[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Ever since I made my initial post in this thread, I’ve been worried that it might be used to further harmful stereotypes. I mentioned my abuser having no empathy and that she probably had an undiagnosed disorder. And I realized that, especially nowadays, that could be used to harm people with stigmatized disorders. (NPD, for example, is currently VERY demonized. And logic-based empathy is a thing in people who don’t necessarily “feel” empathy.) So I want to clarify some things.

On multiple different occasions I had to have conversations with the abuser in question that went something like this: “The thing you just threatened to do to my friend could literally kill them. Please don’t do things that might kill people.” And she thought this was funny. And she would do the thing anyway.

I found out from my now-spouse that she never stopped doing these types of things. So I am talking about a person who frequently inflicted literal torture on people and thought that it was fun and hilarious. I don’t know exactly what made this person act the way she did. I spent many years of my life trying to figure it out and it never made any sense.

So yeah. I just wanted to clarify, because I can easily see people using what I wrote to spread stigma about innocent people. Knowing that I had to show genuine love to this person to be able to help at all, and being abused and triggered and taunted with threats towards my now-spouse the entire time; having my slip-ups and PTSD fight responses used against me…. All of that is some of the absolute worst trauma of my life, and yes I say that even with having experienced the cp-related stuff. This was not a typical abuse experience. None of my other abusers were anywhere near as hard to deal with as this person was, and, yes, that includes the adults.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

I like lizards. What kind do you want to get?

Muppets Classic Theater is my favorite! And The Muppet Christmas Carol is Lothair’s favorite Christmas movie, so we get to watch it every year.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Yeah, we have to be really careful to not burn ourselves out. We were just talking with our therapist about how we’ve realized that we use up any energy as soon as we get it back, and we’re trying to take care of ourselves more. The list of things that could be done to help is endless, so we’re trying to remind ourselves that there are other people out there who care and are working on the issue as a whole, and that the more people who heal and get their memories back, the more people will be able to help. Especially since everybody has different strengths and can do all kinds of things that we don’t feel capable of. So I think that your system just hosting and maintaining this site and the discord server has a really big impact. Being able to meet other people who care and want things to change helps survivors feel hope and gain energy so that we can all work on ending stigma and silence.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Hi! My name is Pip, and I am a cat!

I wish I had a cat friend in our house. But I do have cat stuffies. I really like Hello Kitty.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

I think that saying, “I don’t feel comfortable discussing this” IS a really important part of the discussion. It is without doubt an enormous can of worms, and everybody’s perspective – to include the perspective of “my boundaries say that I don’t want to talk about this here and now” is valuable.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Survivor’s guilt is so real and difficult to deal with. I don’t want to go into too much detail on that because, for my system personally, it would deviate from the topic of this thread. But keeping a conversation about that with my therapist has helped a lot. She knows more about things like the statute of limitations and how cohesive our memory is when it comes to a specific trauma. But I would never blame anyone for not speaking up at the time. I also didn’t talk as much as I wish I had, and it’s mainly because there was nobody trustworthy for me to go to.

I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of those google searches are from kids who are stuck in this situation. I can only speak for my experience in America, but for somebody who was very stubborn about trying to get help, I didn’t see much in the way of results. A lot of kids probably go online to find help because they’ve tried other avenues. That’s what my system did, and we just ended up in more dangerous situations. So I think it’s important that topics like this be discussed openly and honestly. That hopefully will help prevent people from telling the internet that they are currently in a vulnerable situation, because that is a good way to get the attention of creeps. In fact, when I was a kid, there were people online who would promise protection in exchange for a relationship. It’s very dangerous, and I’m sure those types of people still exist.

One of the things with kids abusing other kids online is that it can become very weirdly cult-ish. In the sense that everything is turned into a “game”, and people who refuse to participate are punished and bullied. It’s important to talk about this too, so that people are aware of how much gaslighting is involved.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

This absolutely needs to be talked about more. I’m going to be…more blunt than might be comfortable for a lot of people? Still trying to be careful, of course. I just want to give a heads up for people before I start talking too much about this.

As I’ve mentioned in my blog posts, I was filmed in cp vidoes when I was growing up. There were other kids in the same situation with me, and in that situation, obviously, adults are going to force kids to abuse each other. I remember us trying to fake as much as possible, especially as I was one of the older kids, but there’s some stuff that you can’t avoid, because EVERYBODY gets punished for it. It’s kind of a messed-up “lesser evil” sort of situation.

I know that’s not the kind of situation that you’re talking about. And that is actually my point. Because for everything that all the kids in that situation went through, most of us tried to protect each other as much as possible. We didn’t sell each other out. We didn’t abuse each other in our free time. The older kids would try to redirect attention from the younger kids. The adults weren’t doing a thing to protect us, so we did our best on our own.

As far as I personally am aware, the ONLY two kids who sexually abused other kids when they weren’t being forced to continued to sexually abuse other people into their teens and into adulthood. So I think that child-on-child sa needs to be taken very seriously and reported immediately. When my parents found out that I was being abused by these kids, they did absolutely nothing except for talk to the kids’ parents. And since all the parents in this situation were involved in child sa, nothing changed, and we were still forced to spend time with these kids so that the adults could have their Bible study and free daycare.

It’s really difficult to process, because both of these kids were younger than me. But early on, I got in trouble with my parents for physically hurting them in the name of self-defense, so I started holding back on defending myself, and they took advantage of that. They also tended to work as a team.

When I got older (about 13), I found out that one of these two kids was sexually abusing another kid, and I told the victim to tell her parents and confronted the abuser about it. And she had NO empathy. No remorse. No desire to change whatsoever. Her lack of empathy was so absolute that multiple of our system members split just from talking to her, and we came very close to experiencing dissociative fugue (if we had a car and were old enough to drive, we would have. We experienced ALL the symptoms of it except for wandering away, and we actually were starting to walk down the road away from the house we were at, because we didn’t recognize or remember ANY of the people around us.) It literally was just that disturbing of an experience to see how much this child abuser understood what she was doing and how much she did not care.

I thoroughly believe that people who sa people purposefully and repeatedly like this know exactly what they are doing. These kids didn’t just sexually abuse people. They were emotionally abusive as well and, in the case of at least one of them, physically abusive. I didn’t know one of them well, but the one that I did know continued to be this way the ENTIRE time that I was close with her. I really believe that kids who sexually abuse many other kids on a regular basis have some SERIOUS, undiagnosed disorders. It’s not “normal”, and, in my experience, they exhibit predatory behavior that persists over time. If it doesn’t get addressed, they find more victims.

Things are more complicated in situations where children are only abused by adults that they know and trust. In my experience, abusive kids in this type of situation don’t fully understand that sexual abuse is wrong. But their behavior will mimic their parents’ behavior, and they typically stop sa-ing other kids at a young age, because their heart isn’t in it. They just think it’s how relationships are supposed to work. The hard thing is that the emotional impact on child victims is the same no matter how old the perpetrator is, or what their intentions. I don’t blame people like this who abused me, but there is a lot of healing work that needs to be done all the same.

In either case, encouraging victims to speak up for themselves is so, so important. Even if they don’t have an adult who will stand up for them (a lot of them probably don’t), at least telling trusted friends will protect other potential victims and, hopefully, teach the kids who don’t know any better that they don’t have to abuse anybody to have a close friendship with somebody. And, for the love of god, can we PLEASE stop teaching children to love people who abuse them? Boundaries are so freaking important because of situations like this. If somebody had taught me “you cannot fix or save anybody” when I was young, instead of telling me that Jesus died for our sins and that I should metaphorically do the same for any and everyone, I would have escaped a lot of abuse. I don’t even say that to hate on Christianity. My system has Christian alters, and Jesus did not take ANY shit from people. He told abusers off without holding back and he had excellent boundaries. So why in the everliving heck does the church not teach children to do the same?

The world makes me very, very tired sometimes.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

I pretty much lost my ability to work full-time after I became aware of my alters/headmates. DID is very good at making you appear functional, but once those trauma memories start coming back it gets rough.

My solution was to marry my childhood friend, who also has DID. We both work part-time and are both very okay with the house falling apart when our mental health goes downhill. It’s a sort of “do what you can” philosophy. But I realize that this is not much of an option when you have kids. We also live in an area where the cost of living is relatively low, and our house is payed off, so we have advantages that let us live this way.

It also kind of depends on whether you’re struggling with amnesia, PTSD symptoms, or both. Calendars, journals, and alarms can be good starting points for living with amnesia. Each system is different, so it’ll be trial and error for a bit. And some alters might need to handle things differently than others, which may be frustrating and confusing, especially if you have strong amnesia barriers.

PTSD symptoms are tougher. Only a good therapist will truly be able to help with this, as symptoms and helpful coping mechanisms vary so wildly between people and alters. The only “all around” advice I can give for that is to let yourself feel as much of your emotions as you are able – taking space to sit with them and all that. And to let yourself recharge as much as possible. I know both of those things are a lot harder when you have kids.

That’s my starting point of advice, but please take everything with a grain of salt. Nobody knows you like you do.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Maybe “indulgent” self-care items like bath bombs and scented candles. Craft kits for middles and littles. Books that are related to dissociation – not as in “true story of DID” books, but fiction that is relatable in an emotional or abstract way, like Wendy Darling or The Southern Reach trilogy. (Could be triggering, but I also feel like these type of books might be a safer bet for people who visit this website and read the blogs, without the enforcement of trigger warnings).

Recipes for very simple meals that can potentially be made while fighting depression. Ideas for planners/printables that could be useful for people who are systems/fight amnesia. A card or piece of paper with a list of potentially relatable songs for the recipient to look into. Snacks and fidget toys are helpful for grounding, as others have mentioned. Also maybe small craft kits that are more for adult system members than littles, like amigurumi, cross stitch, embroidery, or a kit for sewing a stuffie or a mini, wall hanging quilt.

Tea is always helpful. I also agree with others who have suggested journals. Pens that feel nice to write with and come in a lot of colors, like Inkjoy. Tarot cards or the type of oracle cards that have self-care suggestions on them. You can never go wrong with stickers, especially with encouraging your headmates to use a physical journal. Washi tape helps too. Adult coloring books and gel pens. Books about science and history are also weirdly grounding for us, but we might be more alone in that regard. Maybe puzzle books like Sudoku or a word search for when your brain is too foggy to know who you are or what you want, but you’ll just have flashbacks if you don’t do SOMETHING.

I personally wouldn’t want stuffies, but that’s because we buy our littles stuffies all the time and we already have accumulated a lot of them.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

We’ve only ever done teletherapy, so I can’t give a perspective on traditional in-person therapy. In-person was what we wanted, as it’s a lot easier for us to feel comfortable around a person if we can “feel” their energy, and we have a lot of trouble doing that online. But, in the end, teletherapy has the immeasurable benefit of us seeing a therapist who has experience with DID. She takes our memories seriously, even when we think we are crazy, and tells us that we aren’t imaginary, even when we try to insist that we are.

I think the biggest benefit to teletherapy is that it gives you a bigger pool of therapists to choose from. And that, from my own experience and from what I have heard other systems say, matters with dissociative disorders.

[The_Star_Fissure_System]

Hi! We’re a newly-diagnosed system (within the last 6 months), though we’ve been self-aware of having DID for almost 2 years. Two of our subsystems had become aware of each others’ existence while we were still in childhood, so thankfully there was already some organization and communication in place when we “officially” became self-aware in a more system-wide way. Body just turned 30, and we recently married our childhood friend, who also has DID.

Almost all of us love writing novels, and our system tends to cooperate pretty well in order to make this happen. Our main career goal is to become an author, though the passion there is strong enough that we’ll keep at it even if it never pays the bills. Thanks to being married, we can work a part-time retail job in the meantime. Tried full-time for a few years and our PTSD could not handle it.

Other hobbies depend on who’s fronting. James and most of the people in Marionette’s subsystem are very into cross stitch. And I mean VERY into it. They can rattle off brands and designer names if somebody is looking for a type of design.

Moira loves knitting, crocheting, and anything to do with wool and yarn. She rescued an antique spinning wheel in near-perfect condition, and has plans to restore it to its former glory.

Laleh plays video games. Her favorites are metroidvanias, though she has a reputation for picking ones with difficult platforming/combat, getting stuck on a boss mid-game, and never finishing them.

Lothair loves writing even more than the rest of us. His entire being is kind of centered around it, in as many ways as he has been able to do so. If he was the only one who ever fronted, we would probably be living in some tiny cabin in the woods, overflowing with books and unconnected to the internet. Thankfully, the rest of us also get a say. 😅

Jennifer, Vincent, and Annabelle love to sew. They own four antique sewing machines, two of which are in working order and one of which they apparently plan to restore. They want to make ALL of our clothes and never buy garments from the store. We’ll see how that goes, as so far the only clothes they’ve made so far are headscarves and skirts.