DID Splitting

[Bedbug]

Speaking of small furry creatures, you have your cat family. :)

 

[Echo]

@Bedbug - yes, I always have had cats. When my mother had me, my father had a kitten (strange biology in our family!), and that kitten and I grew up together. When all the abuse started to happen in my babyhood, I can only imagine that the cat and I were small rocks for one another. When I was older and the abuse happened again, I spent all my time outdoors with my rabbit, who followed me around like a dog. Animals represent the home for me and they are definitely a support system. My boys were licking my tears off my face this morning, despite wanting their breakfasts! Do you also have pets? Is that lovely avatar a portrait of one of your family?

 

[Echo]

Not my usual thing at all, but this had me in tears (mostly the visuals, of course):

 

[Echo]

I've just had a session with my reflexologist / herbalist. We were talking about split parts and the healing conversations that we have. She made a lovely suggestion and I thought I'd share it here.

She advised me also to find parts of me that are happy, well, fine, at peace, grounded, etc., even if they are very tiny and dispersed, and talk to them. Once I've established contact, she suggested that I allow them to talk to the hurt, frightened, cowering parts of me. She herself has been through some of this process and found this very helpful as a way of managing the pain and screaming (I've got screaming again tonight). She is right when she says it is easier to have compassion for a separated-out part of yourself than it is to have it for the self you see in the mirror, as a whole.

I'm going to give it a go anyway. I always prefer to focus on positivity and healing as a way through difficulty. Just concentrating on the dark stuff is so debilitating. Maybe my happier parts will have some tips about resourcefulness!!

 

[HelenB]

I had just been thinking about you and thought I'd check on here and see if you'd said much about how you are doing lately so am so glad to have read this.

I am sorry to hear those parts are still screaming tonight, and really hope it does help you to find more connection with other parts which are at peace too and that you really can feed that safety and security into yourself, giving each part of you the compassion you do deserve so much.

I know for myself in some parts where I have found more peace it has helped to be able to connect with those parts too and feed that into the places where there is still so much fear and screaming, though I had not really thought it through in such a way as you have described here, but definitely think that having read this and thinking about other little girl parts, where I can do this for myself can also help me, and really appreciate you posting it so much.

Helen

 

[Echo]

Thank you, @HelenB - that's very interesting that you've done something similar. That gives me hope that it will work. The screaming is so loud tonight; I wish I'd not had my ears syringed! Somehow though I feel rather removed from it, but I have been doing a lot to distract myself. I think also it is still coming from the 20-year old part of me, who feels as if she is still outside me. I have been dealing more with the baby part of me and her sense of abandonment and loneliness - many people wrote to help me on another thread entitled, How to comfort yourself when there is no-one to comfort you. I am still working on that one and all the great suggestions made on that thread. My baby part told me my 20-year old part wanted to come back in, but I have been too scared to let her in and have asked her to wait until I can do it with my therapist. She was so destructive, scared and suicidal. I don't feel I have any resources in place to cope with that besides all the other things that have been going on.

How are you doing? I have wondered about you often, too, but you were having such a hard time when you last wrote (I may well have missed posts from you more recently) and I didn't want to make things worse by contacting you at the wrong moment. I hope some of your screaming has reduced and you've found some peace. You certainly deserve it.

x Echo x

 

[HelenB]

I am glad that knowing it has helped me can be an encouragement to you too and do think that as you are able to find more connection in what ever way possible, that it will help, and am glad that your 20 year old part is able to communicate to you through your baby part too, and hope you can bring reassurance and safety into this part too, as I know for me that when I am in that part which is so self destruct and suicidal, it comes so much from the fear, and that as safety can be brought in, know this helps.

Personally for me this is something I have worked through a lot with my teenage part, which was so self destruct and so so terrified too, which is where all the self anger and hatred came from, as it felt so much easier and safer to direct it all to me, but I know that now I am working through with younger parts of me, which are also so self destructive and angry with me, that it does help to have that teenage part, to reassure and relate to them, in so much of a different way, as I know I really have come to so much more peace in that part.

In terms of how I have been it has still been pretty mixed, but I had a time at Ellel again a few weeks ago, and since things have settled a lot after that, it has really helped a lot more, and I know that it was another very helpful and important time to be able to work through and release many of the things I had been feeling. Now a lot more has been coming up about my mum, which has been very hard, but the peace and release I know I have found with so much else is helping me to be able to keep hold of that, and keep working through, and though I am certainly not going to pretend it is easy have felt a bit more settled again than I had for a while.

With the Easter holidays and lots of children around it has also been pretty busy, which I often find helps me to stay more grounded too, but it has also been quite chilled too, and it has been good to be able to feel that bit more connected and grounded with things happening now. It still is pretty hard when I stop at all, and again I know I cannot just go on forever, but it had been a long time since I could cope with it as well as I have been, and though I am still very scared of the anger and do not feel as if I can keep myself safe when that comes up at all, I really am trying to also find times for myself when I do allow myself to feel the pain and grief of it and know I also need to allow myself to feel and cry and do whatever I need to when I do have to, and think it helps that I do know I am allowing that when I need to.


Thank you for also asking how I was doing and I hope you don't mind such a long reply on your thread. I had missed your last thread, but as I said had been thinking of you and thank you for your thoughts and consideration too.

Helen x

 

[Echo]

@HelenB - I am so pleased to hear that things have improved for you. You do sound much better. It does seem though, doesn't it, that when we sort one bit out the next bit comes up for attention so quickly. I suppose we have to trust that there is a process in this, whether it is led by our bodies, our minds or something higher, I don't know. I keep trying to believe there is sense in it all.

It is very interesting what you say about using parts with whom you have reached some kind of understanding to intervene with younger parts. That makes so much sense. I guess we need to be as creative as it takes.

Was your time at Ellel a kind of retreat or do they help you therapeutically? I must admit I don't know of it. I probably should.

I wish you a lovely Easter with all the children around you - they do keep us focused on the wonder in life and keep us real, too!

 

[HelenB]

I think that the way so much else seems to come up when we get past one bit, is why I sometimes find it so hard to take hold of all I have already processed and why I still feel so scared to even believe I have got through some bits when things do get a bit easier, as I am so scared that it will all crash again, but I do believe that there is a process, and that it is a journey I am gradually working through, and though it is tough, know I would never be able to get through it all at all, if I could not hold on to the hope that there really is a way through and that this really will bring freedom.

Ellel is a Christian ministry centre, where I have been going for the last few years to various things. It was when I went on a course there for a week three years ago, called rescue from rejection, that I finally made the decision in my life to chose life and not death, and since then, though I have had my points of running from it all again, I have been doing so much better, and it was then that I begin eating again and managed to stabilise my weight and eating, which had been very serious up to that point. Since then I have attended a healing retreat there and also done a course with them, which consisted of one weekend a month over the course of two years, and it was very good for me. Throughout that time I was also having personal ministry appointments, which I was offered after my time on the healing retreat, which consist of being there for a couple of days, with a couple of the ministry team, who are with me the whole time, and it has for me been a very safe place to be able to express and feel so much of the things I have been going through. They totally understand and work with me with the child places, and within that bring the safety of Jesus into it, which is how I have found so much safety and freedom in the places I have already.

Alongside that I have been having various other therapy too, and the sexual therapist I have been working with on and off for the last six years, and who I am currently doing the trauma work and EMDR with, has said how well it compliments the work I am doing with her too, and I know my support worker when I was under the eating disorder team was always encouraging me to go back there too, as though they are not Christians, they really could see the benefits, and I really do know it has been such a blessing and such a safe place, and really do not know if I would ever have got through without the support they have been able to give me.

Needless to say it is always hard to go and very full on, but I know it has always been good and so important, and has definitely helped me find so much safety and release, which I have needed so much.

I wish you a lovely Easter too and thank you for your good wishes.

Helen

 

[Echo]

@HelenB - that does all sound so enormously positive. What a fabulous place! It is lovely that you have it there if you need it; though I'm sure it must be hard to find the time to go when you have a family and other responsibilities. Thank you for explaining about it. We do seem to have to fight on so many fronts at the same time, so having such an array of different approaches is very important. I know I do best when I come back to soul. Yes, I have to address what is happening with my body, but it is only on a soul level that I can find meaning for it all, and hope.

x Echo x

 

[HelenB]

It is definitely an amazing place, and just so so safe which has been amazing for me, and though it is a five hour drive for me to get there, I always know it is worth it, even when it is so emotionally hard to face the things and they are also about for me when I need to call them I between too, which really helps so much. It is definitely hard to get away and leave the children, but I know is so important, and though I hate leaving them, I know it is so important in the long run and know I am so blessed that my husband is so supportive of me too, and he is really good with the children when I am away.

I definitely agree with the different levels that we have to face things, and personally believe that we are made of body, soul and spirit, which are all connected and effect each other, and believe we need healing on all levels, and definitely know that Ellel is a place for me where all of those are addressed and find it so helpful within my journey and everything I am facing.

I hope you are doing ok today ad that you have a really blessed Easter.

Helen x

 

[Hope4Now]

She advised me also to find parts of me that are happy, well, fine, at peace, grounded, etc., even if they are very tiny and dispersed, and talk to them. Once I've established contact, she suggested that I allow them to talk to the hurt, frightened, cowering parts of me.

I think this is called "titration." I try to use it on a physical level for pain. It was a strategy from Peter Levine in his book on Healing Chronic Pain. I find that I am trying to use it more consciously on an emotional level, but am not as successful with it yet. Often hard to find parts of myself that aren't weighed down by all their own issues. It did work for me on Friday night, though, when I ended up in a very bad place. Some part of me ponied up some energy and had me make a better choice.

I'm sorry about the screaming. I do understand.

I also think it is very cool that your younger part is telling you things about your older part. Mine are starting to do this for me too.