functional midbies

[vashti.livejournal.com]

Hi, I'm new here, so please don't flame me too hard. :)

I have a question: is it possible to live as a functional midcontinuum system, without integrating? And if it is, where would I start?

Comments

[shandra.livejournal.com]

1) Yes

2) Well, it would help to know what the problem most before you is - that's where I would start. :)

Shandra

[vashti.livejournal.com]

Okay... I'm trying to figure out how to switch aspects over a period shorter than hours or days, and also if it's possible for me to access skills and abilities of one aspect while I'm in another. If that makes sense. um. :)

[shandra.livejournal.com]

That makes sense, I think. I guess my next question is whether you mean "I'm wondering if I can have the skills to not burn the house down every day" or whether you mean "she speaks french and that is cool and I want to speak it every day."

:-)

I'd sort of suggest that with the skills & abilities you might have to learn them conventionally in the other aspects, or create a common pot. I don't think being midcontinuum would affect that process, although I'm coming at it from a multiple angle. It might be easier to address it that way than trying to force a switch. Then you gain the functionality without requiring anything like integration.

Shandra

[vashti.livejournal.com]

Somewhere in between, I guess. I'd actually looked at this before and figured that it didn't have enough of an impact on my life to be important at the time. I filed it under "interesting trivia about self, but nothing you can do anything about". However, it's just come up in therapy and the guy mentioned integration and also that I was out on my ass in 10 weeks' time. I'm trying to figure out what is best for me, who to believe, and so on.

When I shift I'm still "me", but my ambitions, aptitudes, reactions, behaviour, body language and so on change. What makes it a problem is (a) that some of these states are a lot more adult than others, a lot more equipped to deal with things, and (b) that I lose essential skills like social skills, some memories, relationships, career skills, important priorities, that sort of thing. These are the problems I want to do something about - but I'm still trying to figure out if this is a midbie thing or something else entirely.

I like the idea of a common pot.

[shandra.livejournal.com]

That's a tough process, deciding what might be right. 10 weeks might be enough time to decide what direction but - ugh. Sympathies for those limitations.

For the losses, it sounds like it could be possible - I'm not sure how midcontinuity works from the inside but theoretically it makes sense. Another possibility I guess would be that you are co-conscious but someone else is fronting, so that you're aware of what's happening but not really controlling it, and getting poluted emotional atmosphere.

We started our common pot as a whiteboard and it took off. I think what we learned is first, "normal singletype" is not necessarily 100% competence at all things at all time, and also that it is possible if people are willing to put a lot of the informational things in a pot. Reactions and relationships wouldn't fit there necessarily.

Priorities for us are something that are negotiated and respected, but not /felt/ the same by everyone.

Hope that helps. :)

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

If these different states feel more like aspects of yourself than seperate persons, my opinion is that that would make you a very aspected singlet. If they feel like seperate individuals, then start considering multiplicity or variants thereof. Do you feel that you have the experience of sharing your body with others? That's really what it's all about.

[vashti.livejournal.com]

I agree, I certainly wouldn't describe myself as multiple. On the other hand I do think I'm a bit further along the disassociative continuum than most singletons, and it is causing me very real problems that I need to deal with somehow.

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

If you feel dissociation is a problem for you, I would encourage you to deal with it as you see fit. Since nobody in our system (that we know of) really dissociates, I'm not sure if I can offer any advice, but there are probably others in the community who can help out. What problems do you feel it's causing for you?

[kangetsuhime.livejournal.com]

All we can suggest is practice. Or finding 'triggers' for your aspects to help you learn what makes them 'click into place'.

[saturniakitty.livejournal.com]

It most certainly is. Comunication with each other is probably the most important thing.

[whisperedones.livejournal.com]

With ANY system the big key is communication. We've found the best communication is actually just in a written journal, or even LJ. It's very helpful.

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

In this community, you are not going to be flamed for being new or for asking questions. Welcome.

We know several medians (midcontinuum) and they get on very well. (I like "midbies" :) ) There are several on this community, I think. Would you feel like describing a bit more about how your operating system runs currently?

The suggestion of using music, visuals, food, etc. that are particularly attractive to each person is the best idea we know of.

Skill access: You could try forming a common knowledge access area that anyone in the group can tap into. As saturniakitty said, communication is the most important thing. Can whoever is at front talk to people who are not at front?

[vashti.livejournal.com]

Thanks. :)

I find it hard to think of myself as us or plural, because all of me are me, but different - sometimes very different indeed. It's like being in a hall of distorting mirrors, with no reference for which image is the flat mirror. So there's no communication or co-operation at all, and I have no idea how to start any. I've tried, over a couple of years off and on, but I tend to get panicky, headachey and so on very quickly when I try this.

(goes into possibly too much detail because really, I have trouble believing this theory myself.)

I've become aware over time that I have this pattern of shifting behaviour states, without much real memory of what the others do. Every one thinks it owns the body, and wants to do its own thing. A lot of them would not be writing here. I've considered that I'm simply a very disorganised singleton, and am still not sure whether this option or the dysfunctional median option is more appropriate.

What inclines me towards the median option is partly that I've always dissociated heavily as an escape mechanism (though not to the point of splitting, as far as I know), that when I was younger I had some experiences that could be related to being multiple, and that the multiple paradigm explains my experiences very well. Too well.

The personality problems I experience also kicked in a few years ago, from scratch, after a major traumatic event after which my sister described me as "like a five year old" for a period of weeks. After that I just snapped out of it and was myself again, a bit shaken, but almost immediately recovered. I was not a child at the time; I was 25. It's because of this, and because I can identify skills that I used to have as a cohesive whole which are now only available to me piecemeal, at different times, that I'm inclined to agree that integration is worth considering in my case.

(The "five year old", btw, had fluent access, good enough to communicate with a doctor, to a language I spoke every day when I was eight but would be hard pressed to hold a conversation in at all now or before I split).

So anyway, I'm trying to explore, explain and improve myself as best I can. I agree that communication would be vital, it's just a question of how to get there. :) I'm already keeping a journal.

[kiya]

You sound a lot like a version of me with internal communications difficulties; unfortunately, as far as I can tell, we've always been this way so I don't know how to suggest you build a functional model.

Would having me write about how my system works, internally, help you out?

[whispersong.livejournal.com]

we didn't always have communication either. Tis a tough nut to crack for some. If I can offer insight to you, I shall but I don't know what would help at this moment unless you can ask a bit more specific a question or if I can somehow find out how we got to where we are now.

{J}tatiana

[vashti.livejournal.com]

That would be very helpful, if you wouldn't mind doing it?

[kiya]

I have two system models.

One of them I refer to as "the hydra" -- this is why my LJ is subtitled "Tales of the Chromatic Hydra". One creature, thirteen heads; each of them is semi-independent, but they're all attached to the same big lizard body. (I use this, in part, because it's a nice easy visual.)

Because we're all one creature, as it were, we haven't ever had a lot of the "standard" multiple problems, like losing time; in fact, it took something like ten years after I picked up separate names for most of my aspects before I came to the conclusion that multiplicity might possibly be a useful model. (What can I say. Ain't nobody ever said I was observant.)

My system model is 24/7 improv theater. I don't know if you have much familiarity with theater -- mine's all drama club, really -- but it's a pretty good model. There are generally between two and four of the "actors" on stage -- sharing the front space -- at any given time, and several others in the wings; other folks are in the dressing rooms taking a nap or working on their next parts or whatever else.

For the people on stage, there will usually be someone who's fading back out of a scene, someone coming into a scene, someone who's a dominant voice. Sometimes someone tries to steal a scene or dominate, and sometimes other voices are able to keep the play balanced. Sometimes they aren't.

Times of extreme emotional intensity produce one of two effects: soliloquy or chaos. Soliloquy has one aspect alone on the stage, trying to deal with the entire input. Sometimes this is very useful; some of us are very good at certain specific things and can get a lot done when we're not sharing resources. Other times, not so; some of my aspects are, for example, almost completely non-verbal, and having them on sole front makes it nearly impossible to communicate. Sometimes the single person on stage is there because of consensus that this is the best actor for the situation; other times it's, effectively, that the one on stage clubs anyone who comes into the wings into unconsciousness so they can't transition to shared front.

Chaos -- nobody's front. Or everyone is. Running back and forth across the stage, lost props, scenery falling down, dressing room on fire. Nothing's getting done, the play isn't progressing, it's just hysteria.


It sounds somewhat to me like you have a lot of aspects or selves who are insisting on sole front. (Am I correct in understanding that you don't lose time, but that your perspectives on events depend somewhat on which aspect is dominant?) I don't know if either the hydra model or the improv theater model would help. (Another aspect of improv theater in my life is that most of us spend a lot of time coming up with good lines and waiting for an opportunity to deliver them!) But that's sort of how it looks in my head.

Please ask questions. I'm fairly sure I'm not making much sense. ;)

[36.livejournal.com]

Wow I /really/ like this analogy. We function like this most of the time, although it's not just stress which triggers a 'one man show', many of ours are pre-booked or spontainious improv.

[vashti.livejournal.com]

*nods* I don't lose time either, although as I mentioned above my memory is extremely poor, to the point that I'm constantly running through things I have in mind to say in conversation to make sure I don't say them more than once.

Although I've never made an effort to name my aspects, some of them have picked up different names to my birth name over time. It's quite common for me to become distressed because one of my names is being used out of context. It also took me a good few years - actually until I tried to change the body name to the one most commonly used now - before I realised that this even happened.

I do like your theatre analogy. :) The immediate one that I can think of for my own situation is a badly-run kindergarten, with a horde of messy kids all leaping up and down screaming "me! me! me!" at the tops of their voices.

I'm inclined to think that the times in my life when I was least chaotic are also those when I was the most integrated. I simply don't have any positive experiences of this kind.

Some stuff has come up which I need to look at before I can make much more progress with this, so I'm going to leave this discussion here for now - thanks very much to all of you who followed up, you've been very helpful and I do appreciate all of your responses. :)

[whispersong.livejournal.com]

we learned to communicate i think because we are now a much smaller system. where once there was 300+ now we are eight. it took some effort but we basically just let whoever we could see us know we exist i think. then slowly over time we learned to talk to one another physically inside. communication to the fronters was established via a system of journals, notes to each other & later *much later, years i think* we worked on learning to use empathy & co conciousness to talk to whoever fronted & others inside about things going on. CCness was difficult because it required us to sort of semi-merge in a weird way...its kind of like being conjoined twins when we are CC. we have no real way of doing stuff independently unless we break the connection so to speak. IE: One can speak outside while the other stands & listens but they can inssert their own thoughts too and the speaker can then relay them or go quiet & let the other speak in turn.

our system is fairly straightforward i guess. we have full blown mpd if you wish to use that label. either you're out front, co front (two people conjoined like twins & cc), or just cc where one is "driving" and the other is more or less giving directions where necessary. anyone else whos not in one of those positions is said to be "inside". the most we have CC at any one time is usually 2 but sometimes up to 4 (tho four is very difficult to maintain for over an hours time). Cofronting is usually done with 2 people & one is CC in the back sometimes who asserts their own thoughts/plans where necessary (Kind of like a director giving 2 actors out front their instructions if they flub or need advice).

i hope this is coherent enough to follow. if you want clarification or wish to ask any other questions, please do. i'll do what i can to answer.

{J}tatiana

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

When you say "the multiple paradigm" which one are you referring to? The one that tends to get written up on websites and in books is Cornelia Wilbur's trauma/dissociation/splitting theory. Not all multiples fit this pattern; in fact, very few.

Distractability, absentmindedness etc. can have little or nothing to do with either being multiple or median. Likewise, trauma may have little or nothing to do with it. There are no requirements in this regard, unlike what you're liable to hear from mental health creatures.

We've seen descriptions of both multiple and median systems (including, for a while, ourselves) that resemble what you say here. As we usually understand it, being median means that there is one central person upon whom all the others depend -- they could not take over and run the life if the central person became incapacitated; all of them may consider themselves "the I", while people in a multiple system are more independent. However, lilairen experiences medianship differently. She can tell you more about it.