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 will look at the simple model of ANP, controlling EP and fragile EP to explore how over-emphasizing work with one group of parts will destabilize the whole system by causing an imbalance.

 

The trinity of trauma

We are using Nijenhuis’ extended version of the theory of structural dissociation.

ANPs* are the parts that are mostly ignorant of trauma. They manage daily life and are often phobic of other parts, avoiding them where possible.

Controlling EPs aim for control over the situation and they use control as a tool to reach that goal. The roles of protector/persecutor are summed up here.

Fragile EPs carry the pain of the trauma and the extreme emotions and memories that go with it. They are usually needy and attachment-seeking.

People who help us will probably get in contact with all of these groups of parts sooner or later. The goal is to create a dynamic balance in how much attention everyone gets. Focusing on one kind of part too much can often cause an imbalance that leads to chaos and dysfunction.

 

Over-emphasizing ANPs

We want stability in our life. We want to be grounded and in the present. Some helpers will encourage ANPs to focus on the outside world and grounded activities and ignore the inner experience. It is causing distress, so why would we focus on that. ANPs might get taught that they are the ‘real’ person and everyone else somehow isn’t as important or maybe someone well-meaning just wants us to be as strong as possible before we face more trauma. It doesn’t work that way. Stable ANPs are important, but when they take up all the space we create something like a pressure cooker. All the needs of the EPs of both groups are neglected. There will be an increase in flashbacks, body flashbacks, somatic symptoms of all kinds, amnesia and out of control behavior. Greater attempts to get a grip will just lead to more chaos. What we and many helpers are not aware of is that we caused this ourselves by ignoring the inner experience and other parts. Too much pressure, no outlet. We reduce the symptoms by giving other parts space and taking care of their needs. ‘ANP-only’ systems used to be a treatment goal in the 90s when helpers didn’t know any better. It is utterly outdated now. This is how you make it worse.

 

Over-emphasizing controlling EPs

Negotiating with controlling EPs will be necessary and there is nothing wrong about it. It might just get out of hand. Especially in situations where helpers try to negotiate tricky topics like self-harm or suicidal ideation, we might end up in a power struggle. Helpers try to tell controlling EPs what they are allowed to do and what they must not do. And controlling EPs, who need to be in control, will react in a way that shows that nobody else can control them. They either use words and start an argument that gets mean really fast or they use actions, which is often a lot more harmful. That is how we end up with blackouts and waking up to chaos or in hospital. Every attempt to stop the behavior makes the power struggle worse. Helpers cannot win. Investing even more into this fight will not solve the problem. But more than that: We have just eliminated normal life for ANPs, who have to be in constant fear of the next switch and we took all our attention away from hurting child parts who need help. Attention has to shift back to a systemic view where everyone is important and heard. We got distracted and side-tracked and it is not a coincidence…

 

Over-emphasizing fragile EPs

The extreme neediness of fragile EPs can convince helpers that they need to meet these needs, reparent the children and be there for them at all times. Healthy boundaries are dropped because it is heart-breaking to encounter someone who is so lost and desperate. While corrective experiences are important, full on reparenting is not recommended. Otherwise we get a system where the fragile EPs front more and more often to get their needs met. And the ANPs will show up less and less. Someone is taking care of the kids, so they don’t have to face their own fears of doing it themselves. Let the helpers take care of it, they are better at it anyway. We can see systems lose their independence and their functioning as adults in the world, to the point where it can be hard to even find an adult anymore. When controlling EPs (who are often surprisingly young) act out, that is treated like an accident and they are not held responsible. The system has been utterly infantilized and it will be incredibly hard to come back from that. This is an extreme example but it happens. We can start to create a counterbalance before it gets too bad by addressing the ANPs more often whenever it looks like they are fading into the background.

 

These dynamics are predictable. We learn to notice the signs:

• increase of symptoms, especially body issues and amnesia
• power struggles + acting out
• adult hosts withdrawing, child parts becoming hosts

It might help us to see where we are getting distracted and who is not getting enough attention or responsibility. We balance the system by moving our attention to a different group of parts. It is useful for self-help, where we sometimes create imbalances ourselves because topics feel too hard for us to approach. Those who consider themselves helpers for people with DID need to be aware of these dynamics even more. They sometimes create imbalances of a magnitude we could never achieve alone because they are too ignorant to know what they are doing wrong.

 

 

 

You can find this somewhere in the second book of The Trinity of Trauma by E. Nijenhuis. I will let you know when I find the right chapter again

 

*I am fully aware that the plural of ANP/EP is ANP/EP. Most people are not, that is why we use intuitive plurals instead.