Parts of Me

It’s disappointing I can’t force this healing to go any faster. I can however, get the fuck out my own way and let things happen to heal. My brain is doing it anyway, always rewiring, reprogramming my brain, constantly working on the answers, make it better, form new connections. Neuroplasticity is fascinating. I can’t force the healing, but I can look it from another side. I can make the path smoother like that weird game in the Olympics with the big rocks sliding around on ice and the players sweep the area in front of it so it can slide farther.

Pieces of me, the modes/sides/parts. I already wrote this a few times. I keep writing the same things repeatedly. I think my subconscious keeps repeating to get me to go that direction. That’s the path I need to take. It’s a broken record until I grow into the next step of healing.  I’m going to get in touch and try to describe how I see the different modes, parts of me. Some of them work as a team or blend together too to do things. It is very scary to talk about this. I have deleted and thrown away a lot of notes and paper journals expressing this very thing. Today I am not going to do that. I am going to move forward. This might really suck for me but here it goes. I got this. I’m strong enough to explore and share this now.  This might only make sense to me right now.

I can’t access all the pieces/parts but here’s what I do know and can identify:

Gorilla in the cage(my anger)- I’m afraid of it. Terrified to let the gorilla out. He’s a hulk smashing fit of destruction and will break all the things.

Wrath: more anger but with revenge, vengeance, a yearning for justice I never received. She is 14 year old me. She desires vengeance and seeing the abusive people punished. Unfortunately, she kind of acts like an abuser too and wants to cause pain. She is a sadist. I do not let her be in charge but she does talk a lot and make suggestions. She will sacrifice it all for vengeance. She is also mischievously funny and harsh. She also like to get in other people’s faces and encourage shitty behavior in others whether they are my other modes or other people outside of me. She like to test people and then go “see, people are shit”. She wants to be part of the resistance with a fist and break shit. Rebel and just keep rebelling because that’s what she does. She will tear it all down to get what she wants.

Inner counselor- You can talk to me anytime. I’m always here for you and accept you. That’s the inner counselor. I love her. She loves me. I created her from my need for compassion for myself. She is made from my compassion for others turned inward. She’s kind inside out, HA! Ew, ok, not really, that’s gruesome. Who’s making fun? That makes her step back. Dammit, Wrath. Anyway, she comes to the surface when I need someone to talk to and someone to be kind to me. I think I have parts of her from other people like my grandma and other wise strong women in my life. She is motherly and does not punish. She is a caretaker, teacher, mentor, and helps to guide me.

Little Ones- Yes, plural little ones. They don’t have names other than little ones. There are many. In my minds eye they are different ages. I’m in touch with my playful child self a lot. She’s more easily accessible because I remember her the most. The traumas are not locked away with her. She comes forward around other children, animals, and people I like/trust. There is one that is afraid but wants to reach out and make friends. She is very easy to spook though. One just holds her head and screams (I hear her scream a lot). Some are catatonic. Some of them are dead.

Whoa, this made me dissociate big time. I zoned out just then. Not sure how long. Then I distracted myself with some twitter. It’s the biggest damn distraction but I can use it as a tool to shake myself out of dissociation. I feel like this means I’m going in the right direction. I ran smack into some FEELS and to protect myself my brain goes, nope, we can’t handle what the little ones know yet.

Moving on before I lose myself and can’t write anymore-Learning to skirt the edges and surf the waves a little better instead of being consumed with the waves.

The Boy- My tomboyish self- I have this very masculine part of me. It’s a young boy, 12 or 13. He has crushes on ALL the women. YES, ALL WOMEN! They are the sweet kind of crush. Not acted upon but admiring women from afar. He gets very shy. He loves to climb trees, build things.

Cold Logic: Not always the right answer but the one that cuts through the feelings or doesn’t really factor them in when making a judgement. No heart or feelings. When I think of this part I see a guillotine Swift. Over. Done. Final. This part cuts people out of my life. It comes out when I disassociate into The Nothing I think this part intends to protect but it’s very harsh. Not cruel either in meaning, just harsh logical.

The Nothing: Just what it says. The nothing is nothing. It is still something because I’m still something, I just feel like nothing. I blank. This is dissociation in which I have periods of amnesia. I can’t connect with who I am, most of my memory is inaccessible.

There is also a stage/mode past the nothing and I black out when this happens. I lose complete control and go into some autopilot mode that I can’t even remember what I did. This doesn’t mean that I pass out but it’s like an alcohol blackout because I “wake up” or become aware and don’t remember anything. I have clues that this has happened because I’ll blink and 3 hours will be gone or it’s suddenly the next day. Afterward I am terrified. I am terrified of this happening. It happened while I was on a certain medication and I write a note saying that I would hurt myself if that made me whole again. Like tear myself completely down but it was sinister. I think Wrath gets let out when this occurs. She wants to tear it all down, sometimes me included.

I’m really freaked out about sharing that last bit. It feels like I’m showing people how ill or sick I really am and well, that’s scary but part of me now is trying to figure out why instead of run away. If I go to far too fast, I’ll fuck it all up. I want people to trust me but if they see how sick I really am, then I’ll be shunned. There it is. People won’t have trust, faith in me, or believe me if they see how truly sick I am. Inner critic, I hear you buddy. This comes up a lot around my new business, too.

The inner critic- This was a carbon copy of the abusive people in my life. It is word for word all the cruel things said to me. I can feed it if I am reading my dm’s, emails, messages, or other abusive communication. It’s culmination of decades of emotional abuse. Correction, the people that WERE in my life, I ejected the toxic people or have minimal contact with them but they are still there in my head. I used to hate this part but now I do not. This part can warn me of danger. I don’t think the intent it to harm me now. The intent is to work like an alarm system and remind me of how others might respond to me or fears. I’m starting to separate it into 2 parts now. One that can let me know about danger in a more productive way.

The Abyss-The other more toxic inner critic: BLEH, I see it now. That fucker latched onto the inner critic and has been riding him around. I have jokes about that but now is not the time! (humor fear response) This is the black tar mess, the wet blanket, the toxic stress, the infection that abuse is. It wants to spread and hurt others. I still hate this part of me. One day, I hope I will love it and can help heal it too. I do not let this part of me be in charge. It does creep up though and then I work very hard to not act on whatever the abyss wants. This part can let me know the shittiest most abusive and damaging/destructive way to do something.

This is making me physically uncomfortable to write about and I’m itchy. A chorus of NO! It’s almost deafening in my mind. When I get close to some things the alarm bells go off and I want to run. I’m scared. Trying to force myself to stay here, present, writing. I tried to curl up into a ball, my legs went numb. I’m getting a headache and sounds are amplified. I’m in hypervigilance. I’ve triggering myself by writing and getting close to scary things in my head. Parts of me that hold memories of trauma. I must go easy now or I’ll be lost again. I’ll lose more days. By lost I mean that I’ll be dissociated and not really living or functioning. I think that is all I can share right now or work on. This doesn’t feel like a lot (not enough? Ugh, stop that!) but it totally is. It will be overwhelming to some. It is overwhelming to me all the time. Yes, this is a good place to stop. There are more parts of me of course but I’ll have to write about them another time.