I’m so glad to have the opportunity share about my multiplicity to a new group of caring curious readers. I haven’t written posts that speak to my journey or how we function as a system in a long time; so I think it’s time for a refresher. The personality who is writing right now is Betsy, so my version might be a bit different from what someone else has written.

Hopefully I will soon learn how to better utilize the features that Word Press has to offer to make this website much more appealing. I’m watching some tutorials they offer, but honestly it sounds like Greek to me. Janice (another personality) attended all the business classes we had in high school so hopefully she will either come out or show me how to make use of this technology.

When we write to people who aren’t aware of the multiplicity, we try very hard to refer to ourselves in singular tense. But when we write about our multiplicity, we are apt to take some liberties with the English language in order to communicate clearly. For example, when we are speaking or writing something that applies to the whole system (all the personalities), we may use the word “ourself”., or use plural terms. Over the years we have applied other terminology to express what is happening internally. An example of this is when we are switching personalities very quickly, we call that “Rolodexing”. Some other words common to multiplicity include “alter” (personalities other than the birth personality), “switching” (changing who is out), “out” (who is in control of the body and who’s mind is engaged), “in” (personalities who are not out. They might or might not be able to communicate or share conscious awareness with who is out),”dissociate” (the mind is separating from the the body awareness. It can involve the experience of leaving the body, floating above the body and watching what is happening from above), “exiting life” (going so far from conscious awareness that nothing happening is registering or creating memory. Usually this is for an extended period of time. When someone who has exited life comes back to conscious awareness, it takes time and educating to make them current about what has happened in their absence, including personal history, world history, technological advances, changes geographically, growth of children, and just about everything.They bring back physical symptoms that were present when they left, so it is very important for the Primary Care Physician to be aware and familiar with how different personalities affect the physical body.)

There are more but this is the basics. If we say anything that you don’t understand or confuses you, please ask so that we can clarify. We only ask that we reserve the right to say when we don’t feel comfortable answering a specific question.

There is one other thing I need to add. If you want to know which personality is speaking/writing, it’s perfectly acceptable to ask, “Who’s out?” If that personality knows his/her name, they will tell you; but you need to be aware that many of me have lost their own name, Early in treatment for MPD (Multiple Personality Disorder, but the diagnostic term has been changed to Dissociative Identity Disorder -DID), we went through an experience of deliverance from demonic influences but the man who did it used unethical, known brainwashing techniques for two weeks. He believed all personalities other than the birth personality were demons and used our journals to identify each personality, The result was that we spent 5 months in a psychiatric hospital deprogramming one at a time. The long term affect has been a loss of a sense of self and no connection to any name. We know that we aren’t demonic and that we belong together, but having a name is a total blank for some of us, and choosing a new name can feel too vulnerable. So if someone answers your, “Who’s out?” with, “I don’t know” please accept that answer and move on to whatever you wanted to say.

I hope you find this introduction helpful. Please don’t hesitate to make comments and/or ask questions. We have been in treatment for more than 3 decades, and during many of those years we have spoken publicly about it. Your comments and questions aren’t likely to throw me.