Crying for Da

She cries in the night for her Da.  There is no one to hear her except the us.  She lays in her bed, surrounded by her faithful guardians and we hear her each night as we attempt to settle the mind.  Her voice is that of a child, she hopes each night that he will come.  There is a difference between what she calls for and what we need.  She wants to be safe and protected, wrapped in her daddy's safe embrace.  She cries in fear of the dreams to come and the terror, night after night.  We have done the therapy, the exercises and the talking.  We read the books and speak to the gods.  We surround her with loving and safe people, who accept and understand she is real.  None of it matters and none of it changes the terrors.

If you're lucky, during the day you may see a moment of giggles, and joy.  She comes out and brings sparkles and color, truth and wisdom.  We never know when or why she slides forward. We can only see from the inside, sometimes.  Some of the committee cringes when she mixes stripes, plaids and prints into a kaleidoscope of an outfit.  There have been days of pig tails and flowers or scarves and t-shirts.  She has polar bear footy pajamas and a complete bear ensemble. She is a passionate chocolate cookie fan and can tell you which restaurant has the best ones.   She loves to dress up and it doesn't matter that the body is that of a 44 year old, over weight, white woman.  She is five and she is determined to be alive and joyful during the daylight hours.

When the night time comes, she hides. Sliding back inside to crawl in her big bed, next to the other Little's, buried beneath their mountain of blankets and guarded by the bears, elephants and dogs each night.  Our beloved Julie-girl wants her Da because she doesn't understand why he never saved us.  She doesn't understand he will never come because he never knew what was done to us.  Even though we have a healthy, loving relationship with our father; there will always be a bit of caution and broken heart.  Children don't understand that parents are people.  To children, parents are superheros, with the ability to see everything, know everything, fix all the wrongs and defeat all the bad guys.  They don't understand when bad things happen, that sometimes the Daddy doesn't know.  Thus, they have their trust eroded and their terror justified.  The little girl believes she deserves what is happening, because with the logic of a child, Daddy doesn't care what is done to her.  This is Julie-girl's truth and we have thus far been unable to change it.

Therapy By Julie

Today was the day of reengaging in therapy. I took a hiatus last October, after running into a brick wall during the 10th week of a 12 week cognitive behavioral therapy CBT program.  I also hit a brick wall in my anger and protective nature management.  As each of these traits is controlled by different alters, I went into hiding from therapy.  I used the excuse that I was becoming to emotionally attached to my therapist to try and convince myself I needed a new therapist.  Which would have set me back a zillion years, but allowed me to avoid the last two weeks of the CBT program.  The lesson I'm stuck on is self-worth, I have made at missed a number of appointments in my effort to get back into the work of self healing.  Today, I made it.

The session was extremely successful. Dr. G. was fantastic and completely open to what I said and all of my concerns and fears.  I have been working with her for almost 10 years and our doctor/patient relationship has overcome all of the hurdles I have thrown at it.  I addressed my concerns about how I perceived our relationship becoming more of a friendship and this was interfering with my ability to share information with her.  We addressed my avoidance of the CBT program and how I was afraid of it.  The part of our conversation that truly reminded me of how much I respect her, was when we discussed my desire to begin addressing my DID.  Dr. G. is an expert in trauma, not DID. As a therapist, she would be able to work with me on the traumas and we could discuss how it is affecting all of the committee.  However, it would be stepping out of her area to try and work with me specifically on the aspects of DID.  We made a plan together for her to contact other professionals and organizations that specialize in DID and try to get a referral for me to get help through those sources.

I have an appointment in two weeks to move to the next stage in the CBT program.  Our goal is to complete this program before I begin anything new in regards to the DID.  Thus far, the most successful aspect of the CBT program has been the success I have had in removing self blame for the assaults and abuse done to me.  It is an incredibly difficult program, both mentally and emotionally.  I strongly recommend it as a technique for working through PTSD.  It isn't a fix all, but it does amazing things with the brain.

I have decided not to return to group therapy just yet.  I feel it would be detrimental to the group for me to participate currently.  I am to intolerant of perceived outsiders and of dealing with conflicts within the group.  The group is very much about conflict resolution, but I am not in a place to do so properly or without a great deal of unjust anger.  I have hope for myself, and I am pleased to know I am aware of at least these shortcomings on my part.  The level of hope and anticipation I feel about getting professional help with the DID and with working with Dr. G. to complete the program is very high.  My life is going well and I am thankful that most of the system is aware and grateful as well.

Who ordered this?

There are days when the committee just seems to be spinning.  On those days, all bets are off as to what is going to happen and who is going to take the front.  It can be entertaining and a bit odd for the people around us, depending on who takes over and when.  The Littles: Julie girl, JJ and Pun'kin are always the most entertaining from what I have been told.  When in a restaurant the alter ordering the food may not be the one to consume it.  If Georgia orders a steak medium rare because she loves meat, by the time it arrives Jewel may be out and she doesn't like meat at all.   The choice becomes either Jewel eats the food and continues the conversation she may be having or she goes back inside leaving the conversation unfinished to allow Georgia to eat what was ordered. This puts Georgia in the position of continuing a conversation she may have no idea was happening.  There are also the times when food is ordered by one of the Littles that is just not healthy. This usually comes in the form of blueberry pancakes with strawberry compote on the side.  If we are lucky there will be a protein such as eggs to go with them.  We often are not lucky in that regard.

Our friends are amazing about interacting with whoever is presenting.  They take care of the Littles without even blinking.  We have items gifted to them such as stuffies, food items they love, coloring books and other such  fun things.  All of them have evolved and mellowed over the last couple of years as they continue to live in a positive world.  The feeling of eminent doom and danger is slowing lowering and we are learning to function outside of the fight or flight reflex.  It is incredibly difficult to manage,especially when we are in the middle of it. The people in our life just remind us frequently that our world is peaceful and we are safe.  

The committee and cooperation. .. or not..

Living on my own has been educational to say the least.  I just turned 43 and it's just plain weird.  There are very few of us in the committee who age at the same rate as the body, most of them don't age at all.  Julie girl has been 5 years old for as long as I can remember. Just like JJ has always been three. Rachel will always be 22 and Laura will always be 12.  On the other hand Georgia is about 45 we think and Julie is about the same age as the body. Although we like to harass her and tell her she's getting old faster than everyone else.  Jewel stopped ageing about age 30  and Serenity never seems to really have an age. Tara is apparently about 250 years old but she's a mermaids, so I have no idea what that translates into in human.  Fury refused to discuss something as trivial as how old she is and Frantic seems about 18 but she's autistic so it's not a high priority when she is out.  Pun'kin is about 18 months in her actions but it's hard to tell..she just wants to eat. Cinder is about 25 and very quiet. As long as she has her plants she doesn't really interact with anyone although she lets the littles walk through her gardens as long as they don't damage the roses.  Emma is ethereal and sort of glows. I wish we had her calm all the time. I'm sure I left some one out but I'll catch it later.

For the most part none of us keep track of how old the body is.  It doesn't really matter to us.  We take care of it, sometimes better than others, and we try to be aware of everyone's needs. This can be as simple as feeding the littles peanut butter sandwiches (which everyone else in the committee hates), or a complicated as making sure we take all of our medications every day.
As you can imagine w have a diverse wardrobe.. depending on what is planned for the day we attempt to let Rachel or Julie be in charge of clothing. Rachel has the best skill but Julie has the best business look.
We always end up shaking our head when the littles happen to put clothing on us, because wow can they mix up the color! Julie girl loves stripped socks, JJ  loves oversized shirts and Pun'kin likes lots of color. We usually end up with pig tails and sparkly jewelry.  Let me tell you what a shock it can be to come out at a restaurant and realize you're wearing purple stripped knee highs,a bright yellow shirt, hot pink skirt and leather boots.  It's just special..lol
On the other hand each alter has amazing skills that make us as a whole unique and versatile .

being multiple

Here we are, embarking on a journey of new adventures.  My world took a left turn and I am now  looking at the future with a relatively non-specific plan.  How vague can one person get?  Well with us this person it's fairly easy.  Let me introduce myself, or us as it were.  I am Friday Lowrey.  I wasn't born with the name Friday, I was born Julie Ann Lowrey. Then my last name changed to Brubach and then Hoffman.  Through the years I was called everything from Jewel, Julie, Julie Ann, Jewels to Babe , sweetheart and the other normal collection of nicknames people call females. 
With me there is a bit of a difference though, I live with dissociative identity disorder (DID) or what most people still call multiple personality disorder.  There are some common factors among those of us with the labeling of DID:

usually 4-20 alters is common
there can be alters who are not human
alters who are under the age of ( in our book 12 ) that are called little's
alters of different sexes
alters that may not have bodies
alters that are seen as demons
alters that are violent, mute, deaf, blind, young, old, and any other variation you may or may not be able to think of.

lost time
poor since of time
often have the strangest wardrobes

there is normally other mental illness that goes with the diagnosis
PTSD
depression
anxiety
suicidal
eating disorders
insomnia
personality disorders such as
OCD
bipolor
ADD
ADHD

 There are may be physical chronic illness such as
obesity
high blood pressure
diabetes
poor eye site
migraines (very common)
and any other number of illnesses

We don't all have all of them, but all of us have some variation plus other affects that are not listed.  My personal list is rather involved and long.  I won't be going into that right now but I thought it helpful to give a basic idea of what challenges we live with on besides having more than one person hanging out inside one body. I have heard and used the term singleton to describe people who are not multiple.  I know a lady with a little who asks when the singleton's are going to be fixed because in her mind everyone is supposed to be like she is.  Part of a system that allows the body to function. 

So back to names. We decided on the name Friday for several personal reasons which will be gone into in future posts.  The reason for choosing a name unlike any of the alters or our given name was to remove the confusion of who was responsible for being our "front" person at any given time.  We discovered people seemed to want an accounting of "who" they were talking to as though we function like a switch board or board house.  It doesn't work that way and being forced to have specific alters come to the "front" more often than they desired or when someone outside the system decided they wanted to have a chat was causing chaos inside, which triggers all sorts of negative responses. 

Something very important to remember about those of us that are multiple.  Due to extreme trauma (no it doesn't have to be abuse, although that is the most common starter) the mind either locks a memory down and separates it from the rest of the mind, or creates an alter to deal with the trauma at hand.  There are different jobs assigned to different alters, each job is created to again protect the mind of the person.  As time goes on this becomes the normal way for the brain to respond to extreme trauma or stress.  The person has no idea it's happened or happening, usually until in their twenties at least.  I was 30 before I started therapy even though I knew about at least two of my little's.  I've been in therapy for over ten years now and I have a better understanding of my system and I function so much better, but there are some things that I just have learned to adapt to.