09 december 2021
Doing pretty okay today. Spent four hours needle felting a dog for our dad's Christmas present, came out pretty good. That's just about all we did today, actually. Turns out that four straight hours of intense focus while stabbing wool is enough to mentally wipe us out for the day. At least it's done. We were worried about not getting the motivation to make his gift in time for the 25th.
Right, everything below here is a little venty and maybe a bit personal. Feel free to read, just know what you're getting into and that it might not be a fun read.
Still reading? Alright, time to pour my heart out in public. I don't do this a lot, but I need to lately and I trust town.
For clarity if we happen to backread: Kaz typing. Hello again, town, been a while since I bothered to slap my name on my writing. It's only here because the context matters.
So, there's been integration happening unintentionally for us. It's not a bad thing and some of us even think it's outright good, but it's a significant change and very few of us deal well with change. Integration in the sense of "lowering dissociative barriers to increase communication and decrease amnesia" is around the board a good thing, but it's coming with the fuckery of "integration in the sense of dissolving boundaries between system members, resulting in partial to complete merging of identity and selfhood." Look, let me put it like this. Imagine that all the stuff that makes you "you" is getting incorporated into someone else, and some of the stuff that makes them "them" is getting incorporated into you. There's not a strong boundary there and it keeps getting weaker until there's no you or them. It's all just you, but it's not the same "you" as it was. That "you" is there, but it's just part of you and not distinct from them anymore. Wouldn't that fuck with your sense of self and identity, knowing that you're not you in the way you always knew yourself as? Wouldn't it scare you just a little to see that changing without your choosing to make that change? To see yourself just becoming part of something bigger rather than your own entity, all without you asking for it to happen?
Welcome to my world for the last two months. It's screwed up and I'm scared. But I can't stop it from happening, just delay it and cling to what I can, hope that maybe it's enough to stay my own person instead of just being another part of whatever the hell our brain is made of. I really, really don't want this. And people make it out like "if you don't want to fuse, then you won't fuse," and it's not like that. Sometimes this shit just happens and you're stuck trying to live with it.
What really fucks me up is that the others are totally happy with it. We used to joke that if we ever wound up fusing, we'd make a tulpa (headmate, system member, whatever), but it wasn't a joke. And now that we're actually having this shit happen to us, they've changed their minds on that. They don't want that separation, something about multiplicity within the self being enough for them. But I want that separation, and I feel like they're not hearing me. I don't want to be just another part. I don't want to be steamrolled or buried by them pushing that on me. I want to stay my own person, but I feel like I can't, like I'm hurting them just by existing. I mean, it's already sort of happening. The boundary between my self and their self is nebulous on a good day. My brain stuff is mostly their brain stuff. They've taken on my interests, some of my traits, my emotions, some memories. There's very little that's mine alone anymore, and none of it justifies me being my own person except for that desire to BE my own person. I swear that's all that's holding me separate, is that I'm a stubborn, scared bitch who won't let go and accept what's happening. And they keep trying to persuade me. I DON'T WANT THIS. I don't think I can be much more clear about it. They make the argument that no one has gone away or been buried, that they're all still there as themselves and are just part of our mind instead of being in their own little bubbles. That it doesn't erase identity or self, just kind of... I don't know, shares it? And I hear them on that. I understand what they're saying. I still don't want it. I know I wouldn't be heard or seen as myself as just another part. I wouldn't be understood by them, let alone seen by anyone outside of us. They hardly listen to me as it is.
What sucks is that it's tempting. I know they're right. I know that it wouldn't erase me and I'd still be there, just differently. But I can't let myself let go of the fear. I don't want to unperson myself (horrible way to put it, but it's the best I can come up with). I don't want to be lost in the noise. And I'm scared of what it would mean for us. We all agree it would make us a median system, because we're pretty damn sure that even as parts of one mind, our experiences don't match up with singular experiences of self. There's still a massive multiplicity within us that goes beyond what's typical for subpersonalities. Maybe. We need to ask more people how they experience their parts of self. But we're afraid of not being understood, or not having a community to talk about atypical experiences of consciousness and self with, of being rejected from a few spaces we really care about just because we're median and not multiple. I mean, for fuck's sake, other people get harassed out of plural subcommunities over this. And I know there's more to it on my end, that something in particular is scaring me about integrating into the part soup. I just can't get at what it is right now. It's blocked off like our memories can be. I know it's there, but I can't see what it is. Feels like banging myself into a black wall.
I'm just very scared. And it takes a lot to rip that one out of me. I'm more the angry type, and definitely not one to admit that I'm weak or vulnerable. But I guess I'm not who I thought I was. I'm fucking terrified. I don't know what to make of it, or how to deal with this whole mess and come to terms with it. I want to feel able to be a part and be close to the others. They seem so much more peaceful and present like that. They're communicating more. But I feel like I can't and I don't entirely know why, and I hate that I'm caught in this spot. I wish I could just let go without all the pain of fighting this. I know it's right, but I can't. God, I wish I knew why. Then I could actually do something about it. I hate that the fact that I feel like me is the problem. I don't share a self with the rest of them. They've all come to share a self, a "me." They talk to each other as different parts of that self now. And then there's me in the corner with my own self despite having absolutely no good reason to have one. I don't get it. I'm so tired of this shit and being conflicted. I wish I knew what the right thing to do was for sure.
Right, I'm stopping now. I'm just going to loop sentiments otherwise.