That malevolent beasts disguised as parents set upon and destroyed me, my fragile mind and forming sense of self. They damaged me, severely and thoroughly. The fault was never mine. Nothing did I do to warrant such sadistic cruelty, yet I'm the one walking with the scars and shattered mind. I'm the one copiously bleeding sadness and self-worth.
I'm the one being maligned. And I've done nothing wrong. The guilty walk free smiling.
I clean up and play in my ruins.
Switching Time - a doctor's harrowing story of treating a woman with 17 personalities
I was surprised to locate this book at my local library as I'd never heard of it. It's a decent book told by the perspective of the therapist that treated his first multiple.
I was hoping to discover what he thought and felt regarding the experience of observing someone switching. He never touched on that aspect. It's written quite clinically and a bit old school; no touching the client with either hugs or safe touch, even when the client would ask.
I did find it insightful into the therapist's point of view and techniques for working successfully with a Multiple.
No drama here which is refreshing.
The book, the memories can be highly triggering especially for those who suffered with ritual abuse. Memories are rather graphic. Read with caution and skip over the memory parts if needed.
Overall, I'd give it 3 out of 4 stars.
It's proving to be the closest to not feeling completely alone and lost in a world that is unaware of the challenges of living Multiple.
I feel incredibly alone within my MPD and autism. These two factors color everything about me yet the outer world with its huffing and puffing, run, run, run, get over it and move on pace isn't for me.
I'm this severely quiet and removed person that relishes the slow pace and stress free existence of having as few external obligations as possible. I'm not anti-social per se, just wanting to figure out this whole surviving everyday game thingy.
I searched for an MPD/DID group again. It's a futile quest. I know that I could relate and interact with others similar to me but the only group I found is an hour and a half away, (not a big deal as I have time and my son is old enough to be home alone) however, it costs 40$ out-of-my-shallow-pocket for each one hour group session. I guess the eclectic group in Traverse City whereby I made friends and could switch for a couple hours a week was an anomaly. I was hoping to find a similar free group.
I'm feeling rare, too unique to classify or fit in anywhere. I don't know. Maybe I could attend once a month as I could afford one session and the gas to get there and back.
I don't know.
I wish some things were easier.
The list of things that truly help me is limited.
I've read more than half of the book "All of Me", the biography of Multiple Kim Noble. It started off on a high note, as it presented a comprehensive overview of Multiple Personality Disorder. After a few chapters, all hopes sunk. While "All of Me" is an interesting read, it fails to cover any, Any of the trauma or incidents that led to her developing her dissociative disorder.
It's appalling that this book includes symptoms without any recorded cause.
Maybe it's because my trauma is well known to me, and extensive, but I found this novel to be bland, milquetoast and without any substance. I started skipping paragraphs, then pages and, finally, I was so bored that I put it down unfinished.
I'm bummed, disappointed: I was hoping for so much more.
about the chaotic darkness of a vigorously swirling mind behind vacant eyes.
The time I walked for hours along the buzzing Silver Lake Rd, within shoes that were not mine, in a long black dress coat borrowed from my sister.
My mind was not my own, as it was occupied by a subset of people, splinters really, fractured personas without a base.
I walked aimlessly; I had no place to live. Whilst residing at a group home, I discovered I was within my right to leave; that my rooming there was voluntary. It took me three months to discover that gem. Yet, no one would take me in.
First I "visited" old friends in Manistee who put me up for the night. I quickly realized I was in trouble as their first questions were, "how's your family?" and "where are you working these days?" I couldn't tell them I left my family, wished them all to rot in a burning, raging hell. I wasn't about to mention my hospitalization and diagnoses, too many questions; too many roads I was unwilling to go down, navigate and pull upsetting answers out of my ass.
I couldn't lie, thus, I remained silent and deflected.
As I lay in the spare bedroom smelling, what I could only surmise as the odor of a family, caring, love, wrapped tightly under a handsewn quilt, staring at the adolescent paintings; the mounted deer antlers on the wall. I overheard words that sent me into a spiral of chills, discomfort and fear..."Is she going to be staying long?", the voice of my friends adult child said.
"I don't know. We have your brothers family arriving day after tomorrow. I'm sure she just here for the night."
Silent tears. I hadn't the courage to express my childish, humble yearnings. I wanted a home, a family and I had picked them; in my head; in my irrational fantasy. I had sought her out hoping that she, my friend, a grandmotherly woman filled with love and compassion, would read my mind, ask no questions and welcome me into her forever home. I was devastated.
The next morn, I quickly dressed, said a few parting words referencing the fact that I would "be expected back" somewhere.
My host, my friend, looked puzzled and relieved. I bade a quick "farewell" and "thanks so much for letting me spend the night", and with a false smile painted on, I left. Downtrodden, I headed back to the AFC home. I had nowhere else to go. I wept. I was not wanted, not missed anywhere. I was alone, adrift, nobody.
I dislodge from this crushing train wreck
Untangle the wreckage
Get out from under this tram.
Waiting for cutting tools,
Jaws, pliers, gaffs
Within this wreckage
I am
In pieces
Broken
Small
Disfigured
Maimed permanently
Yet not fatal
I'll find the tools
To release the metal carcass
Embedded within my soul
Perpetrated, pinned against my body
And then
Dear friend
You shall know
Of who I truly am
And of the dozer, the train,
The 12 ton, that hit me
Never swerving
Mish mash
She takes a gasp
Removing one plank
One fistfull of bolts
One ten yard cubic foot
From her throat.
For it's in the telling
That the weights are lifted
Its in the awe of dark night
That she wriggles free
Plight by plight
Will she escape
All of his sins?
Time will tell
With a hefty dose of brandy
And a gallon of pale ail.
God, you should know her,
She her strength,
Internal resolve.
You'll like her
In the place past
The chaos and tears.
You'll admire her
Once you hear
Of her hell.
You'll weep for the child
No one cared for
Or called their own.
She was bait, a pawn,
A broken, malfunctioning toy
Destroyed by evil men
Over and over
And over once again.
Can you see her
Buried there
In the paltry moonlight?
One of these days
She shall cry out with might
And cease to be
The mangled body
Under the train
She vainly searched for words in the abysmal black of the chaotic night twisted, withering, juxtaposing slightly out-of-reach like a whisper glowing a stones throw away as if you could grasp it by reaching under the chair, beneath the layers of gum, guck and ooze, pry it loose from betwixt the reinforced planks, scour the garbage bag, spread contents onto floor, pick with tweezers one micron at a time, somewhere in that vast library we call "mind", amongst the volumes shredded, torn and wisping about,... are the words for the tumultuous
The abomination. The seering pain where nagging doubts curl up to die and the displaced tricycles are laid to rest.
Somewhere she will find the words, though they claw at her hand and make her skin bleed. Ya, she will find them, whip them, gnash them and nail them to the wall.
Someday
Some day
You will hear
And wish you hadn't
Hear all the words
She has to say
Speaks in silence,
In the hush before dawn,
Within the pause as I turn the page
Amongst the grainy feel
Of the wall.
My truth is
A lasso around my neck
Threatening to choke
If not allowed to be free
For I would drown
Deep within sorrows pain
If I didn't speak out
And let the truth reign.
My truth shall not hurt thee
As unbelievable as it be,
For my truth and yours
Are not brothers be
Your father was not mine.
Mother bore you
Yet, not quite I
Separated at birth
Unadoptable waif
Swept under rugs,
Into corners,
Stuffed in closets,
Buried within shoes,
Toward the toe
But always a heel.
A sole in a world
Of bare feet, barebacks,
And dad reads the paper
Next to the ashtray,
The Marlboros, lit,
Smoking, ashing
Here, ashing there,
Snuffing out the butt
Onto his daughters chest.
It burned
No one cried
Foul
Or
Stop.
Truth
Is an ever smoldering flame
Extinguished
Rendered harmless, inert
Only with the telling
Dare she
Find words?
Let the child scream, man
Just let that child wail and scream,
She's suffering in dare
She be sufferin'
Oh my Lord
At Night, thoughts become clear, unmuddled as if I extricate myself from what the outer world wishes me to be. Softness flows down dreamy rivulets where once sweat strode. Daytime armor is shed with the anxiety of social interaction and societal expectations. In three words, "I am free."
I'm a snow white dove aloft, soaring without restraint. I'm the downtrodden peasant that can freely weep my distress and safely discharge my heavy, cumbersome burdens minus any fear of reprisal or whip. Furrowed brow lightens and painted smile wiped clean. I am free to show my pale, fragile, scarred skin. My expedited pace slows to a leisurely saunter. No knife at my back, nor carrot dangling above my nose.
The ancestral noose has dissolved into innocuous threads falling through splayed hands. Long sought safety, the restorative joy of silence, soothe me as no lover can.
I exalt the night as I move, heal in claritys' light.
Therapy today. Spent most of the time talk about the sexual games, my father taught me, to amuse and please his friends. Yeah, I'm not really interested in your tv show, ya know?
My life revolves around therapy twice a week. Each session takes 2 to 3 days to recover from. Most of the time, I'm sitting, processing ...
