Who am I? Am I truly alone in this life?

[Theasylumsystem]

I haven't felt great since my T told me that we don't have DID. She instead diagnosed me with BPD. My Bio mom (Abuser) has the same disorder. She told me I wasn't like her in our last session, but I don't believe it. She also said that my system is probably a part of my schizoaffective disorder. That I probably created my system to have people who will never leave. It hurts. The fact that my system might not even be there. It's all in my head. I'm just f*cking nuts. That is the truth of it. My system doesn't exist, we're not different people. We're just...I'm just crazy. I don't feel like living anymore.

 

[Rose White]

That I probably created my system to have people who will never leave. It hurts. The fact that my system might not even be there. It's all in my head.

Sorry you’re in the grinder!

If you have a system it’s there. For survival. DID is also all in the head. People with DID are not actually different people. Switching happens with disorders other than DID. And Richard Schwartz teaches that everyone has an internal system, but traumatized people notice it more.

Any time he of us on this forum can be or have been called crazy. Crazy is just what people who have no empathy call those dealing with mental and emotional struggles.

This ties into the thread I posted called “CPTSD = BPD?” (Don’t know how to link threads yet.). The names for the symptoms keep changing. The most important thing is to get help.

Wondering whether you can tell your T what you wrote here? Your perception of your disorder matters for your strength in recovery.

 

[Tinyflame]

Hi @Theasylumsystem , sometimes we can feel very alone and sometimes we are very alone. I don't know much but from what you've said about your mother , you are very different already to turn it inwards. Maybe there is a better way? You deserve to be kind to yourself.

I am sorry you feel so badly. ETA, you aren't alone in your feelings. Hugs to you if that's ok.

 

[binchilling]

Sorry you’re in the grinder!

If you have a system it’s there. For survival. DID is also all in the head. People with DID are not actually different people. Switching happens with disorders other than DID. And Richard Schwartz teaches that everyone has an internal system, but traumatized people notice it more.

Any time he of us on this forum can be or have been called crazy. Crazy is just what people who have no empathy call those dealing with mental and emotional struggles.

This ties into the thread I posted called “CPTSD = BPD?” (Don’t know how to link threads yet.). The names for the symptoms keep changing. The most important thing is to get help.

Wondering whether you can tell your T what you wrote here? Your perception of your disorder matters for your strength in recovery.

So, according to Richard Schwartz, are those with trauma lucky? I dont agree with that, not everyone has alters.

 

[Movingforward10]

I haven't felt great since my T told me that we don't have DID. She instead diagnosed me with BPD. My Bio mom (Abuser) has the same disorder. She told me I wasn't like her in our last session, but I don't believe it. She also said that my system is probably a part of my schizoaffective disorder. That I probably created my system to have people who will never leave. It hurts. The fact that my system might not even be there. It's all in my head. I'm just f*cking nuts. That is the truth of it. My system doesn't exist, we're not different people. We're just...I'm just crazy. I don't feel like living anymore.

Another way of framing it is: anyone with alters/parts/internal structures created them because of some form of trauma. Your T is now saying your system is made because of X, rather than Y. It's still your system. The alters are still there. Part of you.
And the goal was always going to be integrating that system into one, if possible. Or learning to live together in a healthy way. It's a shift in focus?

It must be very jarring to be diagnosed the same thing as your abuser.
But: maybe a shift in focus too.
What if your mum got diagnosed with chronic fatigue. And then you did. Or your mum broke a bone. And then you did. Do any of those things make you like her? If not, then why would this diagnosis?
You're you.

 

[Weemie]

It's all in my head.

Well, where else would it be? I thought I had DDNOS for a long time and was misdiagnosed with it for years. I have dealt with structural internal systems since I was 4, due to prolonged solitary confinement in infancy/early childhood. Your experiences exist, regardless of the diagnosis.

BPD and DID can be extremely similar in presentation, and I know several people with BPD that frame their experiences through the lens of structural dissociation. It's a disorder with both instability of identity and heavy dissociative features, so the overlap isn't insignificant.

I wound up having schizoid, which is on the same spectrum as schizoaffective - I think your psych is correct to take DID off the table because of this as schizo-spectrum disorders meet the exclusion criteria of DID (it can't be caused by something else).

A majority of people with symptoms of structural dissociation will wind up having schizo or personality disorders instead. And even for DID, there's no evidence to suggest that they have "different people" in their heads. Neurotypicals converge identity components in adulthood and those with these disorders don't. Mix in maladaptive fantasy and dissociation and constructs and you get parts/alters.

Even while diagnosed as DDNOS I've never considered that I have different human beings in my mind, my constructs are just that - constructions I embody to cope with external circumstances. The diagnostic component is less relevant to me because my experiences exist regardless of diagnosis, and I am fine with that. If it's something I made up to function, which I suspect it is, it's still legitimate to me.