Multiplicity

Someone speaking at a conference we attended, claimed he was the one who invented the
term Did, and convinced the psychiatric community to change the DSM from MPD to Did.
He insisted that all Did was trauma-based;
the topic of the conference was trauma.
He then said, in response to a question whether those who claimed to have so many alters, like a hundred or more, could be
authentic, that, "You just need to listen to five of them, to come up with
a treatment plan."

So all the way home, we had this arguement as to which five of us would be chosen to be heard,
to the exclusion of all others.

We found this absurd, both then and now.

And years earlier, there was the pompous psychologist who badgered us in group that we were
getting a lot of attention, mileage and enjoyment out of being multiple.
We wanted to point out that no way were we getting any enjoyment out of being multiple in
a hospital setting, for sure. His tone was
condescending and abusive, but when in the hospital, the staff has all the power, and we were
disrespected and misunderstood.

Not so, in the case of our therapist outside the hospital, who never viewed us with anything other than
dignity. I heard her say many times, when teaching social work students,

"Being a therapist doesn't place you above the clients.
It's not an us-and-them relationship."

We wish there were more like her.