Abandonment.

For many years, we were diagnosed as many things. Each alter can present with different symptoms, both physical and mental, leaving the same number of diagnosis’s in their wake. The answer to modern psychiatry, though more advanced than the previous centuries by a little, is psychotropic medications. Highly ineffective for DID.

Consistency, is critical in diagnostic determination. However finding consistency in a plural individual, is almost futile. There are some commonalities, and recognizing there has been a cornerstone of our ability to regain control. One of our largest shared symptoms, is the fear of abandonment. We can safely say, that system wide, abandonment is at or near the top, of our fears. But why?

We, as most would, were lead to believe that we could never have been abandoned, as our parents never dumped us in the street. This is what it meant to us. Much like dumping a dog, this was the description we embraced. The fact we were so profoundly driven by this fear, lead to a misdiagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. Seemingly the mother of all bad diagnosis.

Many caregivers will refuse to treat people with BPD. Borderlines are extremely rigid, and hostile, and can be almost sociopath like, according to many. Many will say that Borderlines are the female counterparts to the Narcissistic Personality Disorder. However, we eventually came to learn, this was not to be the case for us. We could not even stop the crazy train on this stop.

We endured through a Hollywood diary, of dramatic relationships; followed by abandonment avoidance behaviors that were guaranteed to ensue. The writing on the wall looked very BPD. What we did not take into consideration? We had an alter, who has almost Narcissistic traits, used to preserve the survival of the system. As he is the dominant alter, he would come out for the appointments, and thus control the perceptions. However, when his time was passed, the next alter out front would take in a different set of traits, totally conflicting with Larry! Again, this looks very BPD, and pushed us further into the pigeonhole.

However, now that we have completely accepted, and recognized our plurality, the healing has begun. Unlike before, where some pill pushing, lazy, over educated drug salesman doctor would pass whatever name and drug was paying best that week, we had something that finally ticked off all the boxes. Answers that made sense. Putting reason to chaos and order to darkness. But how then do we feel this fear of abandonment that keeps driving us even today? This ability to hang onto a relationship well past the expiration date, knowing we will eventually get the sour milk.

Abandonment it seems has many faces. Many aspects of our plurality, have been shaped by the different forms of abandonment we experienced. Without getting into a comprehensive listing here, you can google that, many parts of our childhood, we thought were normal, were actually forms of abandonment.

Today, we have become quite good at cooing and adapting. We are after all the park me result of many bad decisions by people who we’re supposed to protect us. We learned many things from them, including how to be alone. Maybe the thing that we battle the hardest. Is what we are destined to be.

The body, is nearly half a century old. We have moved our residence, not across town, but really moved, over fourth times. We have no friends, no family other than our daughter, and no spouse. We have been driven off by our parents, thrown out by our family, shunned by our brother and other close family members, zero colleagues from twenty years of working. Do people abandon us, or are we just emulating the behavior patterns from our earlier lives. Are we protecting ourselves by pushing ourselves further from the world?

We have come to accept that our young daughter and current SO, will leave us. They will as many before say they will not, but always do. Should we give up on any real interpersonal relationship with other human beings? Are we so damaged that being alive is a mistake? Should have we been culled? Are we a freak of nature that should be locked away or hidden from view? Sure feels that way.