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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 15 of 15. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by serena11 on May 16, 2006, at 19:03:18
After almost 5 years of intense work, I am finally free of DID. It's great to be one complete person, one complex person, one totally present person. It seems that almost every day, I experience being whole in some delightful fashion. Did I want to be healed? No. Did I know I needed to be healed? No. Did I kick and fight throughout it all? Yes. But if anyone else is struggling with this, I can say it is worth the battle. I am really grateful.
Posted by Pfinstegg on May 16, 2006, at 19:25:34
In reply to DID no longer, posted by serena11 on May 16, 2006, at 19:03:18
That is so wonderful to hear! How do you know you have really done it? How did you do it- did you go to therapy many times a week, use EMDR? Was your therapist a really good fit for you, do you think? Was csa a factor in causing it? There are quite a few people here who would love (and benefit) from anything you feel like sharing with us. But, most important- it's absolutely wonderful news! Many congratulations- and much happiness in your future life.
Posted by serena11 on May 16, 2006, at 20:27:58
In reply to Re: DID no longer » serena11, posted by Pfinstegg on May 16, 2006, at 19:25:34
> That is so wonderful to hear! How do you know you have really done it? How did you do it- did you go to therapy many times a week, use EMDR? Was your therapist a really good fit for you, do you think? Was csa a factor in causing it? There are quite a few people here who would love (and benefit) from anything you feel like sharing with us. But, most important- it's absolutely wonderful news! Many congratulations- and much happiness in your future life.
Thank you for caring! It was as hard as anything I can imagine. There was a reason I had dissociated from all the abuse I suffered; relieving it was horrendous. I spent thousands of hours in theophostic sessions. I started with a woman who had barely been trained but who gave me literally thousands of hours of her time. Then I did a lot of the hardest stuff with a couple who are trained in the advanced work. (I had been in therapy for about 20 years when I first left home, and although that kept me alive, I was misdiagnosed as schizophrenic and then bipolar and finally MPD before the labels changed.) I never believed any of it was true, despite having abundant evidence to the contrary. It helped to take medication as I went through the healing process and to have a loving husband.
I love to think about how I know I am whole. Wow. There's nothing like it. No more lost time, no more lost years, and REAL feelings. I finally know what happened and I am at peace with who I am. I feel like I have emerged from hell, clean and shining!
Posted by B2chica on May 17, 2006, at 12:44:49
In reply to Re: DID no longer, posted by serena11 on May 16, 2006, at 20:27:58
my God serena that is Wonderful news.
it is so good to hear such positive outcome from therapy. it actually WORKS!you have made incredible strides in 5 years. incredible, you should be so proud of yourself for getting to where you are.
congratulations and thank you for sharing!
b2c.
Posted by serena11 on May 17, 2006, at 15:20:29
In reply to Re: DID no longer, posted by B2chica on May 17, 2006, at 12:44:49
It is awesome. I am grateful for the people who gave up so many hours of their time, often day after day. I was a real pain at times; as I grappled with inner agony, I gave them a hard time, even though I was desperate for healing. It is fun to be the new me! :)
Posted by Pfinstegg on May 17, 2006, at 15:40:37
In reply to Re: DID no longer, posted by serena11 on May 16, 2006, at 20:27:58
That sounds so incredibly long and hard. But you obviously never gave up, and having a supportive husband is so helpful. I'm not familiar with the type of therapy you have had- theophrostic? Could you tel us a bit about it?
Posted by serena11 on May 17, 2006, at 17:30:07
In reply to Re: DID no longer » serena11, posted by Pfinstegg on May 17, 2006, at 15:40:37
> That sounds so incredibly long and hard. But you obviously never gave up, and having a supportive husband is so helpful. I'm not familiar with the type of therapy you have had- theophrostic? Could you tel us a bit about it?
Theophostic ministry (TPM) is a weird name for a very successful form of healing. It is Christian based, but not exclusively for Christians. It was developed by Ed Smith (he has a webite), and my husband and I had gone through the basic training ourselves before I came to grips with my problem. My husband, a psychologist, had given up hope that I could be cured. He had investigated EMDR (I think that's what it is called) and my sister went through some of that successfully for a period of time. The premise of TPM is that there is a fundamental lie at the core of each trauma. Also, there is no healing without reliving the initial feelings, all of which had been shunted off into different parts of my mind. Over time, I acknowledged these "people" and their lives and pain, then just as quickly disowned and disavowed them as I struggled through the process of healing. Eventually I was able to see that this shattering of my soul was a gift that protected me from unendurable events and memories. I always knew that I had been severely abused; I had all these dreadful paths in my memory that went nowhere. They simply stopped abruptly and I had huge lapses of memory. The abuse I suffered was especially sadistic and destructive. My first suicide attempt was at age 4, if that is any indicator of how difficult my life was. So in TPM, we just prayed and would go to what seemed like a never-ending path in hell. I had to accept what I had long denied. I despaired of ever being healed, hated God with a passion, and seemingly went around in useless circles, becoming very suicidal. Prior to TPM, I had been in conventional counseling for much of my adult life. As I noted before, that kept me alive, primarily through kind therapists and medication, but I really never knew what was happening inside. Because I "saw" and "heard" other parts of myself and their memories, I was diagnosed as schizophrenic for most of the time. One brave therapist diagnosed me with MPD about 30 years ago, but I didn't know what that meant and having just left home, I was not able to come to grips with whatever that was. Being called psychotic was no fun, but until the 80's, that was the most common way of viewing me. Then I had more MPD diagnoses and did coventional (but very frequent) talk therapy to no avail. Again, I had such kind therapists and medication to help with anxiety and depression, so I stayed alive. NOW I am really living! It is truly amazing. But it took a tremendous amount of effort on the part of the people who worked with me. We usually had 4-6 hour sessions (and we all work fulltime). It was also excruciating for my husband to see all that had happened to me. Not for the faint of heart....
Posted by Pfinstegg on May 17, 2006, at 21:05:15
In reply to Re: DID no longer, posted by serena11 on May 17, 2006, at 17:30:07
How wonderful that you were able to get such intensive help- and that it truly worked. I didn't know that such a type of therapy existed-especially the very long sessions. Thank you for letting us know about it.
Posted by kerria on May 18, 2006, at 1:50:29
In reply to Re: DID no longer, posted by serena11 on May 17, 2006, at 17:30:07
Thank you Serena for sharing. i will definately look up that website. i'm a Christian and have found so much condemnation about having DID- especialy from my h. "Why would God use that (DID) to protect you from trauma?" he says and feels it was so unfair for me to marry him when i was so messed up (like i knew or could help it)...anyways, it's good to see someone have a positive ending.
now i'm so much a mess- therapy has made me worse and more separated than ever.
You said that you were better when you acknowledged the parts and then right away they left- after you dissallowed them or disowned them - i think i see- because they aren't needed for you any longer.
Is that how it happened?Probably i still need my parts - even if i could meet them- my life is still needing parts to escape to in order to survive. No one understands- therapy makes me worse. i'll see if i can find someone here that does that kind of therapy. Also to find support because you can't live in a place of non support- hearing criticizm inside and outside also and have to have no help to deal with flashbacks, terrible stuff, etc.
You are like a superhero!
kerria
Posted by Larry Hoover on May 18, 2006, at 8:55:01
In reply to Re: DID no longer » serena11, posted by kerria on May 18, 2006, at 1:50:29
> Thank you Serena for sharing. i will definately look up that website. i'm a Christian and have found so much condemnation about having DID- especialy from my h. "Why would God use that (DID) to protect you from trauma?" he says and feels it was so unfair for me to marry him when i was so messed up (like i knew or could help it)...anyways, it's good to see someone have a positive ending.
Oh, kerria, I don't know how you can live with that condemnation. Would he use the same arguments if you came home, one day, with a diagnosis of diabetes? Why would God use that? Would he accuse you of hiding that, too?
The fact that I dissociate did not show itself to the world, let alone to me, in any significant way, until some major stressors occurred when I was 38 years old. For almost four decades, nobody really had *any* idea that was the case. When I raged, people told me it was like I turned into a different person, but I just tried not to rage very much. The last person I punched, I punched when I was 15 years old. Stuff like. I tried to keep it all "mine". I tried to do damage control. But still, I was 38, when I broke it again.
You didn't hide this from anybody. Something happened, and now it matters.
You are a very strong person. I know that one day, you will know that, too.
> now i'm so much a mess- therapy has made me worse and more separated than ever.
>
> You said that you were better when you acknowledged the parts and then right away they left- after you dissallowed them or disowned them - i think i see- because they aren't needed for you any longer.
> Is that how it happened?Since I'm already talking....I know you asked her, but it was that way for me. The simple act of that acknowledgement caused the gaps between the fragments to disappear. There were never boundaries between my fragments, in the first place. There were gaps. Like deep cracks. Voids. Somehow, experience itself could not leap across the empty space. When I saw what it was, this cracked ego, the observation itself triggered a progressive closing of the gaps. Experience filled itself in, and the fragmented ego pieces re-integrated with the main me. Like the mating of a zipper. I zipped up.
Now, that's me looking back at it. I can honestly say that the experience itself was the most horrific thing I could ever imagine. During the process of reintegration, I had the sense of simultaneous but incongruent experiences. The fragments had distinct memories, and vocabularies, and I had different versions of my life, all jumbled together, for a good few hours. I remember concluding that this was it. This is what it feels like to lose your mind. I was completely ungrounded during those few hours. It was a blur. I was so f*cking scared.
I went to bed, and slept (surprising, eh?), and when I awoke, I was startled. Almost startled again, more than I have ever known. I was New and Improved Lar. I had a confidence, and a competency feeling, that is almost indescribable.
The main work had been building a cognitive scaffold from which I was able to observe a triggered event. I had to be triggered to fix it. I knew that much. What amazed me was that all it took to fix it was observing it.
For the last decade, I felt very much like Humpty Dumpty. I felt like my shell was all jumbled up, as I tried to heal what I had left of me. But that night, when the gaps closed, it was like the pieces rearranging themselves, and restoring the original shell. Only then did I realize that I'd lived my whole existence with a broken shell. Oh, yes, I broke anew, just under 11 years ago. That's when I thought I became Humpty Dumpty. But no, it goes back to before my memories begin.
I'm not physically well yet. And sure, I have some confusing moments when those "what used to be fragments" thinking processes occur, but it's pretty darn cool to have multiple processing capacity, built in. My brain is now a parallel processor. <grinnage> There's always a silver lining. ;-)
> Probably i still need my parts - even if i could meet them- my life is still needing parts to escape to in order to survive. No one understands- therapy makes me worse. i'll see if i can find someone here that does that kind of therapy. Also to find support because you can't live in a place of non support- hearing criticizm inside and outside also and have to have no help to deal with flashbacks, terrible stuff, etc.
You are quite correct about that. I hope you are listening to you.
> You are like a superhero!
>
> kerriaAnd you are like a superhero in training.
Hugs,
Lar
Posted by serena11 on May 18, 2006, at 15:12:20
In reply to Re: DID no longer ****trigger**** » kerria, posted by Larry Hoover on May 18, 2006, at 8:55:01
> For the last decade, I felt very much like Humpty Dumpty. I felt like my shell was all jumbled up, as I tried to heal what I had left of me. But that night, when the gaps closed, it was like the pieces rearranging themselves, and restoring the original shell. Only then did I realize that I'd lived my whole existence with a broken shell. Oh, yes, I broke anew, just under 11 years ago. That's when I thought I became Humpty Dumpty.Dear Lar,
I had often thought I was the only Humpty Dumpty! It brought back memories to hear you use that expression, too! I'm glad that you aren't Humpty Dumpty any longer. I now think there's a special place in life for people who are knit together in this new way. I would never have imagined believing that, but I have read many of your emails on this website and can see how you pour out hope to others. I really want to be a beacon of hope, too.
Posted by Larry Hoover on May 18, 2006, at 15:55:29
In reply to Re: DID no longer ****trigger****, posted by serena11 on May 18, 2006, at 15:12:20
>
> > For the last decade, I felt very much like Humpty Dumpty. I felt like my shell was all jumbled up, as I tried to heal what I had left of me. But that night, when the gaps closed, it was like the pieces rearranging themselves, and restoring the original shell. Only then did I realize that I'd lived my whole existence with a broken shell. Oh, yes, I broke anew, just under 11 years ago. That's when I thought I became Humpty Dumpty.
>
> Dear Lar,
> I had often thought I was the only Humpty Dumpty! It brought back memories to hear you use that expression, too! I'm glad that you aren't Humpty Dumpty any longer. I now think there's a special place in life for people who are knit together in this new way. I would never have imagined believing that, but I have read many of your emails on this website and can see how you pour out hope to others. I really want to be a beacon of hope, too.That's very sweet of you to say.
I've always looked for the shiny bits, in the mire of life.
I was thinking about that Humpty Dumpty thing. He/it is portrayed as an egg, but Humpty Dumpty was a cannon. An egg-shaped one, I'd bet you.
Back in the English civil war, c. 1650, HD was knocked off a wall by a cannon blast from the "enemy". Cannon were very fragile, really, because they had to be cast in one piece. To get one as large as HD was really quite an accomplishment. To not have the casting crack as it cooled.....the larger the casting, the greater the risk of failure. Humpty Dumpty was a work of art.
So, when HD fell off the wall of the tower where it had been placed, it cracked. And, there is no way to repair a crack in a casting. "All the king's horses, and all the king's men, couldn't put Humpty together again." It was ruined. In the end, the walled town of Colchester fell, as the cannon could not be repaired.
That's one story, and I like it best.
Lar
Posted by kerria on May 18, 2006, at 16:46:24
In reply to Re: DID no longer ****trigger**** » kerria, posted by Larry Hoover on May 18, 2006, at 8:55:01
thank you Lar- for the kind words.
tears/ we have to find a therapist first. The T i was going to the past six years ended so painfully. Today i went once more and he kept saying , reminding me that the T relationship is beyond repair. i can't find anyone to take me.
My T made me so worse- finding out i had DID made me so worse. T was criticizing things parts did up to the last moment. Everyone inside is so torn apart. i need to find a T that cares about me. My life is so painful and so trashed.
No i can't do it by myself- there's no one in charge. i can't have that T i was going to because he constantly stood against me in areas where it wasn't my fault. now i'm so hurt AND have aaaall these problems like surgery to get through without a T.
i can't believe a T can be so uncaring. It's so hard to think about trusting anyone ever again.
i need a healing - a different way to heal. Maybe thie way- serena's method that helped would help. i wish i had a T that cared about me and could help.
kerria
Posted by serena11 on May 18, 2006, at 19:15:23
In reply to Re: DID no longer ****trigger**** » Larry Hoover, posted by kerria on May 18, 2006, at 16:46:24
> thank you Lar- for the kind words.
>
> tears/ we have to find a therapist first. The T i was going to the past six years ended so painfully. Today i went once more and he kept saying , reminding me that the T relationship is beyond repair. i can't find anyone to take me.
>
> My T made me so worse- finding out i had DID made me so worse. T was criticizing things parts did up to the last moment. Everyone inside is so torn apart. i need to find a T that cares about me. My life is so painful and so trashed.
>
> No i can't do it by myself- there's no one in charge. i can't have that T i was going to because he constantly stood against me in areas where it wasn't my fault. now i'm so hurt AND have aaaall these problems like surgery to get through without a T.
>
> i can't believe a T can be so uncaring. It's so hard to think about trusting anyone ever again.
> i need a healing - a different way to heal. Maybe thie way- serena's method that helped would help. i wish i had a T that cared about me and could help.
> kerriaDear Kerria,
I tried to post this a moment ago, accidentally hit some key, and it disappeared! I will try again, but this may be a duplicate. During the lengthy process of trying to find help, I had a therapist who thought I was a liar and was severely rejecting of me. She had reason to be wary because I literally threatened her, and I am sorry for that. I do think it ironic that I spent so many years later denying I had DID; it was incredibly difficult for me to accept it. Anyway, her rejection was one of the most painful things I endured in the process of seeking help. At first she refused to see me unless my husband accompanied me (which we never did), then refused to see me at all. It was totally devastating. A patient is already extremely vulnerable. It is incomprehensible for someone to treat a wounded person that way. Even sick animals at a shelter are cared for....
I started to write that I was able to release all of that pain from her during my healing, when I hit the wrong key somewhere.
Kerria, NO ONE should be criticizing any part of you. Every part of your heart is precious and needs to be loved and healed. I hope that you will find a gentle therapist who can help all of you come to rest and peace and life. It is hard enough to be shattered inside, much less having external attacks from the very person who should stand with you. You cannot do this alone and should not be having to defend yourself after exposing your broken heart. It makes me angry that you are being attacked and I hope you will find true healing with just the right person.
Posted by serena11 on May 18, 2006, at 19:18:55
In reply to Re: DID no longer » serena11, posted by Larry Hoover on May 18, 2006, at 15:55:29
Wow. I had no idea that there was a "real" Humpty Dumpty. I love the story. Thanks.
This is the end of the thread.
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