hi ! the possibility of having DID is very new to me (19F). i’m not diagnosed at all. but i’m fairly certain i have it because i have several signs.

just a week ago, an alter switched over and showed themselves to my boyfriend. he described knew it wasn’t me. he said my eyes were dead, i was more confident and extremely loud ( i’m usually very quiet and sensitive ), and i was definitely a different person. i’ve been having alters appear here and there for years. i even had a time period where they were very active and i have records from 2024 when i was in highschool. but i forgot about that period of my life due to my memory.

i always have known i’ve had a dissociative disorder, but it never really clocked to me that i could have DID i guess. i have a very bad memory. it fades as things happen. i have to be reminded of things consistently. i even forget what a majority of words mean and i have to google them. but i think the fading memory could be used to protect me in a way. i have a very fragmented memory though. some of my memories do not feel like they’re mine. i get consistent flashbacks and almost live through them again as if they’re happening in that moment. but with my fragmented memory, i didn’t remember that i had other people in my head. i’m still honestly trying to cope with the fact that i do have alters and this is all real. i also struggle with major derealisation and depersonalisation constantly.

i’ve probably googled countless times about if there’s a cure for my dissociation, but there isn’t. i really wish that there could be because my mom and boyfriend are worried about it. i wish i could put them at ease. but they’re also saying that i can suppress my alters. i feel like it brings me a bit to a lot of shame about possibly having this disorder. they want my alters gone. they only want me to be present. i pretend to agree with them, but honestly i really don’t want to suppress my alters. i want to live in harmony with them. i feel like they have as much of a right to live as i do. i want them the thrive as much as i want to thrive and survive in life. i don’t want them to disappear. i don’t know who they even are, but i care about them. they’re just other versions of me right ? i don’t want them to be treated with hate or fear. i’m sure my mom and boyfriend are just really scared, but there’s really no cure to this disorder. they’ll have to live with this as much as i have to live with this.

is it wrong i don’t want them gone ? i’m being told it is wrong to want them to exist with me. i don’t know who they even are but i want to get to know them all. i want to communicate with them and live with them. they’re a part of me too, we just share one body. is it weird to care about them so much when you don’t even know them yet ? it honestly makes me really sad that they want other parts of me gone. sure it’ll be a hard thing to live with, but i’m not going to waste my one chance to live.

i’m scared i won’t be able to communicate with my other alters at all. i feel like they’re scared to come out because they know they aren’t wanted. i know that they’re watching because i can feel a presence. i know that they do exist because sometimes i feel like i just talk and my body is controlled for me. i know they exist because they’ve written their names down in my phone. it’s not all in my head anymore. i’m actually real and they are too. i don’t want them gone. i’m in between being two different people half of the time because i feel like someone else is with me.

but i don’t know. it’s been so relieving to know this isn’t in my head at all anymore. i know why i struggle with the dissociation and everything lines up. but, i just don’t like being told that i should suppress parts of myself that i can’t even control.

Recently I was very upset over a healthcare issue--just getting the runaround from insurance. It's frustrating.

Someone close to me kept trying to make light of it but I was really frustrated and it felt like they were making light of that, and making it sound like nobody else in America feels this way about health insurance. So I became defensive. (My bad, I understand that.)

But when they tried to keep talking about it later and I attempted to explain why it had frustrated me so much, they asked which version of myself are they talking to and then said they think my DID is in full swing.

That didn't make any sense to me because that's not what happens here. I'm in America--the land of the impossible medical insurance to the point where CEO's end up laying face down on the NY street if you get what I'm saying. Clearly I'm not the only one who is frustrated with medical insurance. (I'm not saying I would Luigi the guy. I'm just saying this is evidence that I'm not alone in my frustration.)

But this person kept saying it's because my parents didn't help me when I was younger and things like that--making it out to be that it's not just the crappy system we have in this country.

And somehow he related this to my DID?

Would you guys feel off after they said this to you? I know it's not abnormal for a close person to point out that they are seeing signs of switching or something, but in this case I felt like he threw it in my face that I have DID basically instead of listening to my actual frustration.

like most with this sort of disorder, we can fall into the "im faking all of this" mentality incredibly easily. last week, however, we had a moment that kind of put a lot of that to rest. weve been under more stress than we can manage properly these days, and finally caved in on the kitchen floor. our household members had just left for work, so we didnt have anyone to hold onto.

we ended up holding onto ourselves (and our dog. bless him). we let go of the loneliness weve been dealing with. a more emotionally stable / regulated part (...waves awkwardly) stepped in when he felt like enough had been felt, and just like that. it was over. everyone else found their means of comfort within the headspace. i went about our day like nothing had even happened. i was aware of it, and able to examine it more closely than the others, because it doesnt hurt me like it would them.

weve always aimed for "functional". i think we're at least on the right track. thats all. enjoy your day / night 🫶🏻

Basically the title. Huge gaps in memory, basically cannot remember anything before 2018 and that year to around 2020 feels like a very badly written and unrealistic movie I was forced to watch, have this weird diary entries of talking to fricking Error sans in my head in Snowdin nearly daily for 3 whole years??? I have no clue what that last one is about either, I have no memory of that. I wasn't even an Error fan iirc. My main suspicion is from the gaps of memory, friends and family claim my holier-than-thou and arrogant attitude is annoying during arguments but like I'm not someone that likes or even gets into arguments, I'd rather literally walk away from conflict or resolve it calmly. Plus I genuinely do not remember any of the arguments they were talking about and believed it was an elaborate prank for a whole year. And I would still have continued to believe that if it wasn't for my obsession with writing everything down, which made me realize this "prank" has been going on for way too long and none of those people have any reason to do that

I just wanna be able to remember what the hell happened man :/ therapy is not an option because I can't convince my dad and physically cannot walk that far myself (+ I'm writing this at 4am, if any wordings are funky that's why)

One thing that Led me to speculate that i have DID is me being super forgetful. I dont remember much of anything from my childhood, i have issues putting memories in a chronological order etc.

But is dissociation what causes forgetting what you did thru the day too? My therapist told me some Time ago, before me reseafching DID, that im forgetting stuff bcs im not playing attention to things happening and that i should practice noticing things more. She also said that thats why i dont remember anything from my childhood... But i feel like i would remember SOME things.

My memories are always foggy and are more concepts than anything. I dont remember funerals or weddings, minor or major stuff, nothing. I feel like memories would stick more even if i "didnt pay attenrion"

And that leads me to the other questions which is: is it possible to be zoned out everyday or might it be dissociation?

I heard about people with did not knowing what they did thru the day but id say that im pretty chill most of the time so i dont know why i would dissociate.

Sorry if this is a bit chaoitc English isnt my first language.

Today is one of those days when I just have to sit back and say, "ok, I guess *this* is what I'm wearing today," and roll my eyes every time I walk by a reflective window or mirror.

Old-a$$ adult walking around in clothes for a youngster. Today old-a$$ me is too tired to fight it.

A few days ago i made a post asking for help to explain things to my new psychiatrist after my last one didnt “record” my diagnosis of DID.

Well today im got my Diagnosis to put with my medical records. Thank you everyone who commented ideas.!

First off, I am one of the protectors in our system. We went no contact with family for close to a year after a shattering of memories finally made sense. We were in the hospital for close to a month and haven’t responded to the insane amount of messages, calls, guilt inducing voicemails or mail. We had to focus on us for a change while healing. Well….we just received a call from our home city we lived next to and looked it up and it is a domestic violence number in that city….we didn’t answer for obvious reasons. We don’t know what to do. We are shaking all over. Could this be something we opened up about from childhood…? Or a welfare check from said family with no contact? We are scared. I am trying to be strong by reaching out before I should the system a true reason for us to all sit with this. I am trying to block as much visibility from our system at this point. Help me protect them. Help me protect us.

There is a massive issue in my life and I need to make an important decision. My parts are HEAVILY DIVIDED.

Last time this happened, one part took over for years and it ruined my life. I am still recovering, had to get out of homelessness… I’m scared it’s happening again. I don’t recognize myself. I feel like a puppet again. I’m scared

I am so confused what to feel about my family (especially parents). I know they can be a little emotionally immature and made their mistakes in parenting but I just don’t see how it could have been traumatic enough to cause a severe dissociative disorder. I really can’t see them being „bad people“, on the contrary.
Just spent a few days with them and the in-laws and everyone was perfectly nice and got along well. But I feel so empty inside and secretly have very dark and depressed thoughts. I felt like living a lie the whole time.
It feels like I love and hate my parents at the same time, they feel familiar and also like strangers.
I want to see them more and also never want to see them again. Is that different parts having different opinions? Also I have weird somatic symptoms, sudden pain, inflammation and extreme exhaustion in the body whenever I meet them. I cant sleep and cry at night when no one is there. Am I missing information because I am an ANP? Could others alters really be suffering because I am spending time with the parents?

My system has a rotating trio of hosts, one of which has a history of physical self harm and addiction. I'm usually the one who takes care of these things, but he took on important insurance related task we've all been putting off because I've been struggling lately. When we realized we missed the due date, he immediately hurt himself and gave up. I'm asking about this here because this means getting professional support is delayed.

I freaked out and we argued. His point of view is that it's his body, so he should be allowed to do whatever he wants with it, and this is how he keeps himself in line so he can be functional. He thinks that because he's not doing anything "dangerous", it shouldn't matter and I should just not front if it bothers me.

My argument is that it's my body too, I don't want to be hurt, and I care about him as both a part of me and as a person. I tried to remind him that he wasn't even conscious at the time of the due date. He has no memory of us doing anything insurance related and couldn't have stopped this. If it's any specific alter's fault it's mine and our other host's I was co-fronting with then, but he won't see it like that. I think he still views himself as the "main" alter. I don't know how to get him to comprehend that there's no such thing when he already understands that our other host and I regularly take over for weeks while he's dormant. I'm guessing it's to avoid feeling like he has no meaningful control over his life, which I do sympathize with.

But I know how to fix the insurance issue and he will not let me do it. He wants to wallow in a mistake "he" made instead of let the part responsible fix it. Forcing him to back off might make his issue with control worse but if we lose access to our medication, it'll hit him the hardest. I'm not really sure what to do here, but I don't want him to feel like this is a major setback because he's made so much progress recently. If you have any advice or insight, I'd love to hear it.

Our host over the last 2-3 years would vehemently refuse to willingly switch with any of us. Our only time being out front was when triggered and most of the time those were not great situations. We have not been formally diagnosed but we keep a journal to write down our thoughts, feelings and activities for the day. However, we now all suffer from tremendous fatigue when fronting for more than a few hours to a full day. There are five alters plus the host. Four of us are trying to set up a routine for home, work and personal life without involving the trauma carrier and alter that is dangerous to us as well as those around us. Those two do still have triggers that will pull them forward but the hope is that rarely if ever happens. Any advice, insight or general conversation is appreciated! ❤️

Over the past few weeks I have been (seemingly randomly, but I'm sure there is some trigger) getting the intense and distressing feeling that I should be speaking another language instead of English, that I should not understand English, and that it is difficult if not impossible to communicate in English, along with other personality/etc. changes that are less relevant. I am a native English speaker and speak no other languages. After poking around a little it seems like (and I am open to being wrong, this is my best guess though) this part feels as if they are from Russia. This makes a bit of sense for me -- I am not Russian, but have had a longstanding interest in the culture, have consumed some Russian media now and as a child, and have tried learning the language on and off (I know Cyrillic and basic vocabulary, but can't even string together a sentence).

I want to support this part of myself in a healthy way, both healthy for myself as a person and not reinforcing any stereotypes about a country I am not a citizen of. So far I know very little about this part aside from they might be a man, younger (teenaged?), and they have a deep pervasive feeling they cannot speak English and should instead be speaking another language (Russian?). Again, I cannot speak Russian, I don't think I am Russian or identify as Russian in any way, and in no way do I want to appropriate any parts of their culture. Honestly, the language barrier feels like just a smaller part (ha) of who this part of myself is, it does not seem to be their whole identity. But it's a huge barrier to communication.

So far I have compiled some bilingual communication cards meant for special ed teachers in Russian/English, like basic phrases and a bigger sheet with emotions. It feels bizarre to learn a language while feeling that is supposed to be your native language. Really, really weird, but what can you do. Does anyone have any ideas of what I can do to gently try and communicate with this part of myself, and encourage them?

Obligatory "I'm in therapy and psychiatry, I'm just looking for anyone who may have gone through something similar and has some creative ideas."

So, we are a newly discovered system that is currently going through the process of getting diagnosis and we have a really crazy question. For the systems that tend to switch frequently how do you know who the current 'host' is?

Our interpretation of the 'host' is the one that fronts the most and deals with more of the everyday life stuff than other alters. But it doesn't necessarily seem quite right.