Dissociation and Dissociative Identity Disorder

7 September 2015 ~ Not for sensitive (child abused) readers please.

As I regularly experience both of these conditions, even on a daily basis still today, I would like to share some links which I hope will help to explain what it is all about in relation to “Patty”, my precious inner child, who I wrote about yesterday.  

This will also show how hard it is for me to stay connected in social environments and situations that I find uncomfortable or overwhelming in one way or another.

I have always described dissociation as falling into the rabbit hole... “Alice in Wonderland Syndrome”... a way of escaping in the moment a situation that I feel I am not coping with... very often a trigger reflex to some reminder from my distant past.

I dissociate for so many reasons, but one place I dissociate most is in the bath.  Bathing triggers memories of my stepfather cleaning his evidence off of me every night after he has raped me when I was of adolescent age on. 

The First Cut Is Always The Deepest
© All Rights Reserved ~ www.pattyskeys.co.za

Little girl, once innocent and sweet
Ripped apart for his panting need
In tear soaked emptiness... left to bleed
Forever, drifting on a far and distant plane
Never to return again
Lost but still alive... she will survive!

 (16 October 2014)

I don’t remember the details of all that happened in the bath after he was done, because I was always too far away already in my dissociative state even before he put me in there... I do remember a child’s mournful crying though... muffled and lost... too far for me to reach... too lost for me to find... 

I have always wondered... was it my own voice or my little sister’s in the room next door... does it really matter... surely we were both crying anyway... 

My mother worked nightshifts, so she was possibly unaware of what was happening to me... When I tried to tell her in the mornings, how much I was hurting, she took no notice.  I stopped telling her in the end... it only got me into more trouble when I tried.... it was no use... 

More and more of “Patty’s Keys” to her carefree childhood, her trust in the world and her happiness were used to lock Patty up inside her dungeon before they were carelessly thrown away.

This is why I prefer to shower, but for now the shower is broken so I struggle to get in and out of the bath quickly.  It just doesn’t happen.  I can find myself in the bath for up to two hours before I surface from my dissociative state... does the cold of the water eventually bring me back... I wonder?  Once I’m in the bath, the dissociation happens and it seems to just want to drag me away into oblivion... 

Swirling, swirling down the plughole into nothingness... GONE!

Gratefully, it’s not as bad as it used to be... I have more control over it these days.  I concentrate hard before I get into the bath on something important that needs to be done, so I get in knowing that I can’t stay for long.  

I battle with the dissociation still, but it doesn’t win so much anymore... it isn’t able to cling so tightly these days... I am winning!

I so very much want to write his name here so that the whole world knows who he is/was... How many more children has he molested and raped since me?  How many others are out there struggling as I have struggled for as long as I remember because of him!  I only found out through flashbacks a few years ago in my 50's what he had done... I (and Patty) relived every ugly, horrible detail physically and emotionally... I relived the pain again, the fear, the horror of it all!  It was a terrible, terrible time in therapy and I am so grateful I'll never have to go there again!!!  He must be a miserable, wasted old man by now... or dead!  OBLITERATED by his own cruel and awful deeds!

As soon as I have raised enough money, I will have a shower fitted again!  I don’t have any problems showering thank Heavens!

What is Dissociation?

http://www.pods-online.org.uk/index.php/information/articles/faqs-dissociation/3-what-is-dissociation

What is Dissociative Identity Disorder?

http://www.pods-online.org.uk/index.php/information/articles/faqs-dissociation/5-what-is-dissociative-identity-disorder

Our Beautiful Song
© All Rights Reserved ~ www.pattyskeys.co.za

I live in three worlds that clash and divide
With chasms and rock falls on every side
Where storms come and go leaving chaos and mud
And absolute devastation in each suffocating flood

A frightened little girl weeps in a broken heap
Holding her knees as she tries to sleep
The weight of her tears presses her down
And all the while, she fears she might drown

An angry adolescent lashes out at each threat
Bent on defeating the troubles she’s met
And all the while a screaming wind blows
Painfully returning all that she throws

An adult is left confused and alone
Wondering if she’ll ever find her way home
And no one can reach her, or find their way in
They can’t understand where the others have been

And so the war rages, inside and out
Leaving her wondering what “Life’s” all about
But deep down she knows that no matter how bad
No matter how hard, and no matter how sad

She does have a purpose and has to go on
For her life has been blessed by a beautiful song
She hears the tune faintly, but its meaning is clear
Her spirit is awakened in just knowing it’s there

She believes that one day her music will play loud
With chorusing angels atop every cloud.
So she’ll never give up... she’ll never give in
There’s coming a day when she will hear her voice sing.

While the little girl will remember how to laugh and play
And the adolescent will find peace at last on that day.
And all three will embrace united as one,
Joining together in their beautiful song.

 (14 October 2014)

Thank you for reading all of this and I do hope that you found the links interesting and/or helpful
~ Pana