How does a person manage all those personalities?

 

 A PERSONALITY SYSTEM

There is usually some kind of structure the person forms as the years go by. A “psychological inner reality” (Dr. Richard Kluft see BOOKS, ARTICLES). A personality system.

 

TYPES OF STRUCTURES

These internal structures may be quite informal, with few rules. They may even be quite chaotic and disorganized. This would be a good way to hide the condition.

Many multiples have very formal organized structures. There may be a hierarchy of some sort with some personalities in control of who does what, who can come out and when, who takes care of the child personalities, how information is exchanged, and even how memories are accessed especially in the healing stage.

The structure may resemble a family, with parents, aunts and uncles, sisters and brothers.

It may resemble a political structure such as a democratic or co-operative culture.

The structure might resemble a tree where the original personality is at the top or at the root with branching up or down to all the other personalities.

 

LAYERING

This is where the personalities “live” in layers, where groups of them exist “above” or “below” other groups. It is one way of dividing the memories of trauma and the emotional pain into smaller pieces.

For me, the groups of alters who underwent the more severe and horrific abuse were buried “deeper” in my mind, harder to access and thus the memories of the abuse were harder to access or remember. It took a longer time in therapy to bring those memories up as they were too overwhelming at first.

Sometimes a more observable personality masks another personality (not so easily seen) and often they are related in some way to specific trauma or life issues.

Frank Putnam (see BOOKS, ARTICLES) says that the trauma needs to be told in graphic detail (for healing to happen) and if there are gaps it may be because of layering.

Another type of layering is when personalities fuse (see FUSION in GLOSSARY) or integrate (see INTEGRATION in GLOSSARY) into one personality. Integration seems to open up niches within the system which are then filled by personalities who were previously dormant or inactive.

Unexplained behaviours or missing memories may be a result of layering

 

FAMILIES …

are when personalities exist in groups on the basis of shared common trauma.

This is very much the way my personalities were originally grouped. I had a group called The Resistance who dealt specifically with abuse that went on in my adolescence by one man.

The personalities could also be related because the group goes back to an earlier common personality from whom they were derived.

They may also be grouped together by functions they perform.

Personalities within a “family” are usually more aware of each other and share memories and/or skills.

Often one family may not know of another family. They may be quite separate from each other.

There may be war or conflict between families – fighting for domination and control of the person.

 

Vicky explains ‘I’m in the center … Sybil is at my right. Sybil has her back turned to all of us.’ ’I see,’ the doctor replied. ‘… is there any connection between Sybil and the rest of you?’  ’Yes, way underneath, so far underneath that Sybil doesn’t remember about it. She doesn’t want to remember because it hurts.’  (Sybil see BOOKS, ARTICLES)

 

 

The alternate persons developed into a structure comparable to the walls of defense in a medieval fortress. (When Rabbit Howls see BOOKS, ARTICLES)

 

 

MAPPING THE SYSTEM

This is one of the tasks of the healing process. This is where the personalities begin to find out about each other and how they are “arranged” or how they work together. They may find out when each personality was created and for what purpose as well as the roles they play in the system. It may take years to do this as it can be very painful work but it can also be very rewarding.

Mapping may be in the form of a diagram, collage, family tree, jigsaw, mandala, or simply a list of everyone. It could also be done by a therapist as the client talks about it in therapy sessions.

A very formal map of the system would involve the name of the personality, age, emergence (when a personality first lets themselves be known), function or role, internal relationships and alliances and any other relevant information such as physical description, if any, what they might need, what their issues are, what their likes or dislikes are.

Dr. Colin A. Ross has an in-depth look at the process during therapy in his book, Multiple Personality Disorder: Diagnosis, Clinical Features, and Treatment. (see BOOKS, ARTICLES)