Lies Are Truth

[Sandstone]

f I'm understanding you correctly, you are finding that your therapist is pushing some kind of theory of dissociation at you, and you don't think it fits your symptoms.

But I do think it fits, And yet I don't. That is the issue I'm trying to resolve here.

Sometimes, if I look at it in a calm detached sort of way, I can see the sense of it. As I'm in the UK ICD is used for Diagnosis, and I can see that when ICD11 comes in I could fit into 7B37 Complex dissociative intrusion disorder

"the presence of two or more distinct, nonintegrated or incompletely integrated subsystems of the personality (dissociative identities), each of which exhibits a distinct pattern of experiencing, interpreting, and relating to itself, others, and the world. One identity is dominant, but is persistently and recurrently intruded on by one or more other dissociative identities, although these do not take full control over the person’s consciousness and behaviour. Dissociative intrusions typically involve a combination of cognitive, affective, perceptual, sensory, motor, or behavioural features."

And yet simultaneously I don't believe it is remotely true or even possible.

I think I've used the estuary analogy before. I used to wonder about tidal estuaries - we have several nearby. If a river is flowing outwards, and the sea is flowing inwards, why is there not a raised up wall of water where the two meet? It seems that since salt and fresh water have different densities, they form layers and the fresh water flows on outwards in one layer while the salt water is flowing in as another.

My mind seems to operate the same way - two (or more) contradictory things can be true and leading me in opposite directions at once. That caused great frustration to dreadful T2, who insisted I could only have one answer to her questions, and hence great distress to me as I struggled to explain to her that it wasn't like that inside my head. It always has been like that, so how could I comprehend that she didn't live that way?

I like the use of the word intrusion as an account of what goes on when it gets alarming. You could stretch the estuary analogy to illustrate it. Most of the time I'm flowing peacefully along in one of the layers, but periodically something happens that stirs the waters. It might just be the paddle of a duck foot, a tiny ripple of something else, that arrives in my mind as a "made" thought - " You have no right to exist". But sometimes it has the violent strength of a massive propeller, and I'm running in terror and panic from a therapy appointment, unable to perform basic functions like putting a sheet of paper in my bag.

At the moment it feels as though our local Fen rivers are carrying their load of silty water out to sea, but someone has put a depth charge in the estuary and everything is a churning tumult of obscured, muddy waves, rushing simultaneously in every direction. I can't see or breathe or navigate. Fragments of true - unreal - salt - real - fresh - false are carrying me and rushing by me.

So every time I accept it, I simultaneously reject it. Every time I take a step, as in finding I'd named an aspect of myself(Link Removed) I immediately hold the opposite view, that it can't be true, that it is all a construct in the mind of T's 1, 3, 5 and I'm being compliant.

The conflict currently has me frozen, unwashed on the sofa for the fifth day, alternately binging and starving.

Is that any clearer? Or just too long?

 

[Suzetig]

I think it very clear and I get the internal conflict and how paralysing that is for you. I've had times like that, where I can't reconcile what I feel with what I know to be true - and yes it's had me moving between sofa and bed in some kind of stuck haze for days (weeks) on end. The only way through for me was to chip away at it in therapy - I'm fortunate to see someone privately who has time for long term chipping away, I know your therapy is coming to an end soon. Maybe keep tussling with it here if that helps?

 

[joeylittle]

Super-clear, @stenni. So, I think the question is, when this happens:

But sometimes it has the violent strength of a massive propeller, and I'm running in terror and panic from a therapy appointment, unable to perform basic functions like putting a sheet of paper in my bag.

How do 'you' experience it? (I'm putting the word you in quotation marks, because I mean to refer to the side of you that can go to therapy, that isn't churning - the you that is in placid water.)

Do you experience it as this kind of intrusion?

Dissociative intrusions typically involve a combination of cognitive, affective, perceptual, sensory, motor, or behavioural features."

• Cognitive: your thought patterns, or the way you hear thoughts in your head, becomes distinctly different - if you normally think in full sentences, do you now think in single words, or colors, or sounds?
• Affective: if you looked in a mirror, would you recognize yourself? Or would your face be unique and strange in some way?
• Perceptual: does time change? does scale change? (buildings seeming larger, streets longer)
• Sensory: is your hearing altered? Does your own voice sound strange or odd to you? Vision blurry, smells enhanced?
• Motor: are you more or less co-ordinated, beyond the normal shaking that is associated with adrenaline?
• Behavioral: do you act in uncharacteristic ways, beyond what one would associate with a panic attack? Do you behave violently, strike out, push people out of the way - or if that is typical, do you do the opposite and become frozen?

Dissociation itself is a spectrum - but I believe, to be considered a disorder the intrusions need to have a marked difference from behaviors that might be understood or explained as a person undergoing panic or moving through a flashback state.

For example, I know that when I have experienced what were probably major (as opposed to minor, common) dissociations, I could definitely say that my thoughts were totally different, and my senses were effected, and my behavior was very off - but those times have never recurred enough, and the changes were not distinct enough, to mark it as a disorder.

I suspect your therapist is holding down the 'you are dissociative' end of the conversation so strongly because you are holding the 'no it's not' end with equal force. It sucks when that happens. But, can you use the detailed list of symptoms, above, to try and articulate just how outside of your baseline-"you"-ness things get, when the propeller kicks in?

(By the way, I hope this helps, but please, ignore it if it doesn't. I know that the reason doctors are qualified to diagnose, and checklists can be useless, is that there's more art than science when it comes to separating one-off behaviors from patterns, and finding that line between the affects of adrenaline and a dissociated state isn't the easiest thing to do. I'm not a doctor, I just know what I've learned from my own experience of needing to parse these things out)

 

[Sandstone]

This is just a quick answer, as I have to try to focus on some real life stuff.

It sounds as though you are asking do I actually switch? And the answer would be no, almost never, though T considers one session is an example of it. That is the point of

intruded on by one or more other dissociative identities, although these do not take full control

the aspects are both / all there, otherwise I'd qualify for DID and no-one has remotely suggested that

 

[joeylittle]

Actually, no, not asking if you switch. Just asking if you can describe the experience of being inside of that 'churning' state a bit more.

That would be in the hope that by breaking the experience down into smaller bits, it will become clearer whether there is enough evidence to support a dissociative diagnosis, or whether what you are experiencing is more likely to be dissociative symptoms.

 

[Sandstone]

Yes, I can see that is very likely that it is all about me lacking in self control. Perhaps had T said sharply " Stop being so ridiculous and sit down" then I would have got on with it instead of escalating. (Just as, if only, if only the doctor and then my family had been brisk instead of sympathetic none of this would have come out after the coil fitting)

But she seems determined to believe the most negative bits of me. When I say "That won't happen, it's not safe", she should fight back, not agree

 

[void]

There isn't enough to account for any sort of Dissociative Disorder. I've read what others recount on her...

This statement is not true.

 

[void]

This statement is false.

 

[void]

I have faced things that are at once both true and false.

...and the above 2 statements suggest that even an individual sentence can hold within it the same paradox.

Life, language, and nature present such paradoxes to the mind.

How will you deal with yours?

The pain of cognitive dissonance is VERY real...I have felt it all to often and I hear it in your writing.

I hope you find your way to peace.:happy:

 

[Sandstone]

Thank you @void At the moment it is so hard that I have been fighting not to think about it at all. It is at best only a short term fix, but will have to do for now.

 

[void]

Thank you @void At the moment it is so hard that I have been fighting not to think abo...

Your mental exhaustion and frustration is understandable...I can relate.
May you be free from inner and outer harm.
Peace:happy:

 

[Stickler]

Observation:
You are using the defense mechanism of minimization towards your traumas.
Strong suspicion:
While you have the memories perfectly clear, the emotions involved have been dissociated almost entirely.