OK here goes nothing. i'm certain i don't have DID. The diagnostic criteria (apart from exclusions) are
A - 2 or more personality states.
B - gaps in memory
C - significant distress
Well i dont have C, that's for sure. i don't think i have B. But A? Two days ago i would also have said no, but now? i'm not so sure.
Saturday afternoon i had an extensive conversation with someone i haven't spoken to since the 90's. He is Reason, and i always thought of him as the personification of the coldly rational side of who i am. He used to talk to me a lot, in the 80's and 90's. Mostly he would show up when i was thinking about emotionally difficult issues and offer an emotionless analysis of the situation and advise me on what i should do. One time he even talked me out of a suicide attempt by pointing out the irrational ways i was behaving and convincing me that i wasn't in my right mind and therefore wasn't capable of making decisions about my life. He literally saved my life. But after i had my surgery in the 90's he went away. i never really thought about why that was.
Cue Saturday when i was talking to some of my friends who have or suspect they have DID, and the conversation got me to thinking about Reason. i mentioned to some friends that i thought that if my life had gone differently, if i hadn't resolved the trauma of being trans by transitioning and getting surgery, that i might have eventually developed DID myself. And then Reason suddenly pops in to say "Hi! I'm still here!"
Then that night while trying to go to bed, another someone who i haven't heard from since the 80's shows up too. She used to be part of how i dealt with being a closeted trans girl in junior high and high school. She hadn't really been around since college when i finally decided to do something about being trans.
And now, thanks to actually knowing some systems irl, and having just taken an abnormal psych class and formally studied this a bit, my mind is suddenly putting all of these past experiences into a new framework, and i'm freaking out.
1/2
