MPD & DID Best Books, Attachment, Trauma & Multiplicity, Quotes & Notes

"As Bowlby himself tells us, we cannot know what we cannot bear to know."

We propose that dissociating individuals are those victims of childhood (sexual) abuse who coped by refusing to conceive of the contents of their caregiver's mind and thus successfully avoided having to think about their caregiver's wish to harm them. They go on to defensively disrupt their capacity to depict feelings and thoughts in themselves and in others.
This leaves them to operate upon inaccurate and schematic impressions of thoughts and feelings and they are thus immensely vulnerable in all intimate relationships.
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The switching from one state of consciousness to another that is accompanied by facial, postural, motor, speech, affective and cognitive changes in DID is made possible because no core sense of identity exists to which external and internal experiences are invariably referred. 
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For these rare survivors of unrelenting trauma during childhood, growing up is an experience  (As we shall hear) of "being chronically unloved", alternately neglected then abused, abused then neglected, so that survival was achieved through dissociation and splitting into multiple personalities, each of whom has only partial awareness of the other (s).
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Pg 39
For adults with DID, they have often experienced from earliest childhood overwhelming evidence of an obstacle to their pursuit of the primary attachment goal, i.e. the wish to be heard, seen, held and understood.
Quickly, they would have learned that to expect such understanding was radically mistaken.
They learn instead to retreat and advance with another, deeply self-protective goal in mind, i.e. the wish to be dumb, invisible, left alone and not interfered with.

It wasn't my fault...

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 by Richard Baer book review

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.

Reading "When Rabbit Howls" by Truddi Chase

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.

All of Me book review

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.

I want to write...

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.

My Dreams

Were simply; to live in a place where no one waa actively trying to hurt me.