winding way

the ongoing adventure of a DID system attempting cooperation 🌬️🍃🌳

[windingway]

organizational notes

#actuallydid : relatable experiences with DID

#references : understanding our mental health / how to heal

#this reminds me of you : for when one part sees something reminiscent of another part

#ww (emoji): part is either front or being referenced 🌟Ⓜ️🔥💎💀🌲🌱🎭☁️⬛❣️ (&2 others) 🌙🔕?

[artistformerlyknownasbutttrumpet]

i bring a "technically i could do this tomorrow" energy to things that tomorrow me really resents

[expressions-of-nature]

by Hanna Lazar

[db-v0id-deactivated20260530]

sheltered by the boughs...

[becherdireinen]

nobody talks about how exhausting it is to live in that space between "things will get better" and "i can't handle this anymore." it's like your emotions are constantly swinging. leaving you both hopeful and defeated in the same day.

[windingway]

30 Days of DID

1. When and how did you find out you have DID?

We first suspected in our late teens. Online journalling communities gave us our first brush with both disordered and non-disordered communities. It prompted our first attempts at intentional internal communication. We eventually started thinking back over memories and pulled together a bunch of other signs from childhood. We were diagnosed in our mid 20s.

Like, we used to be very afraid of our mind (and what could be lurking in the shadows). There was a lot of distrust and walling off to ward against "influence", which would then either sneakily show up in retrospect or outright switches.

So yeah. The signs were there but it took repeated research/denial cycles before we took it seriously.

[shihkas]

30 Days of DID, non parts-focused

It's been eleven years (wow) since the original 30 Days of DID ask meme was created, and there Still isn't one that is not largely parts-focused. So I made my own.

Some questions still pertain to parts but they are much more few and far between than the original ask meme. Answer what you want to, skip over what you don't like. This is all in the name of getting to know yourself better and sharing only what you feel comfortable sharing.

To be clear because unfortunately I have to be, this ask meme is for those with a complex dissociative disorder (so not just DID!) whose experiences with parts are inherently disordered.

When and how did you find out you have DID?

How do you experience DID? Do you find your symptoms manifest more physically, emotionally, mentally, etc?

What does healing look like for you?

Do you have a specific type of therapy that is your favourite and that works best for you? What types of therapy haven't worked in the past?

Have you shared your diagnosis with anyone outside of your care team? If so, who and why?

Are you, as a whole, in a relationship? How does romantic partnership work for you?

How long have you been in treatment for DID?

When did you first learn/hear about DID, if it was prior to your diagnosis?

What misinformation about DID irks you the most?

What are some ways that depersonalization and derealization appear in your day to day life?

Do you have a favourite model of dissociation (eg. BASK, ToSD, 4D model)? Why?

How do you keep track of your symptoms and experiences?

What was your last therapy session like?

What is your favourite sense to ground yourself with? Olfactory, tactile, auditory, etc?

What are some ways that memory gaps appear in your day to day life?

Prior to your DID diagnosis, had you been misdiagnosed with other conditions?

Do you have a favourite movie, TV show, book, or video game that has a character with DID, or one that you believe has DID?

How do you experience emotions in relation to your DID? For you, how are emotions affected by dissociation?

How much internal communication do you have with parts? How do you, as a whole, prefer to communicate?

What are some ways that identity confusion appears in your day to day life?

What songs or specific lyrics do you relate to your experience with DID?

Are you diagnosed with other conditions? How do those conditions affect your DID, and vice versa?

Where is the safest place you can imagine for yourself as a whole?

How do you experience passive influence? How are you able to identify passive influence now, vs. when you first discovered your DID?

Have you read books on DID? If so, what are some of your favourites? What are some books you would like to read in the future?

How do you experience denial in relation to your DID? How do you deal with it?

Do you experience variation in skill correlating to levels of dissociation? If so, what skills stand out as most affected by dissociation?

In your experience, what are the hardest things about having DID in your day to day life?

Do you have a common trait amongst parts, such as a trauma response (or if you want to be less personal, hobbies or interests, etc)?

What is something you feel should be written about that was not asked here?

[windingway]

Journalling time!

Today started kinda slow and unmotivated. We had a nightmare and then a nightmare that defused into a regular dream. Woke up wanting to go back to sleep and not really wanting to do anything.

We decided to look into skincare routines - like, what order you do what - because we have a bunch of products but don't know anything about it really. Our skin breaks out often and is dry and just... we could do better. It's been on our radar for a bit and given how blah we felt, it just seemed like the right time. It's that whole advice of changing something external when you feel shitty instead of just Trying Harder.

Anyways, it felt nice to just take care of our body and we even did makeup for the first time in an age! Then we said, hey, maybe a short walk and we can get a tasty drink? So we walked to the library! (I picked up a game for my partner and a book on Arabic for me.) And it was a beautiful day! I saw a robin a few feet away!

Now, I still don't feel like doing much to address some of the bigger To Do items on our unwritten list, but it does feel good to get out and get our body moving. I'm gonna try and have a shower tonight and write down a post-it note of our to-do list so it's not just filling up our head with stress.

Slowly but surely, we are trying. And I couldn't have done it without the support of my system. 💖

- 🌟

[ohana-system]

Tw: fusion mention

Can someone explain why a system might want to fuse into one person again? Does anyone have experience with that? Do headmates actually want that in some cases? Is it only because they hate being a system or because they hate each other?

Because any time we see someone talking about fusion it's from anti endo DID systems who hate each other and think being a system is awful. And we kind of really hate that.

We don't understand why headmates might literally want to stop existing. It doesn't seem healthy. But we also don't want to judge people without trying to understand.

[artisticdysfunction]

@hiiragi7

[hiiragi7]

Well, to start, I/we certainly don't hate each other nor hate being a system. I am personally of the opinion that healthy, loving fusion can't really happen if systems hate each other/themselves so much that they try to make each other stop existing because I see fusion as a relationship and that's no way to treat a relationship partner, but that might just be me.

For context, I am a fully fused DID system. (plus my parogenic headmate, Fennel!)

Fusion, to me, isn't about parts not existing anymore - rather the opposite. Each of my parts feel more real than ever as fused, more full and more themselves. More ourselves. More "me".

We just exist in a different form than we used to.

I watched Steven Universe a lot when I was younger, so please excuse the reference, but there's a character in that show (Garnet) who is a fusion of two other characters (Ruby & Sapphire). She isn't "less" when she's just Ruby or just Sapphire, they're their own individuals too and sometimes they exist separately, she just... prefers being Garnet. Garnet is an expression of Ruby and Sapphire's love for each other. I relate to that a lot. I could be my individual parts, but I prefer being Rainii. I prefer being the fused whole. It's an expression of self-love and the love my parts have for each other.

This is something that every part of me chose and very much wanted and continues to want. We all worked towards it together, we all have been very excited about it (and sometimes a little nervous!). Ongoing enthusiastic consent is incredibly important for fusion!!! Fusion is something we all very much are happy with. Our fusion would not hold otherwise. If we didn't want to be fused, we certainly wouldn't be!

I/we love being fused because it's incredibly intimate, it's passionate, it's awesome. It's a relationship with myself between all my selves. I think that's super cool! I feel really lucky to be able to know myself and care for myself in this way.

I hope this helps explain.

[system-of-a-feather]

Hopping in as another system that's fused ^^

Also going to echo that we also absolutely do not hate each other, we actually love and support each other so intensely that we actually operate as fused a lot of the time + that "healthy, loving fusion can't really happen if systems hate each other/themselves so much that they try to make each other stop existing"; in my opinion and experience, trying to fuse based on hatred and distaste for your parts often is more likely to result in dissociation and repressing parts rather than fusing them.

For context, we're a fully fused DID system; we have a complex situation with how our plurality presents now (heres something of a post explaining it more) and honestly we kind of aren't really "traumagenic anymore" (hiiragi and I + some others chatting on that topic) but we kind of leave those labels for outsiders to put on us as we don't really care

But honestly, we fused because we actually hit functional multiplicity for a bit and found that sometimes when we did temporary fusions, we were actually able to better understand one another, better able to regulate, and be able to share the world and life we have SO much more fluidly and fluently. It stopped being a lot of "well I'll make sacrifice from my day so that you can have your day" because it was basically starting to be "when I'm fused with X we can be together ALL day and BOTH enjoy the day"

Fusion has NEVER been anything CLOSE to making parts go away. Absolutely never, in fact, I still can and regularly do actually still present and express certain parts and still do regularly present and experience myself within almost exclusively one part should that be 1) a better perspective / viewpoint to take on 2) a part that can enjoy the task / activity more 3) trauma processing and 4) shits and fucking giggles; you can honestly ask @reimeichan and @indigochromatic who was literally hanging out with me today that I literally do still do have moments where its like "lmao yeah hi XIV" or "lmfao okay Aya" because they still absolutely DO exist, its just our base line does not require any specific part to be out. Those parts are still VERY much there, they just aren't the most prominent part unless they / I want to be. (Reimei in particular can vouch that we are also fused because they saw us like 2 years ago and our voice is WAY more consistent than before because we really operate as fused 95% of the time and thus no voice changes compared to before) If one of my close friends that were cool with were to throw a joke or jab at XIV or Riku or Ray or whatever, that part will just pop out, fuck around for however they like, and return to the collective

The only real difference? Complete fluidity, little to no dissociation, and honestly the freedom to not have to think and worry about every single part getting their "piece" of life because I am - at all times - able to genuinely feel for EVERY part in our system, gauge what everyone needs, and we can enjoy every action of every minute of our life at the same time. We aren't living fractions of a life or "sharing" 24 hours in a day, we are all living 24 hours of our life, 24/7 365 days a week.

As someone who was in functional multiplicity for a while and then ended up fusing, the NUMBER one reason I prefer to operate as a fused whole is because we all get SO much more life as a fused whole and the level of which we deeply understand one another is THROUGH the roof.

All of my parts feel more alive, feel more engaged, feel happier and more satisfied with life because they don't have to share 24 hours with others, they get to have all 24 hours WITHOUT taking any time away from the other parts.

It's honestly amazing.

None of us have to compromise. None of us have to agree or disagree or discuss. We all get everything we want, all of the time, with little to no work because we are able to operate as one solid unit.

[system-of-a-feather]

Honestly reading this again is kind of a throw back cause I can barely fathom what it was like to have to divide my time individually between my parts. I did some system / fuctional multiplicity operating for 2-3 weeks or so before figuring out we didn't want to continue the path we were on, but even then - it wasnt nearly as divided as it was in the past.

Will say, the ability to live your full life, full time, with all your parts getting that same full life, full time is probably the number one best thing once your life and mental health recover enough to make life something you all truly enjoy.

[ambientradiation]

I LOVE MYSELF IN ALL ITS ASPECTS AS ONE THING AND MANY AT THE SAME TIME!!!

I LOVE BEING ME!

I LOVE BEING ALL OF THE THINGS THAT MAKE ME!

I AM MADE OF LOVE!!!

[system-of-a-feather]

"I am made of love" is so real tho. Theres so much love between us that not only got us here but is so central to how we managed to fuse and hold that "all of us win" cause there is a certain point in our system where parts are so happy to see the other parts thriving that there ISNT arguing or negotiating, we all just collectively do what makes the net jpy and happiness. No ones sacrificing or missing out cause everyones engaged in what makes any part happy and we all take turns showering and encouraging one anothers joys and desires and dreams. It wouldnt work if we didn't deeply love one another.

[system-of-a-feather]

BINGO.

[pnw-forest-side]

Went to the Hoh Rainforest for the first time in a while!

[pnw-forest-side]

Gatton Creek trail - near Lake Quinault

[mtg-cards-hourly]

Misty Rainforest

Artist: Sam Burley TCG Player Link Scryfall Link EDHREC Link

[weepingwidar]

Fiona Finnegan (Irish, 1979) - The Wooing of Embers (2025)

[thatsbelievable]

[saltshroud]

purgatory chasm

[l00000]

[vandaliatraveler]

A dousing of weekend rain illuminates the moss in the old growth hemlock forest along Little Laurel Run in Coopers Rock State Forest. The gifts of late May in Central Appalachia's old woods include false Solomon's seal (Maianthemum racemosum), Indian cucumber (Medeola virginiana), speckled wood lily (Clintonia umbellulata), and mapleleaf viburnum (Viburnum acerifolium).