Intrusive thoughts are thoughts that suddenly appear in our head and that we perceive as stressful and beyond our control. The content is often shameful or mean and there is a certain tone to them. Such thoughts can be very distressing, especially if they are never actually quiet. And thoughts are not as easy to […]
DID
Avoiding the inner Tug of War
Once we are aware that we go through different stress responses and that parts feel most comfortable in states that match their action systems we can use that knowledge to examine inner dynamics that cause us trouble. We might be drifting apart in response to the external situation we are in. The result is a […]
Learning how to Reflect about Reality
In our quest to make sense of ourselves and the world we will spend quite some time reflecting about experiences. We already shared how to reflect on inner experiences. Now we will look at how to make sense of the world around us. Constructivism We all know only fragments of all the things there […]
Befriending dissociated parts: First Steps
Some people with DID grow up thinking that having Others inside is normal because they always had a way to communicate with each other. But a lot of people are surprised by their diagnosis. They didn’t suspect anything and they don’t have any idea how to make first contact. There might be awareness of blackouts […]
Signposting for the Day (morning exercise)
This exercise is typically used when our days are chaotic because some parts are not aware of the plans others have made and we accidentally work against each other. We miss appointments, do things twice or forget them altogether, we might be chronically late or irrationally worried about being late etc. It is also a […]
Preparing for difficult situations
We sometimes face difficult situations or events and we cannot avoid them because they are important (medical exams, our best friend’s wedding) or they will happen no matter what we do (anniversaries). We need to find a way to reduce the negative impact as much as possible and maybe even turn this into a success. […]
How to choose trauma content for processing
Sooner or later in our recovery journey we will have to decide where to start processing. Because of the amount of trauma we experienced we cannot possibly process everything and the good news is that we don’t have to. But we will have to use some kind of concept to help us prioritize what to […]
About the alternative diagnostic criteria for DID (Dell)
One of my great pleasures in life is reading scientific discourse. Specifically, when great minds discuss scientific theories and approaches and everyone picks on the problems in each other’s theory or framework. If you like these things, please make sure to read Dissociation and the Dissociative Disorders, articles by various specialists collected by Paul […]
Creating our own hell: Reenactments
Although TraumaTime is long past, many survivors struggle to create a life that is safe, peaceful and meaningful. It is as if we are somehow jinxed. We start out with good intentions and end up with the opposite of what we wanted. Sometimes that’s because we don’t have the support or resources we need and […]
Helping masochistic parts
CN: We talk about sexuality, pain, BDSM, (organized) abuse and explicit problems with masochism that can happen after extreme abuse and offer interventions that include sex education and experiments with sexual pleasure. Please don’t read this when you are unstable and stop reading when you get triggered too much. Like, now. If you are already […]
Overcoming patterns of appeasement and submission
We think of appeasement as a collection of social behaviors that aim to restore a safe relationship and maybe attachment with another person who is perceived as more powerful or threatening. If we gave them any cause to be angry with us, we need to fix it and make them calm down and like us […]
Unintentionally destabilizing a DID System
There are a lot of individual things that can go wrong in DID therapy. And there are also predictable patterns where a certain type of mistake will lead to a certain type of problem. Of course that won’t fit every system on the planet. But it fits often enough to be more than random. We […]
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