Posted by shelliR on August 1, 2001, at 20:54:25
In reply to Re: DID, MDs, DSM, EMDR, etc. » shelliR, posted by Elizabeth on August 1, 2001, at 13:58:22
> > No, they talk to me, comment about things in general. Like, "you forgot to give us lunch" or "why is that lady so fat", stuff like that, unless I ask them deeper questions.
> What does giving them lunch entail???
it actually means that they are hungry and I've been too preoccupied to eat. It's not like they eat different things than me. And it's not like I'm June Cleaver.>
> > > Does the aging occur at the same rate as real aging? Or do they age in a discontinuous fashion?
> > Totally discontinuous.
> That's weird. (Not that the rest of this stuff isn't weird.) Do you have any idea what triggers the aging?
I'm guessing that the more secure they get, the more they are ready to pass into a new developmental stage. The youngest one is the easiest one for me to analyze because she is the most different from me now and probably the most different from how I was at age three. She identifies with being very little ( I was quite tall at three) and she used to collect stuffed animals of mice and repeatedly say she was a very little mouse. I just asked her if she still feels like a very little mouse and she said, "no, I am three and a half now." She is very confident in her childlikeness and unlike me at three, she feels it is quite natural to be loved and treasured. She has talked about things that I don't quite understand, like her mommy went away and never came back. And my mother was in the hospital for about a week when I was close to age three. But I don't know why the mommy never came back in her mind. And she talks about sexual abuse that I have no memory of. The details are so vivid, her emotions reinactments so strong, and the descriptions so unadult, that I am sure it happened. Anyway, with sexual abuse I think you always would believe an uncoached three year old. And my first knowledge of my sexual abuse came to me totally independent of therapyAlso, when I was three I tried to burn down my neighbor's house so the fire engines would come (tried with matches to burn brick), and she takes the credit for that, but I do remember lighting match after match. And of course the house did not burn down, and no one found out about it. You might ask what a three year was doing all by her self outside trying to burn houses down--sort of indicates the pattern of neglect in my family.
I had a client who had adopted a son from South America and they had to wait almost two years to finally bring him home. When I met him (he was three), he opened his hand and showed me that he had a little church mouse (not visible to the naked eye :-) ). His name was Brian and the mouse's name was also Brian. I think he sort of choose to keep a part of him separate (as a mouse) to remind him of his old country, his caretakers there and his friends in the orphanage. And mice have often played roles in fairytales, and children's stories, so I think the mouse thing is sort of a part of the collective unconscious.
>
> You say that you find all this dissociating and so forth completely natural. Under those circumstances, I can see how it would be hard for a clinician to figure out what was going on.Well, if I was losing time and buying things I didn't want, and people knew me who I didn't know, and if I found myself in places with no clue how I got there, then it *would* feel strange and very horrible I think. My friend was diagnosed as scheizophrenic in NIMH, because she heard voices inside, but she didn't fit a scheizophrenic profile. It took her therapist years to realize what was going on, in fact her friends who had seen Sybil on tv wondered about it first.
BTW, he is still her therapist. I think he feels so bad about misdisagnosing her (it took eight years!) that he doesn't charge her anything over what her insurance pays. Actually she is his only patient (talk about a transference dream) because he (MD) and a psychologist run a very well known treatment center for people with dissociation and substance abuse, which keeps adding new locations. The only clinical work he does now is run some of the groups out of the centers, if he's still doing that. Mostly he is administrative. It's called the Kolmac Clinic.
> > no, just valium makes me more grounded when I'm very dissociated. But some doctors don't like to give valium so they give me klonopin instead which isn't that helpful, but does help some.
>
> They don't like to give Valium? Why not -- not trendy enough? < g >
Not only not trendy, but even worse: "post-trendy" meaning it is almost blacklisted! Remember miltown (meprabamate?)
>
>
> He should get over it (the phone call thing). Doctors need to be on call, IMO.
--not holding my breath.> > Is anyone else in your family depressed?
> Yes, on both sides of my family. (no bipolar, AFAIK)Anyone in your immediate family (sibs, parents)?
>
shelli
poster:shelliR
thread:67742
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010731/msgs/72979.html