#this is about having dissociative identity disorder

[pinoysol]

My take as someone with DID (everyone who didn’t know, hi yes I have dissociative identity disorder) and who has researched on Munchausen’s for a school report,

There comes a point where someone fakes to the point of believing it, (which is Munchausen’s)

- People DO fake having disorders // you do not know if they’re lying or their intent, people can and will deceive you

- A big part of Munchausen’s is gathering sympathy from others, and that sympathy can be gained from joining a group of people who are struggling with a disorder. People can fabricate on how their disorders develop, this isn’t uncommon

-Most people who do say later in time that they didn’t have DID, (or can refer to it as the outdated and incorrect term MPD), will either tell you that they faked it, or will just say they never had it

How do I know all of this?

Because the person who I got a protection order against lied about having it and said she never had it. But that’s a whole other post for a different time

Hot take: The "If you think you're faking, you're not!" stuff that's constantly pushed in the sys community is extremely harmful and completely false. Faking is not always intentional and I wish more people would listen to former fakers. People need to stop demonizing former fakers. I'm friends with multiple people who used to fake and all but one of them said this rhetoric is part of what stopped them realizing for do long. Imitative DID is a thing and it's horrible to have. It can get you into such a deep hole that's hard to get out of. People talking about being concerned that they could be faking shouldn't automatically be dismissed or told they're not. Yes, denial is a real and common thing in DID but that doesn't mean it's always just denial.

I'm just gonna have to tell you this; if it's unintentional then it's not faking. That is the point. That is what a majority of people mean. You can be mistaken, yes, but that doesn't mean you're faking. A mistake ≠ a harmful action. Faking is something done intentionally, usually maliciously, it cannot be done on accident or because you just thought you had the symptoms when it was actually something completely different. "Former fakers" are either people who were confused and mistook it for something else or people who intentionally faked it and are therefore not welcome among me and my community (unless they were like, really young, I any forgive that because kids are stupid). I understand what you mean, but words mean things. Don't misuse them.

[por-el-chisme-no]

"Encouraging Alters to be individuals and friends is good for us. Sorry if you're system is miserable".

Please. No one says it has to be all missery but if your disorder brings you more positivity than distress well then... Its either not disorder-ing OR it in fact is disorder-ing so fucking hard you are oblivious to the level of dissociation you encourage yourself to be in.

Dissociation, identity fragmentation, amnesia. Those are survival skills your body has developed. 100% if we encouraged parts in our system to further embrace individualality and sense of their own self, ya... Life would feel easier. Easier doesn't mean healthier.

And there is definitely a lot to say about when and if someone is in a place where it is safe to begin tackling barriers. A lot of times it may be safer to continue living with high barriers in order to function in your current environment. You don't have to be actively in the process of Parts work or trauma therapy.

I just think it's an important tid bit to stay mindful of. How using your available means to cope and survive plays into your larger scope of being a system.

[dreamwritesstuff]

the library

sometimes i wander through the library in my mind; it keeps my memories safe, all in one spot. i met the librarian once, but she didn't like me much

"what're these ones?" i asked her, reaching for an old book it was sitting on a high up shelf surrounded by others that looked like it though they were all dusty and covered in webs "don't touch those" she said quickly, hitting my hand away and she nudged me down the steps away from the old tomes that i now was so curious of

they were thick books with browned pages and dyed leather binding. they sat crooked on the shelf, i wanted so badly to open one, to see what the writing inside was like, what memories it held, what stories it told

i felt a like a little kid being ridiculed for peeking into the locked doors when i've been told not to. maybe that's all i am, a little kid who never got to grow up quite right

what memories do those books hold? are they dangerous, i wonder? do they tell secrets, stories dipped in darkness and dripping with a chill you can't quite shake off? i felt nauseous at the thought. i know that feeling a little too well already

maybe i don't want to know. maybe the librarian was right to shoo me away, and maybe those books are dusty, covered in webs, for a reason

[drakesvalley]

The wildest part about being a system and having known you are a system for a while (6+ years for us) HAS to be seeing people who are just figuring it out fall into holes that you've long left behind.

Like. Yeah. We also thought we needed to keep tabs on everyone to increase communication. In the end it became too unwieldy. Especially since DID evolves with what you experience all the time.

Microlabels are cool and I fully support anyone who uses them, but figuring out what to call every single structure in your system isn't for us anymore.

Another thing we notice is people who try their best to know who is fronting at all given times. A lot of that comes naturally to us nowadays, but it's also... OK not to know. Especially if you're not focusing on anything system related at the time.

I guess a lot of this boils down to, it's okay not to care. It's okay to go with the flow of things and figure out at your own pace. Identity is fluid, especially if you have a dissociative disorder. You don't HAVE to have everything figured out 100% of the time.

It's okay to take it slow. It's okay to not know. It's okay to just exist for a bit. It's okay to live and experience things beyond being a system.

To all the people who are just starting to comprehend this. You do not need to know and label exactly what is happening in your head all the time. Fuck, we sure don't. And we're happier for it.

It's okay to just be you.

[pdid-culture-is]

(vent-ish) P-DID culture is being so so so jealous of other (not pdid) systems for how they operate and are so. perfect. we dont work like other systems at all and it makes me so jealous when people talk about their system. sometimes i really wish i just had standard DID so it wouldnt be as hard, all non-PDIDs have it so easy and they dont even know it.. tons of resources online and others to relate to. maybe its bad to say but i yearn for the generic system experiences, even the negative parts. i want full switches and blackouts, i want the confusion that comes with it, i want alters that can actually be active, i want every part of the DID experience so i can relate to someone. i feel guilty over that, why would i ever want it different when i obviously have it easier than most? dont know. im tired of not being seen in the system community im tired of the alienation im tired of everything and i just want to feel comfortable with my own system but its so hard when you dont even feel seen by people who are supposed to get you the most. im sorry

.

[lemon-tea-leaves]

If you're gonna go around talking about how invalid self-diagnosis is and how you should ALWAYS just go to a doctor because they're the experts, consider doing the following instead:

Reminding yourself that no doctor is infallible, and unfortunately there are shitty and VERY misinformed doctors out there

Advocate for the spreading of accurate information about the neurodivergence or illness or disorder or etc.

In that same vein, dispel myths and misconceptions about said Brain And Body Things™

Advocate for easier access to evaluation and diagnosis

Support people who have been medically gaslit in the past and just want to know what's going on with themselves

Support people who have had their life affected by their symptoms (despite not knowing what was causing them) and just want to know what's going on with themselves

Support people who just Feel something Wrong and just want to know what's going on with themselves

Just fucking support people and stop tearing others down because you're white knighting

There are people intentionally making a mockery of things like DID or being autistic, among other things. And there are people who mis-self-diagnose (usually due to research that isn't deep enough) and are fed misinformation which leads to them misrepresenting the disorder.

But there are also people who have the symptoms, looked into the symptoms, found something that matched the symptoms, and maybe FINALLY felt they had an answer when they couldn't find one because they didn't have the means or whatever the reason.

And you're telling them that they're making a mockery of a disorder because they wanted to find a reason. And it's because you associate them with the people on TikTok that you roll your eyes at. And it's fucking annoying.

TL;DR:

Maybe instead of being a dick about self-diagnosis, you could help set a path towards making it so people don't have to in the fucking first place.

(Also, as for my opinion on self-dx, self-dx with a good amount of research from verified accurate sources = A-OK. I'm saying this as a professionally diagnosed person who has had to self-dx in the past. I've been wrong about some things and right about others, and professionals have been right about some and wrong about others. But it helped to set me down the right path. I wouldn't be where I am if I hadn't.)

[cookie-nom-nom]

weirdly enough one of the things that prevented me from fully using exclusively they/them pronouns wasn’t even like a fear of blatant transphobia or whatever. It was because an acquaintance with DID developed a headmate based on me and I realized they were integrating my habits so I stopped telling them personal details about myself bc I didn’t want to influence the headmate into being someone they weren’t. And then the headmate transitioned to they/them before I did and it gave me a crisis about who was copying who. So like. Everyone’s gender journey is different but some are zanier than others. shall we say.

[binary-sys]

not cis not trans but a secret third thing (introject that identifies with my source gender which doesn't match the body)

[blackoutsys]

boy howdy i sure would love to feel my emotions. it'd be a shame if they just evaporated!!!!!

[abrthephantomq]

I love seeing these sorts of things in the Severance subreddit 💀. Like, you're not wrong, but also I have thoughts as someone who is a System -

Reintegration as I see is a process that takes time. iMark and oMark are still separate, but memories will start leaking through the broken barriers.

How they process those pieces of information as reintegration continues can go SO many different ways. Mark (all values of Mark) is suuuuper early into the process.

So really, I interpreted that tiny glitch as just that - a glitch of oMark bleeding through a novel experience iMark was having. My theory for why the glitch happens is related to the fact that this was the 1st time iMark had sex with Helly (if not his first time overall). Maybe the glitch was of a similar emotional moment with Gemma - the first time oMark had sex with her, maybe. For example.

The thing folks I think may be forgetting is that iMark wouldn't know if oMark chose to start the reintegration process. We've only really seen the process from an Outie's perspective with Petey. With him flashing to moments when he's at Lumon.

We haven't seen the perspective of the Innie experiencing it, yet. iMark will probably figure out he's started the reintegration process - but ATM I would argue he DOESN'T know oMark made that choice, and is about to be fucking blindsided when oMark's memories keep leaking through.

Idk I am sat. I am loving this show so fucking much. It's fascinating to see something so similar to my experience of having multiple versions of me. This show is singlehandedly the BEST representation of dissociative identity disorder I've ever seen.

[poems-of-the-anentomologist]

This poem is about DID, from the perspective of a singlet who is trying their best to understand what is is like, and also just feeling... well read the poem

Every Poet Has That One Poem Called “Untitled” So Here Is Mine

My mind feels like a universe sometimes

A cold universe, silent planets drifting in their silent arcs around silent black stars

It feels lonely

I look all around

And I see false statues

Children made of stars

Bugs in the shape of friends

None of them alive

Merely myself, twisted

Reflected, over and over and over

And

I can look up

Pierce my universe

And I can see others

Their universe’s filled

With others

Companions, good and bad

People to keep their worlds company across stars and time

Wonderful new lives that wouldn't have existed otherwise

Living all together in one

Golden beings laying in the fields

and talking softly to one another

and then and then and

and thn I feel more alone

Cold and distant

Separated almost

And I don’t know what to feel

[dreamwritesstuff]

puzzle of us

"careful," he says, putting the piece into place- the last one we have. it's finally done!, i go to jump up from the table, "but there's gaps," i realize, "the edges aren't finished and there's holes in the middle" "i know," he says, "but this is all we have for now"

i stare at the puzzle. it's old and faded, much older than i. the corners of the pieces are peeling up, the paper printed on the cardstock not glued down well enough. they were never cut quite right, never fit together like they should've, you had to force them to fit sometimes, unsure of if it was the right spot or not. the colors were sepia tinted and, as i looked at the picture as a whole… "what is it?" i asked "its us" he said, "its our story of childhood"

i stared at it some more. yes, i could see it now, the swings with our cousin, playing catch with our dad, baking with our mom, games with our sister… "but what about my memories?" i asked he shook his head, "those memories aren't happy"

that didn't feel very fair

so i stared some more at the puzzle of us, with the missing pieces and torn up paper and peeling edges and confusing pictures and sepia toned colors and i tried to make it feel like home

he set his hand on my shoulder, "it's okay" he says, and i believe him because he never lies, "it'll feel like home soon"

and i didn't know how he knew what i was thinking but i believed him and so we sat together staring at the incomplete puzzle of us and it didn't feel like home still, even as the clock ticked by hour by hour, month by month, but maybe it will soon

[wakeywakeyjakey]

The Batman characters I always write and view with DID (aka the “DID baddies”) are Batman, Two Face, and Scarecrow—and I LOVE that they each present with such wiiiiildy different interactions with their headmates + experiences within their headspaces.

The way I see it, Bruce and Batman coexist easily. They have the same mission so they work alongside each other and view the other as having an extremely valuable role to play in their life/are aware that they can’t function without each other. What’s cool is that they have completely different approaches to their collective goal, but ultimately they trust the other and both get where they want to be (from a big picture perspective).

Harv and Harvey coexist grudgingly and work against each other in a lot of ways (it’s a WIP) BUT they have a system (haha) for how to navigate daily life so that they both feel equally represented in their decisions. While “trust” might be too strong a word to use, they definitely both see the other as capable of living their collective life even if/when they don’t agree with the other’s decisions—and so they mostly don’t stand in each other’s way.

Jonathan and Scarecrow DO NOT COEXIST! Jonathan views Scarecrow as a liability actively ruining their life and thus works to keep Scarecrow away from the front entirely. Scarecrow views Jonathan as weak and unwilling/unable to do what needs to be done to keep them both alive. The one area of overlap is their research (and criminal endeavors) so it’s the one space they’re willing to coexist, but outside of their heists they’re almost exclusively at each other’s throats and would rather the other not have access to their life/body/decisions.

It adds so many layers to their characters and entirely fleshes out the “personas” when you come at it from the lens of DID as opposed to just viewing it as a costume they take off at the end of the night imo!

[stellichor-system]

Man, you know somebody fucked up when you got two caretakers in front 😭

[brbuttons]

Self-portraits from a DID System ▸ Mr. Intercontinental Breakfast Augustus Sinclair

part of the 'We Will Be Perceived' zine.

[poolboyservice]

"don't let your disability stop you!!" "it's not you it's society!!!" "you're not disabled or bad, you're just special"

thats cool and all but I have to deal with near blackout amnesia, hearing voices 24/7, and a fractured identity/sense of self 🧍‍♂️ pretty sure society nor ableism has anything to do with any of those