Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID): Animal Alter Parts and Other Nonhuman Alter Parts

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Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID): Animal Alter Parts and Other Nonhuman Alter Parts

October 23, 2008 by faithallen

Over on Isurvive.org, my favorite message board for child abuse survivors, a member posted a question about whether somebody with dissociative identity disorder (DID) could have an animal alter part. The answer to this question is yes.

I had never read or heard about animal alter parts until discovering one in myself. I was lying in my bed, and I felt myself transforming into a wolf. I could feel the fur on my body, and my hands shaped themselves into paws, with my fingers being the claws. I “was” a wolf. To say this freaked me out is an understatement.

Then, I learned that this happened the night before the full moon. At this point, I determined that I truly was crazy and beyond help. Fortunately, I had knowledgeable friends over at Isurvive to talk me through this. Most ritual abuse takes place at the full moon, when there is better lighting for seeing and photographing the abuse, so it makes sense that I would need a protector part as the full moon approached.

People with DID have protector alter parts. Think about DID from a child’s perspective. The point of having alter parts is to protect the child from being harmed. While the child flees the body through dissociation, she leaves behind a protector part to fight back and provide the child with the illusion of safety.

Whatever you, as a child, felt was strong or scary was likely incorporated into an alter part. For me, the wolf in the story “Peter and the Wolf” was one of the scariest creatures I could think of, so I created a wolf alter part. That part comes out every night to curl up around me while I sleep. To this day, my wolf protects me as I sleep. I have tried to integrate this part multiple times, but I guess I still do not feel safe enough to “retire” my wolf.

I also had a snake alter part, which I integrated. Other people have alter parts that are lions, bears, dogs, or other animals. Animal alter parts can be anything that seemed scary to them as children.

I have also heard of people with DID having other types of nonhuman alter parts, such as dolls. Any inanimate object that had significance to you as a child could have been incorporated into your multiple system.

If you have a nonhuman alter part, you are completely normal. Your nonhuman alter part served a function as part of your DID multiple system. Love this part just as you would love any other part of yourself.

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Posted in Alter Parts | Tagged animal alter parts, lion alter parts, nonhuman alter parts, snake alter parts, wolf alter parts | 9 Comments

9 Responses

on October 23, 2008 at 9:50 am | Reply Simon

This has got me thinking alot.
Great thread as usual faith, and cool photo of a leopard. (Im sure its a leopard, could be wrong!).
Simon
on October 23, 2008 at 10:32 am | Reply deannandme

I have an animal part, though I am not sure if it is a cat or a snake -basically its the hissing sound that these animals make that I adopted as a protector when I was very, very young. It eventually morphed into having the purpose of hiding the knowledge of the abuse from myself! After high school, when I was in the early search for what ailed me, whenever I got too close to the knowledge internally, I’d hear this very threatening hiss inside myself and then I’d feel an immediate need to sleep or just totally forget my train of thought. “Back off, don’t come here! This is a forbidden area!” That’s what my hiss was set up to mean.

I also have a part that looks quite a bit like one of the creatures from “Where the wild things are,” a children’s book. I call it the green ghoul, and its basically a representation for murderous rage. For a long time I could not even begin to feel the emotion, I could only see the cartoonlike creature in my mind. I had other images or sounds that represented other emotions. I basically had to learn what each represented and then integrate them into myself so that I could connect the feelings with how I coded them and then, how they actually felt in my body!

We who were abused sure had to do mental gymnastics and become mental contortionists to find a way to stay upright and functional while we were growing up. Thanks for the post, Faith! I might use my comment as a jumping off point in a post on my own blog, it that’s ok.
on October 23, 2008 at 11:59 am | Reply faithallen

Sure!! I am glad that this been a springboard for another blog. :0)

- Faith
on October 23, 2008 at 1:25 pm | Reply palucci

Hi Faith, Deannandme, and Simon.
You dont have to integrate your wolf though, right Faith? He can stay and protect you. It’s not going to hurt you to not integrate him, right? mmm… but then I guess you would need to integrate him eventually so you can feel whole and complete.
I do not have an animal alter part. I have a meditation I do where I meet my grizzly bear. I go there as a baby or small child. I dont have any female body parts or entries and sometimes I dont even have a mouth. I dont have any clothes but I dont need any. I go to him for sleep and comfort. I will either fall asleep on his back feeling the rythm of his movement or I will be asleep on the ground and he will wrap himself around me. I feel perfectly safe because I know he would protect me . Some days I sit on his back and he runs, I have my arms stretched out and it feels like I am flying.
on October 23, 2008 at 7:12 pm | Reply anon

Hi Faith,
really interesting blog some of our alters are birds as well as animals———-have a beautiful strong eagle and one of our animals is a strong,muscular panther we notice them when we are frightened, bad memories start to surface, scared, or under pressure.
Faith was so pleased to know they are real and not imagination. Thank you for your honesty here to help others
on October 26, 2008 at 11:16 pm | Reply Grace

Hi Faith, I love that your wolf wraps up with you at night and protects you. S/he could very well be integrated. Just because a protector is wrapped around you doesn’t mean it’s not an integrated part. The one who know as my inner wisdom and another main protector are usually the only ones around these days. Actually I think they are connected. Anyway, they are always there to hold me or if I’m scared while I’m driving, I can feel the arms around me from behind. It’s very reassuring.

Having guardians, protectors, angels, inner wisdom entities can all be integrated and still be there for you. They never have to go away. I would say since you feel so connected to the wolf that is likely the case.

At one point in my healing I bought a neat book on Native American totems. It helped me a lot when I found animals inside. What their strengths and weaknesses were and the meaning of having that animal in your life. Very neat, IMO.
on April 27, 2009 at 7:43 am | Reply Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) and Multiple “People” Inside « Blooming Lotus

[...] my experience, the parts that felt like completely different people (or animals) felt more separate from the perspective of the host personality. For most of my life, my host [...]
on April 13, 2011 at 9:53 pm | Reply Trauma and Dissociation « Lara's Blog

[...] “I had never read or heard about animal alter parts until discovering one in myself. I was lying i… [...]
on March 5, 2012 at 11:18 pm | Reply Tylas Raine

I have a lot of animal parts. The first one I ran across was a Gorilla. It freaked me out, but then I got use to having animal parts. I have many system protectors, but the Gorilla always seems to be up to bat first. I don’t see mine as helpful though. My animals lock up other parts, hurt them, threaten them and scare them.