It’s normal for singlets to have parts of themselves. Everyone is pretty complex under the surface. But, in a singlet, those parts are united into one whole. One self that oversees and directs those parts and ultimately decides which to pay most attention to.

In a median system, those “parts” or facets themselves have their own complexity and their own sense of self that directs each of them. They may agree to all listen to each other and act as one whether together or through one facet, but they’re independent enough that they can choose not to.

In a multiple system, each member has their own parts and complexity. They too may choose to act as if they’re one, much like a median system. In fact, medians and multiples are very much alike except for one crucial difference - identity.

In a multiple system, every member is completely separate and views themselves as being their own person. They may or may not share memories, they may or may not be able to front separately, but that doesn’t change that they are essentially very different people, bottom to top.

In a median system, every member is only partly separate. Their identities may easily blend or overlap. And while they each have their own sense of self, they also in some crucial, foundational way identify as also being the same person.

Hope this explanation and the diagram helps explain it a bit! :)

Yeah... i have non-possessive switching as well as monoconsciousness so I thought I couldn't be a system until I realized there was an entire sub-community of folks who felt like and had experiences like mine

https://x.com/documense/status/1650756935426142210

Also apparently non-possessive switches are more common? And symptoms are more likely to emerge when exploring trauma?

Wow, this is fascinating.

hi, csn you explain the definitions of "possessive switches" and "non possessive switches" we'e a questioning system so we wanna know :] thanks!

disclaimer: i am not a professional. this is based off of my understanding and my word is not law so you should go do your own research instead of relying on tumblr

so this drawing is how i like to represent possessive and non-possessive switches. its not a perfect representation of it but i think it explains it pretty well

possessive switches are the typical portrayal of switches in media. two alters switch places with another just like any two people would switch places with each other

non-possessive switches are when an alter "becomes" another alter. of course, theyre not actually becoming another alter, theyre switching with another alter. but it feels like you are "becoming" another alter

in my experience, possessive switches are associated with higher switching amnesia and non-possessive switches are associated with lower switching amnesia. some systems have both possessive and non-possessive switches, some systems only have one

so yeah, i hope this helps

I think... the two of us that feel like the current "host" are more median? Whereas everyone else is more "multiple"? And i didn't figure that out until now going through blogs with folks' experiences and realizing what people are calling what term/what set of experiences and realizing where we fit.

Interesting.

A lot of what I thought was due to being a "median system" was actually more so due to being "monoconscious," most likely.

Like, honestly, given what I see in my partner and their polyconsciousness, I don't particularly want it because it can cause a lot of issues if there's no communication. But I do admit that it would make me feel a LOT more valid in my experiences.

Monoconscious culture is wishing you were polyconscious :/

‎

Yeah... I didn't even realize that I was switching/had switches until I figured out that switches could show themselves in different ways. I now can identify my different parts a *lot* more easily and can usually tell who's who, but two of us flip flop very often and there are barely any signs that we've switched besides that our personality and outlook on the world is dramatically different. The rest of the folks have more obvious signs. Their voices are different, their interests are different, their styles of dress are different, their genders and relation to the body feel different, etc.

monoconscious culture is switches usually not being noticeable whatsoever but occasionally having a super noticeable switch that catches you off guard

(we where just crying inconsolably and we where just suddenly so calm?? it was super outputting)

.

Confused median culture is “wait am I X, no wait X is more like this. Am I Y? Are X and Y blurred? Is this a new facet? Did Z split? WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON”

.

living as a system is honestly the important part. coming out as one isn't necessary, if you all feel it won't be safe. you do not have to disclose being a system, but living as one in whatever capacity you are able to is important. realizing it and figuring out ways to express yourselves and live your individual lives helps a lot more than telling folks who may or may not get it, such as family

try to find ways to enrich your lives as best as possible. let yourselves dress differently, talk differently, act differently. do differently hobbies. eat different foods. go to different places. pick up new interests. engage with different media. create different types of art. whatever constructive influence you feel from others inside, go ahead and nurture that

you don't have to know everyone's names yet to live and be independent. whether or not you have dissociative or other types of barriers shouldn't hold you back from being yourselves, whether that's in your headspace or innerworld, or expressing it on the outside in a way you all understand. this is crucial for your collective health and well being. it just helps to be able to be yourselves

lmao, this is us but with psych stuff

What our brain thinks will happen if it switches so someone else deals with the chronic pain:

Alter 1: ouch

Alter 2: everything is better now

What really happens:

Alter 1: ouch

Alter 2: ouch but in a different font

Huh. I thought I didn't experience any amnesia other than emotional. And I only have a few total blackouts due to actual trauma/abuse/rape from my last relationship. But I now realize that I have a *lot* of greyout amnesia. My entire last relationship was a greyout. I've only gotten glimpses of certain events that happened years later after they occurred. And they were pretty traumatic as they came back to me. Most of my childhood was greyouts, and I didn't realize it until a suppressed alter came back, who identified with our original birthname and seems pretty age-stuck as a teen majority of the time, and she remembers in detail what happened to us as children. And then as soon as she stops fronting the memories disappear and get vague again. She also experiences a lot of dissociation though and is regularly non-verbal, so it'd be really hard to get her to talk to anyone about the things that she actually recalls.

Can you explain dissociative amnesia to me like I’m five

Okay so. There’s a few kinds, we are going to explain the most common terms:

Blackout: there is no memory, just a gap of time. This can range from a few minutes, hours, days, months, and even years.

Greyout: This is like you remember somewhat, just not super well. This is kind of a spectrum. It can range from barely remembering something, to having a decent amount, but it’s still very blurry and details are missing.

Emotional: This refers to you can remember it, but it doesn’t feel like it was you. Like a movie you watched.

Systems of any origins can experience these, although not every system will experience amnesia.

😹 When I re-connected with my current partner after many years, they introduced themselves with a different name. And I just assumed that it was because they were trans because I'm so used to so many trans people trying out and changing their names over the years. And it didn't even occur to me that they were plural until they told me later lmao Them: "Hi, I'm [new name]." Me: Oh yeah, that's totally normal. "What's up, how have you been?" Lol

This is meant to be light hearted and silly, adding this since people will always find a way to take it wrong 💔

Did not know the difference between these two. How interesting.

Non-disordered plurality vs. Endogenic plurality: what’s the difference? (FAQ system edition)

What is plurality?

in its simplest form (it’s more complex then this, but this is at its simplest) the experience of multiple beings within one body. The most main stream form that gets talked about is DID, but there is many other forms of plurality. Within the mental health field, systems may also be diagnosed with OSDD-1, UDD, P-DID, (when it comes to labels for plurality at least, misdiagnosis is unfortunately very common as well) typically these get associated with traumagenic plurality, but this isn’t always the case since they are ultimately labels to help categorize plurality in a medical sense. Also not every system falls under these categories!

What’s endogenic plurality?

Endogenic plurality is typically a system who identifies that the system they are apart of was not formed from trauma. This isn’t always the case though! Systems can be Endogenic and traumagenic at the same time. Often times this gets called Multigenic, Mixed Origin, and/or Traumaendo. Also while some systems may identify as fully endogenic, this does not mean they don’t have trauma.

What’s traumagenic?

Traumagenic is a system formed from trauma, it is often associated with childhood trauma, but this isn’t always the case. Once again, traumagenic systems can be endogenic at the same time!

What’s “disordered plurality”?

All this term means is that the system in question deals with significant distress from plurality. This can be caused by amnesia, mental illness, society, not being used to being plural, and many, many other factors. Non-disordered means the person is not dealing with significant distress from the fact they are plural.

So what’s the difference?

Anyone can feel distress from being plural. A endogenic system may be considered a disordered system for many reasons, like maybe they are struggling to manage the fact they are plural along with depression, or they feel a lot of internalized shame and fear about it.

Non-disordered plurality just means the system is not in significant distress from being plural. This can range from a system functioning perfectly fine, to healing trauma, and healing amnesia barriers enough to function well.

Non-disordered plurality simply is functioning in a healthy manner with headmates, while endogenic plurality is referring to how the system originally formed. It’s something that will and does fluctuate overtime.

-Elliot

yeah.... this is a hard thing for me. Especially because I feel so 'odd' in my experiences and like they're not like the typical ones that you hear about ever

Like initially when I told her about it my bestie seemed supportive and now I just think that she thinks I'm delusional but just doesn't want to tell me sigh

And then another part of me wonders if it's my mental health acting up again by mirroring my partner's disorder because sometimes when I'm very stressed my brain will produce pseudo-conditions such as pseudo-OCD. But it affects me just as severely as if I have the real condition.

But then again, my partner's OSDD is nothing like mine and my system seems to be more similar to another friend of ours who I suspect has a more "median" than multiple experience, similar to what I suspect is going on with myself. So... maybe that's the reason for the weirdness of my presentation in and of itself.

i think all systems should stop trying to figure out if stuff is “normal” in systemhood before accepting that it’s happening to them.

there have been many times where i assumed i was crazy because id never heard another system talk about something i was experiencing and tried to ignore it. eventually id find someone else who experienced the same thing, and id be so happy, but realize i wasted so much time doubting myself and beating myself up.

yes, look for others who share your experiences, but also YOUR experiences are enough. you aren’t faking for simply having an experience. you should be allowed to feel what you feel and do what you do.

Say you break your ankle. You could know everything there is to know intellectually about the injury. Even with this vast knowledge, you will still experience physical pain.

Now take this logic and apply it to things like ADHD, autism, clinical depression, and other less visible/divergent disabilities. You cannot think your way out of feeling.

That is to say: you are not a bad, lazy, or selfish person for struggling, even if you know why you are struggling.

can’t sleep

trauma processing

So I am reading a chapter for my class on Developmental Psychology. And this one deals specifically on maltreatment and trauma responses.

It's interesting to read this chapter because at first I was reading it with a very distanced, disengaged point of view, and then I got to the diagnosis information regarding PTSD--and as I was taking notes on the disorder I realized that I'd been experiencing every single one of the symptoms over the past several months. Like there wasn't even one symptom that I had skipped over.

It was interesting to me because a lot of times I don't "feel" that there's anything off or anything wrong. Even when I meet up with my therapist I just usually shrug and say everything's fine although I am notating some weird behavioral patterns/cognitive beliefs, but other than that I don't "feel" very different or "feel" traumatized in any way.

Even immediately after the breakup and all the terrible events that followed I didn't really "feel" much right off the bat. I remember for about the first month or so I felt nothing. And then all of a sudden I started explosively crying at work and I couldn't stop for like an hour. And tears just kept coming day after day and I was like wtf is wrong with me. Cause it still didn't seem connected to anything "specific," although logically I knew it probably had to do with trauma and emotional processing and I had some sort of repression block that probably had finally burst.

I developed panic attacks again that would come on randomly and last for several hours of the day. I seemed to dissociate randomly and not really feel at one with my body or like I was really existing in the universe. Or maybe that everything around me was surreal and fake. I'm not totally sure. My paranoia kicked into high gear and conspiracy theories popped into the back of my head about everyone being out to get me or just wanting something from me. Even friends I had known for years and my own grandma. It made it really hard to interact with my friends even though I really wanted to. I just got really panicky whenever I tried and then just ended up retreating and doing activities by myself again.

I got "triggered" yesterday by an image a stranger in a mutual group posted of my ex, lounging in a bubble bath, with this gigantic grin on his face as if he had no cares in the world. She and I are not friends and do not know each other, although I do know OF her, and knew that she and my ex had just met and were starting to hang out right before my ex and I blocked each other so we can't see each other's posts/pictures/comments/whatever anymore. Unfortunately we're still in the same social circles though so from time to time I did expect to see him. But I wasn't expecting to see him so soon and especially not like that?

I had to block the girl--which made me kinda irritated cause I don't just like blocking people for no reason. Like I very rarely block people. And I was also irritated that I was experiencing a trigger at all. I knew triggers were real things that affected other people, but I hate now having triggers that might impact me, and not knowing where or when to really expect them or even what they are.

I mainly felt my anger and resentment spring up though. Which I actually don't feel that often, so it was a surprise in itself. But I felt a lot of rage at the amount of victimization that my ex had carried on about and tried to make himself the martyr of everything--when he doesn't even seem to have any long-lasting effects about anything? So what, you now have to pay bills and learn to adult and depend on yourself for your own independent autonomy. Whoop-de-doo-da. I've been doing that since 17.

But my ability to socialize is somewhat broken. My ability to trust in others. I can't even seem to properly connect with my current and old trusted friends much less make proper new connections. My mood shifts from extremes of happy and joyful to bitter depression, anxiety, and angst. And I feel shame and resentment and guilt over myself and over what happened. His ability to socialize wasn't impacted in this way. It seemed to have no real impact on him whatsoever. And that is infuriating to me.

I don't really know how to navigate through some of the struggles that I'm having or how to even bring it up with the people that are supposed to help me--like my therapist and my psychiatrist? Like idk how to even let them know what I'm feeling if I don't even know what I'm feeling or what I need or how to fix it?

It's one thing for my therapist to say, "Hey, don't isolate yourself," but then whenever I even think about inviting someone over--I no longer hear the voices whispering to me anymore that it's a dangerous thing, but I still feel it in my spirit and get intrusive images of someone coming over and hurting me--even if it's a friend that I know for a while. And so I just sit back down, stay in my safe zone, and lose myself in work or video games or streaming shows and leave communication to the internet where I know it's "safe" and no one can get me.

I used to have nightmares about my ex or one of his friends popping up on me in my trailer randomly one day. And I still jump at noises outside.

I don't really know what to do or how to move past it yet. This is just me processing.

i have been feeling shitty all day and wanting to talk to someone but i don't even really want to talk to someone. like i dont wanna let it all out or think about it. but it's all there. i've just been needing to talk to someone about the sexual assault from my ex and attempting to process it but like... i don't even know how i feel or what to do or anything? like... all i feel is distress and hurt and lack of trust and i don't even know what to really do about it tbh. the emotions just keep going up and down. i just feel broken.

i also feel ashamed because it's like... i let it happen so it's my fault. like i didn't predict it. i didn't see the patterns. i didn't even realize it the first two times that it was actual rape. i just tried to explain it away or i hoped it was a one-off thing and would get better and it didn't. and then the final dubious consent/sexual assault i finally realized hey... i might've been raped.

i just feel like a fucking idiot and i feel like he manipulated me and played me for everything. like he gets to get away scot-free and not really feel anything or have any consequences and i have to live feeling like shit forever and not even fully being able to trust men or trust myself and my own judgments anymore.

it's just really shitty.