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Diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder at age 36, Emma and her system share what they learn along the way about DID, dissociation, trauma, 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.
Welcome to the System Speak podcast, a podcast about dissociative identity disorder. If you are new to the podcast, we recommend starting at the beginning episodes and listen in order to hear our story and what we have learned through this endeavor. Current episodes may be more applicable to longtime listeners and are likely to contain more advanced topics, emotional or other triggering content, and or reference earlier episodes that provide more context to what we are currently learning and experiencing. As always, please care for yourself during and after listening to the podcast. Thank you.
Speaker 1:I have struggled this year to record any podcast episode at all by myself. So many things have happened, and so much has changed. I needed time and space to process on my own, to let things settle on its own, and to feel myself come through the other side before words could come. Because of the intensity of everything and so many extra things, good things, not bad things, things like the new office, things like the five zero one c three going through and being approved for system speak, or things like the plenary, which was super intense and a lot of work, but also a good thing. All the things.
Speaker 1:And kids changing places for where they live and getting ready for summer. It's been months of change, which is hard for me, scary for me, and exhausting for me even when it's good and right. And so it's taken a while to find words at all, to have enough time and space. For words to cook and brew, for feelings to brood and surface, for expression that feels like mist in the air to solidify enough to pin them down on paper or say them out loud to you. I needed time and space, and I think taking it was the right thing.
Speaker 1:But there was also a layer of being afraid of getting it wrong. The lines between setting my own boundaries and not causing harm through neglect or deprivation, the balance of my own capacity of what I'm even able to do and what others expect or want from me and differentiating all of that in memory time and now time, and when it was abusive or when it's healthy, and when to advocate for myself, and when to just listen to feedback from others. It has been a highly unpleasant learning curve, but worth it in growth and maturity so that things feel very different now than they did before. I had therapy this morning, and we talked about fawning and fireballs and how to focus on my own unfawning, not caring for others at the expense of myself and working in therapy to see the difference there. And also letting others do their own and have their own fireballs for their own therapy instead of avoiding mine by focusing on theirs.
Speaker 1:And we talked about attachment because I, as STD, and that awful session with the camel, which I have still not talked about in therapy specifically. But the meta of that of realizing I'm attaching to my therapist and that she matters to me. And, also, the fear and overwhelm of that and wanting to stay away from it, not just avoiding the attachment, but the fear of what if it's not real or she doesn't stay, which then is approach and avoidance, landing me right back in the middle of disorganized, which explains the chaos I feel all the time. That can look so dysregulated, disordered even when I'm trying. But my therapist is kind and patient and steady and stays and lets me come back even after I pause things for weeks.
Speaker 1:And I brought with me a pile of journaling and envelopes to give evidence, not because she asked me to prove myself, but because I want her to know I'm not quitting and not not trying, that I am writing and journaling and processing. But it's been deep stuff, deep and painful stuff, And it's heavy, so heavy. It feels like going underwater and trying to swim back to the surface with it, and it moves slowly through the water with not quite enough air. Or I told Jules, maybe like a splinter that's long and deep, and you have to pull it out gently and slowly so that it doesn't break off, leaving new splintered pieces under the skin. Maybe that's too graphic or underwater with not enough air being too desperate, but that's what it felt like.
Speaker 1:That my therapist trusted me and my system and gave me off the weeks I asked to take a break so that I could even find what it was I was experiencing and feeling and sensing and try to put it to words, and come back to therapy with it on pages and in our sharing. Because everything I write down on a page for my therapist, for me, seems to bring up 10 other things that need to be said out loud. It has been a year of learning to care for myself, maybe even love myself, certainly choose myself. And receiving care is unfamiliar and uncomfortable, and staying in that has been hard. I said today that I don't know how to tell the difference between receiving care that I don't want and any care just being uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:Except I know I have capacity to say no, and I know I'm able to set my own boundaries even if sometimes it takes me a while to figure them out. So I don't think it's that I don't know or I'm not able to or can't see it. I think it's just really unfamiliar to receive care. But not receiving care and not allowing care always destabilizes me. And the me, I mean, is any of us, any part, any person, any shirt uncared for is not as stable in a state.
Speaker 1:We talked about that in therapy too because this morning, we interviewed Rich Lowenstein who talks about states. States meaning a mood or experience, a particular feeling, access to a particular place in our mind, our brain, our neurological experience. I explained it to Jules like water. Water is still being water even if it's frozen or a liquid or a gas. So all of those are water but in different states.
Speaker 1:So, yes, we may have altars or parts or shirts or people, but each of those also has different states. It's a different kind of blending, not just different parts together or altars together or present or sharing consciousness, but also shifting states between them, with them, in addition to them as if everything has color and nuance. That's what makes it more advanced topics, I think. Because in the beginning of therapy, it's definitely about learning what DID is and what is happening when I can't remember and what I do when I'm not there. What they do, what they feel, what they experience, much less what I do or feel or experience.
Speaker 1:Over time with therapy, this shifts into patterns where I can recognize certain things and know who was there, which person, which people, which shirts. I know who it was that left the salsa out on the counter. I know who it was that left the bunny on my pillow. I know who it is that has different glasses next to the computer. And, also, John Mark can be sad or silly or deeply caring.
Speaker 1:Those are different states. I think sometimes states are like doors or windows that give access to other parts and other states that we can only get to that way, that we can only access through that hall even though we know it's there. It's not just about switching or why Rich says switching isn't even actually the right word because it's not just the structure. It's also process. How I get from one state to another, how I have access to myself and other parts of me, other mes, all of it, us.
Speaker 1:How to settle again when I have really big feelings, how to find feelings when there seems to be nothing, when it all seems numb. This is more than just ego states. Ego states is not enough. I talked about that in the plenary. And, yes, there are still other walls between them.
Speaker 1:Amnesia, between me and memory, between me and feeling, between me and remembering that what has happened was traumatic or a kind of deprivation. But those walls are structure, and there's also process. I think it's another way of holding both. And I think until we get to the place to hold both, we are very limited in how we can access ourselves and what that looks like. We need both structure and process, not just the name of the alter who eats salsa, but why he's here, what he knows, what he feels, how he still shows up in now time, and what purpose does that serve?
Speaker 1:Process is what makes us alive. And three d, not just mapping on a page of lines and circles, something more than magazine cutouts or digital face claims, All of which are useful tools or metaphors like Rich was saying in the interview. But it is not the same as the experience of being us, the experience of being me. That's been a long journey for me the last couple of years. Ten years ago, I was still finding out about DID, But it was safe enough to do so because I was in a world telling me who I needed to be and what that was supposed to look like.
Speaker 1:That's prescriptive, telling me what I need to do. And in the context of shiny happy, it was also oppressive. Even if people were well intentioned or well meaning, the intention and meaning is not the same to me now. I have grieved the loss of that support and those friends, but have embraced coming to know myself and who I am when I include all of who I am. There's a learning curve in that that includes accountability, owning mistakes, making amends, and letting go of what you can't fix or change.
Speaker 1:There's lots of saying goodbye, sometimes to my own children, as I've given them the same gifts and freedom as fast as I've gotten it for myself. Go be you. I support you. I believe in you. You get to decide and discover who you are.
Speaker 1:That's what matters to me. Those are words no one ever said to me. I don't know if I've said them to my own children in time. They're so close to becoming adults. I want them to be happy and healthy and well, but I also want them to define that for themselves, to discover what that means to them.
Speaker 1:This shows up in how they present themselves to the world, what friends they choose, and now who they're dating as they experience the world, adolescence, and growing up. Adolescence is my favorite, not because I like teen parts more than young parts or adult parts, but because the whole point of adolescence is becoming yourself. Childhood, whatever your flavor of childhood, is about taking in all the information in the world around you for better or worse and absorbing it and internalizing it. But adolescence adolescence is the out breath, the release, the decision of what to keep and what to let go of, what nourishes you and what doesn't, what you want to look like, how you want to sound, what things you have to say out loud. It's everything.
Speaker 1:And sometimes, at least for me, those early adult years, they now call emerging adulthood. Where the space after the out breath, because no one told me I could take another breath in. And it was a holding my breath of no breath, waiting for someone to show me the way, to offer some help, or just to stay. There were more in breaths of taking in the world around me depending on different environments I was in and more out breaths when those were worlds not always good for me or not always safe or not always staying. More in breaths when I try it again, when I tried something new or tried to find my way.
Speaker 1:And moments of out breath when I learned to rest, when I learned to play, and when I learned to heal myself. This year has felt like an in breath, but not on purpose. More like hyperventilating or like being punched in the gut and there being no air to breathe in or out. And it's taken me all these months just to find air again. I'm so very human and still not going to get things right.
Speaker 1:I'm still learning and playing catch up from all the things I've missed because of trauma and deprivation and my own mistakes. But the learning and growing that comes from continuing to try, that's tenacity and courage. And I felt that this morning when I woke up at five ready for and excited to hear Taylor Swift's new album because the kids have snuck it into me. And now it's lots of breaths in the singing of it for me and my children. And it being a breakup album describes fairly well the last year or five in some ways, memory time in other ways, never my time in some ways.
Speaker 1:But in other ways, it's an album about relational trauma, and it's full of big feelings, modeling how to be sad, how to be angry, the angst of floating between them, and how to come back, how to be alive again, how to want to be alive again. And I think that matters. And it helped me go back to therapy. On her social media, which I don't follow but read in the news, Taylor Swift wrote, the tortured poet's department, an anthology of new works that reflect events, opinions, and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time. One that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure.
Speaker 1:This period of the author's life is now over. The chapter closed and boarded up. There is nothing to avenge, no scores to settle once wounds have healed. And upon further reflection, a good number of them turned out to be self inflicted. This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page.
Speaker 1:Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it. And then all that's left behind is the tortured poetry that stepped all over my toes and sent me back to therapy, back to therapy with my calendar in hand so that we could schedule therapy twice a week for a while so that I can show up in my own life better for myself, for my children, for my friends, for the people I work with, and for Jules. And related to that, I woke up this morning bolted upright in bed, awake as anything, with the thought in my mind as clear as any other voice? What if it's not all funning? What if Jules just cares?
Speaker 1:What if even if she's good at fawning? What if I've just not had someone take care of me like this? What if it's real? That scares me to death. What if we're going super slow?
Speaker 1:Not because she doesn't want me, but because it's healthy and right. There are times I want to just plow through like a bull in a china shop. I get excited. I have ideas. Things move quickly, partly because that's who I am, partly because of flight, Partly because it's avoidance of freeze.
Speaker 1:And partly, what if I'm not here because someone else has another shirt? But not here, but not around to make things happen. Or what if I lose time and can't get things done? Or what if I forget, and I want to say all the things right now before the words are gone? Or what if I don't want to feel things anymore, so if I say them all really fast, really loud, they'll go away?
Speaker 1:What if puking up the fur balls is what gets the hurt out? And, also, at the ISSTD conference, when they talked about pacing and going slow and attachment, They said we go the slowest as the slowest one needs. That that's what keeps it safe for everyone. It feels dysregulating and confusing when I think it's fine and there's no reason to slow down or it even makes me angry to slow down? And, also, what if they're right?
Speaker 1:What if I am working so hard to be so loud about being okay because I'm not or because I need other parts of me to believe that I am or to convince them to get on board with being okay. But I'm not listening to them. And what if they are right? I feel like in the beginning of therapy, cooperation and collaboration looked like Cassie picking up her dishes if she was the one who ate or John Mark putting away salsa when he was done or little ones picking up crayons when they were done. I thought that's what working together meant.
Speaker 1:And it did. That's true. And, also, now there's something deeper, something more connected to my body. Sometimes I think of that summer day in the park when I felt my hands for the first time. Knew they were my hands.
Speaker 1:The episode between mother hunger and Dan Siegel, the wall of terror. Sometimes that's what I'm trying to outrun. The terror, that's what I'm flighting from. The terror of being attached. The terror of being detached.
Speaker 1:The terror of what if it's real, the terror of what if it's not, the terror of realizing that I am almost always afraid. So it's not about dishes and salsa anymore. I mean, it is, But it's about feeling my body and what all of us need. And is it listing all the things or saying some of them or the details of one of them? Or is it a break from therapy and then coming back as long as we get to the coming back piece?
Speaker 1:Or is it more sessions a week or fewer going less often instead? Or maybe last week when I had an appointment that I canceled because I just couldn't, but I still needed to be close to my therapist because attachment, which was also overwhelming me and frightening me, except also I know she's safe. So even though I had canceled my appointment, I drove to her office, parked in the parking lot, and crawled into the back part of my car where my camping mattress and everything is, closed the blinds, and took a nap there where I was safe and knew I could rest. Collaboration and cooperation look like the spreadsheet for the podcast so that episodes aren't coming up and going down, but, also, I feel safe enough. So there is tension between it is my podcast so I can put things up or take things down to what feels right for me.
Speaker 1:And, also, the podcast is public and belongs to the public. But if that is true, then that changes how much of myself I want to give away or cannot give away, Which is the question that left me without words for several months as if the side effect of growth was being hijacked, which felt violent and aggressive even though I knew people are only trying to help and support and care. But I don't know how to receive that care yet, and it's going to take some practice. I know how to cry in a closet. I know how to be left alone.
Speaker 1:I don't know what is boundaries of. This is my space, and I just need my space. And the boundaries of, I think it's safe enough for me to share this space with you. And it's because of those states that that sometimes changes. Sometimes safe enough changes because of external circumstances like when COVID hit or because of politics or because of changing rules depending on where you live, the way the speed limit changes as you drive down the road.
Speaker 1:Those are all external things, but sometimes safe enough changes based on what's happening inside internally because of state changes. If I'm feeling safe and supported in my frontal cortex, connected and happy, appreciating and appreciated. It is easier to give more access, even the sharing of words and feelings, than a different state who is sad or learning or digging or reflecting and cannot share words because we don't have them yet, because we're still looking or learning, because it's still unfolding. But that's not the same as not wanting or not choosing or not trying. So it's been a really hard year even if also a good one.
Speaker 1:The way therapy is hard even if it's also good. And just to drive the point home today, when I got back to my car after therapy, there was a message on my phone that the court has accepted the paperwork for my divorce. So it's been filed, and they'll be sending copies for us to sign and Nathan to sign. And the heaviness of that, even though it was also good and right and relieving, was all too real after therapy, after the new album this morning, and after talking about state changes. Where my shirts, my parts, my people can all be on the same page, understanding that this is good and right, necessary even.
Speaker 1:But there's different feelings about it, different state expressions, everything from sad to glad, Not knowing what to feel at an ending that is a beginning that is sad but healthy. Completely disenfranchised where no one else feels what I'm feeling. And, also, Nathan knows, and I've been transparent with him through the process, and he has supported me even while also being sad. I had so many things at once, and I think sometimes that's more normal than we realize, That we are more normal than we realize. Maybe that's okay too.
Speaker 1: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.systemspeak.com. We'll see you there.