Limbo Kinnie

Mid 20's ✿ it/she ✿ dissociative CPTSD with memory loss ✿ pfp is from Space Dandy ✿

[limbokinnie]

I haven't used this for a bit but here I am. i've been trying out different accounts on my PC to help me organize dissociation a bit better and I think it's been helping so far. I mostly use it to try to keep track of skills, more than anything else. I know that I can lose my Blender or writing ability due to dissociation at times, so it's nice to be able to get back into the space a bit easier, though also a bit annoying to manage the different accounts and containers. Overall though I think I like it, and I'll probably keep using the accounts and seeing what they help with long-term

[limbokinnie]

I'm really not an authority when it comes to dissociation. I'm trying to understand how it works for me personally and I'm not concerned at all with overall accuracy or a basis in science. My experiences are my own and I know I can trust them well enough. I'm not going to try to fit my experiences into a model created by someone else, and I wouldn't expect anyone to try to fit their experiences into a model created by me

[stkateri-deactivated20260526]

[limbokinnie]

I'm really glad I've gotten back to this point of awareness at least. Maybe I should try to see if I can make a way to reliably put me back into this state. I guess if I talk about it enough at the very least it can be forwarded to parts who may forget.

[limbokinnie]

so, if I were to frame things in a multiple anp model, I don't fully know how it would go.

Limbo would be one, I assume? Worn is maybe another ANP. They were a work-related part, though I don't know if that specific part is the one that actually goes by Worn. Leah would possibly be the last one? We don't really do much cult stuff now so I don't think there's much use for a cult-related ANP. But also it's not like dissociation makes clean breaks between "mormon" and "not-mormon". Still, any sort of thing related to guilt and behavior and sin would probably be generally wrapped up in something. Of course it's possible that there could be another ANP. ANP are just parts that serve more outwardly presenting functions from what I understand, so any function that was needed when dissociative patterns were forming could theoretically have an ANP associated with it.

EPs would theoretically be much harder to define, as they didn't have consistent roles like an ANP would have so I'm not really going to try to focus on that. If any sort of recognizable patterns emerge related to EPs I'll try to make a note of it, memory willing.

[limbokinnie]

it really is kind of strange to realize I just forgot about anp/ep and the basics of dissociation for so long. It must be that other parts don't know about structural dissociation I guess. I don't even think it's a case of them not agreeing with it, which if they don't I would understand that. If there is so much forgetfulness then maybe the understanding of the structural theory is a part itself? I could understand it being scary enough to cause dissociation among some of the anp so it makes sense on that front I guess.

[limbokinnie]

I am suddenly becoming a lot more aware of my own dissociation and it's kind of weird and kind of frustrating that I just forgot so much about how this worked. I assume that some of that forgetfulness was because I was very stressed and so dissociative barriers became more severe.

The basic understanding of my dissociation based on the theory of structural dissociation (granted I don't know how accurate that theory actually is. But at the very least it has helped me conceptualize some things) is that I have 3 major "ANP" which were roughly split along home/cult/school lines. Of course these are all rough categories and it's not like I have a completely clear picture of my life so I can't say those are definitive groupings.

on top of that, there would also be a large number of EP with varying degrees of distinctness. Some of these would be very basic, consisting of only a single emotion or memory as a flashback while others may be more complex and have many memories and emotions which can dictate full personalities.

I think that when it really comes down to it, ANP in the sense I use them are fake. They are an appearance more than they are anything that's close to what a person would be. ANP are dissociated and disconnected from most emotions, and the EP are the ones that actually deal with those emotions. It's sort of strange that the ideas are backwards about them. ANP are treated as more human for appearing as more human, but EP are the ones that have more complex emotions, motivations, and beliefs.

[limbokinnie]

I've been trying to explore dissociation again and go into how it works, and I've gone back to the theory of structural dissociation. While there still is a lot about it that I don't like, I do find the way it defines emotional parts to be extremely useful.

I especially like that it creates a parallel between PTSD and dissociative disorders. And it's much much more useful to have the idea of a part be defined as something akin to a PTSD flashback then defined as an entirely separate person, especially when dissociation so rarely actually makes stable and separate identities.

It makes sense that having a flashback changes your behavior and what is and isn't comfortable to you, and it makes sense that having many traumatic events will create many different flashbacks that you can fall into at any point. It makes sense that from an outside perspective all of this would result in the appearance of a shifting personality. It also lines up with my own experiences of dissociation much more than anything else I've come across.

so parts as containers of specific memories and emotions that will sometimes come to the surface is really good. It also makes it so that you don't have to specifically define parts by behavior and self-identity, which is very rarely ever going to work because self identity just doesn't really work like that. There's too much overlap between identities, unless they're tied to very complex and very distinct parts, which isn't the case most of the time. Even when someone may have those complex and distinct parts there will still be some overlap with less distinct and less complex parts that further confuse it all.

All of this comes back to the fact that I really dislike identity and appearance based models of dissociation. Dissociation does not actually feel like you are many people at once, it feels like you are fragmented and locked away from experiencing and interacting with parts of yourself and your own life. And when discussing and trying to understand how to manage dissociation it's important to go at it from an angle of what it is like to experience it. Not what behaviors make neurotypicals comfortable.

[limbokinnie]

I might try working towards more separation of parts, though a big part of that would be having something that isn't super separated from all the rest.

I don't know how much memory loss I have, but I think at this point I'm assuming that I probably have more than I'm immediately aware of (which is virtually none). So I feel like I need ways of dealing with that. A big part of dealing with it probably involves talking to other people, so I kind of need to work on expressing my memory loss.

Otherwise maybe if I can just try to figure out what skills are associated with eachother it could be good to seperate those into some places? If my 3D modeling skills and writing skills are distinct parts then saving them in the same place might not make sense. Then when one of those parts comes to the front I'll have to sort through which it is. If I had an easier way of organizing all of the stuff associated with that part it might make it easier to pick up where I left off...

also all of this could not work in ways that help with dissociation, because of a large number of factors. So I kind of just have to be open to that possibility. But maybe even if it doesn't directly help it can still give me a better idea of how my dissociation actually works?

sometimes you just have to hope for the best

[limbokinnie]

took an edible so expect some borderline psychotic rambling on here as I once again realize I have a dissociative disorder for the thousandth time

[limbokinnie]

bleh. Think I might have switched again. Different collection of memories and different collection of attachments. Feels like I've been suddenly put back in time a month.. or maybe two based off timestamps.

So that means that March and April have passed by? I don't really know what I've been up to. I can recall the last week or so but not anything before that. I don't think much was done in the first place, but still...

I don't really know what to do about stuff like this. I know I have brain fog and that usually messes with memory, but dissociation does too. Did I get sick and wasn't able to do stuff for a bit? Maybe it was a few different switches and dissociative states over the course of the month. It's kind of hard to tell.

I should probably try to make a more concerted effort to go to places that are physically close to me and see if it helps with this.

[limbokinnie]

there are moments when I remember that just a few months ago it was regular for me to sit in my closet and hit myself because I was dealing with overstimulation and I would receive no support or accommodation for it. I sometimes am frustrated with myself for not being able to do anything, and having nothing to show for the past few years, but I also was not in a good situation. I hope that things can get better, and I hope that not being exposed to constant stress makes it easier to do things.

[limbokinnie]

my dissociation has been heavily affected by the abusive situation i had been in for the last 4 years, which became particularly bad about 2 years ago. I am now out of it and have been out of it for a few months and my dissociation is falling into different patterns that aren't tied directly to trauma I am experiencing. Getting away from trauma is a good thing, but there is a lot of uncertainty over how my mind and body will react now that I am not experiencing constant stress.

The patterns to my dissociation have become more noticeable in recent days, and I've been noticing more emancipation of parts as a result of that. I don't have a plan on how I will adjust to parts or how to cope with sudden loss of abilities, interests, or memories.

There is this fear that I have a limited amount of time to accomplish anything before I switch and a different part with different cares and concerns comes to the front. While I've been trying to develop a ttrpg because it is something I care about, I can't guarantee that it will be something I care about or that I will remember the skills I need to develop a system or lead a campaign.

I don't think that not attempting to do this is the right choice. I understand that I might inconvenience people with my dissociation if I try to make commitments and then switch to a part that does not have the ability to keep those commitments, but the alternative of not being involved with other people is too severe to do.

[limbokinnie]

I really do have a dissociative disorder, huh...

It's so easy to forget that. I don't think I'm in denial really, it's just that memory loss falls into daily occurrences and it's just easy to forget it isn't something everyone experiences. But I do just have entire days missing at times, where I can't remember anything that happens in them. Which is dissociation. I don't really like the concept of a different personality showing up to run things or the concept of plurality. I'm in fact really strongly opposed to the inherent concept of plurality as anything, especially when associated with PTSD and trauma.

But regardless I do have memory loss and I do lose the ability to access parts of myself- which is not just personalities or other people but also includes learned skills, learned knowledge, emotions and spectrums of emotions, motivations, connections with other people, and probably a lot more. Of course some of those may change my outwardly presenting personality, but to imply that other people don't have changes to their personalities is absurd and a lie- but a lie that psychiatry pushed in order to discredit trauma victims.

which is why I really hate when people attempt to push that onto me, especially when they try to paint me as plural in an attempt to lessen the significance that trauma and trauma disorders play in my life. I don't have a broken personality, I have a developmental trauma disorder formed from growing up in a cult which creates barriers in my memories and emotions. It is dissociation that came from heavy and constant abuse done by an entire community for the first 20 years of my life. It is not because I have an inherently bad personality hardwired into my brain.

[growing-home]

i feel like we don’t always talk about the smaller ways that having a dissociative disorder (and not being “out” about it) can really disable a person— i’m in a choir, and idk how to explain to the musical director that SOMETIMES i am a soprano and have no trouble hitting high notes while other times i feel like i physically cannot sing that high. or how sometimes my guitar feels like an extension of my body but sometimes i don’t even remember how i’m supposed to hold it properly. or in art therapy when i only sometimes have access to my adult level of artistic skill while sometimes i have the skill level of a five year old. my dissociative disorder very much disables me, and this is something i don’t see people talking about outside of the ways that PTSD disables those with dissociative disorders. what i mean is that sometimes i do not have the ability to do very basic tasks. dissociative disorders are developmental disorders, and i am very much developmentally disabled much of the time.

i don’t plan on ever being publicly out about my dissociative disorder in a non anonymous setting. i have a hard time even talking about my parts in therapy even to the clinician that diagnosed me with DID. it feels unbearably vulnerable and not safe to tell people about my parts. i feel like we’re seeing more and more people on tik tok start talking publicly about their DID, and while that may be very helpful for them, i honestly can’t imagine ever being fully out with it like that. keeping it secret is what has kept me safe, it is how i survived the last twenty years of my life. my experience with DID also does not line up with most of the DID content i’ve seen online— and i don’t mean this to invalidate those whose experiences are different than mine, it’s just that it can feel really lonely and isolating to have a dissociative disorder that doesn’t fit with the worlds preconceived image of what a dissociative disorder looks like. this is part of why i typically just say that i have dissociative disorder instead of DID.

tldr: dissociative disorders can really impair basic functioning and i feel like people forget that when they focus so much on the parts of DID that are more sensationalized in the media.

[lavender-eyed-lies]

Thank you so much for posting this, it aligns with how we've always felt about being "out" about our disorder and part of why we have never been a part of the broader DID or ptsd online community.

It's like seeing the children and young adults out and proud about being gay or lesbian or bisexual when I'm sure it would have been something so dangerous to our safety to come out as growing up personally.

You're happy for them mostly, that they get to feel safer than you did but it's still tinged with fear. I still don't tell coworkers or anyone outside of really close friends that "I" (the majority of our system) am bisexual let alone that I have a dissociative disorder, at most if I have to explain a switch or oddity I'll use my ptsd diagnosis.

And it's hard to explain why I personally want to take this to my grave even though some of the others don't always agree. It's caused us a lot of suffering, and the previous host had gone dormant due to grief over a previous integration and that was insanely difficult to explain why suddenly things were different and "I" was different. It's not always an easy option to purposely stay covert.

Most of us have never felt safe enough to come out without anonymity. It's an icy hand around the throat just imagining it, and the fear of being outted, by personal choice of another alter or discovery is actually physically painful in the body which makes it incredibly difficult when there are changes between alters that are obvious enough to garner attention.

I'm so supportive of systems that are out and demand to be treated fairly like anyone else, but I'm really relieved there are still others like us who just, maybe aren't ready or never will be ready to bring their systems to the public awareness.

[limbokinnie]

I feel like I have trouble engaging with things because it feels like I'm always dissociated from the parts of myself that would enjoy them. It's so hard to find human connection relatable when you can't remember or feel anything similar to it. I'm empty, and that's all that's really there. So how can I watch something and actually feel like it represents me?

I just need to find someway to connect back to something. I don't think I ever fully recovered from my ostracism. I'm still mostly disconnected from community with no real way to reach out.

I think people can underestimate the severity of ostracism that's given to those with extremely severe mental illness. Fully disconnected from most communities because you exhibit behavior that's socially unacceptable naturally. The signs of trauma you carry are noticed and you get cut off because of them.

So when you're so fully ostracized it can be really hard to figure out what to do. Especially when you already struggle with identity and dissociation. Now you don't have people around so you feel even more disconnected, and then you start to lose sight of what you like because you don't have a way to experience it, then it's even harder to connect with people.

It's a viscous cycle. I've been thinking a lot about it recently with the state of the world. Community and solidarity are so heavily fought against by authority because they're dangerous to authority. When I think about a world where things are better for people like me, I am thinking of a world where cults have less influence. If it's easier to leave a cult, then cults will have less control over other people.

I think that's why I see working at building up a clubhouse as one of the most important things I can do politically. Creating a community and a safety net means that more people can be a part of other communities and more safety nets can be created. If we aren't afraid of ostracization then we don't have to be afraid of acting out.

I think that will have significant ripple effects. I don't think that I can really just change anything, but I can at least make a safety net for somebody. I guess first I really have to use that safety net for myself though.

[limbokinnie]

I guess I just wanted to come back here to remind myself that I do have CPTSD and severe trauma and a dissociative disorder from that trauma. Whatever that disorder may actually be.