Question:
Hi – Hauled out my old satchel of ancient writings (from 20-30 years ago) and read a few things this morning. I was surprised to find that some things that were written when I was 13 or 15 or so were much better than I had remembered. Also, surprise, surprise, many or most seemed to be obviously about dissociation, or arising from dissociated states, or from or about different parts. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised and also a bit overwhelmed. I didn’t read much – it was too much. I will read gradually, I think. I was overwhelmed because, well, it’s hard to acknowledge how close to the surface all the DID stuff was from so early on, and I didn’t "know," even though clearly, I *did* know – the writing attests to it so blatantly. Seems so sad to me that I had to struggle on all that time before someone finally said, hey, guess what is going on with you. I’ll probably put some of the stuff out here at some point, just for the sake of it. I’m even thinking of getting a small collection together to send out to "little" literary magazines. There is poetry from later, which I considered to be my more "serious" and "mature" efforts – but now that I look back at the earlier stuff, I can see that it isn’t as worthless as I had thought. Not all of it anyway. So even some of the older stuff may end up being included in the packets. I’ll keep you informed. Beauty.
Response:
Hmm. Well, I’m sorry that all happened to you. With me, it was a different thing. I did have bad things that I never did forget – it wasn’t a thing of recalling lost stuff. But no one ever picked up on the splitting until I was nearly 40 – I had begun to see a psych. at age 13!! I spent a lot of time kind of mucking around before I finally got down to work that helped. But maybe I had to go through all that I did in order to be able to get to the work that helped. Maybe doing all the kind of conventional digging/analysis kind of stuff helped lay a foundation. (You dig to pour a foundation, right? I don’t know.) Anyway, I know that I was *not* a happy child, in many respects – became unhappier as time went on. And I know that I was splitting since babyhood. It just interests me how clearly this is shown in the poetry and stories from my teenage years. (The stories are downright ooky.) Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – dear beauty, Yes, after lots of therapy we took a "abu*e spin" on our childhood–which was actually pretty happy and fully DID. I am very upset with my therapist for all that. He kept trying to fit us into his abu*e model. There was some and it was very early but my childhood was mostly fine. I was a lonely little girl, getting mixed messages and neurotic values from my family, and that was far more important. Conventional therapy with all the alters would have saved me six years in hell. I don’t know if it would have made me well, but the "horror story" therapy made us sicker and may now have permanent effects. PTSD from therapy is a serious new problem. And we are far more split, more alters, lots of false memory and a very negative spin on the positive things in life. best amy
Response:
dear beauty, Yes, after lots of therapy we took a "abu*e spin" on our childhood–which was actually pretty happy and fully DID. I am very upset with my therapist for all that. He kept trying to fit us into his abu*e model. There was some and it was very early but my childhood was mostly fine. I was a lonely little girl, getting mixed messages and neurotic values from my family, and that was far more important. Conventional therapy with all the alters would have saved me six years in hell. I don’t know if it would have made me well, but the "horror story" therapy made us sicker and may now have permanent effects. PTSD from therapy is a serious new problem. And we are far more split, more alters, lots of false memory and a very negative spin on the positive things in life. best amy
Response:
Hi amy – It’s taken me a while to get back to this, so I hope you don’t mind. I had hints and evidence when I was a child, but no one had ever heard of DID back then (at least not the general public). Then by the time I was a teenager, and I encountered the infamous S*b*l, I always said, "Well, if what had happened to me was *worse* or had been more frequent, I know I definitely would have become multiple, because I have evidence that I have that capacity." Still in denial. Not about the trauma, but about the result – just because DID/MPD was portrayed, and still is, as this kind of almost ridiculous kind of thing. But I guess I was really, really fortunate, because no one ever questioned the precipitating factors and tried to get me to think up more. I was all the more fortunate in that what happened to me was in no way egregious in a legal sense, and some of what happened to me wasn’t even ill-intended. It was just insensitively handled. So it would have been so easy to say either I wasn’t really DID or I wasn’t "remembering" everything. Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – dear beauty, I had my unhappy side as a child. In fact, I was DID as a child and I knew it. I also never forgot my real abuse. By my shrink didn’t think it was the whole story. You beat me by a year, as I started therapy at 14. But, just like you, no-one discussed DID until I reentered therapy in the late eighties. I then quit after a year and thought it was not the real problem. My DID resurfaced in the mid-nineties. best amy Well, I’m sorry that all happened to you. With me, it was a different thing. I did have bad things that I never did forget – it wasn’t a thing of recalling lost stuff. But no one ever picked up on the splitting until I was nearly 40 – I had begun to see a psych. at age 13!! I spent a lot of time kind of Yup! Same here.
Response:
dear beauty, I had my unhappy side as a child. In fact, I was DID as a child and I knew it. I also never forgot my real abuse. By my shrink didn’t think it was the whole story. You beat me by a year, as I started therapy at 14. But, just like you, no-one discussed DID until I reentered therapy in the late eighties. I then quit after a year and thought it was not the real problem. My DID resurfaced in the mid-nineties. best amy Well, I’m sorry that all happened to you. With me, it was a different thing. I did have bad things that I never did forget – it wasn’t a thing of recalling lost stuff. But no one ever picked up on the splitting until I was nearly 40 – I had begun to see a psych. at age 13!! I spent a lot of time kind of
Yup! Same here.
Response:
Hi e (and amy) – A late reply is better than none, maybe? I was just going to say that my most recent counselor and I came to the conclusion that my best strategy is to stop digging around in memory – I’m doing well enough as it is without mucking things up. As a matter of fact, he never did want to know about my "stuff" – he thought that was private. All he wanted to do was work with me about how to a) stay safe, and b) function better. And we did that by talking about and working with how my system functions – leaving all the traumatic "content" stuff alone. It has worked for me better than mucking around in the past did. I mean, maybe I had to muck around in the past first – but, e, it sounds to me from everything that you write that you have an enormously strong analytic grasp on what happened to you. The question now is how to get on with your life, right? I mean, what’s left to know about what happened to you? Just my thoughts, and maybe I’m wrong. Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – dear beauty, Yes, after lots of therapy we took a "abu*e spin" on our childhood–which was actually pretty happy and fully DID. I am very upset with my therapist for all that. He kept trying to fit us into his abu*e model. hi, amy. this happened to me, too. NB: my primary care givers were very abusive so it’s not like i began to think that things that never happened did. i did wonder about a few things that may or may not have happened but i wasn’t sure if they’d actually happened when i remembered them and i’m still not sure. there was lots of abuse whether or not those things happened so they wouldn’t change the overall picture IAE. my first T, clueless [name] as i’ve called him since near the beginning of my therapy, wanted to focus on the abuse. *big* mistake. and he didn’t like that i thought that my childhood was good overall even though there were a lot of awful things in it. he thought my childhood was "terrible" and wanted me to think so, too. i admit that i had to use some mental gymnastics, along with a lot of minimization, in order to view my childhood as good overall (e.g., comparing it to life in a concentration camp or in one of the Cambodian "re-education" camps). but, hey, it worked a lot better than what he did to me. or my other Ts. i think the problem is that many Ts use the "simple (i.e., single-incident) PTSD" model on complex PTSD and DDs. I.e., they think that you should remember the trauma, feel the feelings attached to it, fully process it, and move on. It’s basically the model described in Judith Hermann’s Trauma and Recovery. Well, that doesn’t work well for lots of ppl with DDs or complex PTSD. It causes many of them to deteriorate, sometimes permanently. There was some and it was very early but my childhood was mostly fine. Mine, too. I liked school. 
And I liked playing with other kids. :) I was a lonely little girl, getting mixed messages and neurotic values from my family, and that was far more important. That is hard. :( It’s hard to be a lonely adult. It’s even harder to be a lonely child. :( I think a lot of ppl here can relate to that. I think almost all families send mixed messages. I think most of the FOOs here sent messages that were much more conflicted and conflictual than typical families. And they sent a lot more of them. It’s very hard for kids to deal with that. Esp without support. Conventional therapy with all the alters would have saved me six years in hell. Sorry you didn’t get good therapy. Sorry you had to go through six years of hell. :P~ I don’t know if it would have made me well, but the "horror story" therapy made us sicker and may now have permanent effects. PTSD from therapy is a serious new problem. I’ve got that, too. I don’t think I had PTSD before therapy. I do now. Big time. I’ve also got some other serious psychological and physical problems that I never had before therapy. As a psychologist said before the haldol (so I was doing a lot better than I am now) I’m "a shadow of my former self." Now I guess I’m a shadow of a shadow. I’m not sure how to even become something resembling a shadow of my former self, much less anything resembling my former self. And we are far more split, more alters, lots of false memory and a very negative spin on the positive things in life. That sounds very difficult, amy. It sounds like you have a lot of work to do. It sounds like we are in similar positions: we have far more work to do but are far more debilitated than before therapy. Thus, we have a far more difficult task that we need to accomplish with far fewer resources than we had before. It bites. Big time. If you ever want to talk about this, please let me know. I’d like to hear about what’s happened and how you’re dealing with it. best, e
Response:
I just stumbled onto this thread and I’m feeling quite upset. I’m just realizing I have DID (though I’ve been "we" my whole life…hmm) and am remembering lots and lots of stuff. I thought it was good to remember and integrate and also that there was no such thing as "false memories"…not to say that they are TOTALLY acurate, but certainly not "false". Not to discount anyone’s experience. I’m just confused. I assumed I needed to take the path Herman outlined. What are my alternatives if I don’t want to spend my life just coping? Help? Thoughts? Books?
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi e (and amy) – A late reply is better than none, maybe? I was just going to say that my most recent counselor and I came to the conclusion that my best strategy is to stop digging around in memory – I’m doing well enough as it is without mucking things up. As a matter of fact, he never did want to know about my "stuff" – he thought that was private. All he wanted to do was work with me about how to a) stay safe, and b) function better. And we did that by talking about and working with how my system functions – leaving all the traumatic "content" stuff alone. It has worked for me better than mucking around in the past did. I mean, maybe I had to muck around in the past first – but, e, it sounds to me from everything that you write that you have an enormously strong analytic grasp on what happened to you. The question now is how to get on with your life, right? I mean, what’s left to know about what happened to you? Just my thoughts, and maybe I’m wrong. Beauty. dear beauty, Yes, after lots of therapy we took a "abu*e spin" on our childhood–which was actually pretty happy and fully DID. I am very upset with my therapist for all that. He kept trying to fit us into his abu*e model. hi, amy. this happened to me, too. NB: my primary care givers were very abusive so it’s not like i began to think that things that never happened did. i did wonder about a few things that may or may not have happened but i wasn’t sure if they’d actually happened when i remembered them and i’m still not sure. there was lots of abuse whether or not those things happened so they wouldn’t change the overall picture IAE. my first T, clueless [name] as i’ve called him since near the beginning of my therapy, wanted to focus on the abuse. *big* mistake. and he didn’t like that i thought that my childhood was good overall even though there were a lot of awful things in it. he thought my childhood was "terrible" and wanted me to think so, too. i admit that i had to use some mental gymnastics, along with a lot of minimization, in order to view my childhood as good overall (e.g., comparing it to life in a concentration camp or in one of the Cambodian "re-education" camps). but, hey, it worked a lot better than what he did to me. or my other Ts. i think the problem is that many Ts use the "simple (i.e., single-incident) PTSD" model on complex PTSD and DDs. I.e., they think that you should remember the trauma, feel the feelings attached to it, fully process it, and move on. It’s basically the model described in Judith Hermann’s Trauma and Recovery. Well, that doesn’t work well for lots of ppl with DDs or complex PTSD. It causes many of them to deteriorate, sometimes permanently. There was some and it was very early but my childhood was mostly fine. Mine, too. I liked school. And I liked playing with other kids. :) I was a lonely little girl, getting mixed messages and neurotic values from my family, and that was far more important. That is hard. :( It’s hard to be a lonely adult. It’s even harder to be a lonely child. :( I think a lot of ppl here can relate to that. I think almost all families send mixed messages. I think most of the FOOs here sent messages that were much more conflicted and conflictual than typical families. And they sent a lot more of them. It’s very hard for kids to deal with that. Esp without support. Conventional therapy with all the alters would have saved me six years in hell. Sorry you didn’t get good therapy. Sorry you had to go through six years of hell. :P~ I don’t know if it would have made me well, but the "horror story" therapy made us sicker and may now have permanent effects. PTSD from therapy is a serious new problem. I’ve got that, too. I don’t think I had PTSD before therapy. I do now. Big time. I’ve also got some other serious psychological and physical problems that I never had before therapy. As a psychologist said before the haldol (so I was doing a lot better than I am now) I’m "a shadow of my former self." Now I guess I’m a shadow of a shadow. I’m not sure how to even become something resembling a shadow of my former self, much less anything resembling my former self. And we are far more split, more alters, lots of false memory and a very negative spin on the positive things in life. That sounds very difficult, amy. It sounds like you have a lot of work to do. It sounds like we are in similar positions: we have far more work to do but are far more debilitated than before therapy. Thus, we have a far more difficult task that we need to accomplish with far fewer resources than we had before. It bites. Big time. If you ever want to talk about this, please let me know. I’d like to hear about what’s happened and how you’re dealing with it. best, e
Response:
Beauty How wonderful for you to still have your writings! I too wrote a lot starting as a young teenager. I wrote hundreds of poems and I even managed a novel. I was in my 30’s and just diagnosed when I found my writing stored away in a box. I saw the dissociative poems and all the feelings they dealt with and one of us destroyed everything. I guess we were trying to deny out past. I also found among the pain, poems of love and beauty. I was shocked that I was capable of not only seeing it at that age while all the bad stuff was happening, but to be able to write about it was amazing to me. I only can remember two lines of my poetry, well that is because I put it in my yearbook. I remember that I wanted to be a published author so I figured that the only way that would happen is if I put it in my yearbook. Was’t I cute ? I remember sitting in my hiding place watching a father play with his son on their front lawn. The boy was about 6 years old. I just sat in hiding and watched them and cried and cried because I thought it was so beautiful. My only published poem or part, re printed here: I never saw a thing More beautiful than a father and a son I can’t remember the rest , but it was one of my favorites. I should have saved the novel because it was so totally auto biographical and I am sure it would have been publishable, esp in todays market. I am sure that all my writings from back then would be very useful to me today. I really regret not having them. I decided to not mope over it because I can write hundreds of poems and another novel as soon as I put my mind to it. Right now , I have a series of articles in progress that I am developing as I recover. I hope to maybe publish them someday when I can provide a sumation. I write a lot in journal and that takes the place of my creative writing urges for now. Are you adding to you writings from your past ? What a wonderful way to look back and see progress and growth. I hope to be able to do that again someday. Keep Warm Ellen and keep writing !
Response:
Hello Andy – I am sorry the thread has you upset and confused. I didn’t mean to say that for me it wasn’t good to remember. I do remember. For me, though, there came a time (after about 30 years of work!!!) to quit digging around in the past. That’s all. And my memories correspond to actual events – I am quite certain, because no one has ever denied them, and in fact, they have even told me about things that happened that I don’t remember, that they were involved in and would have no reason to tell me about unless they were true. The work of reconstructing what went on with the parts and the splitting still continues – but not in a conscious way involving digging around in the memories. It happens through considering what is happening with my feelings today, and thinking about where they are coming from. My work is now centered on becoming functional, as much so as possible – and I believe that how that looks for me is going to be very different from how that looks for you or for anyone else, because everyone’s system is different and works differently. I wish you the very best in beginning the work post-dx – and I’ll bet you’ve already done more than you realize, and are probably in a better spot than you think as far as the functionality of your system. The reason I am betting this is that functionality is the reason the system came into being in the first place. Now it’s just a matter of figuring out the *how* of it so that you can decide what needs to change and what you can take advantage of, and what strategies for healing you want to follow. Best of luck – Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I just stumbled onto this thread and I’m feeling quite upset. I’m just realizing I have DID (though I’ve been "we" my whole life…hmm) and am remembering lots and lots of stuff. I thought it was good to remember and integrate and also that there was no such thing as "false memories"…not to say that they are TOTALLY acurate, but certainly not "false". Not to discount anyone’s experience. I’m just confused. I assumed I needed to take the path Herman outlined. What are my alternatives if I don’t want to spend my life just coping? Help? Thoughts? Books? Hi e (and amy) – A late reply is better than none, maybe? I was just going to say that my most recent counselor and I came to the conclusion that my best strategy is to stop digging around in memory – I’m doing well enough as it is without mucking things up. As a matter of fact, he never did want to know about my "stuff" – he thought that was private. All he wanted to do was work with me about how to a) stay safe, and b) function better. And we did that by talking about and working with how my system functions – leaving all the traumatic "content" stuff alone. It has worked for me better than mucking around in the past did. I mean, maybe I had to muck around in the past first – but, e, it sounds to me from everything that you write that you have an enormously strong analytic grasp on what happened to you. The question now is how to get on with your life, right? I mean, what’s left to know about what happened to you? Just my thoughts, and maybe I’m wrong. Beauty. dear beauty, Yes, after lots of therapy we took a "abu*e spin" on our childhood–which was actually pretty happy and fully DID. I am very upset with my therapist for all that. He kept trying to fit us into his abu*e model. hi, amy. this happened to me, too. NB: my primary care givers were very abusive so it’s not like i began to think that things that never happened did. i did wonder about a few things that may or may not have happened but i wasn’t sure if they’d actually happened when i remembered them and i’m still not sure. there was lots of abuse whether or not those things happened so they wouldn’t change the overall picture IAE. my first T, clueless [name] as i’ve called him since near the beginning of my therapy, wanted to focus on the abuse. *big* mistake. and he didn’t like that i thought that my childhood was good overall even though there were a lot of awful things in it. he thought my childhood was "terrible" and wanted me to think so, too. i admit that i had to use some mental gymnastics, along with a lot of minimization, in order to view my childhood as good overall (e.g., comparing it to life in a concentration camp or in one of the Cambodian "re-education" camps). but, hey, it worked a lot better than what he did to me. or my other Ts. i think the problem is that many Ts use the "simple (i.e., single-incident) PTSD" model on complex PTSD and DDs. I.e., they think that you should remember the trauma, feel the feelings attached to it, fully process it, and move on. It’s basically the model described in Judith Hermann’s Trauma and Recovery. Well, that doesn’t work well for lots of ppl with DDs or complex PTSD. It causes many of them to deteriorate, sometimes permanently. There was some and it was very early but my childhood was mostly fine. Mine, too. I liked school. And I liked playing with other kids. :) I was a lonely little girl, getting mixed messages and neurotic values from my family, and that was far more important. That is hard. :( It’s hard to be a lonely adult. It’s even harder to be a lonely child. :( I think a lot of ppl here can relate to that. I think almost all families send mixed messages. I think most of the FOOs here sent messages that were much more conflicted and conflictual than typical families. And they sent a lot more of them. It’s very hard for kids to deal with that. Esp without support. Conventional therapy with all the alters would have saved me six years in hell. Sorry you didn’t get good therapy. Sorry you had to go through six years of hell. :P~ I don’t know if it would have made me well, but the "horror story" therapy made us sicker and may now have permanent effects. PTSD from therapy is a serious new problem. I’ve got that, too. I don’t think I had PTSD before therapy. I do now. Big time. I’ve also got some other serious psychological and physical problems that I never had before therapy. As a psychologist said before the haldol (so I was doing a lot better than I am now) I’m "a shadow of my former self." Now I guess I’m a shadow of a shadow. I’m not sure how to even become something resembling a shadow of my former self, much less anything resembling my former self. And we are far more split, more alters, lots of false memory and a very negative spin on the positive things in life. That sounds very difficult, amy. It sounds like you have a lot of work to do. It sounds like we are in similar positions: we have far more work to do but are far more debilitated than before therapy. Thus, we have a far more difficult task that we need to accomplish with far fewer resources than we had before. It bites. Big time. If you ever want to talk about this, please let me know. I’d like to hear about what’s happened and how you’re dealing with it. best, e
Response:
I just stumbled onto this thread and I’m feeling quite upset.
I hope that settles down soon. I’m just realizing I have DID (though I’ve been "we" my whole life…hmm) and am remembering lots and lots of stuff.
Please be a bit careful about calling yourself DID (I assume you don’t mean ‘realizing’ in the sense of "I’ve been diagnosed but it’s only just sinking in"… ’scuse me and ignore this para if that’s what you mean). I don’t mean that you aren’t because I couldn’t know. I just mean that it is a specific diagnosis with all sorts of criteria and that good clinicians don’t make the diagnosis without giving you some tests and talking with you a lot. To an experienced clinician there are significant differences between DID and DDNOS and dissociative amnesia and PTSD even though inexperienced people will often confuse them and think they’re all pretty much the same. I’ve never been all that keen on diagnosis myself (although I do believe it’s important in various ways) so I’m a run-of- the-mill dissy person. That is, I have problems with dissociation but I don’t assume I’d be one diagnosis or another. Anyway, please be careful about self-diagnosis because a lot of things can give you a similar sort of thing to dissy problems and you can have other problems along with dissy problems. I thought it was good to remember and integrate
A lot of therapists and theorists think this is the best idea. I’ve met people who have done this and who were glad they did, they feel like they’ve ‘healed’ pretty much completely – it doesn’t mean the nasty stuff just disappears but it means they know how to deal with it and it’s just a part of their life. On the other hand I know people like amy and e for whom this doesn’t seem much help – for them it seems to have been a bad idea and their therapists don’t seem to have paid much attention to them saying that it didn’t seem to be helping. I suppose it’s difficult for therapists to decide what’s best to do because if you do remember things that are horrible then you’re going to feel bad about them, that’s only logical, so the idea that things might get worse before they get better is realistic if you pursue the idea that remembering everything awful is your course. I don’t think therapists should really push any agenda at all – I think that if _you_ want to remember things and integrate and all that then go for it, but don’t assume you have to. I did something in between; for a little while I really wanted to push remembering but then I decided I’d just let myself remember if that’s what my mind/brain was doing but I wouldn’t try anything in particular. Things bubbled up every so often for a while and I feel like I’m pretty settled with it – which means I’m probably ‘integrated’ for whatever degree of dissociation I started with. It isn’t perfect, though, and I also have ways of coping with still being a bit fragmented, which is the more important style of recovery for people who don’t need or want to do all that memory/ integration stuff. and also that there was no such thing as "false memories"…not to say that they are TOTALLY acurate, but certainly not "false". Not to discount anyone’s experience. I’m just confused.
That’s okay, it is confusing stuff. I am very sure that there are such things as ‘false memories’. To understand whether that’s relevant to you or not the first thing to look at is the circumstances under which you remembered stuff. If everything came back in response to questions while you were hypnotised then that could mean the person who hypnotized you has misled you by their questions. If you remembered things in a situation where you felt a lot of pressure or stress about the answers you gave then that can tend to lower the accuracy of recall. I don’t mean feeling distressed about the content BTW, I mean some sort of external stress like if people in a group are looking at you expectantly and saying "Come on, tell us all about it" or a therapist is saying "I’ve only got five minutes left so hurry up and get it out". Memories that come back with chemical help like ‘truth drugs’ can also be less accurate than other memories. The next thing to look at is corroboration, can you find evidence that you didn’t know about before the memories turned up which shows that they are accurate? The important things to note about memory of past events in your life IMO are that it is reconstructive and that ‘true/false’ does not adequately cover the possibilities. There’s no reason to think that any recovered memory is any more or less accurate than other memory. As long as there aren’t ‘contaminating factors’ then you can expect your recovered memories to be as accurate as usual memories from your past. Even so, memory is ‘reconstructive’ in that your brain rehearses and repeats it and so do you (under normal circumstances) when you discuss it with people. When recovered memories come up your brain still has to do some of that ‘putting things together’ so there’s some margin for error in there. When you discuss them with your therapist or with friends or other people then you’re likely to do a little reconstruction then too. This _doesn’t_ mean they become ‘false’ as soon as you talk about them, just that you need to be careful exactly what it is that’s come up and what you’re thinking is so because of context or suggestions or things you’ve read or because it makes better sense or something like that. The true/false distinction is misleading. If you remember something happening and remember that you were wearing a white t-shirt but then find out that on that day you were wearing a yellow t-shirt that doesn’t make the whole thing ‘false’. If you find out that you _were_ definitely wearing a white t-shirt it doesn’t prove that the whole thing’s ‘true’, either – but in the absence of contaminating factors there’s no reason to presume it’s any less true than your usual memories. It’s also worth noting that people sometimes have recovered memories which are not ‘factually’ accurate but _are_ ‘metaphorically’ accurate, like a memory of someone looking really scary might only mean that you’re realising that the person was someone to be scared of rather than that you actually saw them looking exactly like that. On the subject of ‘false memories’ as in complete horrible events that never really happened, I’ve e-met lots of people who have had this experience. Perhaps it’s because they are misdirected to fabricate awful things on the basis of relatively ordinary (but still unpleasant) things. Maybe they come up with things to agree with a therapist (or someone else, or maybe just their own suspicion) saying that they’re sure something must have happened. Maybe in some cases awful things _did_ happen but they’ve completely misidentified the time or place or perpetrator. I think there are a lot of possibilities but anyway, I’m sure that sometimes people have come to believe things that didn’t actually happen. The safest thing is to put your story together as best you can without direction or suggestion. Therapists and others can offer support and security and that can help a lot but avoid people who try hard to say "Did suchandsuch happen?" or anything else that actually suggests things. When you’re trying to understand what these experiences mean you can also try to find corroborative things, that’s really the only way to be absolutely sure. I assumed I needed to take the path Herman outlined. What are my alternatives if I don’t want to spend my life just coping? Help? Thoughts? Books?
If you mean in the book "Trauma and Recovery" I think that’s a good plan. That’s pretty much what I’ve done but with some deviation and some periods where I took time off. If you find that remembering and integrating feels right to you then I think that’s a good guideline. I found that I sort of kept cycling through things in the way Herman describes. It’s an odd sort of progress since you keep repeating steps but you move forward as well. It’s okay to be different, though. You might find that the memory stuff is not helping or is too distressing. There’s no law which says you have to know exactly everything that’s ever happened to you in order to be satisfied with life now and in the future so if you feel you would be better off trying a different approach then go ahead and try. Mick. — "Many a mickle makes a muckle". Before you buy.
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Hi Ellen – At about age 20 I "edited" my stack of notebooks – I had a stack which was literally about two feet high. I picked through them and saved what I considered the "best" stuff. Now I am sorry that I didn’t save it all, because how could I have known then what might or might not be important now. But on the other hand – what if all of it were destroyed, even now: I’d have to live with that, too. I am a "keeper." Sometimes I wish some external force would relieve me of that proclivity. Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Beauty How wonderful for you to still have your writings! I too wrote a lot starting as a young teenager. I wrote hundreds of poems and I even managed a novel. I was in my 30’s and just diagnosed when I found my writing stored away in a box. I saw the dissociative poems and all the feelings they dealt with and one of us destroyed everything. I guess we were trying to deny out past. I also found among the pain, poems of love and beauty. I was shocked that I was capable of not only seeing it at that age while all the bad stuff was happening, but to be able to write about it was amazing to me. I only can remember two lines of my poetry, well that is because I put it in my yearbook. I remember that I wanted to be a published author so I figured that the only way that would happen is if I put it in my yearbook. Was’t I cute ? I remember sitting in my hiding place watching a father play with his son on their front lawn. The boy was about 6 years old. I just sat in hiding and watched them and cried and cried because I thought it was so beautiful. My only published poem or part, re printed here: I never saw a thing More beautiful than a father and a son I can’t remember the rest , but it was one of my favorites. I should have saved the novel because it was so totally auto biographical and I am sure it would have been publishable, esp in todays market. I am sure that all my writings from back then would be very useful to me today. I really regret not having them. I decided to not mope over it because I can write hundreds of poems and another novel as soon as I put my mind to it. Right now , I have a series of articles in progress that I am developing as I recover. I hope to maybe publish them someday when I can provide a sumation. I write a lot in journal and that takes the place of my creative writing urges for now. Are you adding to you writings from your past ? What a wonderful way to look back and see progress and growth. I hope to be able to do that again someday. Keep Warm Ellen and keep writing !
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I also think it’s really cool to have old writings. I have 76 journals from the age of 7 to the present, plus three books of poetry and many stories of various lengths. Once in awhile I like to read back over things I’ve written from particular periods in my life, or I’ll go back and read what I wrote on a particular date every year for the past 20 years, stuff like that. It’s interesting to see patterns this way. It’s also interesting to go back and find things from 5 or 6 years ago that was helpful to me that I’d forgotten about, and then be able to use that wisdom again. Of course, there are also times when my main reaction to what I wrote is "DUH!" But that’s waht personal writing is for, I think, to sort out all the different thoughts and feelings, whatever they are. Do other people like to go back and re-read? Are there any particular methods of re-reading that you feel are most useful, like reading everything from one year or by topic or whatever? Do you currently write a lot also? -Nancy
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y’all are so lucky to have kept your old stuff. i don’t have old writings or photographs or mementos or anything from any of my pasts. i wish i did. tess
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I also think it’s really cool to have old writings. I have 76 journals from the age of 7 to the present, plus three books of poetry and many stories of various lengths. Once in awhile I like to read back over things I’ve written from particular periods in my life, or I’ll go back and read what I wrote on a particular date every year for the past 20 years, stuff like that. It’s interesting to see patterns this way. It’s also interesting to go back and find things from 5 or 6 years ago that was helpful to me that I’d forgotten about, and then be able to use that wisdom again. Of course, there are also times when my main reaction to what I wrote is "DUH!" But that’s waht personal writing is for, I think, to sort out all the different thoughts and feelings, whatever they are. Do other people like to go back and re-read? Are there any particular methods of re-reading that you feel are most useful, like reading everything from one year or by topic or whatever? Do you currently write a lot also? -Nancy
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the following book views dealing with trauma as optional: Gold, Steven N. Not Trauma Alone: Therapy for Child Abuse Survivors in Family and Social Context. 2000: Brunner/Mazel.
I think Dr. Gold’s position is more complex than e can convey in her
impact had been avoided or ignored with [clients who were survivors of prolonged childhood abuse]. While the content of the abusive incidents themselves was not the primary focus, their influence on the formation or intensification of distorted beliefs about the self and others was an integral part of the treatment enterprise" (from Gold, 2000, p. 216). Gold goes on to say that the pacing under which traumatic material is examined should be under the control of the client. I agree that clients should not be pushed or coaxed into this material, and I would add (as does Dr. Gold elsewhere in his book) that many clients benefit from learning how to slow down and gain control over intrusive traumatic material–and this is a skill that trauma therapists should know how to teach. Peter — Clinical Psychologist 5851 Pearl Road, Suite 305 Cleveland, OH 44130 Phone: Voice: 440-845-9011, press 6; Fax: 440-845-9013 Opinions posted here are my own and not necessarily those of any organization with which I am affiliated
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Hi Nancy – I kind of open the box where a lot of the writings are kept and begin at the top – sometimes I skip things if they look to challenging or painful. With old journals, usually they are embarrassing – sometimes astonishing. Once, a while back, in the context of re-discovering the course of my life, I re-read the journals, and I found out something incredible. I always thought that my first live-in boyfriend left me! I found out that I decided that the relationship was over, based on the unsatisfactory nature of our relationship. I mean, I think he had pulled out emotionally (but I think he had pulled out of life at that point). But all that time I had been convinced that he had left me, that he had disappeared, that I had been abandoned. It’s probably about time to go back again and re-read stuff. I kept a process journal during the most intense period of discovery at the beginning of my DID work. There’s some amazing stuff there, and I am sooooo thankful I wrote it and kept it – I would never have rememebered a tenth of it if I hadn’t, and it’s so intense and complex. And – I have to go back and look at that, too, because I’m sure there’s a ton of that I’ve forgotten. In fact, the other day I ran across the record of a dream I’d had maybe 30 years ago – and it blew me away, because it corresponded with an inner image-experience I had during DID work just about six years ago. In it, a small boy part appeared. I have to go looking in the process journal to see if I can find where that happened. Would you consider sending any of your writing for the creative publication we are working on? We would like to include as many people as possible, who would like to be included. Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I also think it’s really cool to have old writings. I have 76 journals from the age of 7 to the present, plus three books of poetry and many stories of various lengths. Once in awhile I like to read back over things I’ve written from particular periods in my life, or I’ll go back and read what I wrote on a particular date every year for the past 20 years, stuff like that. It’s interesting to see patterns this way. It’s also interesting to go back and find things from 5 or 6 years ago that was helpful to me that I’d forgotten about, and then be able to use that wisdom again. Of course, there are also times when my main reaction to what I wrote is "DUH!" But that’s waht personal writing is for, I think, to sort out all the different thoughts and feelings, whatever they are. Do other people like to go back and re-read? Are there any particular methods of re-reading that you feel are most useful, like reading everything from one year or by topic or whatever? Do you currently write a lot also? -Nancy
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I totally agree with this … theme … thought … idea … purpose. The "belief", may be more a more accurate word <for me, to learn to slow down in therapy. I gallop. I gallop into "learning more" … "understanding more" … in hopes of interrupting the intrusive memories. Yet … that "more" thing … the gallop to know and understand … actually <for me was part of the perp’s lie … to have me afraid that I would not EVER learn "enough" … nor "be" enough … to heal. Recently … (and, again, I have to convey that this is my own journey’s direction … I could never assume that it is a direction "all" those in recovery should aim) … recently I have asked myself, "am I okay with knowing JUST what I know today?" Even reading the <above self-question … perplexes me. Yet it evolved out of a concern that I have a core need … to always be a human who learns. A human who seeks. Yet there is a frantic nature to my seeking. If I want … or need … to "be" a seeker, then I want to be content, to some extent, with "not" knowing everything today. I have to, at some point, have to come into relationship with the part of self that does NOT know an answer to a question that plagues me. I have operated with a fervent fear that I must hurry to learn "Enough." But am I willing … <I ask myself … to let that which abides in me … the abiding thought and emotion and perception … am I willing to let this be "enough" for today? It brought old and salty tears … in a silent and gulping grief … when I glimpsed a <till recently "missed" relationship with the limits of today. There was a freedom, of sorts … a stillness … that rose up within me … when I began to explore living within my limited understanding of today. Because I AM able to track back over the decade … over the last year … over the last month or day … of therapy OR life … and see growth. And if I can look back and see growth, am I willing to invite myself into that place of "not knowing" <fill-in-the-blank … and still "know" I AM growing. It is what happens. I grow. Even in the disassembly of me, I have discovered wealth <of perseverence in spirit, among many other qualities that I can label as growth. Thanks, Peter, for this thought. It is an enormous lesson I am discovering. It is good. It is not easy. But it is very good … when … even for a moment … I can take a break from the galloping "need to know more", and visit that embrace of what I DO know. And also <the VERY hard part embrace that which I do not know … embrace that as "discovery of life" which I have yet to learn. I have a lot of respect for other perspectives on this … respect for perspectives even in stark contrast to that which I discover about me. Meaning … I appreciate disagreement with the idea of "slowing down." I appreciate that there IS a "time to hurry." I do not, by any stretch, discount the "gallop to know." Yet I have to gratefully "nod" to self, that sometimes … sometimes … it is okay to take it slowly. willowtree I agree that clients should not – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – be pushed or coaxed into this material, and I would add (as does Dr. Gold elsewhere in his book) that many clients benefit from learning how to slow down and gain control over intrusive traumatic material–and this is a skill that trauma therapists should know how to teach. Peter — Clinical Psychologist 5851 Pearl Road, Suite 305 Cleveland, OH 44130 Phone: Voice: 440-845-9011, press 6; Fax: 440-845-9013 Opinions posted here are my own and not necessarily those of any organization with which I am affiliated
Before you buy.
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If I want … or need … to "be" a seeker, then I want to be content, to some extent, with "not" knowing everything today. I have operated with a fervent fear that I must hurry to learn "Enough."
I’ve gone through long periods of time filled with a frantic impulse to learn more, know more, understand more, produce more knowledge that will lead to healing. In the past couple years, I have tried to focus more on allowing myself to just be, to let myself be who I am, to be in a process of becoming without pushing myself so hard that I can’t integrate what learn, and to allow periods of time when I am not so focused on learning, but on other things. I have a hard time finding a balance between pushing too much and becoming apathetic and sliding backward. I think my fear of losing ground is part of my pushing. I think these are very important issues and I’m glad you brought them up. -Nancy
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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – the following book views dealing with trauma as optional: Gold, Steven N. Not Trauma Alone: Therapy for Child Abuse Survivors in Family and Social Context. 2000: Brunner/Mazel. I think Dr. Gold’s position is more complex than e can convey in her impact had been avoided or ignored with [clients who were survivors of prolonged childhood abuse]. While the content of the abusive incidents themselves was not the primary focus, their influence on the formation or intensification of distorted beliefs about the self and others was an integral part of the treatment enterprise" (from Gold, 2000, p. 216). Gold goes on to say that the pacing under which traumatic material is examined should be under the control of the client. I agree that clients should not be pushed or coaxed into this material, and I would add (as does Dr. Gold elsewhere in his book) that many clients benefit from learning how to slow down and gain control over intrusive traumatic material–and this is a skill that trauma therapists should know how to teach. Peter
yeah, but clients should remember to pay attention to this when they are teaching it. I can remember well how my t’pist insisted and insisted I slow down. He kept ‘teaching’ and ‘teaching’ this and I just blew him off. Teaching only works if the client pays attention! It may be up to the client to pace in this area but when the client is a total dingbat *innocently looking skyward, who me?* and _insists_ on going to fast the t’pist should be prepared to pick up the pieces as needed. *sigh* I think more t’pists need to be more direct and blunt and say ‘LOOK! Stop it!’ Rainbow Colors (Jill) — The colors blend, the edges soften. Swirling and mixing we are becoming white light.
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Beauty, who is working on the creative publication? I think I missed discussion of that. I’m interested in hearing about it. It sounds like a great idea, and I think I’d like to be involved. -Nancy
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Nancy, One thing I am learning, with the patient guidance of my therapist, is that during ab*se, my world (my assessment of the world, my intake of informaton) had to be processed at the speed of light … everso quickly … to ensure safety. As an adult, I have worked hard to build a safe world. It is, by all outward signs, safe. Yet I have run on the old vibration of, "Hurry. I have to know "first," before anyone else, in order to stay safe." As you said so well, I don’t have the luxury <from within the story of the past to "lose ground." It causes me to feel unsafe to let down my guard. And, for me, knowledge IS a guard. Even when I can name volumes of details in my life, today, that are very safe, I find I am still riddled with the old vibration of history. One of my main ingredients of growth, is to learn that balance of which you speak. To accept times of simplicity and quiet. To turn down the frequency that runs that vibration of emergency in my veins. And when I <quite often don’t seem to be able to dim the surge of emergency within me … I remind myself that I am at least "open" to the possibility … and then I watch for the growth. Because … even to be "open" to a concept … is <for me a beginning of change. willowtree – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I’ve gone through long periods of time filled with a frantic impulse to learn more, know more, understand more, produce more knowledge that will lead to healing. In the past couple years, I have tried to focus more on allowing myself to just be, to let myself be who I am, to be in a process of becoming without pushing myself so hard that I can’t integrate what learn, and to allow periods of time when I am not so focused on learning, but on other things. I have a hard time finding a balance between pushing too much and becoming apathetic and sliding backward. I think my fear of losing ground is part of my pushing. I think these are very important issues and I’m glad you brought them up. -Nancy
Before you buy.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I think Dr. Gold’s position is more complex than e can convey addressing abuse and its impact had been avoided or ignored with [clients who were survivors of prolonged childhood abuse]. While the content of the abusive incidents themselves was not the primary focus, their influence on the formation or intensification of distorted beliefs about the self and others was an integral part of the treatment enterprise" (from Gold, 2000, p. 216). Gold goes on to say that the pacing under which traumatic material is examined should be under the control of the client. I agree that clients should not be pushed or coaxed into this material, and I would add (as does Dr. Gold elsewhere in his book) that many clients benefit from learning how to slow down and gain control over intrusive traumatic material–and this is a skill that trauma therapists should know how to teach.
Good point, Peter. yeah, but clients should remember to pay attention to this when they are teaching it. I can remember well how my t’pist insisted and insisted I slow down. He kept ‘teaching’ and ‘teaching’ this and I just blew him off. Teaching only works if the client pays attention! It may be up to the client to pace in this area but when the client is a total dingbat *innocently looking skyward, who me?* and _insists_ on going to fast the t’pist should be prepared to pick up the pieces as needed. *sigh* I think more t’pists need to be more direct and blunt and say ‘LOOK! Stop it!’
VERY good point, Jill. I’ve never had a T tell me this but knew this needed to be done by us for us, ie. tell ourselves. Sometimes it’s hard when things are exploding confusion/chaos *and* it’s not impossible. This is one thing we use here esp when someone starts living too much in the past (like beyond meager ponderings) and starts a spiral when injecting the past into the present where it doesn’t belong. "stop it!" works really really good! So my advice is if someone’s T isn’t doing this… pick up the slack bc YOU CAN! : o) Sierra of TN
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This is one thing we use here esp when someone starts living too much in the past (like beyond meager ponderings) and starts a spiral when injecting the past into the present where it doesn’t belong. "stop it!" works really really good! So my advice is if someone’s T isn’t doing this… pick up the slack bc YOU CAN! : o) Sierra of TN
Indeed, it is not only true, it is a big gift to give self … to interrupt the "injection of the past" … WHICH brings up a question with which I grapple … wrestle … grit my teeth upon … That question looks something like this <stated in different questions because, inside me, the question comes out different ways. : "How do I know when the ‘old story’ needs tending?" "How do I understand when an inside part is hurting ‘too much’ … so that if I listened a little closer to what they were describing (regarding "their" past experiences), that I might be able to help relieve some of their pain?" "How do I balance that ‘listening’, with the very important ‘knock it off! ENOUGH for today.’" Answers come to mind … Because I know I have visited this answer in small increments … "Time <or experience provides perspective on balance of ‘listening’ and ’stopping’." "Allow for that very realistic ‘pendulum swing’, where listening might get ‘out of proportion.’ Or where ’stopping’ gets out of proportion." "Allow for the fact that there isn’t a ‘perfect process.’ All people have the freedom to explore and even reject certain options." "When possible, describe what day it is, where I live, how old I am <today, how old I ‘feel’, how much time has passed since the ab*se. Describe the house I am in right now. Identify that the emotional surge of the past is not about things happening today." … Can you tell I am struggling with my PTSD stuff? … I like to consider that I have a "dimmer switch" on the "wall of me" … and can at least turn down the volume of this "figure it out." Even the procedure of slowing down, can insiduously grow into panic. Ahhhh the rocks on the soil of my journey DO sometimes injure my footfall. Then … I chuckel … I AM quite adept at accelerating. Sometimes, lately, when I cannot shut off my brain, I just wave the "white flag" on self-intervention, and say to the parts that are accelerating in worry, "Oh GO for it. Just run in circles trying to figure this out. Might as well get a feel for the exhaustion. Maybe THAT is a lesson I am learning today. The lesson of ‘Define, in infinte terms, the meaning of OVER THINKING’." <ahem willowtree Before you buy.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – How do I know when the ‘old story’ needs tending?" "How do I understand when an inside part is hurting ‘too much’ … so that if I listened a little closer to what they were describing (regarding "their" past experiences), that I might be able to help relieve some of their pain?" "How do I balance that ‘listening’, with the very important ‘knock it off! ENOUGH for today.’" "Time <or experience provides perspective on balance of ‘listening’ and ’stopping’." "Allow for that very realistic ‘pendulum swing’, where listening might get ‘out of proportion.’ Or where ’stopping’ gets out of proportion." "Allow for the fact that there isn’t a ‘perfect process.’ All people have the freedom to explore and even reject certain options.
I really admire the sense of acceptance of your process that is expressed here. So often, it can be so hard not to beat oneself up for every mistake, every overreaction, every time of forgetting lessons that had already been learned in the healing journey, every lost opportunity to learn something new. I think having the acceptance of the pendulum swing that you describe is very important. Jung wrote about a concept called an "enantiodrama" in which people who have lived at one extreme swing over to the other extreme before finding a balance, and he also wrote of it in this accepting way. IME, it seems that often even those who state that this is necessary in theory have trouble dealing with it in reality, and it can be hard to find this acceptance in oneself or others. Thank you for the reminder of how important it is. -Nancy
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are going to be sending out a general post soon – we’re working on a sample post now, batting it back and forth. We’ll get this thing going right away, I think. Beauty. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Beauty, who is working on the creative publication? I think I missed discussion of that. I’m interested in hearing about it. It sounds like a great idea, and I think I’d like to be involved. -Nancy
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And when I <quite often don’t seem to be able to dim the surge of emergency within me … I remind myself that I am at least "open" to the possibility … and then I watch for the growth. Because … even to be "open" to a concept … is <for me a beginning of change
I really like this idea, that being open to a concept can be an important starting place whose value should not be diminished. Sometimes I get very frustrated with myself that certain concepts will become very meaningful to me but I’m unable to apply them right away, and I get angry and impatient with myself (if I was as intolerant with my clients as I am with myself, I’d have had to change professions a long time ago!) It is helpful to be reminded that just being open to a concept is a beginning of growth. I really liked how you put this. -Nancy
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