Structural Dissociation?

[Hope4Now]

Like 3 people trying to quit. :hungover::wtf::banghead:

:roflmao::roflmao::roflmao: You are too funny! I hear your core self coming through here!!!

This is interesting too, though. I went 6 days in the hospital with no smokes and really had very little problem. To my husband's disgust, dismay, and disappointment (and my own), I picked up right where I left off when I returned home. My therapist said maybe I'm not as addicted as I think I am. Hmmm.

Not sure which parts...probably my 12-year old boy rebel part. Pack rolled in sleeve. Too cool to be real.

 

[shimmerz]

we're the person we were meant to be?!

I think it is more like this. We get to choose and there are so many choices it is overwhelming. Imagine if you were reborn as an adult and got to be whatever you wanted to be. You knew the choices you made before were the 'old reliables' but hadn't gotten you far... who would you pick as friends, how important would money be, what would you spend your days doing....the list goes on and on. Hard to express in words.

It is like a blank slate and you have to know how to mix the colours just right.

 

[Hope4Now]

It is like a blank slate and you have to know how to mix the colours just right.

Ooh, yep! Have you caught my analogy disease?

Blank canvases always have made me nervous with their endless possibilities. Can't tell you how many times I've had to muck up canvasses before I paint, or have just said f- it and made something random just to see what would happen (this is one of my current painting projects...there is some initial choice involved, but the outcome is pretty much out of my control. Some of them turn out pretty cool, others are throw-aways. This is all fine and good for art, but doesn't work so well with my one little life. What to choose?! What happens when you choose wrong?

 

[shimmerz]

What happens when you choose wrong?

I will let you know....

But if feels kinda like..... :laugh::roflmao::hilarious: oh, nvm.

 

[Hope4Now]

Now that I think about it further...
The crux of creating a self seems to be choice. And choice is very confusing and scary because we learned very early that there was no choice (helplessness and entrapment) and/or that any choice was wrong because it did not result in being loved the way we needed to be loved. But back then, the choices weren't necessarily conscious. Now they are.

And that is what makes my brain feel like it is going to explode. There are too many choices. And probably none of them are right. Because how could they be? Any choice precludes others and creates a whole new reality. This is where structural dissociation theory, trauma therapy, and philosophy start to overlap and get wildly complex, I think.

In no particular order and offered as food for thought/comment:

1. Existentialism
In existentialist philosophy, the term 'existential crisis' specifically relates to the crisis of the individual when they realize that they must always define their own lives through the choices they make. The existential crisis occurs when one recognizes that even the decision to either refrain from action or withhold assent to a particular choice is, in itself, a choice. In other words, humankind is "condemned" to freedom.

2. Ontology
"Ontological crisis" is a term coined to describe the crisis an agent, human or not, goes through when its model - its ontology - of reality changes.
In the human context, a clear example of an ontological crisis is a believer’s loss of faith in God. Their motivations and goals, coming from a very specific view of life suddenly become obsolete and maybe even nonsense in the face of this new configuration. The person will then experience a deep crisis and go through the psychological task of reconstructing its set of preferences according the new world view. (On this one, I'm not thinking about loss of faith. I'm thinking about the recognition of PARTS...)


3. Phenomenology
Phenomenology should not be considered as a unitary movement; rather, different authors share a common family resemblance but also with many significant differences. Accordingly, “A unique and final definition of phenomenology is dangerous and perhaps even paradoxical as it lacks a thematic focus. In fact, it is not a doctrine, nor a philosophical school, but rather a style of thought, a method, an open and ever-renewed experience having different results, and this may disorient anyone wishing to define the meaning of phenomenology." ...In its most basic form, phenomenology attempts to create conditions for the objective study of topics usually regarded as subjective: consciousness and the content of conscious experiences such as judgments, perceptions, and emotions. Although phenomenology seeks to be scientific, it does not attempt to study consciousness from the perspective of clinical psychology or neurology. Instead, it seeks through systematic reflection to determine the essential properties and structures of experience.

 

[Hope4Now]

I love this quote:
"Integration is more like making a fruit salad than like making a smoothie: It requires that elements retain their individual uniqueness while simultaneously linking to other components of the system. The key is balance of differentiation and linkage."
Link Removed

@Chava, I'm tagging you in this post because I think you were one of the people wondering about what happens to child parts...

 

[Chava]

I do like the salad analogy to integration (vs smoothie...that sounds really confusing...because we need to be slightly different selves in different situations...like no "F" words around the kids, being positive at work even when feeling messed up, etc).

There is probably another "part" I can't place in time (like I don't know what age, but I think 1-5) that is also angry, but is the really crazy destructive one. Confusing because the active self-destruction didn't happen until teen years but I think it's actually really young. Just got better tools when older. And more triggered. It's the part that was there when I was cutting or hiding a knife under my pillow (now I just need to hold it or keep in my pocket sometimes). Also imagines intense escapes like setting self on fire. In a brain scan, likely very lit up in trauma and survival areas, but wanting badly to be blank. Probably my alcoholic.

There seems to be an inner confusion about self-protection vs self-destruction (like impulse to do both, which seems like a major paradox) and I assume it's just about control. Seems triggered by shame but then becomes about control. Not sure. Very confusing. I know very little about it. I burn myself still, though rarely because I can't bring myself to cut (that's good) but like today I need to carry around my knife in my pocket. I'm going to mostly have a normal evening I think. So maybe in some ways this part is integrating (vs taking me over). I just need to have my knife close. Worst is sometimes it merges with the frozen self (so like holding my knife and feeling frozen).

To a point, the angry parts are helpful. But not this one. It's too much. It wants to be totally high. It has abused and poisoned me a lot. It has broken things. It wants to destroy me. But it really wants to destroy something external and can't so it all drives back into me. I don't feel this come up much in therapy which might be okay because when it did in a tiny amount, I quit therapy right after that session. (then somehow went back, but how many quits do I have in me?)

Okay, onto semi-normalcy protected by knife in pocket. See if sunshine and biking pulls me back out since I'm like only half a foot into this part at the moment. Anyway, sorry that's not a very fun part. Pretty ugly. :mad::mask::blackeye::ninja: But it's gotten me into a lot of trouble and I don't yet understand how she's helped me survive (I do understand on some level preventing overwhelm, even if the response to stress seems pretty damaging in itself).

 

[Chava]

Damn it that was long. Nobody has to reply, it's helpful to write and notice connections around the concept of EPs...understanding them as sort of a set of responses or deeply imbedded patterns. The destructive one seems subdued these days, but I think it still exists through my need to double my sleep meds (not okay with my doc). Anorexia was very much like the shutdown, blank EP. Self-destruction was bizarrely simultaneously self-protective and destructive...self-harm and all attempts to poison myself or numb out in self destructive ways. I've had dreams that sort of clarify this mixed up self-protection-self-destruction state.

I've learned a good deal of self care. But that doesn't somehow make this destructive part totally go away. I think I've been thinking self care would counter that. Not quite.

But I don't know how to address in therapy. It rarely shows up (usually we're working with pain and shutdown stuff). If it does, the session is sort of a loss...like my clawing at my head and therapist trying to get me out of that...then I drive home in a fog and e-mail her to quit. These would be the two strong EPs and they are completely disconnected from others.

 

[Hope4Now]

I get the difficulty of addressing the self destructive part in therapy. It sends me into crazy land. Probably how/why I ended up in the hospital...I got a little too in touch with the part. Mostly my self-destructive part comes out in socially acceptable ways. Just had an argument with my husband...I mentioned I'd like to go hiking in the white mountains. He said not alone. I said alone. I need to push through this pain stuff somehow. Prove to myself I can overcome it. He thinks I'm nuts. I probably am. Am still thinking on it.

Anyway...it is important to get to know the self destructive part with your therapist. It's tough going. But somehow I think until we deal
With that part, all the self care in the world is rather like a bandaid on an aortal wound.

Sorry I'm sounding like a downer tonight. Not a good night. Hoping my writing group will distract me for long enough for it to pass.

 

[Chava]

Anyway...it is important to get to know the self destructive part with your therapist. It's tough going. But somehow I think until we deal
With that part, all the self care in the world is rather like a bandaid on an aortal wound.

Thanks. I'm just starting to realize this. Feels like a little war with myself all the time...self care stuff can be very hard but most of it (like eating) is sort of just normal habit now. But those extra steps like loving kindness meditation feel like TOO MUCH. And if there is any EP or part of myself in the way, it's this one. I'll try to bring up in therapy somehow.

Thanks @Hope4Now ....I hope you are doing okay. Take care of yourself this evening. Easier said than done :confused:but I do mean it.

 

[Hope4Now]

Anyway, sorry that's not a very fun part. Pretty ugly. :mad::mask::blackeye::ninja: But it's gotten me into a lot of trouble and I don't yet understand how she's helped me survive (I do understand on some level preventing overwhelm, even if the response to stress seems pretty damaging in itself).

No need for sorry. Honor this part that is working very hard on your behalf and probably doesn't much like the job that it's doing. But it is helping you in its own weird way. :hug:

 

[ms spock]

Now that I think about it further...
The crux of creating a self seems to be choice. And choice is very confusing and scary because we learned very early that there was no choice (helplessness and entrapment) and/or that any choice was wrong because it did not result in being loved the way we needed to be loved. But back then, the choices weren't necessarily conscious. Now they are.

Choice is so very confusing and scary! I understand this.