Reply To: Organisation and communication. How does your system do it?

[Flusterette]

I am a self-Dx’d OSDD system, based on my experiences. I have very poor System communication.

I can sometimes hear the distant crying of a young child in my head, and sometimes there’s emotional bleed-through. I’m able to speak to/with the child and comfort them. Fronting used to occur, and has happened once recently involving a letter to my therapist where I disclosed the names of system individuals.

I have awareness of the names of several individuals of my System, and memories of some of them fronting.

I know one is like a gatekeeper who works more beneath-the-surface. Mecca, spider-like (literally used to appear in my dreams as a spider watching me) with connection through web to all the System individuals, memories, and alter creating. I remember the first time I learned the word ‘Mecca,’ and feeling that finally some core part of me had a name for herself that described what they are. And Mecca can kind of semi-front (feels more like a submarine popping up a periscope into the consciousness of whomever is fronting, to take in the way whomever is fronting is living, to get data for another Alter they’re working on once it’s been decided that the current fronting Alter isn’t able to sustain a thriving existence).

As I’ve become more integrated, Mecca hasn’t needed to consciously create new identities. I’m kind of lacking a full identity at the moment, very slowly getting stable enough to authentically explore myself. Depersonalization and derealization, on top of lots of dissociation and fatigue, have been issues contributing to a lack of a sense of Self.

I occasionally try to meditate at getting better communication with other Alters. There’s a voice that I can kind of communicate with, but I feel like I can’t tell if I’m just making it up. It feels like an inner voice communicating its own thoughts; I’m not taking time to think of and construct responses, the voice just knows what she thinks/feels.

However, interestingly, I get the voice of a young adult male sometimes. Loud as day inside my head, saying just “Hello.” Usually when I’m half-awake, which naturally leads me to thinking its a weird dream phenomenon. Happened again this morning.

But I previously only knew of females in my System. So maybe it is just dreaming? Feels quite differently to dreaming, despite my admitting to being in that semi-awake state.

I used to have better communication with my Alters when I was more fragmented and I used cannabis (legal in my country). It helped bring down barriers to my consciousness and the consciousness of the others. But now I cannot use it.

Physical forms of communication aren’t necessary in my System. Though perhaps I’ll try more automatic writing after connecting with the child identity.

I don’t know if it’s an OSDD thing, given that there’s no amnesia, and feeling blendy occurs, but it’s hard to sometimes say if it’s me, my imagination, or an Alter. I’m trying to lean into it being an Alter, but I feel still phobic of accepting the different identities in me. Particularly if one is male, I find that very awkward for me to accept.

I’m going to try to talk to my Therapist today about the male “Hello” that happened again. But even my therapist seems a bit dismissive of the extent to which I think I have “identities” (versus that my therapist is ok talking about singleton IFS parts). So that kind of annoys me. But maybe I need to better self-advocate; he’s an otherwise wonderful Therapist I’d never dream of leaving.

I find I think more about communication when my dissociative symptoms are at their worst because I usually feel like I’m caught in a stasis of not functioning, and I wonder what I can do about it. When I’m not dissociating, I’m more about functioning and exterior Self-discovery.

Anyhow, kudos to anyone who reads all this. I’m just not sure how my experience stacks up with folks’ notions of being a System and trying to have communication.