Dear Addy,
Yes what you are experiencing is perfectly normal for people who dissociate extremely and severely. I have had this myself. I have encountered severe dissociation and CPTSD for around thirty years or more. I have been in thereapy for six years and did training in counselling about 15 years ago but was not able to finish the full training due to my dissociation. I realised during training that I was dissociative but kept this information away from my everyday self/ core personality, we tried to create co-consciousness but I fell into old script/ schemata of feeling overwhelmed
and blocking/ dissociating this from my core personality/ everyday self. I carried on in denial until at least eight years later I was triggered into a breakdown, I still didn't know what the F*&K was going on even though I had known previously. Eight or nine months after the breakdown I watched a programme about a soldier's PTSD on TV, this triggered co-conscious awareness within my everyday self and I consulted what I call the "Google Gods" i.e. looking at keywords on google relating to PTSD and in turn to dissociation. I found it very difficult to accept the dissociation label but it made complete sense. I then went out and found a proffessionally qualified therapist/ trauma specialist who understood both PTSD and dissociation. My therapist was able to confirm that I was indeed highly dissociative and that of course I had CPTSD. I had spent years running from the label and just thinking about it triggered me to dissociate at first.
The journey can often be slow to start, acceptance doesn't come overnight for most of us but rather comes in stages as my different dissociated parts began this journey of acceptance. This is classically dissociative behaviour as some of my parts (ego states, self states, sub-personalities, EP's, etc.) had been created to protect me from knowing that I was highly dissociative, this was part of the original purpose of some of my parts. It has just taken several years to gradually re-assure my parts that it is OK and that the original purpose of withholding this information from my everyday self is not really needed and that we can transform the original intention cathected (imbued/ created) at the inception of these parts. It has also been helpful to remind my parts that through transformation and acceptance we can still work together rather than annhilate my parts, but that we need to change the structure and operating framework within which we operate. My parts, ego states, etc. often feel scared because they feel that they are no longer needed and will be destroyed or damaged by a new relationship within myself between my parts. For me it is a case of finding new meaning and purpose for my parts. Most parts were created in chilhood and can often respond in child-like or simplistic ways. It is very common in DID and severe dissociation (DDnos & severely dissociative CPTSD) for parts to fear therapy and labelling. It can also be very frightening and triggering to read some of the DID literature from the earlier days of dissociative therapy, as it can be a bit outdated by over-focussed upon integrative models, especially at an early stage in therapy.
Your therapist sounds like they know what they are doing and saying as they are not pressuring you but encouraging you to consider and work with the diagnosis of severe dissociation. EMDR is not normally used for a period of about two years into therapy where severe dissociation is present as it can cause severe abreaction (if you doon't understand this word please google it as it is very important to understand it) and frequently causes clients to dissociate so much that it can be counter-productive and cause more harm than good at the earlier stages of stabilisation. It really can be a very useful tool when rapport and trust between client and therapist has been built up and the client is showing sufficient signs of stabilisation.
As to the diagnosis being possible.....well people who dissociate severely are frequently classed as 'highly hypnotisable' (can go into trance easily in specific situations).....well most highly hypnotisable persons are 'highly functioning' and dependant on symptoms experienced can cope very well and far better than the average person in many situations in life. If you are working and functioning well in life, this is normally a good sign. If you are genuinely highly dissociative then you are likely to have a lot of trauma to process but will not necessarily be aware of the traumas and your level of attachment to unprocessed trauma to date, as your high level of intelligence has most likely helped you cope by dissociating the problems/ issues into fragments. One responds to this wisdom by fractionation
and you may find it helpful to google the terms fractionation and abreation as fractionating the abreactive proccess is key to dissocaitive therapy. Too much, too fast creates flooding, which is when one becomes overwhelmed by too much emotions, memories, etc. coming into consciousness, this in turn can then cause/ illicit the original severe dissociation.
Severe traumatisation and dissociation require dealing with things gradually and slowly. EMDR has worked great for me but was very highly abreactive for the first two or three years of using it. It has enabled me to process trauma far faster than simple talk therapy. As to your friends not seeing your dissociation....this can be very hard if they are not trained and please remember that for people who dissociate severlely it is often the case that this denial and dissociation of the condition is what stopped us from becoming overwhelmed in the first place. I hope that this reply is not too lengthy and that is helps and makes sense to you and others as this is my first post on this site.
Best wishes on your journey.
