On my blog entry entitled Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID): Should I Integrate?, a reader posted the following comment:
For some people, the problem is that some of those chunks of ice contain poison. Better to leave them frozen than to contaminate the entire pond. ~ Ethereal Highway
To understand the metaphor of the “chunk of ice,” please read that blog entry.
I respectfully disagree that we need to keep some parts of ourselves separate forever, and I will explain why in this post. While I respect Ethereal Highway’s right to make this choice (as well as anyone else in this position), my experience has been different.
I, too, feared parts of myself. I did not want the poison contaminating the pond. It seemed better to keep the most painful stuff safely frozen inside of myself. However, this choice left me feeling less than whole.
Instead, I chose to follow the advice of Chrystine Oksana in her fabulous book, Safe Passage to Healing. In my opinion, this book is a “must read” for anyone with DID or alter parts. It is by far the best resource I have found for understanding DID.
Here is what Chrystine Oksana has to say about healing each part:
A common error is to concentrate on healing the cooperative parts. These parts are often already “on board” and well on the road to recovery. By leaving the difficult parts behind, a key part of a survivor may remain anchored in the past and prevent progress beyond a certain point. Some alters hold violent, angry, or destructive aspects of a child’s unassimilated trauma. Because these parts hold extremes of frightening experiences, survivors and therapists alike often try to avoid them. However, it is usually these difficult parts who need healing most. In many cases accepting them restores a great amount of strength and personal power to a survivor. In addition, these apparently uncooperative parts, once healed, often become strong allies in recovery. ~ Safe Passage to Healing, pp. 148-149
This was my own personal experience as well. I had very destructive parts that wanted me to die. I came to realize that they were actually loving me in their own way – they feared that my “telling” would result in my sister being murdered. They would do anything, even commit suicide, to prevent this from happening because her death would break my heart. Yes, these parts were misguided, but their ultimate motivation was love, not hate.
No abuser has the ability to poison you. Abusers can instill programming in you, but you can undo that. Ultimately, every single alter part split off to protect the child. Some were manipulated into believing that protecting you involved harming you or others, but every single part split off out of love. Those parts are the most wounded parts of yourself. Loving them back into the core is amazingly and powerfully healing.
When I would integrate these parts, I would begin by thanking them for all they endured to save the child. I told them that I love them. Many of them would react with hostility. I would tell them that I am not the one who harmed them: Their anger lies squarely on the shoulders of the abusers. I would then run the faces of my abusers through my head until the alter part reacted.
I would give the alter part permission to fight the abuser through a visualization. Those visualizations could get very disturbing and graphic, but I never stopped the alter part. I gave the alter part a safe place and way to express the anger. As the alter part did this, I could feel the release of so much pent-up energy. After the alter part got to fight back, there was no longer a need to stay separate, and that part would integrate into the core.
Even though each of these parts came with deep pain, I could handle the pain because I now experienced the pain against the backdrop of all of my life experiences. The pain was no longer encapsulated in its own place with no other context.
I have experienced deep and profound healing by loving accepting my most wounded and hostile parts. They are all me.
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Blooming Lotus 
Wow. this is amazingly helpful. I’m struggling to understand how a “bad” part can be created to help the system when all it seems to do is more damage but the plan is to integrate everyone apparently…
Thanks for this 🙂
I used to feel that certain alters were “bad” or “evil” because of the things they would do and say. I wanted nothing to do with them, I scorned them. But over time, I came to realize that they acted that way for a reason. Some were created to enjoy certain things that I detested, because we had to endure them. Others merely reacted to the abuse, becoming tough and rebellious because they’d been hurt so deeply.
We had one alter who lived far from the others inside, on the fringes, because everyone was terrified of him. He was a monster, bigger than life, frightening in appearance. He would attack the others, supposedly able to kill them, and he would make threatening comments. Everyone feared him, including me. Then one day, in therapy, we discovered that he wasn’t the big, bad monster that we all feared. He projected that image to keep anyone from seeing the true him–a scared little child, who had endured the worst imaginable things anyone could do to a child. Once we knew this, the monster image vanished, leaving behind a frightened little kid, who held so much rage and pain.
It’s our hope that we can heal him, along with the others who are “evil” or “bad”, because in reality, they are that way only because of what they went through. It might take a lot of time and patience, but once they know it’s safe now, they should be able to start trusting and healing.
In our system we have parts that even I – the Bold Alter – am afraid of, and I am considered the most courageous one.
But still I let this part to express him/her/itself at my blog once.
Nobody had the courage to reply (not even myself) to the post – except for the friend (therapist by profession) who we know from another online community.
But it’s just feelings!
We shouldn’t be afraid of any feelings, isn’t it so?
Because no feelings, no matter how murderously morbidly sadistically revengeful they seem to be – can really murder anyone, can they?
Repressing them and/or not finding a creative (non-destructive) way for their expression, though, can lead to acting-out…
We are proud of ourselves to be able to let our “bad” parts talk/express themselves on our blog.
p.s.
thank you BTC for your tweet about this blog post
@ Blooming Lotus – thank you for your post.
It encouraged us to allow our “bad” part express it-/him-/her-self, maybe even start a blog of her/his/its own…
What a wonderful post. Very thought provoking. I agree with almost everything you write. And very much agree with the quote from “Safe Passage to Healing”. We do have to start, though, with what’s easiest. The cooperative parts, as they start collaborating and communicating, seem to bring along the harder parts. I agree you cannot stop there. I’ve worked on that some, but haven’t gone to certain areas yet.
Where I have problem with what you write is when you say this: “every single part split off out of love”. This is true for most parts, but there are parts who internalized the abuse and that is all I currently know about them. I don’t know how to deal with them yet. Mostly they don’t cause me trouble; except at religious holidays mainly. A part can be a part because they were forced to be a part. If that’s the case, then there’s no love involved. It could be manipulated by the abuse. This is very true in RA cases, and so I’m very interested in taking a look at that book you mention.
But the basic principles you write about I wholeheartedly agree with. If you are going to heal, you have to address every part. So, I wonder then, if I’ve been doing this almost 20 years, how long will it be until I get to healing everything?
Paul
I agree with you in principle, I am simply saying that it appears I am not capable of doing this. I have tried and the only thing that happens is unending sorrow, despair and unimaginable fear. It does not ‘integrate’, so it has to go. I have been weeks and months at a time living in the muck that was brought up and trying everything to work through. It’s been this way for many years. I have come to the natural conclusion that it won’t integrate. I guess this is just the way things are for me. It is not about hate or rejecting myself or labeling myself as ‘bad’. It’s about sometimes being able to actually choose not to spend weeks and months at a time crying and too scared to leave my house when it doesn’t end up helping me to have that out there. There is nothing more I can do right now but accept that this is where I am. I admit that I have to live with a part of myself swept under the rug because I can’t live with it out running around loose. It hasn’t ever helped me to have it out. The only thing that has ever actually helped me is remembering and I have no control over that at all. Unless I someday remember, I suppose I will just keep living this way, even though it is mostly empty. I know that stuff will continue to break through and take me down and it will all be for nothing, again and again and again. I may be unable to get real healing, but I can at least find ways to try to keep going.
I have kind of come to the same conclusion as you, Ethereal. In 20 years I have not found any resolution to the really dark parts. It’s a nice concept to imagine that all parts can melt and come together. But in practice I am not sure this is the case for everyone. I think the issue of manipulated parts who have incorporated “evil” may or may not eventually integrate. Maybe the goal is to come to some agreement and collaboration. Integration, I think, is overused and means different things to different people. We don’t all have the same goals. We are not all capable of the same outcomes. I fully agree with what you write that at some point you may have to accept the way things are. This does not mean you cannot have a decent life and cannot be healed to some degree. Again, great post and great comments. Paul
Hi All,
Faith you have an amazing way with expression. You seem to make sense out of confusion, and it appears effortless.
I do not have DID, so I don’t have a comment about this post per se, but I do have a thought.
I have read that men and women’s brains work differently. Men have a greater capacity to compartmentalize, which may be why they have a greater capacity for aggression/abuse. I wonder if the compartmentalization of the male brain is a softer form of DID or some other dissociative mechanism?? My guess is that this probably developed during the times when men were the protectors of the tribes and also had to put their lives on the line to hunt the Wooly Mammoth and etc. But seems to make sense it had to happen that way for the survival of our species. Much like DID for the individual… I did have a point, but I don’t remember it! I was just throwing that out because i thought it may be interesting to ponder.
Best of luck everyone. You are all amazing~
pf
EH,
Sending you safe hugs:
(((((( EH )))))))
I do believe that healing is possible. I do believe that you can embrace and heal this wounded part of yourself. You might not yet be ready, and that is okay. This isn’t a race, and there is no need for you to heal any faster than you are ready. When you are ready to heal that part of yourself, you will.
Hang in there.
– Faith
I wish I had a word of wisdom to contribute here. But really, all I can say is thanks. Am in the throes of this issue of integration, scary parts (have RA background), etc. This is the most honest discussion of a topic I have no one else to discuss with. Each of the posts was enlightening to me. All I can say is I admire Faith and each of you who replied, you are brave, true, strong amazing people and inspire me to keep on with this healing journey, even when it seems endless. Thanks to all of you!
Ruby
Hey “EH” 😉
I have to admit I’ve struggled with some of these same thoughts… feeling like there were parts of me too poisonous (my exact word too) and too dark, too rotten, and too irreparable/irretrievable to ever deal with again. There are things that are right now terribly frightening to even peek at, let alone face full on.
I think that Faith is right though… I don’t think healing can be complete unless ALL the parts get their time.
I’m pretty resigned to the fact that this is going to be a many years process (vs. a couple-few years which is what I went in hoping for).
{{{hugs}}}
-else
Thank you Faith. I hope you are right. I really do because I’m getting tired. I should probably clarify here, too. I have no problem with the ‘dark’ part. I love him and he helps me and protects my daughters from things I might not notice without him. Now that he is fully recognized and valued as a part of me, I cannot be deceived the way I could before. It is the little girl that is the worst problem. I know this sounds terrible, because she is a little girl, but the sorrow and the fear are more than I can tolerate EVEN with the so-called ‘dark’ part available to help condemn the crime and not its little victim. He is the protector. We don’t fight anymore, yet I still can’t deal. I just don’t know what else to do. That’s why I run until I get too tired. Then when I crash, she escapes and makes my life a miserable hell, but I still cannot remember and nothing is resolved. The whole thing just keeps repeating and it’s finally driven me to drink. I’m not sure if things can ever change, but most of the time I am able to keep a hope that they might. I wish they could because I need that kid to keep from falling down and dying prematurely. She is the one who writes stories, takes the photographs… she even used to sing, but that has been many years ago now. She is the creativity that makes life worth living but I can’t have her here because sometimes she STABS me with her art. She makes horrors to torment me, yet I cannot remember. Sometimes this makes me dread her even though she’s just a kid.
Hang in there EH.
I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers that you find the path to the highest good for everyone.
Mia
All of these postings are miraculous. We seem to forget in our pursuit for wholeness that life is a journey for everyone. We all walk our walks to what we hope will be completeness, getting the sweetness of our beings, and on and on and it takes a lifetime for each one of us.
But as victims/survivors/fighters of abuse our journey is so vivid. Our past and our present melt together in real ways. It is not my imagination that a part of me is right there while I’m right there as well. How can that be? That feeling in itself is impossible to explain to anyone who hasn’t coped and survived with DID. Then there are the parts that hold so much pain that even when they step into my life for a moment it is pain I feel I cannot survive just like I felt as a child. To have to feel that pain that I so religiously split off as a child as an adult does not lessen its impact. Yet, and I witness it in all the postings above, many of us have chosen to do just that. Feel the pain, let that memory come, understand the miracle of our lives – we are here and we chose to survive as we choose to heal.
My point to all of this, when I read about people who have been doing this for twenty years and feel there is so much they haven’t done yet, I say we have been doing this all of our lives. That is how we survived. We started healing even as we split apart because we chose to live.
Faith, once again thank you for your courage to put this site together and to help others find a place where they are boldly depicted without fear of judgment. It is a comfort to read what I am sure are my own words from someone else.
One last thought, somewhere along the line I believe I read that awareness of parts is a strong step toward integration. For me, that awareness is close to bliss. Finally I understand the chaos in my life and the confusion that chaos brought into it as all of me wanted to live and “come out.” I too have dark parts one which I was sure was the devil. It took me quite some time to understand the impossibility of that since I live my life in a genuine and caring way. That is a message imbedded into my Catholic spirit when I was young and it was potent, demeaning and a great cause of shame. Though there continues to be a sad, sad, darkness within me, I can define it for what it is – the hell of my abuse and it will come out when I can handle it.
Care to all.
Great points Esther. Yes, it’s good to remind ourselves that we really have been doing this all our lives. And, while yesterday I was a little down on how far I’ve come and how long it’s been, I can often take pride in the progress I’ve made and rejoice and be glad. Yes, awareness is a big step. Sometimes it brings bliss. Other times it makes you aware of how chaotic things are. But, there is really no other way.
Paul
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