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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:
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 1:Okay. How's that? I can hear you perfectly. Can you hear me okay? Yes.
Speaker 1:How are you? What a nice, nice treat.
Speaker 3:I'm so glad to talk to you again.
Speaker 1:Me too. Me too.
Speaker 3:Oh my goodness. So many things to share. Thank you for coming back on the podcast again.
Speaker 1:Thank you for having me. I love I love talking to you anytime.
Speaker 3:Do you want to introduce yourself briefly again in case we have new people who did not get to hear you the first time you came?
Speaker 1:Sure. My name is Larry Ruehl. I'm, the author of a memoir called Breaking the Rules about my recovery from childhood sexual abuse and my addiction and alcoholism and the work I do now to try to help others. And I'm also an artist, a collage artist, and most of my work represents rising from the ashes sort of concept of how we continue to heal and find ways to find some light in the dark.
Speaker 3:Love your work. So appreciate your contributions to the community.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Came up recently because I'm I have this secret, and something I don't do so much on Instagram, but I have this secret obsession with collecting, dead insects and flat and dead flowers and bones and doing these little installations. And somebody was asking me if I had shared this with you, and I don't think it's something we ever talked about.
Speaker 3:Oh my goodness. What do you wanna say about it?
Speaker 1:You know, it's so funny. I think I hadn't really thought about it before, but it's something I've always done since I since I was a child. And I think it's part of that whole finding beauty and decrepit things or things that are sort of past their prime or or have shifted in some way. Yeah. I always I always love that.
Speaker 1:Like, anytime that I buy flowers for for our apartment or I have flowers in the studio, I always let them dry and always let them die and see what happens to them. And more often than not, I I keep them, sort of as a testimony to a different kind of beauty in their next in their next life.
Speaker 3:I'm so curious about why someone mentioned meat in that context, but it's true that I also do that. And I have jars and jars and jars of petals and flowers and leaves.
Speaker 1:I'm telling you, you and I are like, we were just meant to know one another.
Speaker 3:I do. During the pandemic, we were stuck in quarantine for quite some time because my youngest has a complex airway. So we were in quarantine for the full two years And we spent part of that time for like science class. We classified all of the plants we could find. We lived out in the country at the time and we classified everything we could find and put them in jars and labeled them.
Speaker 3:But also there was a rose garden nearby. And so there were all these different kinds and colors of roses. And just every day, there were petals everywhere, and they picked them up and played with them, and then we used let them dry and use them in different art things, and that's so fun.
Speaker 1:How incredible. I I know. And and, you know, I'm I have to go back and see and look at the message because this when this first came up, I was talking about, you know, preserving the butterflies and hydrangeas and and and I said, you must talk to Emma about this.
Speaker 3:Wow. That's wild. I love it. Okay. I have to tell you.
Speaker 3:This is why I'm circling back to you because I have stumbled myself into recovery ness, recovery adjacent.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:And you are the person I had talked about this before on the podcast simply because you shared your story at healing together, I think.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:And it's so trick C. So please, any boundaries you need to set is fine, whether personally or about recovery, recovery is supposed to be anonymous, right? So Yes. Because also here we are talking about it.
Speaker 1:Yes. But I will tell you that with regards to the trust that I have in you and and knowing that our both of our our intentions are clear on this, there's nothing that's off limits in terms of this conversation. So I'm happy to share freely. There's nothing you can't ask and nothing I'm not willing to talk about.
Speaker 3:Oh, the the other thing I wanna tell you because I don't know if you're aware is after you on the were on the podcast, podcast, it became like a cultural phenomenon in the system speak world, that when we have a really good therapist that we get to keep, which all of us know is such a hard thing that we refer to them publicly as a Linda.
Speaker 1:Unbelievable. You're gonna make me cry. That's incredible. What a tribute to her. Yeah, that's incredible.
Speaker 3:Right? Well, and then in the community and Zoom meetings and things, it came up just as a, what if we have a male identified therapist because then like just gender roles and names and things. So people started calling their male therapist, Larry.
Speaker 1:No. Oh my God. That is how I'm so touched.
Speaker 3:Paul, I just wanted you to know that you had contributed that just in a safe way we found language for it way that when we don't wanna identify our therapist, that when we have a good therapist, we say Linda or Larry.
Speaker 1:We're not even five minutes into this, and you're making me weepy. So
Speaker 3:my Thank you. Okay. So here's my story I'm going to share with you, and then you can help me walk through this because I am a newcomer, as they say.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 3:I had talked to you whenever that was. It feels like years ago, and it feels like yesterday.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:And then also, I read and went through some on the podcast. I just realized I hadn't finished it, so I may circle back to it. But I went through someone had sent me codependent no more. Which references recovery.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:And then also there's a Laura Brown book that I have been reading that mentions recovery.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:So these different things that mentioned recovery.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:So I have been in a place personally in my own therapy the last couple of years where I was learning, oh, this is a trauma response and this is a trauma response and this is a trauma response. And so basically in a very shiny, happy trauma response kind of way, What I did was stop doing all those things.
Speaker 1:Yes. Understood.
Speaker 3:Like behaviorally, but I didn't actually replace them with good things or healthy things or give myself
Speaker 1:time
Speaker 1:to learn how to do these
Speaker 3:And so when I stumbled across the Laura Brown book, which referenced recovery in a way I had heard at codependent or in the book Codependent No More, which had made me think of you and recovery, I thought, okay, I feel like this is something I need to look into. A couple of things happened for me. Is that I had met with my tribe and said, hey, I have these ancestors, which now I know also we call them elders, and I am disconnected from my tribe. I am functioning, I'm providing for myself. I'm not asking for like benefits, and I'm one generation away from being able to reenroll, but I still wanna be connected, how can I do that?
Speaker 3:I learned this is called reentry and that they still could connect me with classes and groups for language and culture and teachings and all these things, but they also had what was being called well anon.
Speaker 1:Okay. Yes. Yes. Okay.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I've been doing that. And, basically Yes. I also have found like, I am so I'm sorry. My my language access to this is so new.
Speaker 3:I know there are different things like I know there is a a and I watched the movie when love is not enough. Yes about the dynamics of how that got started, but also how the women were all waiting in their cars and they're like, wait, we need support too. So then we got Alan
Speaker 1:on. Yes.
Speaker 3:And I'm sorry there's so much preamble to this, but I want to walk through how this even happened.
Speaker 1:This great. This is great.
Speaker 3:And then so I learned about Al Anon. And then the other thing that happened is that I, both of my parents are deceased and both of it, like in both cases, it was fairly traumatic and happened fairly close together. And I also have a partner who died by suicide when I'm now old enough to say when I was much younger. And so I have been going for the first time finally trying to address these issues to a grief group called, well, I don't wanna say what it's called, but it's through Naranan actually. Okay.
Speaker 3:So I'm in this adjacent world, I'm learning about 12 steps, I'm learning these different things and they are starting some a group of people in the community are starting meetings in the system speak community. So Yes. For all of these reasons, this is why I have circled back to you why I know some things and also don't know very much all at the same time.
Speaker 1:That makes everything you said. I stayed with you a % and everything made sense.
Speaker 3:Okay. Thank you for enduring that backstory. It's all happened so fast. What I wanna say explicitly that I have found already is that the tools I have learned in these programs are the things that are tangible that I needed to replace all those things I just suddenly stopped doing because they were trauma
Speaker 1:responses. Yes.
Speaker 3:And that has been amazing. So in recovery language, I would say like in a step one kind of way, I would say, I was powerless against like all the childhood trauma and deprivation that happened to me. Was like powerless against grief and loss, all of these things. But in my own responsibility and my own accountability, I was making my life so unmanageable in response to all of this. So how do you connect even, like, childhood experiences or recovery and healing from child stuff to your recovery in the present?
Speaker 1:Yes. Great question. And I think that, I'm gonna follow your lead. I'm not gonna filter so much. Okay.
Speaker 1:So I'm gonna I'm gonna be honest in the way that that you and I respect. I will tell you that I really fought against entering any twelve step group because I just I I was so full of shame, and and I really believed at the time that 12 was a religious group, and I had deep fears around it. I was also too ashamed to admit my alcoholism and addiction. But I have to tell you that entering into twelve step work was has been one of the most remarkable life saving changes I've made for myself. And I think that in the beginning, what was so difficult was that I had been in intensive therapy with Linda for eight years, and I had worked so much on my childhood trauma and all of the things that went with it, that when my alcoholism and my addiction sort of really spiraled out of control, I was left feeling completely confused because I thought I've made all this quote unquote progress in therapy with the trauma issues and why can I not get a handle on my drinking?
Speaker 1:And it's when I really came to understand that for me, while they were very late, I really medicated my years of therapy with alcohol and prescription drugs. It really became a separate thing. And and and I say this in I go I regularly go to 12 step meetings, and I continue to say this in meetings, and this is very true for me. I am one of the I am a firm believer that therapy is one thing and it was very necessary when you can find the right fit therapist. Twelve Step Work for somebody who suffers with alcoholism and addiction, twelve step work for me has been remarkable, and a psychiatrist that is separate from both of those things.
Speaker 1:And sometimes I laugh and say it takes that trifecta to keep me running, to keep me functioning, to keep me going, to keep me feeling steady. And and that remains true. You know, one important thing, and you said it, you used the word, so I will reflect back on what you said. But I know that there are many, many, many survivors who struggle with some of the 12 step language admitting we were powerless. It get it's a tricky word, and I always say, for me, that I was absolutely powerless over my alcoholism and my addiction.
Speaker 1:You know, I'm I am not a powerless person, but my my addiction and my alcoholism was very much a wild, cunning, baffling thing that I needed support from for for.
Speaker 3:I think you've spoken to some really important pieces because I think there are a lot of us who are like, I'm not a victim, I'm a survivor. And some people don't even use survivor words. And also, it was a really empowering thing for me to acknowledge when I was harmed as a child, I was powerless.
Speaker 1:Exactly.
Speaker 3:The the other piece that you mentioned was about the spiritual language, and obviously, that's things like higher power or references to God. And you can find groups that adapt this differently. Like, I've been to a dharma recovery groups and things like this. Yes. But I think one thing, especially as someone healing from religious trauma
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:One thing that has been also empowering for me is broadening my understanding of that. And so, like, instead of thinking shiny, happy God or what someone else has told me God is, or using higher power language more generally gives me opportunity to both deconstruct, like what was told to me and what do I actually think and what do I wanna keep, what do I wanna let go of, But also decondition, like the programming that comes as a result of that. And I don't like using the word programming because I know it can be so scary, but really that's just conditioning. And so taking back my own choice and critical thinking is something that recovery has helped me with. And then with higher power ness, broadening my understanding to just recognize sometimes there are things bigger than me, but that doesn't mean I'm not a human or not valid.
Speaker 3:So, like, a super neutral example of that would be, I'm from Oklahoma, and we have tornadoes all the time. It's tornado season. And the, like, the wind is a higher power. I do not have control over the wind. The wind can do things I cannot.
Speaker 1:Yes. I'm gonna share a personal thing because you just you just shed light on this and it's so perfect. But in the very beginning, I I I had met so many survivors who were religious abuse survivors, church, Catholic church survivors that I just I was like, I didn't the whole idea of God and the whole I was like, uh-uh. No. No.
Speaker 1:No. Not for me. And but I'll never forget the first time when when I was struggling with the whole spiritual aspect and somebody said, you know, you know, AA as as a group can be your higher power because as a collective group, it is, it is larger than you. And that was really helpful to me. The other thing was using the word God in a different way.
Speaker 1:Emma, maybe you've heard this, but for me, hearing it understood as God meaning group of drunks. And that was something that was tremendously helpful to me until I had until I understood and realized that I could have my own definition of what a higher power meant. And so I clung to some of these non religious definitions in the beginning until until I could really get to the point where I could open my heart and my mind more and to say, alright. You know what? I I've never believed in a punishing god and lightning bolts and all that crap.
Speaker 1:So what does the idea of God or a higher power mean to me? And and slowly over time, I'm I'm coming up on twelve years sober in February, and it took a it took a solid four years for me to even start to feel some sort of spiritual connection.
Speaker 3:It's really like healing any other wound. Like, I broke my foot last And it's like, okay, the intrusion of pinning it in place, splinting of it, the casting of it, all the things, and then slowly being able to remove some of those extra supports and then doing the physical therapy and then being able to walk again and all the things. It's really a process of healing.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yes. Well, now that you you say the process of healing, now you're gonna get now you're you're opening me up and getting the the other the other part as the direct link to our childhood traumas and and this kind of work and readiness. But, you know, this is not something I I talk about very much at all because it's you know, it was very painful for so long. But we had on my refrigerator as a as a child, my mom had, like, a magnet or something on the refrigerator that was the serenity prayer.
Speaker 1:Oh. And my mother used the serenity prayer to justify her behavior. Yes. And it was it was just so manipulative and and and so I had this connection to the serenity prayer that was so dark, that was so related to my my mother and the horrific ways that she treated all of us. So in the very beginning of getting into twelve step recovery work, when the serenity prayer was said, I I froze.
Speaker 1:I absolutely froze, and I and I just had to breathe through it. And I'm very grateful that I had people that I could trust. My I spoke to Linda about it. I worked through it, and I had to had to reheal that old wound in order to progress with healing, my addiction and my alcoholism. But we we all know that that work and it is not easy.
Speaker 1:And in the beginning, it can feel like you're drowning.
Speaker 3:Yes. Yes. How would you speak to the similar thing when things are activating, like coming out of religious trauma, there's like, I'm having to pay attention to like, what feels culty? What doesn't feel culty? So when people talk about, oh, be careful about recovery.
Speaker 3:It's kind of culty. Like, what is your response to Yeah.
Speaker 1:My response to that is, you know, for me in the beginning, I I also had that concern and that fear, and I found a few people that I started to have conversations with and they one or two was all it took. They became my point people to who I could talk about when those things came up for me or when I felt that way. And then I would I would slowly learn to be present at meetings, say, you know what? Yeah. You know what?
Speaker 1:What's being said right now and this person or this this conversation, that doesn't resonate. That doesn't feel so good for me right now. So I would then, you know, rely on a few individual people that I had incredible private personal conversations with, and they are still in my life today. They are, they're huge pillars of support in my, in my, ability to have remained sober. And even now, I, as I deepen my commitment to 12 step work into helping other alcoholics and addicts, I say the same thing because they come to me with their trauma and they come to me with their stuff and they say, yeah, you know what?
Speaker 1:I can't do this. And I say, I completely understand. I had a similar experience. Here's how we can look at it differently. And I think it's really about conversations and about really honoring what can feel faulty, what can feel triggering.
Speaker 1:You know, all of those things are really important to honor, but had had I walked away every time I was triggered in a 12 step meeting, I don't think I would have stayed sober.
Speaker 3:Right. Think for me, it is recognizing, like the structure of a meeting are boundaries that keep me safe. And the tools I've learned from the literature are things that help me with critical thinking, which is something that was a weak spot for me because of religious trauma. And that's what's different. Something that is culty, like, turns that off, but this is turning that on.
Speaker 1:That's that's incredible. That's incredible insight because if you think about it, know, think of how much shame comes along with religious trauma, right? Or cult trauma. Yes. Or ritual abuse trauma.
Speaker 1:There's so much shame and so much fear attached. And then on the other side, when you start to really understanding some 12 step work with regards to whatever your ism is, it's really a tool to start shedding shame. And so you have this fascinating contrast of this thing is waiting for you, this support to shed shame and all the shame that you come in with. So it be for me, it really became such a balancing act. It was like I felt I was so full of shame when I first was getting sober.
Speaker 1:And it was really by understanding, you know, the the language and 12 step work that really started to allow me to shed shame. And but it but it took time, and, you know, willingness is the word that is used most often. But I I hadn't I was killing myself, and I I was really desperate. And I had to I had to really stick with it, and I'm so glad I did.
Speaker 3:I think it was desperation that led me to it. Like, when I talk about my life being unmanageable, I knew, like, almost every area. There was chaos in my relationships. I was overworking. I my my children were in process of what we call unshiny, more happy.
Speaker 3:And Wow. Yes. I was reclaiming my gayness in the middle of these politics and going through the divorce because conversion therapy is not safe or healthy and I do not need to be married to a man, even though we have a great relationship and he is very kind and I have lots of male friends including yourself. Like Yes. That doesn't mean as a lesbian, I need to be married to a man.
Speaker 3:And so Exactly. Like, just trying to get my life more congruent with myself, I I felt like and it kind of happened in my system. And I think by the time this airs, people will have heard that. But I felt like Katniss in the hunger games where I'm like, I can't tell even anymore who is a friend, who is an ally, and who is trying to kill me.
Speaker 1:Yes. Oh my god. I totally relate. I totally totally relate. I'm so I'm so moved by that.
Speaker 1:And I I just completely relate to that.
Speaker 3:It it was like I needed something
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:To literally just pause everything
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:So I can be like, I love the people in my life, and I love my children, and I love my work. And also, I am not being a quality contributing person anywhere because this is so much chaos, and I just need everything to stop for a minute so I can get back in touch with my system so that I can get grounded again so that I can do a check of like, what what am I even doing? What is happening to me? What am I creating in my life? Because the common denominator is me, which I've talked about before on the podcast, but this is the piece of it.
Speaker 3:I was making my own life unmanageable.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yes. I yes. Yes to all of that. I I I get it.
Speaker 1:And I think that I think that for for what you just said and for my experience and where you and I hover in all of this sameness in terms of understanding one another. It was like I almost felt like it it, you know, 12 step work, whichever whatever. There's so many great programs, but whatever. It gave me it gave me a way to start creating some order out of what was all the chaos. And it gave me places to put things or to put feelings or to put triggers and to start to be able to organize and say, okay.
Speaker 1:Alright. Here's what this is, and here's what that is, and here's something that I'm I feel ready to maybe start to try to heal. And, you know, I mean, there are things that got healed in recovery work that I couldn't access in therapy. And that's just the truth. And that's sometimes difficult to talk about, but that's true.
Speaker 1:I mean, there are definitely things that I was able to work on and heal after I got sober that I just couldn't do before.
Speaker 3:For me, it felt like so much was unmanageable that I knew if I could do therapy that would help because that's at the underlying root of But there was so much chaos and so much trauma happening in now time that I couldn't even get to those pieces.
Speaker 1:That makes sense.
Speaker 3:And I was going twice a week.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Totally get it. Like You know, it's so funny. People will ask me now. They'll they'll if I refer to being sober for twelve years, they'll be like, well, so you don't go to any meetings anymore.
Speaker 1:And I start to laugh, and I say, if I don't go to meetings, I run the risk of losing everything I've worked so hard to have.
Speaker 3:Yes. Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes. It's maintenance for me.
Speaker 3:I I was able to it was like I'm trying to find a metaphor to describe it. It was like putting on glasses when you go to the eye doctor and you get new glasses, glasses and you're like, oh my goodness, I didn't know I couldn't see it. Now I can see so much I was able to literally start seeing this feels good. This does not feel good. And it was like, I couldn't even discern that before enough to actually be able to consent to things.
Speaker 3:And I had to break things down. You say this, what are you actually meaning? What does that mean to you? What are you talking about? And having to ask these questions and flush everything out so that it could actually start consenting in my own life.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah. Totally. Yes. And and what it gets I mean, I'm I'm just in awe of what you're sharing right now. I mean, it's really special because you're you're in it and you're doing it, and it's really it's very moving to hear.
Speaker 3:The the other thing I love about meetings is that because it is everywhere, that if I am having a hard time or can't sleep or whatever, I can literally get on my computer and just join any random in the world. Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yes. You know, I I have to tell you that I don't this is not something I've had the opportunity to talk about at all, but I've got an amazing recovery community in Portugal. We it's we have four English speaking meetings a week. Wow.
Speaker 1:And it's it's incredible, and it's deepened my commitment because now I'm working with others. And and, you know, I mean, you know the statistics. I mean, you know the links between addiction and alcoholism and trauma. It's like, you know, I just sometimes you witness someone and you're just waiting. You just you just know that it's part of the story, and it will only come out when that person's ready.
Speaker 1:But that's one of the gifts, I think, of of being president and showing up to meetings is to watch transformation of others. I mean, it's just been incredible. You know, there's there's something I wanted to share with you that I don't that I that I don't talk about so much. I think maybe I referenced this in one of the presentations at at Healing Together once, but when I was probably three or four years sober, I was no, I'm sorry. After the book came out, I was asked to take a 12 step meeting into the women's jail where I lived.
Speaker 1:And I was a little bit confused about why they're asking me to go into the women's jail, and the the truth is that I was going in under the under the premise of bringing in the an AA meeting, which I was. But the person running it asked me to specifically talk about having been sexually abused as a child. And Emma, I have to tell you, it it was life changing to be in the prison with, I think at the time it was 15 women in the first meeting, and to witness them making the connection to their trauma in their childhoods, to who they were now as incarcerated women. And it changed my perspective about, shame, and about what we carry and about how we hold it and how society, can be so critical, especially of women. And and it really in terms of 12 step work, it was one of the most rewarding and life changing things I've ever done.
Speaker 3:Wow. I you know, I see groups at Healing Together. I see groups and systems speak community, and there's lots of other communities and different kinds of things. And being able to be vulnerable with others in a safe enough way and be responded to and respond to others and have opportunity to practice that in safe enough ways, I think really is one of the greatest things of peer support
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:That changes like, it's game changer. It's what saves lives. Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes. And, you know, and I I continue to say this just as we started today, but it's like when I when I find myself in those situations, I always reassure the person there's there's nothing you can't say to me. Now I'm not I'm not telling you that I don't have to then go and process what I hear. You know, I have my sometimes I'm really thrown off and I have to go and deal with whatever has gotten triggered in me. But as a human, on a very human level, to be able to witness on a peer level someone's story that they're willing to share is one of the gifts in in in my recovery.
Speaker 1:It's one of the biggest gifts in my recovery to be able to bear witness and to hold something with someone. I mean, it's it's why I love healing together. It's why I love talking to you. And it's it's why I really find myself so grateful to 12.
Speaker 3:I think that there are so many of us that would not have, like, would not be alive without it. And that is really like my bottom, right? Like that is what I got to is I am not going to survive this. The grief of the loss of relationships, the struggle in relationships, I am not going to survive this, but that is life happening to me and I'm not okay with that. I wanna choose for myself I want to live and I want my life.
Speaker 3:And that means something has to change because I cannot do it this way anymore.
Speaker 1:That's a %, resonates. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Speaker 2:Thank you for listening. Your support of the podcast, the workbooks, and the community means so much to us as we try to create something together that's never been done before, not like this. Connection brings healing, and you can join us on the community at www.systemsspeak.com. We'll see you there.