{"id":1076,"date":"2009-06-13T10:56:13","date_gmt":"2009-06-13T15:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/?p=1076"},"modified":"2009-06-13T10:56:13","modified_gmt":"2009-06-13T15:56:13","slug":"karen-answers-dk-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/?p=1076","title":{"rendered":"Karen answers DK"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Comment by DK o<\/cite>n 08 Jun 2009 at 11:17 pm<\/em><\/div>\n
Once again you so succinctly put into words my experience with DID\/MPD! Until this blog\/you, I\u2019ve never met or spoken to someone with this disorder and your responses make me feel \u2018normal\u2019 for the first time in my life! Normal for someone who has lived with a complex often confusing spectrum of behaviors and characteristics, as is seen in DID\/MPD.<\/div>\n
I too have never used drugs (often times including prescription medications) or alcohol because of their affect on me. Prescription medications are the most frustrating to deal with because I often tell the doctor you can\u2019t give me the adult dose it has to be lower because of how it affects me – I\u2019ve only recently come to understand that was because sometimes kid parts were out front and sometimes adult parts. It\u2019s not unusual to have very inconsistent results for medications from day to day or hour to hour – very frustrating for the psychiatrist I worked with initially who did not believe in DID\/MPD. If parts are waring inside and I develop an all too frequent headache, medication will not even work at all – angry parts seem to blow the medication off altogether. The only solution is to figure out the war that is going on inside and calm everyone down. With bodily pain, I learned very early on to dissociate it.<\/div>\n
When I first became aware of the fact that there might be more parts of me, acting independently, than I had always believed, I realized that decision-making was – shall we say complicated! For example, for breakfast one part always likes to have coffee – one cup in the morning, that\u2019s all. Another part likes to have an egg, another fruit, others toast or whatever happens to catch their eye. One morning I suddenly became aware and I had 5 breakfasts on the go, in various stages of completion! There was no way I needed all the food I\u2019d suddenly found myself confronted by and was compelled by each part to eat each breakfast. Knowing I didn\u2019t need the food I felt helpless to stop and could not choose just one! Shopping with this committee of minds is an equally challenging and somewhat lengthy process as parts became increasingly more vocal about their likes and dislikes. They had always been there before but as we worked with the parts and let them have their voices, they felt increasingly more need to have their voices heard\/attended to. While somewhat frustrating, throughout this process, I\u2019ve allowed myself to laugh at the sometimes crazy situations I get into! It\u2019s not uncommon for me to be on my own in a room and breakout in laughter because some part has set things up in such a way as to create a \u201csituation\u201d that can only be described as absurd, way out in left field! It frustrates my family because often times it\u2019s not so funny in the explanation for the laughter – they think they are missing something! They are!<\/div>\n
I\u2019ve watched very little of US of Tara – Canadian and I don\u2019t think we get it – but I\u2019ve seen some segments on computer. I find the extremes in dress and presentation far more drastic than anything I might ever display. There\u2019s clearly differences in likes and dislikes in say for example dress (and breakfast!) but it\u2019s a matter of color choices, looseness of the clothing, professional vs. casual, very bright colors vs. subdued but the overall style is globally uniform. We all know how to dress say for the doctors office, for work, or for a formal occasion. It\u2019s too difficult for me to explain why the skirt today, the first time in a year, so as a rule we-all try to avoid skirts. We save skirts for special occasions or summer wear instead. There\u2019s differences in posture, voice, accent but they are slight so as to avoid attention.. Even my supportive husband misses many switches. He recognizes the free happy go lucky or mischievous kid parts but doesn\u2019t see their coming or going and treats me\/us-all according to what he sees – always as a grown up and with respect – even when he has to tell me to stop throwing the tennis ball inside because it might break something!<\/div>\n
I was so terrified most of my life, doing anything illegal or against my parents wishes was unheard of. I did the best I could not to rock the boat – that is except for one part that seemed to make it\u2019s mission to rock the boat at any opportunity it got! I\u2019m sure that some people have parts that get people with DID in trouble but in my life, it was about steering clear of being in trouble and visible.<\/div>\n
Thanks for sharing the view into your DID\/MPD window. Your comments today made me feel so \u2018normal\u2019 and there\u2019s not much opportunity for feeling \u2018normal\u2019 when you are made up of a committee of parts – even if the committee is slowly reducing in size!<\/div>\n
DK<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Dear DK,<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Thank you for sharing all that you have. \u00a0I truly appreciate all of your compliments. \u00a0I’m glad to know that there are others like you and me who share similar yet different experiences in our journey to healing from multiplicity.\u00a0 I believe each person who journeys the road to recovering from multiplicity is unique; and although our experiences may appear similar, they are truly our own. \u00a0It’s good to know that we can find some peace and laughter in the silly things that our alters sometimes do in order to help us survive. \u00a0I believe my alters were a God sent coping mechanism. \u00a0I surely wouldn’t be alive today without their past help. \u00a0I carry\u00a0my alters\u00a0within me now. \u00a0My alters are me. \u00a0I am them.\u00a0<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Regarding feeling normal… we are<\/em> normal. \u00a0Those who create alters, like us, do so to survive every single day. \u00a0How many people can do that? \u00a0I believe it takes great creativity to be able to do so. \u00a0Imagine: multiplicity, our coping mechanism, able to separate inner pain by temporarily removing it so that we can function at our best at all times. \u00a0Multiples not only deal with great inner pain, they also provide their own entertainment! \u00a0There’s never a dull moment. \u00a0An entire\u00a0family within one self!<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Dissociation is a remarkable way of getting through a day. The abilty to switch takes creativity, intelligence and imagination. \u00a0Multiplicity is incomprehensible to most, but at the same time, a definite plus in\u00a0dealing with reality in an abused person’s world, where disappointments, mistrust, and frustration\u00a0tend to pull the abused\u00a0into chaos. \u00a0In a multiple’s world, there is a way to let go and release tension by removing oneself from it. \u00a0An amazing gift, if I do say so myself!<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
I agree with your thoughts on medication. \u00a0In my opinion, medication does not\u00a0work for a multiple. \u00a0Talk therapy: building trust, feeling loved, calming the alters down, and being there when needed, is the only way to go. \u00a0I believe many doctors are too quick to prescribe medication to take away the temporary pain. \u00a0Medication only disables a multiple and her alters. \u00a0It did for me.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
The truth is, I lied about taking the meds prescribed. \u00a0I only started healing when I stopped taking all the meds prescribed to me, and I didn’t tell Dr. Baer. \u00a0After we were on the right path, I finally told him. \u00a0I had bottles and bottles of untouched pills in my medicine cabinet. I would get them re-filled, but I’d never take them. \u00a0I was afraid Dr. Baer would know I wasn’t taking them if I didn’t refill them.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
My alters knew what was best for me all along. \u00a0Trust your instincts and you and your alters will do what’s best for you. \u00a0After all, the alter’s were created to protect you, not harm you.\u00a0<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Thank you for sharing part of your personal journey.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Karen<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Comment by DK on 08 Jun 2009 at 11:17 pm Once again you so succinctly put into words my experience with DID\/MPD! Until this blog\/you, I\u2019ve never met or spoken to someone with this disorder and your responses make me feel \u2018normal\u2019 for the first time in my life! Normal for someone who has lived […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-karens-answers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1076"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1076\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1078,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1076\/revisions\/1078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.switchingtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}