out of work and pick me up. I ordered a large iced coffee, because I knew I had to kill a lot of time waiting. I watched dozens of people walk in and out. I saw teenagers come in, by themselves, and walk out, by themselves. Then I thought about how I never had that freedom before. Here I was, sitting by myself, in a coffee shop, completely free to do whatever I wanted to do. There was no one with me. There was no one outside waiting in the car, watching every thing that I did. I was free.

After a couple of hours, my friend picked me up. As he was driving, we passed by the place where I used to live. I froze for a minute, and then I started to cry. There was my prison. The place I spent more than 29 years of my life, 29+ years of pain and hurt. If I were living there, I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy that iced coffee I just drank two hours before, alone, with no one watching over me. I wouldn’t have been free.

So while I made the return to my home city of origin, that ended up being the closest I got to that place that was once called home. In that moment, I realized I couldn’t give up the freedom I finally had. While I may at one point need to return to that same city, I could never return to that building. I would be much better without a home at all, then back in the prison my parents believed home should be.