Structural Dissociation?

[Hope4Now]

Not ridiculous. Not unbelievable. So devastating and overwhelming for you. You are so very strong and brave. Both to have become who you are now, and to talk about it with us. You deserve to be alive and to feel proud of your survival and to be walking this path toward living with less fear and doubt and shame. Can I walk with you?

I think I have decided to return home after all this chaos today. It has takene six hours of sitting in the car and a semi-harrowing experience at the beach to get to that place. I will sit a bit longer to make sure it is a self decision and not a parts one. So hard to know what to do when parts want and need such opposite things.

 

[shimmerz]

Can I walk with you?

Oh, yes please. Thank you so much for your kindness. I didn't actually realize until this afternoon how much humiliation was in there about this stuff. I feel like a circus freak, honestly. I think I am in that EP right now.

I get to this thread and I tell you, it is like I can't read properly anymore, can't articulate properly. Holy Moly! It is a sad state of affairs.

@Hope4Now, I do actually see you as a partner in this. You seem to be processing and reacting to this stuff like I am. I feel badly for you. :confused:

@Eleanor, you have been such a tremendous help to me today. My hat is off to you - always. You, I am certain, could be off doing other things. Don't think I don't notice your service to others. Thank you.

All of you who are posting here, I so appreciate your eloquence and grace in posting, your sharing, your fortitude. Just - thank you.
:hug::hug::hug::hug:
Shimmerz

 

[shimmerz]

I am so sorry. I missed this one. What semi-harrowing beach experience? It doesn't sound like a very fun day for you @Hope4Now.

 

[Powder]

I completely believe and am so sad to read what you went through just to arrive here in one piece. The feeling I have is quite fully sad. It feels like both of my shoulders are being pushed down upon and my midsection felt heavy as though it would give way. I felt bowed with the sadness of being trapped inside such an unloving parent. Just writing it out, it passed.

Just the loss of the twin is, I think, a huge trauma for people. I think just going through all that would be enough to cause or set one up for PTSD. My first T was a psychiatrist, and he said that birth or uterine trauma (such as hearing screaming) is now known to predispose one to PTSD. Makes sense.

What I cannot fathom is how the best people are born to the worst. That doesn't and likely will not ever make any sense to anyone, for they learn nothing, in my opinion, from us.

I have one student who, by his own example of not ever drinking an alcoholic beverage (as a Native American, who talks to Native kids about alcoholism in schools) impacted his father. The father had been a lifelong drinker, not violent, just not "there."

The father in his late 40s decided to be sober for the first time in his adult life based on his pride in his son, who is also playing Bball and going to college. This happened DURING the quarter I taught him, and he wrote about it.

I went home and cried.

I didn't ever expect to see a parent change based on the child's moral uprightness and character. The father was so proud of his son that he decided to FOLLOW his example. Still, I am in shock. And rather than envy him, I was grateful to the Universe for sharing this lovely and rare eclipse of the "son" with me of all people. If I can't experience it, I'm glad my wonderful student did.

I saw him today. He smiled at me, and I waved.

We don't all get to see the goodnesses of life in our own families, but I am glad to see goodness wherever it presents itself to me.

God whispers, they say. I must be quiet to listen. Sometimes, I hear nothing. And what I do hear is the goodness in my own soul watching for signs of life.

 

[shimmerz]

Just writing it out, it passed.

Yes, it sure did. I thank you from the bottom of my heart as I just couldn't put words to it as you so eloquently did. Funny thing is, my shoulders and my abdomen seem to have taken the brunt off all of this throughout my life. Interesting that you would pick up on that.

decided to be sober for the first time in his adult life based on his pride in his son

Oh my gawd, what a beautiful and touching act. A father honouring his son in such a touching way. Generations coming full circle. Thank you so much for sharing that story.

I didn't ever expect to see a parent change based on the child's moral uprightness and character.

And isn't that just a sad statement? Isn't this what generations are for?

God whispers, they say. I must be quiet to listen. Sometimes, I hear nothing. And what I do hear is the goodness in my own soul watching for signs of life.

Thank you for this lovely reminder. Yes, I will watch for this as well.

 

[Hope4Now]

[DLMURL="https://www.myptsd.com/c/members/24896/"]@Hope4Now[/DLMURL], I do actually see you as a partner in this. You seem to be processing and reacting to this stuff like I am. I feel badly for you. :confused:

:) Thanks, Shimmerz. I'm glad we can "walk" together. I feel badly for you too.

I feel like a circus freak, honestly. I think I am in that EP right now.

Yep, that's definitely and EP. I have one of those too. It doesn't see me as a circus freak, but something equivalently humiliating.

I get to this thread and I tell you, it is like I can't read properly anymore, can't articulate properly.

While you may feel that way, it doesn't look that way on screen. You are always quite articulate. But I know what you mean. My eyes get weird sometimes when I'm activated and I can't look at things properly. And I regularly get stopped up when I'm trying to talk. Doesn't happen when I write so much, but definitely when I am face to face with a person and parts are up. Ugh.

I am home now. Probably the most decent choice I could make for both myself and my family.

:wideeyed: Surprising discovery today at the beach. I was all alone there and attempting to get through the snow down to the rocky shore and I got stuck in the snow. It was snowing sideways and very, very cold, and I of course was not dressed properly because I had gone to work (then fled work just moments after arriving...I will have to deal with that humiliating experience another time). On the beach, I think I discovered that the part of me that makes me do stupid and risky things sometimes (well, not terribly risky really) doesn't really want to get hurt or die. Just bravado...trying to prove that I'm not scared and that I am independent goddammit. Of course I continued on the beach after I finally extracted myself from chest high snow. The rocks were very slippery but I persisted, then fell. Then got scared again. No harm done. Lucky me, I guess. Same lesson again. And again. And again. A lot of parts of me actually do want to live. Imagine that. I'm still processing this...maybe something got through to all the parts today.

And, after many hours in the car, I also recognized that the runaway me is a very, very confused child part. It's still there and up, but the responsible me has the upper hand at the moment.

 

[Hope4Now]

We don't all get to see the goodnesses of life in our own families, but I am glad to see goodness wherever it presents itself to me.

Thank you for sharing that story Muse. It's powerful. And, yes, we need to take in all the goodness around us. There's a lot. It's all in how we look.

 

[shimmerz]

I also recognized that the runaway me is a very, very confused child part

And I think this is what is happening to me lately. My 'self' is aware of these splits, seeing things very differently but in a very organized way. It is affecting everything. I expect that with time I will become accustomed to the feeling or reality of it. It is very similar to the feeling I had when I recognized through my T-doc that my entire life had been laid out as a lie. I recognized to an extent, the effect it would have on me and that it would be profound. It feels like that.

@Hope4Now , I too wander when a certain part of me is triggered. There is no bravado, just a little girl who wants to find a tree to curl up under and die. It takes people to find her. She will not get up on her own. I have been found in snow storms, in boiling hot cars, on ant hills, being chewed to crap, in ditches. What scares me is that I truly don't think this part of me wants to be found.

I am distressed that you continued on and fell to boot. Please keep that little one safe for me. :hug::hug::hug:

 

[Hope4Now]

What scares me is that I truly don't think this part of me wants to be found.

Might she be the part that attached to your twin?

Please keep that little one safe for me.

I'm working on it. Right back at you, dear @shimmerz.

 

[shimmerz]

Might she be the part that attached to your twin?

Hmmmm, I hadn't thought of that. Thank you.

I hope you have a better day today @Hope4Now so that your little one doesn't feel the need to run. I send you both :hug:'s

 

[Hope4Now]

I hope you have a better day today

Thank you. It was better. I did not go to work, went to an extra therapy appointment (thank god for that), then came home feeling slightly less crazy. My therapist does that for me. Makes me feel like all this is going to end up okay. It is very comforting to some parts and rather maddening to other parts that want all this to be dealt with RIGHT NOW! As if. He says all this has been stuck inside for 51 years, and it will take time to get to know all these parts and what they need. Sigh. It all seems so "normal" (well, maybe not normal, but normal-ish) when I am with him. Then I leave his office and I feel like a crazy lady again. The difference between this therapy and all the other times in my life I've attempted to reach out for help is that this therapist seems to get the profundity of my distress...somehow he has been able to see beyond my outer self. Somehow he believes what I am saying and has helped me muster up the courage to say/feel more. Yikes. Scary. I think I am working on what they call "earned attachment" along with all the trauma stuff. It's a bloody slow process.

Ugh...sorry...need to keep talking...will shift to trauma diary if it goes on too long...
I am still rather wrecked and very exhausted, but that actually is coming to feel more normal these days as I start to link up some emotions to all the rest. I don't feel like I am in a crisis like I did yesterday. I told my husband about some memory stuff that has come together for me in the last two weeks. It was very helpful even though scary...helpful because he knows my mother and knew my father for a long time (died 7 years ago), so he has a broader perspective than my therapist who has only my point of view. And helpful because I have been trying to take some risks and let him into my inner life a bit. It is very difficult to be in a relationship with all this stuff going on, but we seem to be doing okay so far. He has risked/shown a great deal to me about himself. I think we are giving each other courage. A LOT of fragments of memory that have never ever made any sense in isolation are clicking into place, and suddenly some of this "parts" stuff is starting to make sense/feel real to me. Today, my therapist used the phrase "incest survivor" to me for the first time. It shook me. The words sort of skittered across my consciousness. It is real. And he believes me. So does my husband. Wow. Intense.

Hmmmm, I hadn't thought of that. Thank you.

I worried about posting that question. I hope I did not overstep bounds or upset you. I have a part that wants to die as well. Lots that don't, but one that is determined and scares me. It is a part I have not yet explored as I get pretty flipped out every time it comes up in therapy. I'm not sure where it comes from, but one possibility is from in utero. I'm learning that fetuses and newborns do take in "information" but that it isn't coded into memory the same way as later life experiences. I was a mistake, and when I reconnected with my birth mother as an adult (never met her actually, but exchange correspondence), I learned about her terrible experiences while pregnant with me in a home for unwed mothers (think movie Philomena). I am certain parts of her hated me and wished I would die (but she was a staunch Roman Catholic so...). It's different, very very different from your experience, but it did make me wonder whether some of our parts go way far back. I have had some really deeply upsetting flashbacks that relate to birth and shortly thereafter.

Okay...time to carry on elsewhere. Sorry so much. Long day.

 

[Eleanor]

What scares me is that I truly don't think this part of me wants to be found.

OK, this may be out there but... the twin bond is, I am given to understand, profound and mysterious. Perhaps this part doesn't want to die for the sake of dying, but to be reunited with your twin? In which case a kind of metaphysical/mystical intervention might be in order. Trying to connect with your twin past death. It happens, and it can be very very healing.