Hereâs some actual DID/OSDD advice
You should not base all your understanding of DID/OSDD based on one, single source. You need to take into account what professionals have told you, things in the community, things from individual people with experience, studies, books, etc. and form your own opinion. There are a lot of bullshit professionals, but that doesnât mean theyâre all gonna be wrong. Misinformation in the DID/OSDD community, especially on tumblr, is rampant. Donât let it fuck you up.Â
Integration involves complete acceptance of your alters and lowering dissociative barriers between them. It is a form of recovery and healing. It is not killing your alters; it is not driving them away. You do not need to integrate to be healthy, and the recommended treatment is to have a cooperative and âfunctionalâ system rather than integrating. Partial integration is also an option. If you donât want to integrate, you do not have to. However, integration is not as bad as tumblr likes to make it seem.Â
You can split again at any time (developing new alters). Itâs also possible to uncover old alters that have been around for a while. Both of these things are valid. You are not a failure for splitting again.Â
There really isnât any rules about how many alters you can or canât have. Some systems are made up of just 2 alters, and some systems have more than 100 (Iâve seen a couple with over 300). Any number of alters is valid. Number of alters also isnât an indicator of how âsevereâ your trauma isâall trauma is âbad enoughâ and all trauma is valid.Â
DID/OSDD is a traumagenic disorder. Itâs meant to protect you and keep you safe in response to repeated, inescapable trauma and lack of support through that trauma. Obviously there are a ton of shitty parts (it IS still a disorder) but try to keep it in mind that your brain is at least attempting to protect you here, not trying to make you suffer.Â
There are different definitions to âhost.â You donât need to match the body or have the bodyâs name to be host. For us personally, host just means âperson who fronts the most and deals with daily life the mostâ. You donât have to define it that way for yourself. Itâs subjective.Â
All alters are equally important as the others. Some people view their alters differently than othersâsome view them as parts of a whole, others view them as different individual people. None of these definitions are wrong. You are allowed to view your system in whatever way is helpful for you. Just donât force your view of your own system onto others. Allow other people to be healthy in their own personal ways.
Other alters have the right to front and itâs not fair to withhold that from them, HOWEVER, sometimes itâs not appropriate for a certain alter to front, and they are not equipped to deal with that kind of situation. Please be mindful of this.Â
Persecutors exist. Destructive alters exist. However, treating them poorly will just damage your relationship with them and cause issues with communication and recovery. Treat your alters with respect, even if you donât like them.Â
Some systems have it so alters have separate blogs. Others just use one blog. There isnât really a right or wrong way to do thisâitâs up to your system.Â
If youâre a singlet, the way each system wants to be treated is different. Donât take advice from a post. Ask the system youâre interacting with. Some systems want to have each alter recognized, while others want to keep it more private. It is up to them.Â
Like in my first point, Iâd like to stress, DO NOT use one source. Form your own opinions. That also means to not use this post as a single source. If it helps you, thatâs great! But you need to take time to find what works for YOU and not just do what everyone else, or I, am doing.
Feel free to add your own input if you have some other advice that I did not include :)
