Dissociated1
Silver Member
Alot has happened in my life since I posted my intro back in 2012. Unfortunately the thread is no longer active so I thought I should start a trauma diary to share that it does get better. See
“Diagnosed As Ptsd And Dissociating As A Guy & A Girl,” at https://www.myptsd.com/threads/diagnosed-as-ptsd-and-dissociating-as-a-guy-a-girl.26265/
My first wife was killed in a car accident when I was 26, otherwise it seemed life had been good to me. I got through engineering grad school, had a successful career, was blessed with a second wife, didn't think I could have had better parents or a happier childhood. What I didn't know was it took a System of five alters to keep up this illusion.
My System worked like a well-oiled machine for the best part of a lifetime, hid everything that happened to me as a child so far away I had no memory of any of it. It has taken 500+ hours of therapy to remember the death and violence that surrounded me growing up; that I was psychologically abused by both of my parents; nearly drowned as a toddler; was raped by my cousin when I was 6; and was molested by my Mother through grade school.
Looking back there were so many clues. I was an extremely self-disciplined workaholic, constantly pushing myself to my mental and physical limits, bulimic, homophobic, transphobic, uncomfortable in new places and around unfamiliar people, did not want children and was never able to bring myself to have sexual intercourse. The individual pieces were small enough to dismiss. And to keep me from seeing the big picture.
A demotion at work for a job well done toppled the apple cart when I was 48 and my System collapsed under its own weight. I began to experience an uncontrollable compulsion to behave, look and spend time in public as a woman. My wife and I were terrified. I'd had 3 mysterious cross dressing periods over the course of my life I never told a soul about til I started counseling. Despite my insistence that I didn't WANT to be a girl, my therapist maintained I was textbook age-onset transsexual in denial.
Refusing to "come out" to anyone besides my wife and the medical professionals who treated me, I kept this other life completely separate from my own. When hormones and spending a day and a half a week as a woman brought peace instead of pushing me towards living full time as a woman, my doctor changed her diagnosis to androgyne. A year and two psychologists later the time/memory loss, flashbacks and nightmares began.
I was 51 when I was diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder. As horrible as trauma recovery has been, somehow my wife and I have always known we could get through it. My misdiagnosis as transsexual nearly cost our marriage and destroyed everything we'd spent over 15 years building.
There are five of us in my System: me, a 7-year-old boy, the Protector, a 13-year-old girl, and the Inner Self Helper. I'm the System host, what remains of the original (birth) personality. The 7-year-old is me as a boy and the Protector is an angry maniac full of hate and rage; they only step in when triggered. The 13-year-old girl is a strong alter. She fronted for the System all through junior high which explains the razzing I got for acting so girly back then. She stepped in during those "mysterious cross dressing periods" to help me cope with three very traumatic losses in my adult life. My female alter became self aware when my System collapsed and like me, demands regular time to front for the System. The Inner Self Helper works in the background juggling who fronts, who knows what, and who is coconscious with who.
The movie "Fight Club" is a distrubingly accurate representation of my reality. Like Tyler Durden, my 13- year-old alter is free to feel and act in ways the System will not allow me to experience as a man. She and I have different talents and perspectives, chatter, tease and help each other none stop throughout the day regardless of which of us is fronting. Trying to keep track of the ping-ponging consciousness would make your head spin.
I am extremely fortunate to be tall, skinny and wear my hair in a shoulder length grunge. Tip the scales a little one way or the other and people have no problem me seeing me as a man or a woman. My female alter and I are both so confident of who we are, our voices, mannerisms, personalities so stereotypically feminine and masculine, no one ever mistakes her for a guy or me for a girl. It's still hard for me to believe but I can literally walk into the men's room in my tee-shirt and jeans and if she comes to front, tucks this and combs that, people will see me as a girl when I come out.
It took 4 years to figure out why hormones brought peace to my System. I didn't experience any psychological effects from them, and the tiny breasts I developed just look like great pecs when I go without a shirt in the summer. That said, they are very important to my female alter's sense of self and the hair I lost makes my body look more like she remembered it when I was 13. I'm just happy she doesn't feel she has to shave anymore. But the chemical castration that came with hormones gave the System peace. Knowing that once and for all the atrocities committed by my parents, their parents and their parents' parents ENDED WITH ME.
Having been a successful professional my life now is very humbling. The time/memory loss is hard to accept. So is the fact that I never was the one calling the shots and that I am only one of five in my System. There have been several close calls when my 7-year-old took over while I was driving. Can't even imagine what it's like for my wife when he gets in the sandbox to play with the other kids at the park or the 13-year-old goes on about makeup and clothes.
It was a blessing my Mother is still alive to verify many of the memories I recovered. Coming to know she is also dissociative, that she shared the story of her own abuse and molestation opened the door to compassion and acceptance. Now that I understand the way this brain of mine works, I can look at the things that happened to me as a child with my adult mind. I am slowly beginning to understand the way people who were not traumatized think. And for the first time in my life, am learning what it really means to be mentally and physically close to the person I love most in this world.
I'm not certain integration/fusion is possible for my System this late in my life. Six and a half years of therapy has helped the five of us to learn to work together as a team and I have made great steps towards healing the wounds of my childhood, but I will always be dissociative; it's the way my brain is wired. I live life at a much slower pace since retiring. Yoga is a very important to keeping my mind unified and in the present. I am far along enough in recovery to understand my ability to dissociate is a blessing, not a curse. My alters allowed me to survive the abuse I suffered as a child and to live a happy life. My ability to see things from different perspectives, to be what people wanted me to be helped me to be extremely successful in my career. And I have come to accept I am everything I am because of and in spite of the things that happened to me as a child.
“Diagnosed As Ptsd And Dissociating As A Guy & A Girl,” at https://www.myptsd.com/threads/diagnosed-as-ptsd-and-dissociating-as-a-guy-a-girl.26265/
My first wife was killed in a car accident when I was 26, otherwise it seemed life had been good to me. I got through engineering grad school, had a successful career, was blessed with a second wife, didn't think I could have had better parents or a happier childhood. What I didn't know was it took a System of five alters to keep up this illusion.
My System worked like a well-oiled machine for the best part of a lifetime, hid everything that happened to me as a child so far away I had no memory of any of it. It has taken 500+ hours of therapy to remember the death and violence that surrounded me growing up; that I was psychologically abused by both of my parents; nearly drowned as a toddler; was raped by my cousin when I was 6; and was molested by my Mother through grade school.
Looking back there were so many clues. I was an extremely self-disciplined workaholic, constantly pushing myself to my mental and physical limits, bulimic, homophobic, transphobic, uncomfortable in new places and around unfamiliar people, did not want children and was never able to bring myself to have sexual intercourse. The individual pieces were small enough to dismiss. And to keep me from seeing the big picture.
A demotion at work for a job well done toppled the apple cart when I was 48 and my System collapsed under its own weight. I began to experience an uncontrollable compulsion to behave, look and spend time in public as a woman. My wife and I were terrified. I'd had 3 mysterious cross dressing periods over the course of my life I never told a soul about til I started counseling. Despite my insistence that I didn't WANT to be a girl, my therapist maintained I was textbook age-onset transsexual in denial.
Refusing to "come out" to anyone besides my wife and the medical professionals who treated me, I kept this other life completely separate from my own. When hormones and spending a day and a half a week as a woman brought peace instead of pushing me towards living full time as a woman, my doctor changed her diagnosis to androgyne. A year and two psychologists later the time/memory loss, flashbacks and nightmares began.
I was 51 when I was diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder. As horrible as trauma recovery has been, somehow my wife and I have always known we could get through it. My misdiagnosis as transsexual nearly cost our marriage and destroyed everything we'd spent over 15 years building.
There are five of us in my System: me, a 7-year-old boy, the Protector, a 13-year-old girl, and the Inner Self Helper. I'm the System host, what remains of the original (birth) personality. The 7-year-old is me as a boy and the Protector is an angry maniac full of hate and rage; they only step in when triggered. The 13-year-old girl is a strong alter. She fronted for the System all through junior high which explains the razzing I got for acting so girly back then. She stepped in during those "mysterious cross dressing periods" to help me cope with three very traumatic losses in my adult life. My female alter became self aware when my System collapsed and like me, demands regular time to front for the System. The Inner Self Helper works in the background juggling who fronts, who knows what, and who is coconscious with who.
The movie "Fight Club" is a distrubingly accurate representation of my reality. Like Tyler Durden, my 13- year-old alter is free to feel and act in ways the System will not allow me to experience as a man. She and I have different talents and perspectives, chatter, tease and help each other none stop throughout the day regardless of which of us is fronting. Trying to keep track of the ping-ponging consciousness would make your head spin.
I am extremely fortunate to be tall, skinny and wear my hair in a shoulder length grunge. Tip the scales a little one way or the other and people have no problem me seeing me as a man or a woman. My female alter and I are both so confident of who we are, our voices, mannerisms, personalities so stereotypically feminine and masculine, no one ever mistakes her for a guy or me for a girl. It's still hard for me to believe but I can literally walk into the men's room in my tee-shirt and jeans and if she comes to front, tucks this and combs that, people will see me as a girl when I come out.
It took 4 years to figure out why hormones brought peace to my System. I didn't experience any psychological effects from them, and the tiny breasts I developed just look like great pecs when I go without a shirt in the summer. That said, they are very important to my female alter's sense of self and the hair I lost makes my body look more like she remembered it when I was 13. I'm just happy she doesn't feel she has to shave anymore. But the chemical castration that came with hormones gave the System peace. Knowing that once and for all the atrocities committed by my parents, their parents and their parents' parents ENDED WITH ME.
Having been a successful professional my life now is very humbling. The time/memory loss is hard to accept. So is the fact that I never was the one calling the shots and that I am only one of five in my System. There have been several close calls when my 7-year-old took over while I was driving. Can't even imagine what it's like for my wife when he gets in the sandbox to play with the other kids at the park or the 13-year-old goes on about makeup and clothes.
It was a blessing my Mother is still alive to verify many of the memories I recovered. Coming to know she is also dissociative, that she shared the story of her own abuse and molestation opened the door to compassion and acceptance. Now that I understand the way this brain of mine works, I can look at the things that happened to me as a child with my adult mind. I am slowly beginning to understand the way people who were not traumatized think. And for the first time in my life, am learning what it really means to be mentally and physically close to the person I love most in this world.
I'm not certain integration/fusion is possible for my System this late in my life. Six and a half years of therapy has helped the five of us to learn to work together as a team and I have made great steps towards healing the wounds of my childhood, but I will always be dissociative; it's the way my brain is wired. I live life at a much slower pace since retiring. Yoga is a very important to keeping my mind unified and in the present. I am far along enough in recovery to understand my ability to dissociate is a blessing, not a curse. My alters allowed me to survive the abuse I suffered as a child and to live a happy life. My ability to see things from different perspectives, to be what people wanted me to be helped me to be extremely successful in my career. And I have come to accept I am everything I am because of and in spite of the things that happened to me as a child.
