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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,
Speaker 3: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:Hello? Hello. Excited to get to talk to you.
Speaker 2:That's so kind of you. If you want to introduce yourself however you want to introduce yourself
Speaker 1:Okay. That's fine. Yeah. My name is Holly Crumpler, and I am a trauma survivor and I have the Id. I have been working with a therapist for the past two years in person but then with COVID-nineteen, you know, we switched to online therapy through Zoom and we've been doing that for a couple of months and I also have been participating in online therapy with my husband for couples therapy and then also with my son for some therapy that he and I do together.
Speaker 1:So I've had a lot of experience with online therapy for the past couple of months.
Speaker 2:Okay. So your life sounds a little bit like mine in that there's a whole lot of therapy happening on Zoom. And a whole lot of Zoom meetings. It has been impossible for me. We have triplets and twins and a pre k like three fifth graders, two second graders and a pre k child.
Speaker 2:So they all are supposed to have their Zoom meetings for their classes, but the fifth graders are supposed to have it three times a week, plus they all have IEPs. So they're also supposed to be meeting once a week with the speech person and with the OT person and with this person and that person and it ultimately was like if you also counted counseling for the children it was like 27 Zoom meetings a week and I just couldn't. I cut it off. I was like we don't even let our kids have that much screen time.
Speaker 1:Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's it's not it's not healthy to be on the screen all that time for for the kids or for us really for anyone, right? So, yeah, it are, I have two children. My older one is a junior or a junior in college and actually he just finished yesterday. So, now he's a rising senior in college and my younger son is in in his finishing his sophomore year in high school. So, they both have been on virtual school for the last two months and my younger son, he's not quite done yet.
Speaker 1:He's so over it. You know, he's just like, he can't, it can't end soon enough.
Speaker 2:How did you find the podcast in the beginning?
Speaker 1:You know, I honestly cannot remember how I found you. I think I was just doing a lot of research trying to find, oh, you know what? I think I was trying to find some more resources because I had to go to be hospitalized twice last year and I was getting really down about just having DID and you know, feeling stressed about how long is this going to go on? When will it ever end and and what do I have to do to you know live a normal life? And II was I'm I'm 53 years old and I wasn't diagnosed with DID until two years ago and that explains so much.
Speaker 1:That explains so much. But I, you know, I was going through a lot of hard times last year and it was getting discouraging for me and so, I really wanted to find some people who could be like north stars for me and inspirational people for me. People who have DID and are coping and healing and recovering and so II think it was in that search that I came across your podcast because I was looking for up of all different things, you know, books and podcasts and just expanding my knowledge base around DID and when I found your podcast, I was like, oh my gosh, this is the most amazing thing. It is such an incredible resource and you know, when I found it, I I I can't remember, you know, time could be a little elusive for us, right? So, I I found it sometime maybe the end of last year or beginning of this year, I don't know and I just started binge listening and I, you know, I just walk around my house a lot of the time with earbuds and listening to listening to your podcast, and I've just learned so much through through you, and I'm so inspired by you.
Speaker 2:Oh that's so very kind.
Speaker 1:Oh true.
Speaker 2:Oh I want to respect your privacy of course so anything you're welcome to pass but what about your journey for getting diagnosed are you able to share? What was that like for you?
Speaker 1:Well, gosh, you know I like can I tell you my whole story of my life? Oh, what it was like? So I had a lot of struggles throughout my life with a number of different things and you know, I I went to a lot through a lot of therapy throughout my adult life. I for a long time just thought I was on top of the world. I just thought I was an amazing person like everything was so perfect and you know, II was always like a stellar student and I was, you know, valedictorian in high school and the number one in my business school and you know, then I went to work at a big accounting firm and I became a partner in my firm and you know, I just had all of these achievements and that's because, you know, I had to strive to be worthy, right?
Speaker 1:And because as a child, I was I was sexually abused and I didn't realize, right, my whole life that like I was trying to compensate for all of that and and work through all these challenges that I had had. And so, you know, I just kept trying to do my best at everything II did. I kept working really hard and you know II met my current husband when we were in college and we got married six years later and I just kept going along trying to create the perfect life and we had two children and you know, I had a lot of challenges under all of that and so, I, you know, I went started going to therapy. I don't even remember when. Sometime, you know, when I was when I was working and having children and trying to figure out how to keep all of these balls in the air and all working, you know, well together and I wasn't really realizing that I wasn't happy and so, you know, I would just talk to therapists about different struggles I was having and it was a lot of anxiety and you know, stuff related to work and being a mom and just trying to manage everything and and so, you know, I I had I had these challenges but no one ever really, you know, focused actually on my abuse and I'm I'm not sure how many of them really even ask me the question sometimes about what happened to me and which you know, I'm not unlike so many people's stories with DID.
Speaker 1:They they don't, you know, necessarily know to be looking for the right things or asking the right questions and it ends up taking forever to get diagnosed, right? So, I I had, you know, I'd have these kind of situations with different therapists and I was also having some challenges just in my relationship with my husband and I see counselors about that and you know II remember going to this one therapist and she did start talking. We were talking about the intimacy challenges with my husband and she was asking me about my childhood abuse stuff and she made a comment in one of our very early sessions about how my parents had not protected me because that they were not my abuser. And I couldn't hear that, you know, and I was like, run away. I wouldn't accept that and I was like, run away from that and so I, you know, I kind of stopped that therapy and and and then, you know, I just kept, I think, running away from everything and working really, really hard and then, finally, at some point in my work life, I was getting tireder and tireder and I I didn't know why.
Speaker 1:I was so tired all the time and it got worse and worse and finally, I really was just physically extremely sick and I, you know, at this point, I had a very big career and it was very a lot of responsibilities and a lot of people that I was managing and you know, had two children and all the stuff in my life and I was trying to you know, keep all the balls in the air and it was hard but II I finally just got started getting really sick and and actually I had struggled with my physical health, my whole adult life and it was, it kind of started in college and it was a lot of things, you know, a lot of upper respiratory infections, this illness that was ongoing and but I would always fight through because I was, you know, young and I could kinda overcome and then I would get better again and then I get sick again. I get better again. I get sick again. So, I was constantly fighting this physical stuff that was going on and I didn't realize that like how much I was fighting inside all of the stuff that had happened in my past but the physical health issues really came to a head in February and I became extremely sick and with with very bad fatigue and pain and brain fog and I could hardly function and I ended up having to retire from my job and I had a disability retirement and you know, I started doing more and more therapy as a result of that just trying to deal with all these physical health challenges and I still have my physical health challenges but I think finally being at home away from my job and and not running away from everything kind of allowed more of my DID symptoms to present.
Speaker 1:And I've I I I kind of got to this very kind of a crisis point where we didn't know what was happening with me and I was just behaving strangely all the time and I was becoming very unsafe and unstable and we finally made our way to a couple different psychiatrists and then finally finally got to the right one two years ago who figured out I had DID and all the pictures, pieces of the picture started coming together. I'm sorry that was a long, long answer to your question.
Speaker 2:No, I think it's a long journey for most of us from realizing that we need help to actually getting a diagnosis. I think that's a very common thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So it's it is very common and it's very frustrating and discouraging and you know I when I meet people who are much younger than me, have been diagnosed with DID, I think oh I wish so much that I would have known this a long time ago. Now whether I would have accepted it, because I know we also run away from these things, right, sometimes, but, I just wish I could have started working a long time ago on this. But I think it's also hard to work on it when you are in the middle of trying to have a career and raise your children and do community service work and and and and so it's easier to run away, right? And escape through addictions like, you know, work addiction like I had.
Speaker 1:I had a serious work addiction. I also had a a you know, a part that was my superwoman part who was carrying me through being able to do all of those things.
Speaker 2:It's true and I think that there are many people with DID who are also gifted in many ways and one of the challenges with that can actually be sort of an addiction to your own thoughts and when you are problem solving then you sort of get this dopamine hit and it reinforces that same thing. So it can be very challenging in processing and letting go of thinking about that and keeping your brain fed so that you can function enough even for healing. That's a thing, that's a common thing.
Speaker 1:Uh-huh, uh-huh, I see.
Speaker 2:What was that like for you when you finally got a diagnosis and knew what was going on?
Speaker 1:Well, it felt like, oh my gosh, this just explained so many things in my life that, you know, I didn't understand. So, you know, it felt like a relief and you know, it's kind of like when I was really, really, really sick in 2012 and I had been on this journey of trying to figure out why am I physically sick all the time and II didn't tell you this part but you know, I ended it ended up that I had toxic mold in my home that was making me very very sick and I had also had Lyme disease and I had chronic fatigue syndrome and I had all of these things and you know, when I was going through this process for years of searching for what is wrong with me physically, it was so hard because you can't heal if you don't know what you're healing from and so similarly, you know, yeah, getting diagnosed with, oh, you have anxiety or depression or PTSD from this or that, you know, was not enough information to allow me to really start down a path of focus healing. So, getting that diagnosis, I felt hopeful. It was like, oh, wow.
Speaker 1:Someone is really figured out. You know, once I started reading about it, I was like, yeah, that's exactly what's going on for me and you know, there were so many things like I just thought, oh, I just thought everyone has these voices in their heads. I thought that was like just my brain thinking. You know, I didn't know that there were things that happened to me that weren't just everyone else's experience and I didn't know you know, like I could be such different personalities in a short period of time and had no idea but other people could notice and they would make comments to me, you know, like they'd say, you you just don't seem at all like an accountant, you know, and like when they would talk to me because I wasn't in superwoman mode, if I was in a different mode, you know, I was in my party mode part or whatever and so, it just put a lot of pieces together and it gave me hope that I could have something to really focus on and work towards healing.
Speaker 2:How was that for you to share your diagnosis with your family since you're married and have children?
Speaker 1:Oh, wow. That's a question. My husband he was, you know, the one that was driving me around at the time to like the neurologist and the different psychiatrist. This is, you know, this is a couple two and a half years ago when I kind of went into real crisis and so, I think he also was feeling relief. You know, he was hearing these things pretty directly from my psychiatrist with me.
Speaker 1:Also, he would go into session with me and you know, he was sharing my behaviors and things that he was observing and things I was doing and and it was very, it was all very scary. So, I think it was very scary for him at the time and somewhat confusing because he didn't know anything about it and as you are well aware, even if you do know something about it, there are so many misconceptions, right? About this condition and so, I think it was a relief for him too just to say, okay, wow, someone seems to understand my my wife and so, he felt some support that we've seen. We got really lucky. I think to finally find a good therapist who she was a she's a psychiatrist and my therapist all in one which is really wonderful and II can't I have to say I just feel so much compassion for you right now that you are not in therapy and II feel guilty even talking about my therapist when I'm talking to you because I know the challenges that you have gone through.
Speaker 2:Know what we we have felt that on the podcast in the past when we had friends who did not have a therapist or who had terrible therapist or who had good therapist who just didn't know about trauma and we had such a good one and so I know that feeling but but I'm glad to hear your story and I appreciate you sharing.
Speaker 1:Thank you. So so you know my husband he was the easy one but then the challenge is I have two children right and my older son who's 21 now at the time he was 19 and so I I don't honestly it was such a crazy time you know. I don't remember all of the details about telling him but I know we told him pretty early on after my diagnosis and it it helped explain a lot for him and honestly, it's been a very challenging journey with him because my DID created a lot of trauma for him as a child. And that's a lot to to face as a mother. You know, to know that you are traumatizing your children not on purpose or not because you want to or or that you are even aware that you are but you are because you are so broken that you are not handling yourself well and so for my older son, this was very difficult and he and I we did a lot of therapy together to work through a lot of the issues and I think him knowing what had been happening was a relief for him.
Speaker 1:You know, it explained why was it that my mommy when I was a little boy, sometimes she, one moment, she was sweet and loving and then the next moment she was like a witch. And you know, wow. When you're a little child, that's really confusing, right? So, we had to work through a lot and you know what the the beautiful thing about it now because he and I are in a really good place. Is that he's a he's in film school and he has to make, not has to, but gets to make a a film for his senior thesis and he's chosen to make a short film about the day in the life of a woman with DID.
Speaker 1:And so I think it's wonderful that he, you know, he wants to tell and show the condition in its reality, not the way that media normally paints us inappropriately but in a true light of what is it like to have this challenge of living with DID and trying to have normal relationships with people in the world and so he and I have been collaborating together on his senior thesis film and and writing that script and it's been a wonderful experience for us. So, my younger son, you know, it's been it's it was rougher for him because because of his age at the time of my diagnosis, we didn't tell him immediately and I don't think we even told him the first time I went to the hospital which was a year ago. I don't think we told him all the details of my diagnosis. I think we just told him I was having challenges or I honestly don't remember. It's such a blur.
Speaker 1:But before we we had to go back to the hospital in October, November, October of last year and we felt like it was now time to tell him. I think we told him right before that and he had felt like we were keeping him in the dark and that's a bigger conversation about our whole family dynamic but I think it was hard for him also. He he was very confused and yet also very compassionate but you know, scared of me because scared of like, what does this mean? Like, who is my mom? You know, who is my mom and What is happening to her?
Speaker 1:Why does she all of a sudden turn into a three year old child? You know, that's that's scary when you're relying on this person to take care of you and all of a sudden, this person is three years old. So, it was scary and hard for him and he and I have been doing a lot of therapy together. I mentioned that at the very beginning and we have really gotten to a good place now that he understands my condition. He's he's he's 16 years old now.
Speaker 1:He understands what's going on. He has a lot of empathy and compassion toward me. Has compassion towards my younger parts. I think he still really struggles with my angry parts and those parts that are my protectors that sometimes he sees how they affect me. And how maybe they're not so nice to me and he feels protective of me.
Speaker 1:I'm saying me as Holly, his mom. So, yeah. Another long, long answer to your question.
Speaker 2:I know I think that is maybe the most honest and brave thing I've ever heard anyone say in talking about how that impacted your children and what is difficult about it. I know that many of us with DID and who also have children are very concerned about how our children are doing and how our children are processing it and how we are parenting for those of us who did have parents who were abusers, how are we parenting differently than
Speaker 1:yes
Speaker 2:we parented we were parented but also we have to fight as a community so much stigma about parenting and people with mental illness that it's a scary thing to talk about because it feels like and I mean feeling as opposed to what is necessarily true on the outside but it feels very threatening to very risky to talk about parenting and DID because of stigma and because of outside perspectives from people who don't understand and so I think what you shared was very very brave and really one of the most honest responses I've ever heard to such a question. Thank you for sharing.
Speaker 1:You're welcome. You know, I've I've had to deal with a lot of shame about this, you know, and it's really what drove me to the hospital of the second time in October was feeling like I was just the most horrible mother and wife. You know, just feeling incredible shame about how my condition has affected my family and I was fortunate enough when I was at the hospital and and I I've gone to the Roth Institute at UBH in Denton, Texas twice now and you know, that second time I was there, my therapist really helped me do a lot of very good work around my shame on those issues and getting in touch with the parts of me that were feeling that shame and challenging challenging their beliefs about you know, I'm not a good mother or I'm not a good wife and and you know, really connecting that with the reminding of those parts that none of this is my fault and I'm I'm not the one who should feel the shame. It's my abusers who should feel the shame but I, you know, I worked on converting my shame to reframe statements of truth about I am doing the very best I can as a mom and as a wife and I am working hard every day on my healing from this trauma and working with my DID so that I can be a better mom and wife.
Speaker 2:That is so powerful and again a very common experience that many many of us have had to go through being in the hospital and I'm really really glad that you had a good hospital and a positive experience.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yes, I did. It was scary. I'd never been I'd never been to a psychiatric hospital before a year ago in my first day and so it was quite a shock for me in many many ways and yet my experience it helped me tremendously in my healing.
Speaker 2:What has therapy been like for you since getting diagnosed and before the pandemic? We'll lead into the pandemic but what was it kind of like from once you were diagnosed and once you had a good therapist that you were comfortable with what was sort of that experience like generally up until the changes at the pandemic?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you know as I mentioned I feel very very fortunate to have found this psychiatrist slash therapist and you know, first, I wasn't so sure about whether like I had the right connection with her. And part of that is probably just, you know we're we're not necessarily gonna just trust people, right? So it took me II was fairly open with her. Like I was able to share like because I had been doing so much therapy for many years, I would say not really getting to the root of my issues but doing so much therapy for so many years, I was comfortable telling my story and I was comfortable talking about my trauma. Some, I guess, I don't know that I realized I had as many as I did, to be honest.
Speaker 1:I kind of thought I had, well, I had this really big T trauma, right? And then I have all these other smaller T traumas that because of DID, were bigger and well and and because of the abuse were bigger. Not so much because of DID, but because of DID, I had new parts associated with all of them. But, you know, I was was fairly comfortable sharing and so I think that set me on a pretty good path with her and she told me I'm kind of like I wanna get stuff done. Know, like like I had this really strong driving part of me that's my part called Superwoman and Superwoman.
Speaker 1:She just gets stuff done. That's who she is and she can do anything and she believes that because our mother told us that. So, she was like ready to be like, okay, we've got this DID thing. Let's just, you know, get it fixed up and move on with our life, right? And so early on, we had no understanding of what the past might be like for this therapy and we really thought it was going to be something we could do quickly and I think part of that too is that our therapist told us that she felt like we had like all the right things going for us which I have an incredible gratitude for the fact that II am privileged in so, so, so, so many ways and it it breaks my heart when I meet other people who have DID who do not have so many of the things that I have and yet, it's still so hard and so, my heart goes out to all the people with the ID who don't have all those things lined up for them but you know, she you know, was telling me from the beginning that she just felt like I was in a good a good place to make progress and to heal from this and that it wouldn't have to be something I suffered with forever because you know, I had a supportive husband and a supportive family more broadly and I have financial resources and I have a pretty, you know, strong intelligence and ability to solve problems and I am driven and committed and you know, just had a lot of factors and I have AI have a therapist who understands DID, right?
Speaker 1:And treats for DID and she's, you know, local to me and all of these things in my favor. So, and there's probably lots more that I'm forgetting about but she, you know, she was encouraging to me at the beginning and and yet I had very unrealistic expectations and so there were lots of kind of fits and starts I think for me because I would I was going through this process of like getting to know who my parts were and that was like mind blowing to me. You know II wasn't aware like even though I kind of had this sense that there were these other pieces of me. I didn't understand them as identities or parts as they truly were because they were kind of like, I don't know. They would take me over and I didn't have any idea if they were just doing their thing, right?
Speaker 1:And I wasn't aware of it. And and so, I was the first I think it was about kind of discovering some of these parts and trying not to be so afraid about them because they were scary, right? I was having lots of scary I want not visions because they're not outside of me. They're in my head but like images of them and it's like they were trying to communicate with me and I didn't understand what they were trying to do and say and so it was this process of just trying to understand DID and and what was happening and who these parts were and where they came from and and going into crisis a lot and and I hardly remember the first year of it. I mean, it was just like this big blur of confusion and and you know, and I was speaking to understand I was reading things and trying to find different resources where I can learn more and it was like I was drinking from the fire hose of learning about trauma and DID and at the same time trying to get to know myself and all of myself and all these parts that have been pushed away while I've been primarily in, you know, the superwoman part for most of my life that was allowing me to survive in the world and so it was an exploration and that that therapy was was very powerful with my therapist because I don't remember at what point she started doing EMDR work with me but that was amazing.
Speaker 1:I was blown away at how much I could learn from my part through the EMDR and the things that they would express and share were just amazing. So, I was, I was, you know, on an exploration and and I honestly, I don't remember how I ended up to this crisis point that first time I had to go to the hospital but it was a really wonderful thing that happened because when I was at the hospital, I started this process of really, really, really getting to know my part and I did that through a a journaling technique that they had me do there at the Ross Institute where I had like 12 different questions and I would ask the question in my journal with my right hand, my dominant hand and then I would answer the question with my left hand and I would do that for each part. So, when I would allow the part to answer with my left non dominant hand, it was accessing the right side of my brain which you can't, you know, which is what EMDR does as well allowing you to get to both sides of your brain and just you know, talking about your part doesn't get you there and so that journaling I did was a phenomenal way that allowed me to get to know my part you know, and just having that space to do that in a safe setting.
Speaker 1:Was really amazing and I, you know, I made a map of my system and I got to know my system a part of it. We didn't get, we didn't learn about everyone yet but phase one of my system and and making kind of a map of of them and kind of how they somewhat fit together. I was starting to understand some of that so that then I could come back from the hospital in a safer way and with a better understanding to continue doing that work with my therapist. And then that you know continued to go well with more exploration with more parts and I would learn about different ones that would come out. But unfortunately you know as they come out, some of them are very angry and dangerous and scary and you know, I ended up like I said, having to go to the hospital a second time but I think that was very helpful for getting through a lot of the shame work and learning to be much more compassionate towards myself for what we are all dealing with all of our my parts.
Speaker 1:And so I've had a really great experience with this therapist for the last two years and with additionally those two hospitalizations and lots of EMDR and then also lots of self therapy, Lots of art therapy and play therapy and self care and journaling every day and you know, I've I'm able to then go to my therapist each week. Right now we're weekly. We used to be at 1.2 or three times a week. I don't know. We're weekly right now which is is good for us.
Speaker 2:How has the transition during the pandemic been for you? What has that look like? How has therapy changed? What was hard for you to adjust with that or what has that been like for you?
Speaker 1:You know, it's actually been an easy transition for me and quite frankly, there's some aspects of it that II kind of like better. You know II find it stressful driving all over the place and I know you can relate to this. For so many therapy appointments and for a while, you know, I was going to to my therapist more than once a week and I was also in couples therapy with my husband which I still am and I was taking my younger son to his in person therapy and to his separate psychiatrist and he was having a lot of challenges in the fall. And again, a lot of that had to do with me. So, it was you know, I would just get overwhelmed with it and also driving in addition to all that, you know, there's appointments for my health, for my physical health which I hate saying physical health and mental health like they're two different things but this is like how the world talks about it like mental health is not a part of your physical body.
Speaker 1:It's your brain which is an organ in your body but that's how we talk about it. So, anyway, I have, you know, other appointments for, you know, my chiropractor and my stuff for my my TMJ, my jaw, and my pain in my neck and my, you know, ongoing issues with my chronic fatigue and you know, doctors, doctors, doctors. So, I just I just want to be at home more so that I can have some self care and take care of myself and and so not having to drive around all these appointments is to me like the biggest blessing of COVID-nineteen for me and I know some people have different views about like being on the computer and and and for me, I'm not on the computer all day because I don't have a work job. I'm on disability. So, it doesn't bother me to get on, you know, a few Zoom meetings throughout the week to do therapy and you know, in some ways, it's easier to because I don't feel as vulnerable when I'm on with my individual therapist.
Speaker 1:It's like she is not there sitting there staring at me in my vulnerable state because you know, with like Zoom, you can't actually make eye contact with someone. You know, you when you're looking at the camera, you're, you can't both look at the camera at the same time which is how you have to look into each other's eyes. So, I just feel like it's less vulnerable for me and I can have this like shield I guess of the computer that I kind of like. I mean, I can still see her but I don't feel quite as exposed. So, there is an element there that I like.
Speaker 1:I can still do EMDR. Normally with her we do EMDR with the buzzers, the tappers. I can't remember what the husband called those on one of your podcasts.
Speaker 2:Right, right, the tappers. We'll go with that. That's so much better.
Speaker 1:Yeah so and I think about him a lot actually when I hold him, but and I like those a lot. That's the only type of EMDR I had done. I hadn't done like the thing with the finger or press your eyes or any of that. But I I had done that. So now at home I just you know do the like butterfly hug and I do the tap tap tap tap tap on my own shoulders.
Speaker 1:Although today, when I I had a session with my therapist today and we were doing EMDR and I have this one part which very very angry right now at my husband. She's he's frustrated with him and so we were working through some stuff and as we were doing EMDR, I'm like banging on my shoulders and my psychiatrist, she was like, is there a reason that you're tapping so hard on your shoulders? And I'm like, yeah, because I'm angry. So I I can still do EMDR and it still works but I, you know, I'm not sure I get quite as deep in my EMDR work through Zoom. I feel like when I'm in the office with her, I feel a little bit more isolated off from the rest of my family.
Speaker 1:So, I think that's a little bit of a challenge of feeling like you are in a safe, protected place where you won't be overheard or you know, have someone else hear you and be offended by what you say. So, I have to work to find a place where I feel comfortable. Although right now, it's terrible. We had a we have an issue in our house. We had some water intrusion issue which we've had a lot of problems with that in the past at our house and so we have a water mold issue and it's being remediated and then they discovered termite because water and mold was not enough.
Speaker 1:So our house was like a it's a disaster zone. It's a construction site here at my house and and we're all stuck here, right? But the good thing about that is like it's so loud out there. There's all these fans running because they're air scrubbers and fans going that peep I don't have to worry so much that people in my house can overhear me when I'm complaining about them during therapy.
Speaker 2:That's funny.
Speaker 1:But you know, I think the other thing there's, you know, the other thing that I guess I don't like it as much for couples therapy or for like the therapy with my son. I think the dynamic there is harder when you're doing it over Zoom. Because like both of us are sitting looking at the computer and like not facing half facing each other half facing the therapist. So, that feels a little awkward and weird and and you can get, I think you can also kind of get distracted by seeing yourself in the little window when you're you know, you're talking but you see yourself and that that is especially a strange phenomenon when you are dissociating and like one part is talking and then you see this picture and you're like, that's not me or you know, what is going on and how's she here because I'm talking and that's a really strange thing with DID.
Speaker 2:I agree. I think that's a big piece and I'm glad you mentioned it. I also know that the family dynamic pieces are pretty interesting. Our children were all in counseling and with the family therapist and since we've gone in the stay at home orders or the lockdown here they just sort of haven't asked and she hasn't mentioned it and it just sort of hasn't happened. They've not been in therapy these months.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 2:I don't know if it's because we are not functioning enough to let them see her or if she's excited to have a reason not to be able to see them or what's happening.
Speaker 1:I doubted that. But
Speaker 2:And then the husband has continued his therapy. He has a good therapist and he has continued with her. Although she is not doing EMDR. She won't do it on telehealth. He is missing the EMDR a lot and it's actually caused problems for us.
Speaker 2:Not for us, mean for him. It's been a challenge and then one night I had gotten the children to bed and I was finished so I just burst into our bedroom because I was ready to go to bed for the night. And he was on the phone with a therapist. I didn't even realize they had an appointment and I felt terrible cause I just walked in but I didn't know. Right.
Speaker 2:I didn't know what was happening. Right. So Yeah. It has its own challenges for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I mean, I'm again, I'm very fortunate because like I have a a fairly big house. So, there's multiple rooms, right? Where different people can go and have privacy but not everyone has that but you know II was listening to a webcast that McLean Hospital did last week. It was about supporting your college aged students during COVID-nineteen.
Speaker 1:It was it was a good podcast and not podcast webinar and they were talking about, you know, just being mindful of people's need for privacy for their therapy and I, you know, they said, well, you know, you can always go sit in your car. There, you can go sit outside. There are definitely other options but I think it's something that's important for, you know, anyone who has someone else in their house that has therapy to communicate around and work through how are we going to make sure that this is working for you and that we're supporting this being a safe private time for you so that people do feel comfortable. So, you know, I know for me, I was at first just trying to do that on my own and then I'm like, I need to talk to the other people that live here, you know, and set some some boundaries and some things so that they won't like, you know, walk in on me and then feel bad like we're just explaining and so I I've tried to do a better job of figuring all of that out. So, as things have gone on and I've been at this more, I'm doing better and then, of course, I have the fan blowing right now.
Speaker 1:So, that helps too.
Speaker 2:Wow. Has there been any differences that you were able to share certain parts or certain things because you were in your own home where they had been too difficult to bring to the office or it seems the same as far as presentation for you, for your system?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's an interesting question. I'm not sure. You know, it is interesting. That while I've been in lockdown, I have had several new parts present that I was unaware of. Yeah, this is, yeah, until you asked me that question, I hadn't thought about this so much but I I it's kind of like, you know, some people talk about being in lockdown as being like a retreat which I know you don't feel that way at all and your with your situation.
Speaker 1:Right. With six children and everything that's going on, right? But there is some aspect of that for me where well, it felt that way the first month. The second month has not felt like that. It's felt like, you know, just get everyone out of my house and just I need some peace and well, it doesn't help but it's a construction site here and but I also got another mold exposure and that it was really sick and all these things but at first, it kind of felt like a retreat and I had more space to like just do more self care because I wasn't running around all these appointments all the time, right?
Speaker 1:And that felt good and I think there's been some element of that that has allowed either some of our parts that didn't feel as comfortable or didn't feel like they had the space or time to be able to present or it wasn't their turn to to kind of maybe demand a little more of my attention or I was more tuned in to them and listening more carefully and like I know like there was this one part that I had known about him for a long time and I have been like actively not engaging. And like He's been wanting to have his time and. Finally. I'll say exploded out a couple of weeks ago with my family. It was it was bad.
Speaker 1:It was a bad crisis situation. II guess there must be some element of us. It's kind of like when I go to the hospital, you know, I when I go to the hospital, I feel like I'm kind of cocooned away from the world and I get so much work done on myself and it's been kind of like that. So, I think it's not just the doing something differently with my therapist and and it's I don't know. Maybe it is also that whole thing that I've got that screen protecting me and in a way, I'm I am safer to express some things that have been tucked away but there have been a lot of awakenings and increased communications with parts that maybe I sensed a little bit, but a couple of them are getting really close just now that I wasn't giving full attention to.
Speaker 2:I think I think that's good you shared that experience and and your perspective of what that's been like for your system. Ours was very much the opposite where they had the only time we had to be able to work on us, the only time we had that cocoon was while the children were at school and that was taken from us and so now we have no space, we have no privacy, they've taken our markers we used to use for journaling, they've used up all our notebooks that we used to write with, like everything is just gone. All that we worked so hard to create even this attic space for like our hammock and where we could write and work and all of this we had finally created the space and they've just invaded and taken it over and it wasn't even about boundaries there's literally nowhere else for them to be all day and weather here has been raining raining raining for weeks and weeks and weeks and so like even the basement room has flooded as well like you're dealing with water in different ways right? So we have we can't even send them there as a playroom because it's not safe and so there's literally nowhere else for them to go and they are everywhere and they can't we can't even send them outside and because we're on precautions for our daughter we can't go to the park or the trails and so we are literally have been in the house with six children every day not leaving for three months.
Speaker 1:I I I think about you every single day. I honestly do and I have such incredible compassion for you and what you are dealing with with that and I II listened to your I'm back podcast today. I listened to it twice and my heart is just breaking for you for all that you are enduring and it I don't think you have lost everything. I am confident that this is a pause for you and you will be picking back up but it's just II can't even begin to fathom the challenge that you are facing right now and yet II know because I've listened to most of your podcast now that you have such incredible strength which is why you're able to keep doing the things that you're doing and taking such incredible care of these six children. And so I I do I I mean it when I say I think about you every day because I I am just so sad for you that you're not that you're having to be in this pause that I know it's not a retreat for me for you and it's everything other than that especially with what's going on with with your with your youngest daughter and I'm heartbroken over all of that for you.
Speaker 2:I so appreciate that and I really think I just needed someone in my life to say that so thank you for saying that. It's again a reminder though everyone even though we're all going through the same thing through the pandemic, our experience of it is so different. Everyone has a different experience of it. And you, I love I love that you as a system have been able to take some of this time as really a sacred time to have that cocoon experience whereas for us we've not gotten that but we had it some before and that's why we were able to do such intense work with our therapist before and now looking at it honestly, I mean acknowledging what's hard because I don't want to relive it later so I'm trying to process it as that happens but the good thing that has been wonderful is that our cocoon has been with our family. And so our children have received that.
Speaker 2:We have been present with them. That has been beautiful and sacred and good. And so I have no complaints about that piece even though it's been hard.
Speaker 1:Yes. Well, and that is you have built. It's not just that you have one. You have built such a beautiful family and it is amazing how you all are together And so I hope that you will just continue to be that blessing and allow that to carry you through until you can get back to, and you will, get back to really doing that work for yourself that you deserve to continue doing.
Speaker 2:That's so kind and gracious of you.
Speaker 1:I will tell you also that I'm not sure the rest of my family completely appreciates my cocooning because, at least my husband, because like I said, I had a pretty scary part that emerged or felt safe enough to emerge or felt frustrated enough with everything that's going on here to finally have enough to emerge. So it's been it's been hard, know, on I think on my husband, but I think it's been good too for some of the work with especially my younger son and the work that we are doing for him to understand me better and allowing us to come closer together and me understanding him better. So yeah, there's there's been a lot that's that's been good there and yeah, we are we are all suffering in our own ways in different ways. This pandemic, I have a lot of guilt because I feel like, oh, there's so many people that are suffering so much more than me and feeling helpless that there's not more that I can do because I have to also like continue to be realistic about what can I give to other people because it is a challenge for me every day to take care of myself and it is it's it's hard, you know, even with like I said before, I feel like I have so many privileges and yet it is an ongoing effort to take care of my physical health?
Speaker 1:There's a lot I have to do to manage my chronic fatigue and take care of my physical health and to take care of my mental health and try to keep moving forward in some way and and at least not going backwards because it feels so bad, right? Every time you have a new crisis or you go, you know, into a place where you've been before that you thought you've moved forward from. It's just, it feels so bad and yet, that's just the reality of trying to work with this horrible traumas that we've endured and to heal from it and to learn to work with our system and who knows whatever that's going to look like in the future. That's such a mystery to me and yet I've I've tried to let go of the striving that I used to have towards healing and getting better and not suffering from this and I can so so relate to some of the things you were saying on your on back podcast of I just I don't want to you know I had so many times where I'm like I don't want to be this anymore, right? And I, I want this all to go away, and it's, it doesn't go away, unfortunately, unless we keep doing the work, and that takes a lot of motivation and support and help and I do hope that at some level, you can feel like that energy from your listeners that are out there wishing that best for you all of the time and that you you don't have to keep giving to us as listeners in order for us to keep sending those positive ways your way.
Speaker 1:So, you have to give yourself, you know, the time that you need during this time and and not be worried about your listeners or your your podcast because if you never made another podcast in your life, you will have changed the lives of so many people already and so, I just wanted to share that with you too that II want you to keep yourself front of mind always and to the extent the podcast helps you process do that, right? But to the extent it's something else, you know, don't. Just do what you need to do with the podcast for you.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well I just, I've never met you but because I've listened to so much of your story, I feel like I know you and like I talk about you to my family all the time and I I tell them, I say, there's this this most amazing woman and she is so inspiring to me and I do. I talk about you to them and they're I now I know you might think this is silly but like I'll just say I said my friend Emma and they're like they're like, you need that that one you've never met? I'm like, yeah and the one that you've never talked to? Yeah. I'm like, my friend Emma because I just feel that way because I know so much about you and and I care so so deeply for for you and and so I I you know I tell them different things about you and they just all think you're amazing too because you are and so I just think you're you're such a special person and I I I hope that you can embrace that fully one day and and believe that fully of just all of the the gifts that you have and how how what an amazing impact that you've had to so many people.
Speaker 1:And you know, I just I just think that there's so much gratitude that so many people have towards you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Thank you for the encouragement. That's so kind. Thank you for sharing your story tonight.
Speaker 1:Oh you're welcome. Yeah, I was, it was good for me to share, right? It's I don't know, it helps you also to kind of, each time you talk to someone about your story, it puts different little elements and pieces together for you and makes you think about things in different ways. So it's helpful for me to just, you know, talk about it to to someone, especially someone like you who I know understands every single word of what I'm saying. You know, that's kind of rare that you get to talk to someone who you know gets completely what you're saying.
Speaker 1:So that's a gift to me to get to share it to you in that way and know that you're understanding what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:I do. I do. I so appreciate it.
Speaker 1:If I don't share, I'm just contributing to the whole stigma and why? You know, what do I have to be ashamed about? I didn't do these things to myself. It's not my, like you say, it's not my secret, right? Right.
Speaker 1:It's not, it's not my secret. It's it's my abusers and so it's empowering in a way just to kind of think about, okay, my story is going to be out there with my name on it. I mean, I didn't share any details of my abuse, right? I just told you I was abused as a child. So, it's not really a big secret.
Speaker 1:Wow. Well, I just appreciate you so much and what you have done with this podcast and I really do mean what I said earlier though about I want you to always put yourself first and not your listeners when you're thinking about what to do with the podcast. Yeah, and I hope that you get some sleep. I don't know how you ever do get to sleep.
Speaker 2:I will go sleep now. Have a good evening.
Speaker 1:Okay. You too. It was an it was an honor talking to you.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Okay. Good night. Good night.
Speaker 3: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.