Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
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:
Speaker 2: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 long time 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 we are currently learning and experiencing. As always, please care for yourself during and after listening to the podcast. Thank you.
Speaker 3:How does that get impacted when we have therapy trauma?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very good question. One of the experiences I mean, really my biggest experience of therapy trauma happened this year.
Speaker 1:And that's kind of what spurred, I think, our discussion about having this podcast, today. In that I had to leave my therapist of two and three fourths years, back in March as a result of, some therapy violations, that I came to realize were actually more pervasive than I first thought. And you know, what I- what I notice right now is, it- it has not necessarily been a huge impact on my friendships so much as like my relationship with my new therapist. Like, it was really scary to reach out to my new therapist to start, you know, to start over essentially after having left someone that, you know, it didn't, it didn't end well, it didn't go well, so to, you know, so to speak. So I feel like maybe time will tell if like that particular piece of like attachment trauma for me, like, deeply, deeply messed with my overall relationships.
Speaker 1:I may just not have identified that yet, potentially. I think if anything, like, I needed more con- I probably became more, needy for attachment and connection because of that attachment relational trauma in that therapy relationship ending. I think if anything, that might have been the impact for me, ironically. And our group, really saved my life in- in that process, not- not literally, but like, you know, kind of just helping me process it when I first I- it was pretty new into connecting with this group, when I had to leave this therapist. And in talking with folks on group about, you know, these are the things that are happening, you know, this was a really strong misattunement.
Speaker 1:I'm experiencing this sense of, you know, there was a lot of control issues that I thought I was the one in the wrong, but now looking back, you know, no, I don't think so. What I learned from talking with with folks who are so validating and helpful was, This is really common. Like therapy violations with people who experience dissociation, even our group being therapists who experience dissociation, who are almost by definition a little bit more empowered to know what therapy is supposed to be like, even if our therapist self isn't prominent in therapy a lot. The experience of maltreatment of individuals with dissociation is kind of pervasive and it certainly runs the spectrum between, you know, boundary crossings all the way to these, you know, therapy violations. And certainly a lot of folks who've shared about their experience, it's been very severe and very traumatizing.
Speaker 1:I would I would count my experience as relational attachment trauma. So there is trauma, but it doesn't I I don't think it's reached the level of some other folks' experiences in that there wasn't like an element of maliciousness and that, you know, it wasn't as out of control. But regardless, the point is, I think that folks with dissociation are a very vulnerable population. And I believe that that therapists, who treat dissociation often have their own experiences of trauma and dissociation, whether they know it or not. I think for me, that's probably why I was drawn to complex clients early in my career.
Speaker 1:And I didn't realize it. I didn't realize that's why I connected so much, and unfortunately didn't find out until, you know, years later what my experience was. But there there is a huge problem with therapists not doing their own work and that being dangerous. So I don't think I ended where your question started, but that's where I'm at.
Speaker 3:No, there's two things that were just blew my mind with what you just said, if I can hold on to them long enough to talk about them. One was what you said about an increase in feeling needy, like being more needy because you had lost that therapeutic relationship. And I think that puts words into part of what we experienced because we felt that same thing. Like when you lose a therapist, especially when you've had for a long time, we were at four to five years for ours and losing that absolutely was having the rug pulled out and absolutely sent everything crashing down and absolutely was so destabilizing and upsetting besides the actual grief work or whatever. I think that increase in neediness, what happened with us was that we would have used our support people for that to balance things out and get a new therapist, but our friends were involved with it.
Speaker 3:Right. And so we could not there was nowhere to put it. And so even and that brings up the second part of what you said about it not being malicious and learning that even though it's not malicious, it still hurts. So for example, like, our friends are really good people and really safe friends in lots of ways. And they would even say if, like, if they were on the podcast right now, which I've offered, but they've not that's not ever played out.
Speaker 3:If they if they were on the podcast right now, they would say, or if I were just just talking to them, like, in real life, whatever, if they would say, you can tell me anything. Like, I am here for you. Right. But even though they are willing to do that, it doesn't actually work because they can't give anything back to those pieces. So when I tried to put those pieces there or seek support or utilize my support system or whatever because of that increase in neediness or to share what was going on, it was so re traumatizing they could not respond to it.
Speaker 3:So they would receive or they would listen or be kind or whatever, but they couldn't process or talk about it or give anything back, which for me, as someone with relational trauma, that was misattunement. Yes. And so it actually doubled the trauma of what was going on so that my people who were safe became people who were neglecting me, not because of what they were doing, but because of their limited capacity for how they could respond. It was not at all malicious and they were not at all trying to hurt me, But it was a huge, but it was very wounding what happened.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So it was more relational trauma. And so like all of the people in my life and then, okay, so then at the same time, all of this was going on with the pandemic and then my husband had to leave to take care of his parents, of this stuff over the last year. Literally the people in my life that I had worked so hard to identify as safe people, all of them betrayed me.
Speaker 1:Gosh.
Speaker 3:That All of is them just me. But And none of them doing that intentionally or meaning to do that or it being malicious at all. It wasn't. It was purely circumstances at every layer. And so I spent a whole year thinking all of that was my fault because I do understand that malicious piece that it could still hurt even if it wasn't an abuser.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah. Such a good point. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Abs- absolutely. And I think that's part- that is definitely part of the self invalidation I experienced with family of origin trauma, relational trauma, is like, I don't think certainly, certainly I have witnessed other people's, you know, clients' experiences, especially of, family of origin being sadistic, being malicious. Certainly, I've experienced that for other folks. I don't think that's the case with my family of origin. I think that they mean well, but are, you know, probably deeply wounded, traumatized themselves and have not done that work.
Speaker 1:And in acting out their experience, you know, as as parents, I think that, Yeah, without an without an intention, but with like this ignorance to what they were doing, and ignorance to the harm and then failure to- to correct or repair. Like, it's just easier to blame the person who's reacting than it is to look at yourself and say, maybe I'm doing something off, you know? I- I don't think that it was malicious intent, and that is probably part of the self invalidation for me, is that I, you know, I don't think that they were, trying to be harmful, but they still were. And I think that awareness made it harder to see this as trauma. So I can identify that on that level,
Speaker 3:This started, I don't know, two years ago or something. And then all through the pandemic, we were literally falling apart. Even the podcast, like that season of podcasting is like the worst podcast ever because it was literally us trying to stay alive and it's so horrible and dark. We kept going it was like the only authentic thing we had to offer. If other people are going through this, let's be real about it.
Speaker 3:And how do we crawl out? And it was our group that helped me crawl out because it was in group that the first time I was able to say, this is what happened, this is how I felt. People say, I'm so sorry that happened to you. Or I'm so sorry that was not okay. Or yes, even though they were good people, this still hurt when this happened.
Speaker 3:Like to be able to actually finally have words to say it out loud. For us, the timing was just terrible because of the pandemic. Like we couldn't even go to these people like we normally would have in real life and just had a Like, was no working out of things or resolving it because of And the Right. And so in group, to be able to say, here's why my heart is shattered. Right.
Speaker 3:For people not to do anything but just sit with me in that Yeah. Is when we that like, that's what started to turn things around.
Speaker 1:Wow. Yeah. I could see that absolutely being, like, kind of this life altering experience because, like, if you've been lost in in that space throughout the pandemic and then, like, finally getting, like, the validation, and the presence, like, I could see how significant that would be.
Speaker 3:The other thing I wanted to speak to what you shared was, it was also our experience that it was very hard to reengage in therapy after we lost a therapist.
Speaker 1:Right. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 3:In fact, we hide this sort of general response of, okay. We've made enough progress. We've done all these podcast interviews. We've done all these ISSTD classes. We know about dancing mindfulness and all these things.
Speaker 3:So we can do this part. Like, I will process privately, but I just need you to be the therapist and to like, give me homework or something. Like as if we could dissociate from the therapy process itself of, I'm not gonna tell you parts names. We still don't let them talk to you. Like, they're switching by accident, but not like younger parts who just feel free to come forward and play or tell stories.
Speaker 3:Like, there's no disclosure. Like, no. I don't trust you. No. I will never again let anyone just have access to this system.
Speaker 3:Like, that's how it feels now. It has changed things and it's so hard even just to show up. And we had to try several different therapists for all kinds of reasons and the pandemic didn't help. Then ultimately, the therapist that we've been able to stay with is someone who has complex trauma.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. I know you've spoken about that, like, being so h- being so helpful, like, that sense of she really gets it. Like, you can tell she really gets it.
Speaker 1:I believe, like, I wanna say it was maybe Thursday. I know it was before that, I think. But like, yeah, like how how much that matters. And I think that does speak to, you know, kind of like where I am now in the process of, you know, personal and professional intersecting is like, I do think that I am far better able to help clients with DID and complex trauma than a lot of people who don't experience it, because there's just a dimension that I think you can't fully understand. The things that they're not going to teach you in a textbook, the things you're going to know from your own experience that are just far more significant if you have the lived experience.
Speaker 3:It's hard to find a therapist when you can't have a therapist that's your colleague from ISSTD or a therapist who's your colleague from Jamie Meredith or or whatever, and and you're trying to find someone who knows their stuff and yet knows their stuff from different resources but still well enough to be helpful.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yes. I I I definitely and and being for me, being in a small town, relatively speaking, I know all the therapists just about. And in fact, the person that I am seeing now, knows my former therapist and their kind of close colleague friends. And so thanks to talking with- with folks in group and- and their guidance, you know, kind of helping me push past some of my, my fears about this.
Speaker 1:Like I went into that new therapeutic relationship saying, here's the deal. This happened and I'm not really ready to talk about it yet. But I need to know because I'm gonna be afraid, that I'm gonna be hurting you, that it's okay for me to talk about this considering, you know, you two are colleague friends, I'm aware of that. You know, and it was really kind of a trust test for me to see like, is- is this person gonna be safe considering, you know, she has this tie to someone I have trauma with? And she did amazing.
Speaker 1:Like, she- she was so validating and like, I can totally compartmentalize. And yes, I agree our styles are really different. When I was looking for my first- my former therapist, I was looking for someone who- who is highly technically skilled. That's what I wanted. I was new EMDR therapist.
Speaker 1:I was looking for someone who was really, really advanced in their EMDR process. Of course, didn't know I had dissociation at the time. And having left that therapeutic relationship and seeing a lot of the problems that existed, like, she was very technically skilled, absolutely. But there was something missing in terms of, like, compassion or understanding or warmth, something like that. I could almost never get emotional with her.
Speaker 1:And I, you know, small town, same problem. My office partner, who's probably my closest friend in town, also saw her for a while and said the same thing, that she couldn't really cry in front of her. And now that I am with my new therapist, who I've only been with for a couple of months, I like genuinely broke down and cried, like, about a a week ago as I was grieving some stuff with infertility trauma that I was working on. And, and it was so freeing and healing, and I don't remember the last time I did that, like, ever. And so what I'm noticing, when I saw all that to say, when I sought out this therapist, I wasn't look I was looking for, yes, she can do EMDR and parts work, but I wasn't looking for an expert.
Speaker 1:I was looking for someone that I felt like was going to offer me presence and like warmth and, you know, just someone who the relationship was more important and egalitarianism was more important because that is huge for me personally and professionally. I need to know that we are equals, that you're not above me and hierarchical for me to feel safe, and that I'll have the right to say no to something. And that was a huge issue in the former therapist relationship that I had to leave, that I didn't feel like I had the right to say no to doing a particular skill or so on and so forth. And- and since I've been in this new relationship, it's like, oh my gosh, I had no idea this is how it could be. I thought I was just bad, but now I'm realizing, like, the conditions weren't safe, and that's why I wasn't okay in that former therapist relationship.
Speaker 1:That's why things would get stuck and stalled. So it's been amazing.
Speaker 3:I think that that absolutely plays in, especially with relational and developmental trauma. You have someone, even who's good with presence, not good with responding, when they're not responsive, then it reads to a trauma person as that misattunement again, where I shared this and I'm just left hanging.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:And that feels dangerous even though they're really good at being present in the moment. And so it's so hard to get to that moment then you're so abandoned after that moment. You've gotta have that responsiveness as part of it. And I think the same thing with what you said, if you have someone who's technically skilled, but not warm or compassionate or any presence at all Right. It does the same thing from a different angle.
Speaker 3:And it feels to me like either of those case scenarios acts out, is a reenactment in its own way of that abuse experience. Those abuse dynamics are playing out again, even if it's not malicious.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yes, absolutely. And and what I had come to realize a few months before things ended with my former therapist is, I had major counter or major transference with my mom issues with her. Like, there were some similarities in terms of feeling invalidated, feeling misunderstood, having this drive to try to get her to understand, you know, control being a big factor. This just kind of hierarchy, this kind of like, you know, I have more power than you dynamic.
Speaker 1:And I came to realize that like, yeah, there was this huge reenactment piece to therapy that, you know, we were kind of going through some of the sta- even though oddly enough we were, I mean, I guess maybe not oddly, but like we were processing a lot of attachment trauma from my mom, and yet it was playing out in the relationship, in the same way. And, you know, someone on- you know, some people might look at that, the fact that I had transference towards my mom with my therapist as, Oh, well, that's just something you need to process. That's not about the therapist. But- but really it kind of was. I mean, you know, the same dynamics existed of there being this kind of invalidation piece at some level.
Speaker 1:Though not malicious, I'm confident, like, there was still a major invalidation piece. This speaks a bit to skill, I guess, but, my therapist was so mindfulness oriented, that it was almost like- like mindfulness devoid of warmth. Like, how do I say that? She was almost dogmatically pushing mindfulness, and I had to really connect with other organizations. Like, really got involved Institute for Creative Mindfulness, and took a lot of what I learned from those organizations to put words to what I'd been trying to say, that you can't just expect me to practice mindfulness easily, quickly, much when dissociation is a phobia of mindfulness.
Speaker 1:I mean, fundamentally, that's what my system was created around. And you can't tell me that I can't do trauma processing until I solve mindfulness as a problem because that's fundamentally what my dissociative system is built on. Let me do the trauma processing so I can learn to do mindfulness. And that was a huge, huge area of contention that I think we wrestled with for years and ultimately never really solved. So that piece is a bit of an element of skill, but it demonstrates the reenactment of I have to prove my point and and try to like make my case because I want you to understand, which is very much what was going on with me and my mom throughout most of growing up, etcetera.
Speaker 3:All of that misattunement and relational trauma triggers, like, every single shame button. Yes. And so much shame of how hard do I have to try for you to approve of me? How hard do I have to work for you to think that I'm good enough or for you to respond to care for me or to choose me or like how much do I have to give Right. To get something back?
Speaker 1:Yes. Absolutely. And when when the the initial conflict happened that ultimately led to my leaving that- that therapist, that initial rupture happened, I tried to work through it with her. I tried you know, we talked about it. And in talking about it, you know, I- I thought I would be okay, and I came back for one more session after we discussed it.
Speaker 1:And after that second session, my part started telling me, this is not safe. You know, you can keep going, but we won't talk. So, you know, have fun with that. Like, basically, if you keep going to her, we're not gonna feel safe. We're gonna protect the system.
Speaker 1:We're gonna shut down. And I came to realize the only way that I could keep going would be to be fawning, to- to be like, just, oh, I'm I'm the one in the wrong. I'm going to choose your reality instead of my reality and that's also a reenactment and I'm not doing that again. And so, for me to leave my former therapist, even though it was terrifying and so, so painful and hard and his trauma was me fighting for and protecting my system. And it was absolutely the best choice I could have made.
Speaker 3:Being able to say, this is toxic, even though you are not a bad person and I'm not a bad person, the process that's happening when it cannot be repaired and is not being tended to, that is toxic to me, even if you didn't mean to hurt me. And even if I didn't mean to fail therapy or whatever, fill in the blank, it is still toxic, and that's not okay. If I have made progress or learned anything from therapy, then I know it is not okay to keep putting myself into that situation and that I have every right and permission from myself to remove myself from that toxic situation, even if it's not about who is bad or what is terrible, but that this is toxic between us and it is okay to walk away and okay to step out. And I think that was powerful to us because we fell into the whole experience that we had in our effort to step into and step toward. And so stepping away and stepping out felt like failing that two years of intensely trying to make it work and realizing it's just not, and that we were giving pieces of ourselves away, trying to earn that, trying to prove ourselves, trying to show up, but not getting anything back and realizing that's not healthy.
Speaker 3:Like I wouldn't date someone who treated me like this.
Speaker 1:That's a good point. And yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. That makes sense.
Speaker 3:That was a turning point for us of being able to find this strength to just step away and to be okay without that and to be okay with needing what we needed, but also be okay with it's not being met here. Have to do something differently. Without, like, we don't have to do it in a drama way. It doesn't have to be ugly, but staying is going to be ugly. And it's only drama that we're experiencing because no one else is even aware it's happening.
Speaker 3:And so like we've put ourselves into our own hell and that's not okay. Have to care for ourselves and getting ourselves out of that is part of maintaining healthy relationships. And it doesn't have to be about anyone else being terrible or bad or a monster. It's about, I'm an adult with adult resources. And when this is toxic, I remove myself from that, which we had to learn was not the same as running away.
Speaker 1:Right. Right. Right. Absolutely. And I think in, it sounds like a shared experience we have is like, you know, kind of walking away from a situation where, you know, that person is not, again, like not intentionally harmful, but the situation, you know, in your situation, like the situation was harmful and it became unsafe.
Speaker 1:You know, and- and like my, former therapist, like, sure was not unintentionally harmful, but probably hasn't done her own work around certain things and, you know, became unsafe for me. You know, probably there is there isn't a bit of work that she needs to do on that. But like, yeah, leaving was was wise and hard, I think, for, you know, for both of us, from what I understand of your situation and mine. And like, coming to redefine it as that was about self protection in a way that's honoring the needs of the system instead of that was about having failed is really a challenge.
Speaker 3:For us, it took nine months, like birthing a child, right? Nine months since recognizing that actually being able to leave.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:And then it took another year of grief, of nearly drowning it. It felt like nearly drowning in that grief to be able to say out loud, this is how much it hurt and what it did to us. And it's been six months since then. And we are in therapy again, and we are engaging in therapy as far as showing up every week, which is more than I can say for group. We are not yet still, still even like, so two years altogether, two years later, we are more than two years, we are still not back to the place of, hey, here are my parts and we wanna share with you and let's work on this hard thing and here are the people that have pieces of that hard thing and no, no, we are just now for the first time, being able to say, oh, it's hard when our daughter can't breathe.
Speaker 3:Right. Right. Like like just even what you call not not that it that's superficial stuff, but, like, adult stuff, recent stuff, right now stuff.
Speaker 1:Present. Yeah. Yeah. Present prong stuff, not past trauma. Like, you it's not it's hard.
Speaker 1:It's just getting to the space of like, what's going on now, much less being able to go back farther.
Speaker 3:Right. And it feels very precarious. And what those two years were so damaging and hurt so much that we are very protective, not just of parts or that kind of thing, but protective of we don't want to go through that again. Right. So being, I guess the good thing that came out of it was learning to feel our feelings and learning to trust our feelings and learning to say, regardless of who is who or what's going on, this doesn't feel good in my body, or this doesn't feel good in my heart, or this doesn't feel good in my mind, or this doesn't feel good with all of who I am.
Speaker 3:And I just have to trust and respect that and either wait it out or bring it up and see if we can do some repair work or let it go and that that's okay.
Speaker 1:Right. Right. So, like, learning that you you know, learning to honor your in ex your inner experience and to believe yourself, to validate yourself when you are experiencing that something's not okay and taking action based on that, like, that's a very reparative, kind of dynamic to learn through this as horrible as the process I'm sure was.
Speaker 3:That's what I feel is that I would not trade this lesson for anything, but it was hell to go through to learn that.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Absolutely. Yes. 100%. I can see that.
Speaker 3:Was there anything else that you wanted to share or to wrap up before I let you go?
Speaker 1:I guess just, you know, part of my intention in wanting to speak on this topic with you and, and share with, you know, with the audience, like, is just to, to say that even though, you know, I, I am a therapist who treats this, I didn't recognize that something was wrong for so long. Because being in that client role, you are you are disempowered. You know, you are not going to assume the person who you've put all this trust in, you know, has become problematic or is a problematic person for you. You're going to, most likely, if you're coming in for trauma work, or dissociation work, etcetera, like, you're going to assume, just like you did as a child, that you're the person who's in this parental type role is, you know, doing what they should be doing. And it's sort of that same, like, you know, brutal traumatic shock that you can learn sometimes that that's not the case.
Speaker 1:Like, this is not okay, just as it wasn't okay back then. And that is a terrifying realization, but it is empowering to come to realize that I need to trust my judgment. I have the power as an adult now to leave a situation where things aren't aren't right any longer. And as hard and as brutally painful as, you know, as both of our experiences have been in leaving, it's still what needed to happen and it's still what even opens the door to safety because staying would have prolonged suffering and and prevented progress, in my opinion. At least in my experience, I know that's the case.
Speaker 1:I sometimes imagine how I think how how much farther along it might be if I had started out with my current therapist because there is safety that wasn't there before. So just to say honor your instincts, trust your own system to speak to you about what doesn't seem safe. And if there's a situation that you have to leave, it's valid to make that choice when it's the right choice for you.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for sharing with us.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Wonderful to talk with you.
Speaker 2: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. One of the ways we practice this is in community together. The link for the community is in the show notes.
Speaker 2: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. I'm there to heal too. That's what peer support is all about.
Speaker 2:Being human together. So yeah, sometimes we'll see you there.