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Diagnosed with Complex Trauma and a Dissociative Disorder, Emma and her system share what they learn along the way about complex trauma, dissociation (CPTSD, OSDD, DID, Dissociative Identity Disorder (Multiple Personality), etc.), and mental health. Educational, supportive, inclusive, and inspiring, System Speak documents her healing journey through the best and worst of life in recovery through insights, conversations, and collaborations.
Over: Welcome to the System Speak Podcast, a podcast about Dissociative Identity Disorder. If you are new to the podcast, we recommend starting at the beginning episodes and listen in order to hear our story and what we have learned through this endeavor. Current episodes may be more applicable to longtime listeners and are likely to contain more advanced topics, emotional or other triggering content, and or reference earlier episodes that provide more context to what
Speaker 2:we are currently learning and experiencing. As always, please care
Speaker 1:for yourself during and after listening to the podcast. Thank you. I got an email asking if new people were still welcome in the community. The short answer is yes. And the long answer has more to do with us in the community needing to be welcoming.
Speaker 1:And I tried several times to answer the question, and a lot kept coming up for me, which tells me that there are likely layers of that important to my system to make explicit, which tells me it's also likely to be important for some others to hear it too. So I'm going to try to find words. I have a lot of big feelings about it in a lot of different ways. And some of those layers came up for me with big feelings, healing feelings. When we had our recovery meeting last week in the community with a speaker, I shared sort of the history of the community in a way, how the podcast came first when there were no other podcasts.
Speaker 1:Now there are so many. I don't reference other podcasts about trauma and dissociation because I don't want to be intrusive into their worlds, which is my trauma. Thinking I should not take up space. Thinking I don't have right to have needs, especially for connection. So I stay isolated in my world and don't listen to other things.
Speaker 1:There are a thousand podcasts I would listen to, if I could. I have friends who send me ideas of some that I should. And also, I'm a mom, and that takes up most all of me. Can you hear the trains? We have trains and boats nearby, And they come through regularly, much like new people in the community.
Speaker 1:Except unlike me, trains and boats bravely announce their presence. Do you hear him? He's like, I'm here. I'm here. It would be danger if they didn't.
Speaker 1:I feel like it would be danger if I did. But in the beginning of the podcast, there were no other podcasts. And at first, it was just the podcast. Only my voice and your emails. And that's what connected us.
Speaker 1:There were lots of other communities before system speak. Yahoo groups in the beginning. Then Facebook. Ivory Garden. And then Healing Together.
Speaker 1:And the plural association, even, almighty, with a broader focus and more specific groups of people. That's helpful in so many ways. But when the pandemic happened, my heart was full for the people I only knew through their words from emails. And I felt like I could not abandon them. And I felt like I would drown if I didn't keep my head above water.
Speaker 1:And at the time, my work was only text based, meaning I had a job where I wrote. I was not doing live sessions with folks on telehealth, which meant that during the pandemic, I could get up between three and four and have my work done by eight or nine. And then I had the rest of the day to homeschool the children while we were in quarantine. And when they were done or doing activities, I had free time to do journaling or therapy or art projects, and ultimately to start the community. And I've said before, I will never forget that first meeting.
Speaker 1:That first meeting when our Zoom boxes filled with the squares of each other and our faces and cameras came on for that first time that was so terrifying and also connected us in ways I will never forget, forever changing all of us. And because of my youngest and what she needed for her airway, Our family was in quarantine the full two years. And that's what it was like for those two years where I had amazing chunks of time to do nothing but community. And it was so good for me. And for some of you.
Speaker 1:I forged friendships that I think will forever be in my heart. That are meaningful to me in ways I will never forget, even with those who have moved on since. And some people do move on. We're together for a season, and they have other needs and find other groups. Or they get better and don't need groups in the same way as before.
Speaker 1:Sometimes that's because they're able to transition what we did in groups into real life in person and are able to do that with the outside world. Others go to other places for side quests, like we've had to the last couple of years, for religious trauma, for LGBT support, and for recovery help. And they spend other seasons doing those things. Other people leave because they don't want to do the side quests Or because something is too hard or they're not ready for it. And that's okay.
Speaker 1:There's no shame in that. They're not doing it wrong. Those are healthy boundaries. And also others, like me, struggled as they came out of the pandemic and had to transition back to workdays. By the end of twenty twenty two, I was doing live sessions all the time on the computer, which I had never done before all day long.
Speaker 1:That made it harder to get to the community. And then when I moved, I think there was a big shift, and I think it's important to talk about. Not for shaming myself or anyone who left because I wasn't there, but to make it explicit, because there is no shame in it, and because it's valid to feel like there was a shift. Because there was. And it's okay to acknowledge that.
Speaker 1:And when we don't acknowledge it, then our system is left feeling like something is wrong or not okay, but without the information for why. And so it leaves us feeling unsafe and unsettled. And then trauma responses start to emerge, and then others respond with their trauma responses. And then instead of connection brings healing, we have folks who are hurting and stepping in attachment wounds, and it feels like quicksand instead. And it's true that as I left Oklahoma, I was in new crisis.
Speaker 1:I was in crisis and in transition, facing new dangers and struggling to balance everything. And I had to work more because I had to pay for the kids in Oklahoma and the kids with me. So I worked more and more and more. And that and everything else swirling around me in life got between me and the community. And I think it's important for me to own that, even if it was not malicious.
Speaker 1:Just taking responsibility for it. I had never navigated that before. So it makes sense that it was messy. Me trying to tend to myself and my own world. I never had before.
Speaker 1:And in fact, it happened because community. People in the community said, no, you don't have to be here at every meeting. It's okay for you to take care of yourself too. And also, it's true that because of my trauma, not because other people are bad, because of my trauma, I experienced that the more I tried to do that, to take their encouragement, to go tend to my own life, the more people became upset that I wasn't there. Which is valid.
Speaker 1:It's activating, right? Those of us who have any kind of abandonment trauma at all. And then you add to that the complications of things like ruptures that happen in all relationships, repair that's hard to do if we're not both there, and things like boundaries, which for me were fluctuating all over the place as I tried to grapple with them in the context of letting go of shiny happy what could be more flexible, what could not and answering my own questions of what do I want and what do I not and learning how to say no, which it turns out most people don't actually want to hear. So getting myself through those things and checking in in the community from time to time, not just to be sure we were still on track with what we had agreed we were there to do, but also because the people in the community mattered to me and because it was my safe place too. But we do have to keep it safe, and it's hard to feel safe when also I was moving it.
Speaker 1:When I changed to the website, I had such a specific vision for what I thought we could do. And also, I did not have the capacity enough to fine tune it enough, to smooth it out enough for it to meet the needs of people. And really what it turned out is just the app was easier. The app was easier and people missed it. I missed it.
Speaker 1:And it's okay to say, this isn't working, and to give myself permission to be brave and to try something, and also to be vulnerable and say, I missed the app. Even though there are good things here, let's go back to the app. And then losing the website before we even all got transitioned. It's okay to feel betrayed by that. I felt betrayed by that.
Speaker 1:I also didn't understand how much of an impact it was to have to try to move and then try to come back. Kind of like our family having to move so often for different reasons, some people have a lifestyle and the privilege to stay in one place. Renter families don't get to stay in one place even if we didn't have other reasons to move. I have moved my whole life over and over and over again. So what is reenactment and not being able to settle?
Speaker 1:And what is just resources? Like the way we lost our original domain just because we couldn't pay for it for a week in time, and someone stole it that fast. So having moved to the website and back to the app on the third domain for our website, we are all just doing the best that we can and learning together, which was the whole point of the community. The other thing that comes out of the community are close relationships sometimes when we are vulnerable with each other and connect, which is why when folks have been in Zoom groups for a year, we move them into small groups and advanced topics. And also while I was away, people did it naturally on their own.
Speaker 1:And as they continued to heal, because it's been years now of the community, people got better at this doesn't feel good to me, and so didn't want to go to some groups, and this feels better to me, and so felt closer to some folks. And so some people take their groups offline and continue them on their own. That doesn't bother me or offend me. But the check-in groups we keep so simple and direct so that they are safe for new folks. And then the advanced topic groups are more flowing and less structured because people in those groups are ready for that.
Speaker 1:It's not about needing groups to be a certain way for me. It's about consent and capacity. And whether it's system speak or other community groups, I think what matters is that we're safe, and we're tending to ourselves and connecting with others. That's the whole point. It's also interesting because several times in the community it's come up of, why do we call it community?
Speaker 1:And it can be such an activating word, especially in the context of religious trauma for some folks. So is there something else we could call it? And even for a season, we joked about calling it the spa instead. Which now I would say is what symposiums feel like, except also brutal in their degree of vulnerability. Part of why it's called community is because that's what's trendy online and what the Mighty app calls them, communities.
Speaker 1:But in my vision, and in my head, and my heart, I never imagined it as a religious trauma kind of use of the word community or the online apps that market communities kind of community. I imagined it more like Sesame Street Community, helpers community, being fully myself and others getting to be fully themselves, that kind of community. And on Sesame Street, they talk about community helpers, different roles and jobs and ways people support each other, which is healthy for adults. We should not have had to have those roles as children. And because we did, sometimes it plays out in adulthood.
Speaker 1:Right? Those are the reenactments. And so because we are talking about connection, attachment wounds happen and ruptures happen. And also we can tend to them and we can respond to them. And part of that is within myself of learning when can I be in community?
Speaker 1:When is it too much? And not because community is bad, but because as opposed to when the pandemic started and I was alone all day and had all the time to do what I wanted on Zoom, now my work is on Zoom all day. So sometimes adding one more Zoom meeting is exhausting. It doesn't mean I don't want to connect with folks I care so much about or who are so wise and kind to teach me so much. When we started the community at the beginning, I still had children who were so young that they napped for two to three hours every afternoon.
Speaker 1:Now I have a house full of teenagers, and what they need is conversation and presence, and it takes all the hours. So sometimes getting to the community is hard for me pragmatically, even if my heart is there. And also, when I myself am in danger or struggling, as you're about to hear through the next few weeks of episodes, everyone's going to feel that. Not because I maliciously want to cause harm, but because we are survivors together, and because we are hypervigilant together, and because we have trauma responses together. So if I do not come in community calmly and regulated, if I'm in distress, you will feel my distress even if you don't know what it is.
Speaker 1:It happens in therapy sessions with transference and countertransference. Right? And also, when we don't have the whole story, we draw conclusions. And when we're not safe with each other, there's gossip. And that is disconnect and dysfunction instead of connection brings healing.
Speaker 1:But no one can connect if we don't talk about the things. And so I'm here talking about the things. I have been struggling, and it has been hard, and I've had to flee for my life is what it feels like. And I have had to fight for safety. And I have had to find a new therapist and resettle my family.
Speaker 1:And things are much, much better now. But at the moment, the last six months, the last year, three years, my life has been in transition. And my life has been struggling. And my life has been hard. And I have been facing some of the hardest of the hard.
Speaker 1:I want the podcast and the community to support and give voice to the very real struggle of trauma and dissociation. And also for me, and reclaiming myself and part of my story meant taking the side quests, not just of attachment, but also sexuality and also religious trauma, because I could not come full circle back to my therapy pieces until I could bring those parts of me with me. So I know not everyone has wanted to stick around for those side quests, but for others, it has saved lives. For me, it has saved my own life. So while I can have compassion with not everyone being interested in every episode or every Zoom meeting, I'm not sorry for being thorough and gathering my own self up and making sure that I am safe and that the community is safe so that we can be safe and stable together.
Speaker 1:And because podcast episodes are so often four to six months behind, you don't know yet that I'm okay. That I am so much better than I have ever been. That I am more myself than I have ever been because I have such a good therapist. And this time when it airs, it will still be true. Because my family and I are safe where we live.
Speaker 1:And because I'm refocused on me, and having resources and capacity to do what I'm called to do, which is only to be myself, The same as you. Just need to be yourself. And in that context, the community is absolutely open to new people and welcoming to new people. There are some people there who have been there from the beginning. There are some people there that come and go as they need to.
Speaker 1:Yesterday, I got to see and talk and hear from someone in check-in group that hadn't been there in three years. And it filled my heart to get to hear from them and to hear the updates of their life and how their life has been so, so, so hard. And also how they brought themselves to safety and returned to connection. I am so grateful that we have the safe place of the community, and also the community is us. It's you and me and us together.
Speaker 1:And even as I learn to do one more Zoom meeting in less binary ways, like the way I see faces of some folks who have always done art projects during Zoom meetings. Or those who used to take us on field trips for walking during Zoom meetings, giving myself the space and less binary way of still being present for the meeting and also caring for myself. I love it. I love it. It's so good for me And helps me find ways to incorporate being present and caring for me differently than thinking I have to or I can't.
Speaker 1:Which is so binary. So I think the community itself reflects the growth that is happening for each of us. We have had folks who are learning to find their own voice and advocate for themselves and say, No, this is what I need. Or, No, this is not what I need. And that is beautiful.
Speaker 1:Folks come and go. And some of us learn how to stay. And for some of us, it's right to run. And all of it is seasonal because that's part of community life. And that's healthy and good.
Speaker 1:I did, in recent months, change the outro to the podcast, where it stopped after connection brings healing. Instead of inviting people to the community, which is what this email was about, which was actually a really funny email about my introverted self and if I was done inviting people to be present with me. I'm just still not good at that, right? I think that will always be hard for me. It will always be a sunburn for me.
Speaker 1:Sometimes, as a friend pointed out in community, second or third degree burns. So receiving care is hard. Having a voice and advocating for what we need is hard. And I have spent the last six months, the last year, saying, I do not feel safe or stable, and I do not know how to be in community, saying nothing is more important to me, my healing, or the community than safety first. And that leads us to stability, which then grows into the diversity of what we want that to look like.
Speaker 1:One of the most challenging things about the community are the schedules of the Zoom meetings. Because we set them during the pandemic and people have not wanted to change the times. For example, there is a check-in group in the middle of the afternoon on Saturdays, which is a terrible time for everyone, except for a mom whose children nap during the pandemic. So it was the best time for me to be there in that season. Now it is the worst time for me to make it, and it is so hard sometimes.
Speaker 1:And also, we have so many people in the community, we can't just move Zoom meetings around what works for me. And so I had to get comfortable with my own discomfort of having to miss things while raising teenagers. Or like how Mandala Monday was my favorite group in the beginning, and we actually thought we were going to teach art classes, but it is not what people wanted. And they wanted to talk and connect then, which made it very hard because the parts of me that can do art do not talk and wanted a more quiet group. And so it became an opportunity for mapping for me, not because folks were doing group wrong.
Speaker 1:People were meeting their needs in group, and that is beautiful. I could not get myself mapped to make group work for me. And then because it was not working, we went ahead and accepted a teaching position where that is when we teach classes is on Monday nights. And also, it's still true that I grieve and miss the art group. And I have several different times said, Hey, do you want to move the art group to a different night?
Speaker 1:Or do we want to do this? Or do we want to do that? But it's not just about scheduling or Zooms, it's about mapping. And why is it that it's so hard for me to do art in a group? Maybe it's because I started out with crayons in a box.
Speaker 1:And I was so, so alone. And those parts of me don't know how to do that yet. So it's an example where nothing malicious is happening, nothing bad even is happening. And also, who keeps art group going if I'm not there? Another example would be, there was also a season a couple of years ago where our particular job we had at the time had so much flexibility that we could do zoomies all the time, meaning random extra zoom meetings where we could just start a meeting and whoever could come could come.
Speaker 1:And it was happening so much and it was so fun. And the people who were coming really enjoyed it at the time. And also so much that they asked for a regular zoomies where we came and just talked about personal things, kind of like the podcast but in real time. And that was such a sacred season. And also when things happen online with the controversies or the dramas or the things where there's so much trauma responses happening, which is valid because it was trauma happening.
Speaker 1:Or I get hate emails that were really extreme or things like that, where it just feels harder to be safe. It feels harder to feel safe. When I can't feel safe in real life, then I can't be vulnerable the same in group. Right? Like I have to take care of safety first before I can be vulnerable.
Speaker 1:It is not appropriate to be vulnerable when I am not safe. When I am not safe is when those walls should be up. And then I changed jobs again where my housing was not being paid for the same and kids were moving in with me, so I was having to pay for two houses because I had to pay for the Oklahoma house and the house I was living in. And more kids came, so I had to get the bigger house for more kids, which just meant I had to work more, which is fine because that's what parents do, are make sure the kids are safe. That's what we should do, caring for our children, right?
Speaker 1:But because of that, then I also didn't have time for as many zoomies because I was having to work. And so none of that's malicious, and also it shifts the flavor of the community. And for lots of us, it steps on those toes of abandonment where it feels like, where are you? Where did you go? You were here and now you're not, except we're not playing peekaboo and this is not childhood.
Speaker 1:And then when I release Queer Colors and the Seasons episodes, and then when I released the Shiny Happy episodes, I lost so much support that the community could not pay for itself anymore. So it became much harder to do extra Zoom meetings anytime I wanted when I was having to work fourteen or sixteen hours a day. Like I work some really long days because I have to. I just don't have the privilege not to. And so I think as I was moving this last time with all of those U Haul trips back and forth and all the things, I changed the outro because it ended with I'll see you there.
Speaker 1:And I didn't know if I would. I think, like, my picker is broken. My friend said this to me the other day, and I have found it to be so powerful where I keep picking, oh, this person is going to be my safe person, or this person is going to be the one I learn how to be friends with. And then something goes wrong and then they disappear, which to me, my wound there is like foster care trauma of like, okay, one more person that didn't actually show up. So I wasn't just struggling with, I'll see you there because I was having to work so much, but because I don't know if I will see you there because other people were in and out as well.
Speaker 1:And so I could not I didn't want to betray myself of that, of thinking. Like when I thought, Oh my goodness, this is the handful of people that I have enough support with that I can look at queer colors, and then they don't like how I say it, so they leave. Or, These are the folks that understand religious trauma enough that I can talk about it, but I don't do it fast enough. And so they leave. So then I get that feeling of like, I'm doing it so wrong that I'm not going to be able to connect.
Speaker 1:So then I can't gaslight myself saying, I'll see you there when I don't know that you're actually going to be there. Does that make sense? So because I was so focused on re establishing safety, I had to stop saying that while my system didn't know if it was true. And I think grieving the letting go of the nonprofit, it just hurt more. And so I didn't know literally if we were going to make it, if we were going to pull through that, even as a community.
Speaker 1:And then when there are other things happening that I don't know about because folks don't tell me and then I can't help tend to it, And then I find out if people are hurting or struggling or feeling alone in it. That is not feeling like community. Because the whole point is connecting while we're doing the parallel work of caring for our own selves and connecting with each other in that, in healthy ways. But with trauma and deprivation, that is really, really hard to do because attachment wounds. And it's really, really easy to feel unsafe and to feel scared.
Speaker 1:And so being able to hold space for how scary it is that what we do every day, and also it is the connection piece that is saving lives. And also, because we so desperately need that, then it feeling so high risk to try. Because if that gets taken away, then it feels like more betrayal or more hurt or more trauma, which makes it even harder to carry. So it's not that the community is safe because we are perfect. It's not that the community is safe because we can be at every single Zoom meeting every single time.
Speaker 1:It is that the community is safe enough because I am keeping myself safe enough. Because you are keeping yourself safe enough because we do not give up. Because we keep showing up. That is how we stay alive. That is how we stay connected.
Speaker 1:So are there some meetings or some seasons where it's full of lots of fun or laughter? And we've had times where it was this season of taking care of littles as a community or taking care of middles as a community. And sometimes it is like, okay, y'all, we are still here and we are still showing up and that is the best we've got. That's valid. We are growing and changing.
Speaker 1:We are not static. It's not always going to be the same. And when we have new people come in, they are starting in a different place than we are. They're coming with their, as they say in recovery, experience, strength, and hope. And we bring our experience, strength, and hope.
Speaker 1:That is how connection brings healing. And I can bring back the all see you there, not because it's the right thing to say, but because I only say it when I mean it. And I've spent the last two months on the road moving my family to safety. So I could not see you there because I was in a U Haul in the mountains where there was no connection. But now that we are safe, I will see you there.
Speaker 1:And new folks too. And all of us in season. And that's enough. That's enough. We have lived life cycles together.
Speaker 1:We have seen graduations. We have seen weddings. We have seen funerals. We have seen new jobs and new births and new fur babies. And those days I was driving through the mountains in the U Haul, that's what was on my mind.
Speaker 1:Your faces, your fish, your cats, your puppies, your stuffies, and the beautiful intimacy that we have built together emotionally and relationally and mentally. The way symposiums have bridged that into real life in person three dimensionally. And how much we've all grown, how much my system has grown from the very first people we met at our very first healing together all the way until now. Groups won't be the same a year from now as they are this week, because we are changing and we are growing. And that's okay.
Speaker 1:In some ways, they're very much the same. In other ways, everything is different. It's okay for us to have needs. It's okay for us to tend to them. It's okay for us to balance them.
Speaker 1:It's okay for us to welcome new people safely and intentionally. And it's okay for us to have harder conversations as we build safety with each other. We are okay enough together because we are doing that work on our own enough. That's the lace we're making of doing our own work and connecting with others. That's the whole point.
Speaker 1:And we're doing it exactly right, no matter what shape that takes or what shows up in our lace differently from each other or together or what we create together. It is enough. Sometimes our groups are silly. Like our monthly New Year's Zoom that we do for whoever has birthdays that month. Sometimes, like check-in groups, conversations take the dance, like a rhythm between the very vulnerable and the very present and the very chatty and the very silent.
Speaker 1:Some groups are very social. Some groups are very quiet. This morning, I spent all morning in silent Saturday group. I was there for four hours. My kids were playing happily and were not even asking me for things.
Speaker 1:So I just left my door open in case they needed something, but they were playing games. And so I got so much paperwork done. Someone else was in there doing homework and someone else was cleaning their house. They didn't wanna be alone and they didn't like cleaning. So they were getting it done during the silent Saturday group.
Speaker 1:None of us were talking to each other. We typed a few things in the chat, but we were just there getting things done together on our own. Other people I see just posting. Other people are reading and watching and feeling out what they need because they're still learning. Like me, I'm still learning too.
Speaker 1:I think for me, the hardest thing is that because of my own trauma, I will always struggle with, They don't even want me there. Sometimes that's true and that's okay. But that's my trauma, right? That's memory time. And I don't share that because I mean tending to in a fawning kind of way.
Speaker 1:I mean, that in a vulnerable way of, It's literally hard to show up when the social contract of childhood is that you shouldn't. And also, learning how to show up is how we rewrite that contract. And so that is the lace that we are making. That we're doing our own work individually, whether that's through therapy and recovery and coping skills and containment and all the things that make us be able to function in any kind of group setting, and also connecting with others and coming out of isolation because we are humans who want to heal. And I think that is beautiful in any season.
Speaker 1:So yeah, welcome to the community. We're so glad you're here. Thank you so much for listening to us and for all of your support for the podcast, our books, and them being donated to survivors and the community. It means so much to us as we try to create something that's never been done before, not like this. Connection brings healing.
Speaker 1:One of the ways we practice this is in community together. The link for the community is in the show notes. We look forward to seeing you there while we practice caring for ourselves, caring for our family, and participating with those who also care for community. And remember, I'm just a human, not a therapist for the community, and not there for dating, and not there to be shiny happy. Less shiny, actually.
Speaker 1:I'm there to heal too. That's what peer support is all about, being human together. So yeah, sometimes we'll see you there.