Many Layers of Bookkeeping
We often talk about double bookkeeping, and how for a lot of us it can be quite distressing, but often I think "double" may not really express the pervasiveness of it in your life and how many layers deep it can really go. For me the layers of bookkeeping can often go three to six layers deep potentially more going on towards infinity.
There are probably different interpretations of the term double-bookkeeping, but I always read it as you essentially have two books one for your reality and one for how the humans decide reality is and keeping track of the two things at the same time.
The thing is that operating in that other reality the humans demand, it is not a neutral thing and it isn't a completely separate thing. You exist in these two realities at the same time, but the second one has impacts to -your- reality. You could argue this just alters the first reality, but in a way I think it almost makes a new reality or at least a new layer which you exist in which you would not have to if you did not have to double bookkeep in the first place.
The first book then is the core "delusion" as the humans would demand me to call it - in my case that I am a whale, I was born as one out in the sea to a whale mother, and that through some means and for some reason beyond my knowledge or understanding my body was twisted into a human shape. The second book then is this world we live in as the humans understand that, that no I am not a whale, I am in fact a human, with schizophrenia, and all those experiences are delusions and not real. The first is real to me, but the second I have to act on because the humans will punish me if I do not. Ironically this does in some ways make the delusion worse rather than dispelling it. Certain aspects like the belief that I must serve the humans and do what they want or they will hurt me are very much strengthened by the demand to double bookkeep because they -will- actually hurt me. In order to function effectively under this second world, which to the humans exists but is not how I experience the world, and to avoid the punishment that comes for failing to operate under the humans demands, I have to construct or understand these additional rules to help me survive and properly navigate the demands of double bookkeeping and hope I do not at any point mess it up.
For a lot of situations three deep does let us navigate the world. But there are a lot of situations where a fourth layer, or potentially six become necessary. There are a lot of people who are kind and do want to help, but they are not really prepared for the true depth of books one and three. So now you have a fourth layer basically asking, how much of layers one and three can this person accept? There is a certain amount many will sympathise but if you go into further detail, despite them asking you to and despite them saying they are prepared, there comes a point they will shut you down that it is not real, it is delusion, and that I should not feel the pain I do, or worse, they will get you hurt thinking they are protecting and helping you. This though happens with nearly every close relationship like family and friends but also as well doctors and therapists who are evaluating you. People want to know what is going on with you, and for many people, they do genuinely care about you, but cannot handle the world as we exist in it.
I tell my father almost nothing of levels one and three, our relationship has always focused on technical things, though they know of the zoanthropy, the schizophrenia, and of the whale feelings. My mother knows a bit more about the whale feelings and my desire to be in the sea and she knows of a "whale spirit" because explaining to her the extent of my reality would be difficult for her and she as well does not know the extent of my desire nor plans to return to the water. Even my companion and close friends who know about my experiences I have to be careful what I say and I really cannot tell them much.
But because of these risks, and the risk that if you share with them what they ask you that they might hurt you or simply choose to exit your life, you have to create rules for how you interact with them. But they know still that you are holding back from fully letting them in no matter how much they ask and how much they say they are prepared. And you now need to take this into account of this next layer of reality (number 6) of what they think they want versus what they actually do want and how they will react because they will notice that they are not being fully let in. This could arguable go back and forth on and on forever in layers of the mind of the reality you exist in, versus the humans, what this particular human thinks it wants, and what it actually wants, and how it will react to you not giving it what it thinks it wants.
With the layers of double bookkeeping you can never really get full support, you can never talk about an issue freely and openly. You can never really let someone in fully without them rejecting you, and yet because you close yourself off so they do not reject you or hurt you, they can see that they cannot truely get close to you, and in time will go away themselves. You cannot ever really get comfort because those moments one would get comfort are limited by the rules of the layers, and every interaction beyond layer three is a minefield of what you can do or cannot do as you desperately try to manage the layers and manage your relationship with losing your leg or worse.
Every interaction is so exhausting and still you can never truely connect to another. Even in the few places I do not have to double bookkeep, where I can express levels one and three, I struggle to really be fully open, to really be able to let go for levels 2, 4, 5, and 6 for fear how others might react and that I might lose the community I value and the only place I can express certain parts of 1 and 3.
That is why double bookkeeping is so stressful to me. It is the constant crushing weight of the managing of so many layers of reality at the same time, of understanding what you experience, what human society in general think is real, and what the person you are talking to is willing to accept and that the smallest error might lead to the end of your relationship with that person or of the limited freedom you are allowed. This mind game affects nearly every meaningful interaction I ever have, it affects every relationship, business, friends, companion, family. It is so pervasive in my life, and I do very much want to connect and share experiences with others, but it also becomes clear that you cannot really get close to others.
