Diary of a Newly Diagnosed Dissociative Part 1: Confusion

Outstanding text, its really owe me to visit more and more here!! Deon Dumouchel

hi holly,
i don't know if you are still reading this old blog but i wanted to tell you how very helpful you have been to me the last few weeks. i was diagnosed with DID about one month ago after struggling enormously with all kinds of issues, self-harm, eating disorders, etc., for 30 years, in and out of therapy, emergency rooms when younger, etc. i won't detail all of it, suffice it to say that i kept trying and each time i would go to therapy i would get worse. finally i started with a wonderful therapist and psychiatrist who referred me to a specialist psychiatrist in dissociative disorders. i am still in shock. i am a very high functioning successful professional, i am a good and devoted mom with two terrific kids, i have friends, etc. i hide all of it very very well. but it is BAD, very bad pain and suffering and confusion. when i got this diagnosis i was relieved and utterly terrified. i printed out your series on this and relate so much to it. i am totally confused, terrified, scared, alone with it, yet also relieved, so relieved to get help. i watched your videos and relate so much. holly thank you so much. i hope you get this. i feel very very frightened. thanks.

I agree with all you said. For me, I was diagnosed roughly 20 years ago now, so it's really hard to remember those early years and the confusion. It was also a different period of time, different approaches, even DID was called MPD. The one thing that has settled for me over the years is my confusion about DID. While I still get confused a lot, it is not nearly the way it used to be. So, I want to tell your readers that if they are in the beginning, it will get better. The key is to not freak out (which I know is very very hard). But you can't get anywhere if you are freaking.

I know about dissociative writings. Negative messages feel so real. Yet, they are not real in a concrete sense, though they can have a concrete impact. I wish you the best.

Holly,
Thank-you so much for sharing this. You are brave and beautiful. I think you're right - there is no substitution for seeing it for ourselves, but most people would never let us.
(If I might make a small request. Perhaps you could type the content of the letter out as well as it's hard to read from a photo.)
- Natasha

Holly- You are brave in sharing some of these intimate and personal feelings that were so strong at the beginning of your journey. I see the remarkable amount of progress you have made even in the relatively short amount of time we have known one another. I highly commend you for looking back just to see how far you really have come.
I remember these times in my own journey so well. I did not so much struggle with denial of the diagnosis. Instead my struggle was with the insane flashbacks that were so overwhelming that I was consistently in a hyper vigilant state, an anxiety attack was always right around the corner. I remember thinking "I watched way too many horror films as a kid" and "wow I must be crazy". Also in the beginning I was living alone and was absolutely convinced that people were breaking into my house and writing me letters at night while I was asleep. I now know that these were letters from the parts of me that hid themselves so carefully.
A small note to everyone that is at this beginning stage. Try to remember it wont be like that forever and you are not alone.
Dana

Thank you for sharing this Holly. I can only begin to understand how difficult it was for you to do so.
I still experience some of the messages and feelings you describe here. It doesn't seem to get any less confusing. I am able to understand them and their motivations more often though.
Take care,
CG

Hi Holly,
I want to acknowledge the huge sacrifice you made to help those of us still struggling with the acceptance of this diagnosis. I know that you must have fought against all of your instincts just to post this. What I read moved me beyond description. It reads so similar to the way my journals are reading now. There is a part, or possibly more than one part, of my system that still tells me that going to my therapist is a mistake, even though I completely trust my therapist. I also relate to the feeling of being pulled in many different directions, not knowing who I am, and sometimes not even recognizing myself in the mirror! Your 6-16-2004 entry broke my heart more than anything. That particular alter wanted to convince you that you were doing this just to stand out, but I know you weren't. I know that the last thing you wanted was to stand out. Not like this. We like to hide, right? When we come out of hiding, we do everything humanly possible to appear normal, to blend in, right? That is why that journal entry breaks my heart. I have at least two alters who ridicule me, and tell me that I brought this on myself. They try to ridicule my therapist. They have made it difficult at times to accept this diagnosis. They actually succeeded for many years. My therapist has known for nearly 8 years now. I only accepted it this year! That is how resistant I was. Only after journaling this past year, and watching myself switch right there on paper....in black and white, did I truly accept that I have Dissociative Identity Disorder. I finally admitted to my therapist a few weeks ago how crowded and alone I feel. Crowded and alone sounds so contradictory, but that is exactly what it feels like.
I want to thank you once again for your incredible sacrifice here, just to allow people like me to see that these feelings of incredible chaos, and turmoil are completely normal. -- Mareeya