I saw something on Emily First Girl blog asking about how you define DID in less than 200 words so I thought I would have a go.

Multiplicity is coping mechanism rather than a straight mental disorder. When traumatic events happen to a highly intelligent person at a young age their brain and personality will fragment into two or more distinct personas so that they can survive the trauma. There is no chemical imbalance, no medication that can “fix” the separation.
Often times with a cooperative system a person can lead a very “normal” life, and survive for quite some time before it becomes apparent there is something strange going on. Often times something will cause triggers that the multiple cannot ignore and leave them requiring therapy. Some times all the therapist will have to do is help them process the trauma so that they can regain their balance other times it’s best for them to work extensively with the therapist to integrate so that they can become a single unit once again.

From Multiple Monday by the Birch Household

1) Does anyone celebrate Thanksgiving? Why or why not?
We didn’t for the first half of our life because we were in a different country and they didn’t have Thanksgiving, only Bonfire Night and then Christmas; but now we do with family and friends.

2) What kinds of food do people like eat on Thanksgiving?
We have the traditional turkey for the most part. One year we had a ham, but it was really salty.

3) With whom do the front runners spend Thanksgiving?
This year it’s with the in-laws primarily and then my family is coming over for dessert.

4) Does the household have any internal holiday that is similar to Thanksgiving?
No.

5) Does any like to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade? On TV or in person?
We have watched it in the past, when we still lived at home. Tend to forget that it happens.

I had this eloquent thought while I was driving today and I’m hoping that I can translate it to text as eloquently as it came to me.

We’ve been having some incidents with some acquaintances in our social circle that have really burned bridges with us recently because of some things which have been going on. Perhaps back in July or August when things first started happening there would have been reconciliation but as a friend discovered yesterday when he tried to broach some peace-keeping the bridges are thoroughly burned, and to reconnect is probably going to be nigh on impossible.

I had the thought that myself, with all my alters, can be compared to islands in a stream, and when you make friends with a person without DID you’re building a bridge from your side of the stream to one island, but for someone to make friends with a DID person while they think they’re building a bridge to one island really they’re building a bridge to three or ten, and the work they think they’re putting into the bridge is getting spread out between those ten bridges so it takes ten times as long, especially as you’re building bridges over some pretty cantankerous waters.

Now some of these islands are pretty, they’re full of vegetation and people chasing butterflies, and others are barren and stark and still others are fortified, with jagged rocks and towers with gun turrets in them, and it takes a long time, a long time to convince all those different kinds of islands that you’re worth while enough and a good enough person to be trusted with passage to those islands. You might get to set foot on a few of them, you’ll see the vegetation, and play in the forests, but you’re probably not going to get past the gun turrets to see what else might be on there, and you might think that you’re close but really you’re knocking on the doors and running around the edge, swimming in the shallows.

When you screw up and the bridges are burned you’re ticking off ten island nations and you’re not likely to get the opportunity to rebuild any of those bridges at any time, because there have been so many people in the past who have swum there way to those islands and pillaged and maimed and we’re done with that. There are too many precious things that we have to protect, and we’re starting to realize that it’s not only our family that deserves this protection but we do too. All of our little islands, even the ones that are barren landscapes filled with strange alien fauna they’re all worth protecting, and all need their own gun turrets.

Multiple Monday from the Birch Household.

1) Do people like or dislike (or maybe not care at all) when posts have warnings due to possibly upsetting content?
They can be a bit frustrating at times. We’d never really experienced them until we joined a certain support group mailing list; but I can see why they’re used. It depends on your system’s control. Ours is a bit more stable than many others I’ve encountered in support groups if we had joined a support group a few years ago I can imagine we’d be a lot more grateful and less frustrated with those things.

2) Does reading things on the net trigger anyone?
Not really no. We tend to avoid things that we know will be upsetting. However actually seeing visuals and things in films that can be very bad. However some times we will watch things deliberately because we’re masochistic like that.

3) Does anyone have things that trigger them in real life?
Certain things happening on film and television can be very triggering.

4) Do you find yourselves censoring things you read about multiplicity?
Not really.

5) What is the best thing about spoilers? What is the most annoying thing about them?
When they actually say why they’re spoilering I like that, for someone to just write TRIGGER or put a random bunch of letters annoys me because I have no idea what it’s for; but if they say (trigger for ritual abuse) or something like that I’m more prepared and know if I should actually skip it or not. People who post triggers every single post really frustrate me because I wonder if they’re just attention whoring and if they really need some different sort of thing. I try to post more upbeat things, or things I need input on, like tips about disability filing, or talking to family and friends and rarely post something I feel will be triggering; mostly because I figure triggers are better talked about with my therapist, and what sort of attention do I need? But that’s just me.

I often read horror stories about people who haven’t told their family out of fear. They say “you can never UNtell” and things like that, and live in a half-cast existence where they have to hide their multiplicity from everyone around them. I couldn’t live that. I was reading some things on The Ability to Trust and a few other articles on Emily First Girl about relationships with spouses and significant others I thought I would share my own experience.

To be clear I’m not decrying anyone’s decision to tell or not tell. I just wanted to put out there why we told our spouse. I’m still not sure how I will tell my son when he’s old enough to understand; but I imagine because we’re very open in our household and among our close friends, room mate and with my mother about these things that we will also tell and I’m sure there are other multiples out there who have told their families and hopefully have shared their experiences.

To talk about why I told I have to start with when I first started to find out that I wasn’t…normal…which is when I was in college.

When I was with my “psycho” ex our entire relationship was about the various fragments we both had. To this day I honestly don’t know if she was also a multiple, at the time I didn’t know I was. In our relationship we spent a good deal of time channeling our personas from past lives, and while this did help my fragments to find a stronger personality base to live through it, it also meant that our relationship wasn’t very grounded in the real world, and I was afraid for a long time to talk about my experiences and the fact that even though the relationship ended I felt that I was still fluxing from past life aspect to past life aspect.

I rebounded into a relationship with a guy I had dated in high school, because Max thought he was a wonderful and randomly kissed him at a stop light while we were driving somewhere. Unfortunately for us he preferred some of my other aspects to Max, which made things very awkward, especially because we were completely scared about talking to him about our fluxing because I didn’t want the potential for our relationship to turn out like my “psycho” ex’s; but it meant there was a lot of gaps in our relationship which I felt was unfair because while he understood that I had “crazy” days. I was also very skittish and hesitant about talking about a lot of things. So, there were gaps of distrust, and in the end my wounded and scared self ran away from the relationship when he asked me to move in with him, and I hid at my parents house. Those were not the only issues with our relationship but it was a big part of it, the longer I didn’t talk about it the harder it became.

Several years later I discovered that I really did have feelings for the man who would become my spouse. I didn’t want to have the lingering mess that I’d had with my rebound guy, but I also knew that this man was different than both the rebound guy and the psycho ex. He actually had drive and ambition, he had a grounding in faith and also a respect for other peoples beliefs, and to me it was a disservice to both of us if I didn’t explain to him about my faith and things that went on with my head. At that time I still thought that my fluxing and changing was purely due to the past life personas I had who were very strong. So, before we’d been in the relationship three months I took him with me to a get together some friends of similar beliefs and I had so he could see us talk about our past lives and alternate lives, and reading tarot together, and doing regressions and he was fine with that.

Over the next few years we talked at length about anything and everything. I feel very happy that we have a relationship that’s actually grounded in communication, despite what my step-father would say about it, we really do. My step-father would try to lie to one or both of us about other things going on figuring that he would get away with it because he would tell whoever he was talking to that they shouldn’t tell the other of us, but my husband and I would discuss things and then he would come back and say, “You guys don’t talk at ALL do you?” and it was more of a, “No, we DO talk you’re just a lying manipulative jerk.”

Anyway…back to my point. I came to realize especially when I became pregnant in 2005 that I was still very fluxy that it really wasn’t just channeling that there was something else going on. I was terrified that my fluxiness would have a detrimental affect on my unborn son, so I tried to clamp things down and function using just one of my personas. That didn’t work at all. I went from being able to function to being a walking shell. So, I decided I should have a new tactic. I talked at length about these things with my husband, and he agreed that it was better for me to be functional and flip periodically than not functional, and pointed out to me that logically it would be better for our son to have a mother who was functional and whose voice and mannerisms changed every once in a while than for his mother to be a shell of a person.

After our son was born there were some very rough times. It was a very traumatic time for our family, not just because of adjusting to a newborn but because my husband’s job switched him from nights to days, and because my husband’s mother was very sick. There was a lot of stress. Add to that a few months later that we moved from one apartment to another, and that my mother and step-father started divorce proceedings because he was cheating on her, and everything went extremely loopy. I was put on a new medication by my GP and that messed up the system equilibrium further. I started having missing time again, and my husband and I had a long discussion about why that was bad for me, and looked into getting me into therapy. That proved problematic because of insurance issues and time issues, we were trying to move again and my mother was living with us for a time, and then tried to go back with my step-father, who was abusive towards me, and I freaked out, more than a little.

I started realizing that there was a good chance I was actually a multiple. I would look at my notes to myself and how the handwriting changed, and I definitely knew that Max was strong enough that he could count as a separate personality. I had a conversation with one of the mods of an otherkin list, about my missing time and things and she shared some of her stories, she’s very open at being multiple, and some of her stories were so very similar to my own that I started to make peace with the fact that I was likely multiple. Hubbie and I had some more talks about things, there were certain things that I couldn’t do but that Max could, and I asked him if he would be averse to Max taking over certain things, and he said absolutely not he and Max got along very well.

So, this is why he knows, because to a point he already knew. He was along with us on our journey of selves discovery, and has been one of our greatest supporters. When I finally did get into therapy in February and was diagnosed in March it wasn’t so much of a revelation as a confirmation, and I told him as soon as I got home from the appointment that I had been diagnosed, and over the next few days we had several more discussions about things and elected to tell our close friends who are often over gaming with us and things, especially as half of them suspected anyway.

I know that telling isn’t for everyone. It’s taken me a long time to be able to trust people, and there’s still people in my social circle that I don’t trust enough to tell. If I do go back to work I doubt I’ll tell my bosses because that’s just too awkward a thing to do, and opens things up unnecessarily in the professional environment. However for my husband to know was important to me, because I knew that he needed to understand why certain things go on, and also because I don’t want there to be any secrets between us. It’s one thing to remain between one or two alters at a job but it would be a disservice to my husband and also to our recovery process for him to not know what was going on with his wife, as far as I’m concerned. Plus it prevents there from being issues with certain alters and certain acts. One of the big things between a husband and wife is sex. He wouldn’t want to be having sex with one of the littles, or with Jared, who is a male alter who is straight…that would just be awkward for everyone. So, with him knowing about the switching he knows now that if certain people are “out” there are certain things that he’s not going to do to me. He and Jared get along, they’re just not going to do that.

So, that’s why we told. I know it’s not for everyone. If I hadn’t been aware that I switched before I got married, it might be a different story.

From the Birch Household’s Multiple Monday meme.

1) What are the front runners favorite modes of transportation? Why?
Several of us really like trains, because we associate them with fun times in child hood, but there are no trains where we live now (at least not in the same way) so it’s pretty much driving all the way.

2) Do any/all of the front runners drive?
Yes. Ami doesn’t really drive and she’s the only one who is frequently front who doesn’t. The littles don’t for obvious reasons and Debbi who is their caretaker doesn’t. Jay, Max, Abby and Kiddy all do, Terri technically does but never has that I recall. Apparently some of us are more aggressive drivers than others, according to observations from passengers.

3) What mode of transportation would people most like to try?
Airplane. We’ll probably get our wish in August, we have to go out of state for a wedding.

4) Is anyone in the group afraid of any mode transportation?
We have several people who are nervous about flying for a variety of reasons; and Ami is petrified of the bus after some rather scuzzy Greyhound bus stops that we experienced in college.

5) Is transportation different inside?
… not sure what this question means.

This is something I found saved on the hard drive while I was trying to find our resume. One of us wrote it at some point and I find it very interesting and useful:

The things I find it prudent to remind myself of is that it’s not always necessary or important to actually place yourself in an era because you might not need to learn anything from it, it is actually possible to have a happy and well adjusted life who has no issues. I like to think of them as ‘true vacation lives’ or ‘yay, I win!’, and other times it’s also important to note that while you might remember something one way, another person might not, and that does not make either of you incorrect. Everyone remembers things differently from day to day, why? because that’s a part of life, each of us has a different take on things, perhaps because we have different information or because we don’t want to remember exactly what went on, or we weren’t properly paying attention. These things happen. Ask any police officer who has interviewed several different witnesses about a crime scene (which I have, because I know one) and wow, the different stories you’ll get about something that happened…sometimes witnesses won’t even agree on the race or gender of an assailant, that’s got to be fun; and, that’s something which is going on in the HERE AND NOW, imagine you’re talking another life time where things are hazy recollections across time and space to begin with, and you’re expecting to see things exactly the same? I’ve got news for you. You’re NOT going to. Stop trying.

In many ways it’s better, I believe, if memories do not agree, it feels to me that then there is a more accurate interpretation of the era and life going on, rather than something someone is reading off parrot-fed. Especially when you’re dealing with otherkin, because with otherkin lives it’s a lot harder to draw upon a memory and back it up by going to a historical archive somewhere. If you reincarnate to Vietnam as a soldier, there’s a good chance you can give a name, a rank, a serial number and have it found, and then look at what you feel happened to you and look at what the historical archives say happened to you and validate your memories. That is a lot harder with otherkin, because there is no archival information beyond legend, or in some cases perhaps a book or series that you might feel the author channeled from the same life time you’re tuning into, but chances are in those cases, what you remember and what the author wrote so that he/she could gain commercial acclaim and financial success NOT similar in the slightest.

Anyway, moving on towards soul mates, if you’re still with me by this point, go you, or I’m sorry, whichever you prefer.

Soul mates are a different kettle of fish, because that involves a slightly different situation. When I speak of soul mates here, I don’t speak of a group of people varying roles all and around. I speak of the more commonly conceived notion of two people who are destined to pair off romantically because they have done it over and over and over and over ad naueseum.

Why ‘ad nauseum’? This goes into the realm of my personal opinion, so it might antagonize a few people, but bear with me, okay? I can see the benefit to soul mates, but just barely, and granted this is highly subjective because I know it’s colored by own very personal and very negative experience with squishing yourself into the ’soul mate’ category to your own detriment, why? Because I did.

If you believe you’ve met your soul mate and it’s working for you. Good for you. So long as you’re not limiting and squashing yourself because of it.

To me, reincarnating is about having a variety of experiences, and I do not believe you can appropriately have a variety of experiences and learn to your full potential if you constantly do the same thing. On a much smaller scale, it would be like wanting to learn about all the foods in the world but only going to “Burger King” to eat, and maybe once in a while branching out and going to “MacDonalds”. If you want to learn about all the foods in the world, you’re going to have to travel, because even if you go to all the different restaurants in the United States, you’re still only getting a very narrow perspective. That’s the way I see the over publicized ideal of soul mates.

Now, do I have a soul mate? I do believe I have incarnated with my spouse before. I do believe I have known several friends before, but have I always hooked up with the same soul? No. I’ve had series of time, stretches of life times even, where I have hooked up with the same soul, but there are other life times where that soul might be my sibling, my co-worker, my mother, my son. Variance of experience.

I was with someone for quite some time, and we believed ourselves to be soul mates. I think sometimes that the soul mate thing, for many, is a fanciful phase we go through while we’re still young and romantic and first uncovering the possibility of reincarnation. This is not to say that if someone tells me they’ve met their soul mate I’m going to tell them that they’re wrong. If they believe that, it’s great, I’m more inclined to think they may have met the soul mate of theirs they elected for this life time as their partner, and in another life time they might hook up with a different person from their ka-tet, depending on what they need to learn.

My point, as rambling as it is, is that while we may have life times where we get to sit around and just relax after assessing our various experiences and sort of process everything we’ve learned and been through is that while it is nice to mesh with people and have a connection that shouldn’t be the be all and end all of your reason for reincarnating. Learn to live on your own terms first, learn to be yourself, expand as much as you can, experience as much as you can. Try to be complete on your own rather than focusing all your attention on either fixing or completing someone else, and as you learn and find connections don’t discount those connections or try to force your memories on others, revel in the differences, because those are what make us special. I’m not saying that we’re all special and unique snowflakes, but we are all different, and it’s those differences which make us.

From the Birch Household’s Multiple Monday meme.

1) Does the current presidential race interest the front runners?
Yes, very much, especially as this is the first election we’ve been able to vote in, given we got our citizenship this past year.

2) If you are in an eligible body, are you going to vote?
Absolutely! In fact I already did! I went to early voting.

3) Do all the front runners agree about how they want to cast the body’s vote?
Yes. We didn’t really have a discussion about it, the ones who’ve been paying the most attention made the decision and everyone else deferred to them.

4) Is the presidential race the one big thing on the ballot where you live or are there other interesting races/ballot initiatives on the ballot as well? What are they?
No, there’s also been Amendment 2, which is about gay marriage and civil unions. That’s caused a big ruckus as well.

5) If you are not eligible to vote in the US election this Tuesday, for whom would you vote is you could?
This one is not applicable, and I’ll answer it on the bonus questions.

Bonus Questions:

6) If you are voting this Tuesday, for whom s the body casting its ballot? Why?
We voted for Obama. Mostly because were voting based on vice presidents. Obama went against some of his initial claims, but McCain is extremely sleazy and any time he spoke we wanted to either hide or punch him in the face. However Biden we liked, and Palin…ugh, Palin. She stands for the exact opposite (almost) of everything we were hoping for. There were some things that the Obama-Biden ticket and I didn’t agree on but at least they would properly explain their convictions and reasoning instead of waffling about how they didn’t want to offend anyone and then side-stepping the question completely.

7) If you are voting this Tuesday, how are you voting in other races or for ballot initiatives? Why?
The main one that I voted against was Amendment 2 because I did not want to ban gay marriage and civil unions. I changed our school commissioner, or at least tried to, and voted to keep our sheriff in office because he’s done a lot of good for the police departments in the area.

If the front runners don’t agree on how to cast the vote, how are you deciding who gets to use the body’s vote?
We researched.