lostinside
02-18-2008, 08:24 AM
Hi,
First, I would like to thank everyone for reading this. I do tend to get long-winded, so I warn everyone now. This is going to be a lot of begging for help because I honestly do not know what to do or where to go. I have never tried to ask for help via a forum, so this is new to me as well.
My name is Stephanie, and I feel like I am going crazy. I want to figure out how to live peacefully within myself - I gave up on any "normalcy" long ago. I am 36-years old, and I was diagnosed with MPD in the early 80s as a teenager. Later, this was changed to the more politically correct DID. While I have heard there is a difference, I am not quite sure what it is.
Honestly, I care little for an official diagnosis. What I care about is the symptoms. I want to stop hurting, I want to stop losing my memory, and I want to quit hurting others including myself.
I am married to a caring man whom tries to help me deal with this. Some days are definitely better than others. I have tried shrinks as well as therapists, and honestly, I am tired of being told I need hospitalized so I can learn to handle repressed memories and merge into a single unit. While I would love to be a single unit as they call it, I would not know what to do without being able to keep myself company.
Anyway, I also have a 16-year old son. He is another story for another day.
What bothers me the most is the loss of memories. Not just a few memories mind you but all of them. I forget everything. Whether it is what my husband or I argued about two nights ago or what I did in high school, I cannot remember things. The things I do remember are like a dream of a memory or a dream of a television show I watched with the faces and names distorted.
When I have any strong or overwhelming emotion, I tend to be looking at what is happening to me from a position of floating above the situation. I can see what is happening, but I have no control over what is happening, and then I do not remember what I saw only what I felt by seeing what I saw. I am not sure that makes much sense. I remember the emotions and feelings, but when it comes to remembering the actual experience, that is gone forever.
Unfortunately, I then tend to make up stories that fit the emotion or feeling. I feel like it is lying, but when I talk to my husband or even therapists, they tell me that it is my way of handling the emotion and the experience.
I want my own experiences. I want to be able to remember the last television show I watched other than the emotion it left me with.
My husband says he knows of 6 or more extremely distinct people that are inside of this one body. Each has a name, and each has their own set of experiences and memories. Each has a talent is a different area. For example, this one writes for a living, and another one I know about and seem to share memories with knows how to code extremely well. I do not know how to code, and the other one called Beth does not know how to write very well.
When another one comes out I rarely black out. I am left with the feeling something has happened. I am left with the general feeling of whether it was good or bad, but I do not know for how long the other one was "out" or what exactly was said or done.
I have been to around 45 different therapists. I am tired of trying to find a therapist that honestly understands what I am going through. They run tests, and then say for me to integrate these selves I need hospitalization to handle what will happen. They try to inform me of being a proper multiple, and concentrate on how I should be as a multiple rather than trying to help me handle who or what I am.
One shrink ran this test where I had to answer literally hundreds of questions. When the results came back she said she was astonished. She said the test has built in results for people trying to lie, and while mine looked like that at first, as she looked more closely, it looked like 2 people took the test. One was compassionate and loving, the other was a mean and cynical person.
Obviously, this was a disturbing result because I was not happy being called a cynic as well as mean. I actually blacked out and came to being escorted out of the office forcefully and needless to say they never saw me again. They wouldn't answer my phone calls either. I do not try being mean! I usually love myself, but lately, that is getting harder and harder.
I need help. I want help. I feel so alone. I feel like I am slowly dying, and the worse thing is it is getting worse the older I get. I have horrible headaches and nightmares of being assaulted by clowns or disembodied or mangled bodies. I am here begging that someone can help me find a therapist or someone who can understand what is happening to me without telling me how I should be or wanting to stick me in a hospital.
I am lost. :confused:
Thanks for listening...
Steph
First, I would like to thank everyone for reading this. I do tend to get long-winded, so I warn everyone now. This is going to be a lot of begging for help because I honestly do not know what to do or where to go. I have never tried to ask for help via a forum, so this is new to me as well.
My name is Stephanie, and I feel like I am going crazy. I want to figure out how to live peacefully within myself - I gave up on any "normalcy" long ago. I am 36-years old, and I was diagnosed with MPD in the early 80s as a teenager. Later, this was changed to the more politically correct DID. While I have heard there is a difference, I am not quite sure what it is.
Honestly, I care little for an official diagnosis. What I care about is the symptoms. I want to stop hurting, I want to stop losing my memory, and I want to quit hurting others including myself.
I am married to a caring man whom tries to help me deal with this. Some days are definitely better than others. I have tried shrinks as well as therapists, and honestly, I am tired of being told I need hospitalized so I can learn to handle repressed memories and merge into a single unit. While I would love to be a single unit as they call it, I would not know what to do without being able to keep myself company.
Anyway, I also have a 16-year old son. He is another story for another day.
What bothers me the most is the loss of memories. Not just a few memories mind you but all of them. I forget everything. Whether it is what my husband or I argued about two nights ago or what I did in high school, I cannot remember things. The things I do remember are like a dream of a memory or a dream of a television show I watched with the faces and names distorted.
When I have any strong or overwhelming emotion, I tend to be looking at what is happening to me from a position of floating above the situation. I can see what is happening, but I have no control over what is happening, and then I do not remember what I saw only what I felt by seeing what I saw. I am not sure that makes much sense. I remember the emotions and feelings, but when it comes to remembering the actual experience, that is gone forever.
Unfortunately, I then tend to make up stories that fit the emotion or feeling. I feel like it is lying, but when I talk to my husband or even therapists, they tell me that it is my way of handling the emotion and the experience.
I want my own experiences. I want to be able to remember the last television show I watched other than the emotion it left me with.
My husband says he knows of 6 or more extremely distinct people that are inside of this one body. Each has a name, and each has their own set of experiences and memories. Each has a talent is a different area. For example, this one writes for a living, and another one I know about and seem to share memories with knows how to code extremely well. I do not know how to code, and the other one called Beth does not know how to write very well.
When another one comes out I rarely black out. I am left with the feeling something has happened. I am left with the general feeling of whether it was good or bad, but I do not know for how long the other one was "out" or what exactly was said or done.
I have been to around 45 different therapists. I am tired of trying to find a therapist that honestly understands what I am going through. They run tests, and then say for me to integrate these selves I need hospitalization to handle what will happen. They try to inform me of being a proper multiple, and concentrate on how I should be as a multiple rather than trying to help me handle who or what I am.
One shrink ran this test where I had to answer literally hundreds of questions. When the results came back she said she was astonished. She said the test has built in results for people trying to lie, and while mine looked like that at first, as she looked more closely, it looked like 2 people took the test. One was compassionate and loving, the other was a mean and cynical person.
Obviously, this was a disturbing result because I was not happy being called a cynic as well as mean. I actually blacked out and came to being escorted out of the office forcefully and needless to say they never saw me again. They wouldn't answer my phone calls either. I do not try being mean! I usually love myself, but lately, that is getting harder and harder.
I need help. I want help. I feel so alone. I feel like I am slowly dying, and the worse thing is it is getting worse the older I get. I have horrible headaches and nightmares of being assaulted by clowns or disembodied or mangled bodies. I am here begging that someone can help me find a therapist or someone who can understand what is happening to me without telling me how I should be or wanting to stick me in a hospital.
I am lost. :confused:
Thanks for listening...
Steph