Wednesday, November 05, 2014 @ 2:17 pm
Good afternoon. This
is us … I know it is relatively late in the day for us to start an entry, but I
thought we could do a shorter one and catch us up in time a bit. The last entry we wrote was about 3 weeks ago
just after our 2nd grandson – Alex, was born. YAY!
For HIM!!! At the time, we were
getting things ready for Austin to be here – our oldest Grandson. We hadn’t seen our Granddaughters since that
time, because Maury had made other reservations for them. One of the weekends, he brought them for an
overnight at his father’s place, and now this next weekend, Ame wanted to go to
a Saturday overnight so she was going to do that and Maury was then going to
check in on the girls during lunchtime.
I’m not sure if that isn’t going to be a regular thing. We had talked to him this morning and still
have mixed feelings about it. But, just
have to wait it out. Maury’s birthday
was during the time we’d been gone and we let him know we were looking forward
to meeting him for his birthday after the fact, and he said maybe next week –
depends on other things going on.
Austin was totally terrific having over. He was more apt to stay on his own computer
with less talking time, but we did have one session that was really
special. Take a look at the ruler pieces
below. They are really colorful and were
REALLY terrific to make with Austin – in that we were able to teach him so much
and then learn back from his perspective to the content we were showing
him. It was taken from the recent Google
Searches of our Mind Map. The idea was
that we could take any article from any of our sections and then we’d relay to
him in an abbreviated manner what the piece was about, or what it meant to me
as a studious Multiple. So for example,
I might talk about a Multiple who was jailed, or a student writing a paper on a
Multiple, or about someone confounding an article – his or her own negative beliefs
in something. Then with Austin’s scale
we would estimate it to come in anywhere from -1 to 10 with -1 being an
abomination like the False Memory person Elisabeth Lofton to pretty much “Good
Tier” above awesome. We ranked about 50
articles and then we were able to sit back and really get a good look at the
material. We just left abbreviated
titles for the articles read. The
articles (beside Lofton) at the bottom were related to death, criminal, mental
institutions or then lesser things that assumed the people in the article had a
greater pathway to replaying Negative conceptions on Multiplicity – like Dr.
Phil was really down there. Up toward
the top were people and organizations doing great things to support people with
Multiplicity and because we were having fun – we included our name/quote in the
Wiktionary as very top of the line good things.
The time we had in developing the model was soooo much fun
and interest it was just incredible.
Anything I could tell Austin about what was happening and about my or
his conception of the rating scale was just gold. I’d never had anyone spend that much time
with me in actual relating to the content.
It was one of those most special times – you just never forget because
of his generosity in time with things important to our own mind. The ruler was important to him, and having it
useable to me I think was also very good for him. We both laughed and growled at the
appropriate times. I think his ability
to pick-up the “bottom-line” to the data was just incredible. (Remember click to make the pictures bigger!)
Saturday, November 8, 2014 @ 5:32 AM
BACK! Wow that was a
long 2-3 day break! We got into some
other stuff and left this part behind – that’s a little frustrating as to
getting things done. We just read over
our material and discovered that we hadn’t even gotten up to the part of our
Wiktionary … Oh lord – that is now some days/weeks ago. This is what we were talking about. Go down to the part under “English” that is a
noun and on the 4th reference it says – “A single individual who has
multiple personalities.” And then if you press the one for quotations, you WILL
notice under 2010 the person that did the entry included our name, book and a
sentence that we’d written in the book, so that WE are a part of describing
what a “Multiple” is! OMG … what an
honor that was! It says, “I had seen its
first show when it was a freebie, but I thought it made multiples in general
look silly – no one changes clothes THAT much!”
It was a comment I’d made in our introduction section talking briefly
about the TV show “United States of Tara.”
I thought the comment perfect for the Wiktionary, though I had no part
in getting it there. Just extremely
honored that someone had found the statement AND had included it in their
thoughts. WooHOO!!!
So that was that … for the record though – Austin thought it
was kinda cool too. Man oh Man impressing
a teenager? Worth all the gold in the
treasury!
So, thinking what else has happened? As kind of a current note … we stopped by at
Cari’s FB and found that she and Joe had had a tough night with Alex. Our blessings go out to them … there’s nothing
worse than not being able to figure out why a newborn is crying. I think she is taking him to the doctor to
see if it is colic or an ear infection.
Poor little guy … just hard to be new.
I know that Cari and Joe would have both worked with him and done their
best and that really IS the best! Hoping
they all catch some good sleep though too.
God Bless them!
Figured if you hadn’t seen the Wiktionary, there are a few
other things you haven’t seen yet too.
This is one of our new favorite pictures of Dakota …
Isn’t he terrific!??
His eyes are so steady and trustworthy – just loving this dog to pieces
and as of now – he’s gone through 5 weeks without pooping in the house …
although in an emergency we’re sure he’d do it, I think pretty much we got this
down! I’m not as sure about the peeing
part … we had one accident here with the cat several weeks ago and we had one
incident at Cari and Joe’s, but now the baby is almost a month old – so it’s
been a while AND we’ve been traveling and we didn’t have any incidents
there! YAY!!!
I guess we might as well skip ahead to that situation. Last weekend – well a LONG weekend, we went
to Rich’s daughter and SIL’s house in New Mexico. WOW!
What a trip! We left on Thursday,
got there Friday, left on Monday and got home Tuesday and now its Saturday
again. It was really really nice to see
Jill and Chris and Natty and their animals.
It seemed a big deal part of the trip that Dakota was there with their
two dogs and two cats – especially the dogs.
The big store was the relationship between Wrigley and Dakota. Their other dog was older and barked at
Dakota, but didn’t really relate to him much.
She did accept him in their pack, but she left him alone. Wrigley and Dakota had like two relationships
one positive and one NOT as positive.
Wrigley snapped at Dakota a few times, we think mostly when she was
around food. She got a little
possessive, BUT the other times, they got on really well. Dakota would lean down on his elbows in the
play position and Wrigley and him would play and play as if there wasn’t a huge
size difference between them. I think
Wrigley’s plan of attack was to go for Dakota’s ankles and then Dakota would
nudge Wrigley and push him on his back.
It wasn’t serious stuff just really good playing and anytime your dog
gets along with someone else’s dog to that degree it’s just really nice.
There were a few other things going on – like we got there
on Halloween so got to watch Chris finish up with his decorations – and then
later take them down so he’d be ready for a business trip he was taking
Sunday. AND, the “big event” was that we
were to have an early Thanksgiving while we were down. That was Rich’s idea and he’d prepared for
it. He did what was necessary to prepare
stuffing and he helped Jillian with the turkey.
All the other stuff Jillian did and she did a fantastic job! Rich played out the part he loves most as
supervisor, and I was just an observer.
Rich let me use his computer most of the weekend and that was a good
deal for me. I was able to sit and talk
and be with people, but I didn’t get in their way either if they moved on to
something else … there was always something for me to do – and we worked on our
Google Searches which didn’t take as much concentration. We were worried before we left that we’d be
able to step away from the work, but we did really good and didn’t open Rich’s
computer OR Kindles either going or coming back.
But, as to Thanksgiving, Jillian had invited her best friend
H and his wife Kathy over to share the Thanksgiving dinner so there were seven
of us. They had a really cool table and
chairs that were higher, so it felt different as if at someplace fancy. The conversations were good at the dinner and
throughout the weekend. It was just a
pleasure to be there, AND Jillian and Chris decided that we should even with
our protest, give us their room and master bath while we were there. OMG it was like being treated like
royalty. They have a brand new house
they’ve been in since February and we’d not seen it for real yet. It was very nice and comfortable and included
this very nice rock garden and patio set out back for people AND the dogs. There were dogs on either side of their house,
and they had a tall built-up fence, but the dogs next door to the one side were
bigger and could jump REALLY high to see over the other side, which they wanted
to do – especially with having a new dog visitor drop by. Dakota got really excited to see them too! Heheh.
There was one part where Rich and Jillian went out shopping
and they got a few things. Part of
Sunday was watching the ball games, so we got to have a little time with
Natty. By that time, we were given the
option of sitting in the main rocker/recliner and it was really nice too! They had brought in for me one of the wrought
iron chairs from the patio so we could sit in something a little more
comfortable an when we sat to do the computer in the living room while all the
others were watching football, we were able to use the lawn chair to put up our
feet. I felt so cozy AND there were
plenty of leftovers between Halloween and Thanksgiving to keep EVERYone
happy! WooHOO!
The trip down there and back was pretty nice too – one each
trip we stayed overnight at a hotel. The
first time in Oklahoma and the second time it was Missouri. Hmm, not sure now was it Oklahoma or
Texas? Thinking it was Texas. The conversations and such during the trip
were pretty good – not sparkly, but we felt comfortable in the car with Rich
and there was a lot of scenery we were interested in seeing. There was two bad conversations that were
about the same thing. Basically, we
wanted to take Maury out to dinner and Rich was saying no, because we were
giving him a cash gift. Of course that
was going to make me upset and then other things got involved – though
relatively focused. The first time I
think we shut down for two hours, and the second time on the way home – last
hour we shut down for about an hour.
There’s no conclusion yet, but I know our heads have filled-up with more
arguments toward. And, the bottom line
is that I will just take Maury by myself.
I think we all deserve some time out.
In all the 1 ½ years living at the new house, we haven’t gone out with
him ONCE! BLAH!
Anyway … it wasn’t as much going out as I think Rich and us
working through what was fair financially between us and all 6 of our
kids. NO ONE asks us for money, so it’s
not that – I don’t know just complicated a bit.
ANYway – that was the only sore spot, and I guess after
spending 2700 miles or 45 hours in the car together, we were good for ONE
problem!
Something that wasn’t a problem though? Dakota was the best traveling dog ever! It got worked out so that every time we
needed to stop for a break/gas, or whatever, I would go to the bathroom first,
and then Rich would fill the car, then I’d come back and he would drive the car
to a grassy/stone area, and then we would put Dakota on a long leash so he
could go to the bathroom, and then Rich would go while I was doing that with
the dog. Then we’d be on our merry
way. I didn’t know that it could work
out so smooth, but Dakota was a champion and seemed to know where he was in the
pecking order, and that when we stopped it was time for his nose to get going
to smell the new area – he was having the best time. AND, when the car slowed down to 45 mph or
slower, we’d ask Rich to roll down Dakota’s window and Dakota would stick his
long snout out the space and just snort up the small towns we were going
through. Otherwise? If we weren’t slowed down – then MOST of the
time Dakota was sleeping. We did have
this one thing so that if I put my hand back of our neck toward Dakota’s space
in the back, then within seconds his warm muzzle was put inside my hand and I
felt the warmest glow! Rich had put in
the back seat – on the seat down side (elevated) his doggie bed (from his
crate) and he slept either there, or on the double side of the seat that was
still put up. It was like an L and
enabled him to get up and move a bit.
The rest of the car was filled, but not so bad it was a
problem. We did bring our walker, but
never left Jill’s house so didn’t have to use it. Because Rich pulled the SUV over for the dog,
we could hold onto his leash while we were sitting down on the front seat with
our legs out overlooking Dakota’s area.
It was a really great situation.
Dakota did have a very high jump to get from outside to up on his dog
bed side (with the back of the seat down), but he managed pretty good and the
times he didn’t jump up straight away, we gave him a little nudge. There was no whining or pacing or anything
like that … It was like he knew his position was to sleep, let me pet him, get
in his air, OR go to the bathroom, and the bathroom part carried over, so that
he seemed to understand when we went to Dr. Marvin’s and I let him out next to
a tree – he knew then what I wanted him to do … It’s a bit of a trick, because
when he’s got his vest on and is taking care of walking me, he can’t be
smelling to go to the bathroom, but when it is time and we present the tree or
whatever, he has to know its his time, AND he’s doing a pretty gosh darn good
job of it!
I really think that the conversation was fine, but not much
in-depth. There was a lot more
conversation on the here and now part of especially the scenery we were going
through. That was very relaxing. I think that pretty much wraps things up
there … I’d do the whole trip again in a minute! Jillian and Chris and Natty were just that
good of hosts!
Before the trip was kind of a rush. We had to leave like 5:15 am Thursday
morning, so the car had to be packed Wednesday night. Monday was Rich and our 20th
anniversary, so there wasn’t any work that got done that day. We did start to pull together a list of all
the things that had to be done before we could feel comfortable leaving. For our anniversary, we went out to a new
restaurant though we hadn’t known until going there that that was where we were
going. We knew that we had to meet Rich
at the brakes place to get his done and while it was happening we’d be at a
restaurant. We ended up in the new
Italian restaurant in town. We of course
had Dakota there and he’d done a very good job, but the restaurant was
otherwise pretty empty. The nice
part? The costs were about right and the
meal was excellent. We had shrimp
primavera and it was the best I’d ever had – a very good sauce and the shrimp
were done just right. We were too full
to have a dessert and we were driving home from the brake place in our car so
Rich could drive his SUV so we didn’t have a drink, but OTHERWISE it was good
and the waitress was very nice. It was a
special night!
The next two days though we had to make-up for the sacrifice
of not getting ready during our anniversary day. We had problems because we didn’t want to
leave our work on the computer with the mind map. We also had problems in not wanting to go to
Dr. Marvin’s because we had so much work to do.
So, it was arranged that we only had a 15 minute call. We had that opportunity on Thursday too while
we were driving, but Rich let us drive a couple hours each way and it ended up
being our turn when Dr. Marvin called, so we missed the opportunity. Then we had about an hour back – right before
the second argument with Rich to talk to him about another 15 minutes. NEEDLESS to say that when we had the
opportunity to go in on this last Thursday, we made it to the appointment.
What helped the most was that we made ourselves a few
checklists before we got to doing much moving about. This is what they looked like.
Hehehe – well, yes, we can have fun with a checklist! We printed one out and started crossing
through things manually especially with the packing list. Most of the packing list happened on
Wednesday because Tuesday a good part of the work was washing clothes and steaming
them – WHILE we were watching Utopia.
Hmm, haven’t watched the show since we’ve been back. Do we want to? Not sure, but it IS a good thing to be doing
while steaming clothes. We brought our
operation out here by the desk – wait – I got a picture!
Yup yup … ann’s Laundry *sigh*
Anyway washing, drying, folding, steaming was done on
Tuesday and one last load on Wednesday of Tuesdays clothes, but we were behind
on Tuesday, so it seemed to take a long time.
There was a lot to get done before we left – and I think everything made
it, BUT the vacuuming. No one’s perfect!
So that is pretty much it for the pre-trip too!
Have to touch back with FB to see what else was happening
Hehehe.
Let’s see … for one, we’ve been doing a better job of
getting Dakota out for his walk, which means WE’VE been doing better getting US
out for a walk. You are going to get our
full picture show now Hehehe. This is
Dakota in his “walk world.”
Nothing walkwise would be happening if it weren’t for the
old scooter my mother gave us. It is the
most fantastic gift of the year. We are
trying a new arrangement of our medicine so we get it at 7 am, 11:30 am, 3:30
pm, and 7 pm. SO the next part is that
we’re trying to get Dakota out for when we stop for the middle two medication
times so somewhere between 11-11:30 am AN 3-3:30 pm, he is going for a
walk. AND, when we go out, we’re trying
to cover two blocks each time. SO while
the weather is still dry, Dakota is walking about 1 mile each day AND he LOVES
it! He’s quite happy to be out and
moving, and he seems to enjoy listening to all the other dogs on the
block. Good boy! We’re also being very specific in that he
goes to the bathroom before he leaves, so the walking is just that – a nice
brisk walk. We do think he’d go faster,
but the scooter is only 4 mph. We’re
both managing!
The next picture is what has happened out our windows … Fall
is happening all over the place … that means two things. First there are a lot of leaves about and
second – the corn is now down – wait got pictures of both! Well, actually we have about a half a dozen
pictures. You DO know we’ve been
off-blogging for a bit now, right?
Couldn’t help but to squeeze in a couple fall pictures 2014 of our new
Grandson too! Ok, well truth be told had
to get in pictures of ALL my Grandchildren … In the larger Halloween picture
Ame and Isa are in the back row in the 6th and 9th (end)
positions. Austin? He’s the first one to the left in the Award
picture – So gosh darn proud of all of them.
Happy Happy to be a Grandma! AND,
now ALL three of our sons have kids.
They did well! Happiest Fall!
Ok, back again … I know a LOT of pictures, right? We’re watching the kids FB entries carefully
to make sure we don’t miss anything. We
are still behind on Maury’s birthday, but hoping to catch-up this next week …
hmm, hoping we’re on the right weeks!
Weekend has jumped upon us pretty quickly this time because of the
extended trip this last week. Did want
to say too that the corn pictures were pretty darn cool too because they are
taken from Rich and us sitting on our front patio just looking across the
yard. It’s like a show made for just
us! AND, a special Congrats goes out to
Austin for having won his high school’s Outstanding Student Award from the
Social Studies Department – ESPECIALLY as a freshman first quarter. When you look at the other departments it
seems most are won by Senior Students … Austin is just that smart! Congrats Austin!
Ahh just been such a great fall this year … AND? Rich might want to take one more trip. He’s thinking of going out toward the east
coast to see his Aunt and Uncle soon. It
would be nice to do it for Thanksgiving, but I think that would mean Rich has
to make a commitment soon and see if it is possible for his Aunt and
Uncle. I’d love to do the trip – we’ll
just have to see how things shake out.
Another thing that has just happened this week is that we’ve
had people over to help us change up some of the windows in our house –
hopefully before winter sets in formally.
Eleven of the sixteen have to be replaced and it’s going to cost about
$5,400 through Home Depot. We had to
take out a credit card, but will have two years to pay at 0% interest, so we’re
hoping that that is going to be ok … it puts things officially at cost/labor of
each window just under $500. It’s a lot,
but hopefully we’ll see some of the energy efficiency right away. The windows are really needy of being
done. Rich also got the front stair done
over the time we were away … The repair guy showed us the screws and how badly
rusted they were and he had to do a little build-up of the stairs ALONG with
reinforcing the bottom step. I’m really
glad he got it done, but it cost $120 and he said he couldn’t do any more
outside work for the year. Rich is still
thinking he can paint the boards and reinforce the airway under the sunroom so
we don’t get such an up wind from that direction. I think it looks terrible so am against it,
but understand what he’s trying to do.
These jobs could have been done pre-winter, but that’s not really Rich’s
style *sigh* the windows should be ready to go in about a month from now – into
December. I really like the idea that
we’re putting money into the place to make it a better house. First roof, then windows, PLUS a few little
things … we should be good to go and on to the next chore on the list ;)
Ahh back … we just finished talking to Linda … she’s going
to take a class this afternoon – good for her!
This next week she will be going to a quilting retreat – the one we used
to go to. Want no part of all that
though!
We used the washroom – and got the dog out and fed him and
ourselves too. It was an all-purpose
trip! Rich has been up for a couple of
fishing shows now … think he’s in happyland … BUT feel sorry if he really does
want to go outside today it is chilly out there and we’re supposed to be
getting an arctic blast this week – about mid-way. Won’t want any part of that … hope we’ll be
able to get outside, but read an article on winter and dogs. Some are using the boots, but they suggested
using baby wipes on feet – not booted to get the salt off the bottom. That is the bad part because it sometimes
burns. Think that’s what we’ll be
doing. If dogs have been moving through
life for thousands of years, don’t see it important that all of a sudden on our
shift, we have to put annoying little boots on him. He’s just not left out that long.
I think the one main thing to talk about is the work that
we’ve been doing on the mind map. This
is the area that we’ve put the most thought and attention into. As you know that our Multiples mind map is
broken into sections an that we’ve been trying to build them up. I think last time we talked about doing
PubMed journal abstracts and we’d done a section from Amazon of about 450 books
on Multiplicity. In the PubMed
abstracts, we’ve been getting it better and better so that the entries get the
most use out of them, which really means doing a lot of reading. We have been reading EVERY abstract, and then
from there usually making about 5-7 connections back to other sections of our
outline, so that something that fell out of dissociate Disorders – might be DID
(dissociative identity disorder), but then it might also be a title like
“Spirituality, religion and complex developmental trauma
(2014, Sep 29), so along with DID it’s also in sections for “Attachment
Theory,” “Children and adolescents,” “complex developmental trauma,” and
“spirituality/religion.” And then, from that title going down we get how the
abstract reviewed five domains that influence survivor’s ability to develop a
sense of faith, positive identity and hope and they assessed how the trauma
affected developmental trajectories.
Lastly of course, we included links to the author’s names and the information
that came with that listing so this would be the listing for the above entry.
Nov 06, 2014 08:19 PM
Spirituality, religion, and complex developmental
trauma.
Author: Van Deusen, Stephanie 1 ; Courtois, Christine A. 2 1
STAGES Counseling Center, Lancaster, PA, US2Private Practice, Washington, DC,
US
ProQuest document link
Abstract (English): The purpose of this chapter is to
describe the effects of multiple, repetitive traumas occurring primarily over
the course of childhood on an individual’s spiritual development. We begin by
describing the effects of complex trauma, with a focus on spiritual problems
stemming from trauma of this type. Then, using the lens of the work of Erik
Erikson and James Fowler, we provide a developmental framework to set out a
number of identifiable steps leading to healthy faith development. With a fixed
developmental trajectory in place, we are able to assess how and when
experiences of complex trauma affect standard developmental trajectories. We
review how the five primary domains of complex posttraumatic stress disorder
(CPTSD) influence a survivor’s ability to develop a healthy sense of faith that
fosters positive identity and hope. We present the case of a client with
dissociative identity disorder, including some of her artwork and writings, to
illustrate how extreme emotional dysregulation and trauma-related expectations
of relationships affect spirituality, attachment to God, and faith development.
Finally, this chapter highlights specific strategies for integrating issues of
spirituality into each of the three main phases of treatment for CPTSD.
(PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved)(chapter)
Links: Check for full text access
Subject: Early Experience (major); Religion (major);
Spirituality (major); Trauma (major); Faith (major); Childhood Development;
Dissociative Identity Disorder;
Classification: 3200: Psychological & Physical
Disorders; 3310: Psychotherapy & Psychotherapeutic Counseling
Population: Human
Identifier (keyword): spirituality religion complex
developmental trauma repetitive childhood trauma dissociative identity disorder
faith
Target audience: Psychology: Professional & Research
Monograph title: Spiritually oriented psychotherapy for
trauma.
Pages: 29-54
Publication date: 2015
Format covered: Print
Publisher: American Psychological Association ( Washington ,
DC , US )
ISBN: 1433818167, 9781433818165, 1433818175, 9781433818172
Language: English
Document type: Chapter, Edited Book, Book
Number of references: 34
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/14500-003
Release date: 29 Sep 2014 (PsycINFO);
13 Oct 2014 (PsycBOOKS);
Correction date: 13 Oct 2014 (PsycINFO);
Accession number: 2014-22343-003
ProQuest document ID: 1606005080
Document URL:
http://proxy.cc.uic.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/1606005080?accountid=14552
Database: PsycINFO
Does that make more sense?
The main part though is understanding the abstract, or sometimes if the
entry refers to a book, it is a good idea to sense out the table of contents to
see what the author(s) are trying to focus on.
Our areas are broken down to:
1.
Life Span and population served
2.
Assessment and diagnostic
3.
Theory
4.
Brain, Mind and Mental
5.
Emotional
6.
Behavior
7.
Prevention & Intervention
8.
Medical
9.
Psychiatric Disorders
10.
Pharmaceutical
11.
Treatment & Support
12.
Conclusion
This is not to say that more categories won’t be added after
this, but that each of these categories have sub-categories and sometimes it’s
really drilled down, but the end point is being able to include the articles
where they go … here we’ll show you … This next picture is on 9. Psychiatric
Disorders
You can pretty much see that the 1rst picture outlines the
different kinds of Psychiatric disorders, and then the 2nd picture
outlines the different kind of dissociative disorders, and then in the 3rd
picture we have an outline of DID with all the articles falling under that
precisely, then that moves aside when we choose one of the articles, and we
have the article connected to all 6 authors, the cascading thought that DID
patterns states were tested with a pet scan using a neurobiological model, and
that on top of the article we listed the 6 categories we felt the article fell
under – DID, emotional over/undermodulation, Etiology, identity states,
Neurobiological Model and PET study.
Then when we go to for example the Etiology link, we find that its under
the diagnostic link under assessments and that we have several other kinds of
assessments made for example …
There is soooo much information in this particular mind map
– it’s really quite amazing. I don’t
know if we’ve been able to make a good declarative statement on what someone
utilizing the mind maps might find. I
guess we feel that there is so much information out there on Multiplicity and
some of it is good and helpful and some is absolutely terrible. Our purpose is to organize it so that people
can understand it from the perspectives of the highest practitioners, to the
most ignorant questioner wondering if Multiplicity is real.
One of the things that happened this week is that Dr. Marvin
accessed his psychinfo database at UIC which is similar to the pubmed – except
it is not through the government, it is put together by the APA (American
Psychological Association). We have
unused connections to the APA (American Psychiatric Association) – though the
psychiatric one isn’t nearly as large.
Psychinfo comes with less biological inferences then PubMed. The bottom line though is there is about
3,300 DID articles/abstracts in PubMed and about 2,500 articles/abstracts in
Psychinfo. My ideal is to go through all
5,800 articles/abstracts and really work out an outstanding mind map – and this
is just one section though it is a major section. An ideal day would be to process 30-50
articles so would take about 145 days IF we could do that many days straight
through … nothing is that easy, but if we could do those 145 over the course of
a year, I would feel fantastic … that is an average of 16 articles a day –
that’s a good goal to shoot for. We’d
have to be very prosperous!
We’d be able to do more, but there are other databases we’re
working with. I think we told you this
stuff last time. The section we’re
working on the hardest is through the google searches. Between the Psychinfo and Pubmed the data
goes back all the way to 1904, though the majority really starts in the late
60’s. As to the Google search though the
data is newer … it is stuff published day in and day out on the internet, and
since it was something we had to do personally, we only started as far back as
2010, BUT 4 years of special data is just that.
I can’t imagine that anyone else has thought to do the same thing. Even if they started today, we’d be that much
more in advance, plus having the other databases.
This mind map picture is about Multiples in the google
search that are sure about their multiplicity, just thinking out loud about
general hard things, especially through feelings of being in personal
crisis. So by the time someone happens
to come by that area and drill down to the current 8 articles/thoughts, there
might be something in the map that they can identify with.
I randomly chose the 4th entry and this is then
what the body of that entry says …
Oct 23, 2014 12:22 PM
http://www.experienceproject.com/stories/Have-Dissociative-Identity-Disorder/4929309
I live in this physical world that's just so-so and nothing
fantastic ever happens, nothing exciting, everything just feels flat. I have my
manic days or weeks where I feel ok and then ultra depressive weeks or months
where I just want to bury myself.
Then I'll wake up one morning still in this physical world,
but my mind is flooded with memories and/or thoughts about another world. I
remember horrible things I've done and had done to me, but they never really
happened. I try to push the thoughts away, but over days they just get
stronger.
Then I wake up and I have become the person who remembered
the horrors, only now I'm stuck in this god forsaken physical world where
everything is far worse than the horrors I remember inside.
(Continue...)
I wish I could fall asleep and go to the place I really
belong.
I'm trapped inside a body not my own.
I'm living the ultimate nightmare. A horror story where I
can't fight back against my physical attackers because I would go to jail. Just
once I would love to snap and really make it count.
It's like being tied down with no defenses, or alive but
comatose. I'm claustrophobic...this is hell.
I'm alive...but I never truly get to live
10-3-14 DID Google Search
I Have Dissociative Identity Disorder
Experience Project
Being DID and : A true, personal story from the experience,
I Have Dissociative Identity Disorder. Being DID and BiPolar feels like this to
me.
.
Hi hi … we’re back … this particular entry is linked to the
“Experience Project” on October 3, 2014 and because it’s a link – the reader
can go back to the original entry and read the complete entry. When things read (Continue…) you know there
is more being said then was copied. We
usually just take the highlights. In most entries you link back to there is a
comment section so people who come across can read and possibly identify with
the questions/answers presented, or they can leave their questions/answers and
become part of what I’ve always considered to be “The Great Conversation.”
I guess that’s basically the way it works. No one should have to be out there on their
own, or be out there with limiting information.
I really want our site to become a place to learn. I guess my own part – since everything I’m
collecting has been written and usually commented on by others, my part is just
pulling together the data out there through categorizing and being able to pull
together searches within the map …
For example, we pulled out a keyword from the above … Using
the word, “Defense” we came up with 6 strong leads – where the word is in the
title, and then the report will pull the next top 100 leads according to the
strength of their algorthythm Score.
This is the original sentence, “It's like being tied down
with no defenses, or alive but comatose. I'm claustrophobic...this is hell.”
The first researchable title takes defense to be part of the
dissociative structure or self-state, the second is using defense as an excuse
as a Multiple to avoid prison time, the third talks about dissociation as an
intra-psychic defense, the fourth talks about an animal defense within
dissociation, the fifth is from an online mental health publication that talks
about symptoms of DID as defenses against “hard” impulses, and then the last
one goes back to using the word as a legal argument to avoid criminal behavioral
consequences. Then looking at a few
pages of the lesser articles, we find that there are quite a few at the top
talking of legally not being responsible for crimes due to the “disorder” of
being multiple. One of the links though
is through Ferenczi’s concept of the victim identifying with the aggressor
(sexual abuse) and understanding that dissociative structure … it is an
interesting concept because it goes on to say, “While identification with the
aggressor begins as an automatic organismic process, with repeated activation
and use, gradually it becomes a defensive process.” It is kinda funny to think now that in
relationship so far of the above, dissociative separation from an abuser
becomes a tool, that in the legal sense using that same tool (that the victim
[whose become abusive]) wants a dissociative separation from other selves – the
abusive parts. AND, because it is not
only legally crazy to have this tool, it is also part of the crazy process to
have been a victim in the distant past of ones’ other selves – and now the
legal system one needs to face being imprisoned instead of receiving
psychiatric help. I think that is the
legal questioned being pressed. The “tool” of dissociating is the dissociative’s
“dissociative structure.” The self-state
is the identity up front at any given time.
By being intra-psychic, the tool or defense seems inaccessible to the
individuals involved within one system – it is that which goes between them –
we happen to call this “Marie.” She to
us is our unconscious that switches us when necessary – without our consciousness
– though after one’s done something wrong at least one of the many individual
parts – most likely knows he’s done something wrong, just the argument is that
the other parts might have been unwilling or unknowing participants and without
them being able to make a conscious choice, shouldn’t be held responsible? The animal defensive system makes sense as to
it being a type of flight or fight instinct that is more animalistic. I would imagine that a “hard” impulse would
be like the part who struck out and did damage up to killing someone else. I could imagine that as a symptom of DID one
could mentally escape and that escape is a defense to protect from a damaging
other, but the ‘hard” impulse would mean does one take the suffering caused by
another – or strike back – little confusion there as to which is the real
“Hard” part – to stand suffering or to cause hard damage to other, all of which
could be considered on a continuum between ordered and disordered. We have to assume the victim is the “ordered”
part and the abuser represents “disorder.”
To fight/flight the abuser’s disorder, the victim matches disorder – not
wanting to bleed out his more ordered self.
In this respect it is an automatic organismic process repeated in
identifying with the aggressor to protect one’s innocence. In the case of trial … one could possibly
strike an abuser because the abuser has struck the victim – and the victim’s
matching force to force – but then there is the part of accountability. Out of the role of being the one who is
struck – whether or not the other deserved it, there still has to be
culpability. When the Victim steps back
and is no longer identifying with the abuser, is he less guilty with less
association to the event in question? In
a sense his attacker part – protected the parts that could be hurt. Right to protect oneself? Yes?
What happens though when the attacker/victim attacks someone not being
abusive … like a defenseless child? He
is no longer protecting him/herself.
People with bad motives have bad motives and I still think they have to
follow the justice system. I think all
prisoners have some element of insanity, but not all who are “insane” – those with
psychiatric disabilities are harmful in need of punishment or REALLY insane. Later we’ll have to think through moments of
psychosis, but not now. Ok, now we’re
like really far down the line in this questioning of the word defense … better
try to wrap it up – though I have to admit this is a bit of a mental discussion
worthy of being held in our head. Hmm,
another link – have to think through of defensive fight, flight OR avoidance …
which is other kinds of flight? This is
another interesting play on words – and without going to read the entire
sentence, we’re looking at the terms psychic conflict, distress, and defense …
BEAUTY! Explains the above … something
bad happens (conflict), the situation feels bad (distress), and then the
body/mind tries to protect itself (defense) … looking again at the two-sided
picture conflict can be directed from another, or self-directed. I could not know how to handle pressure –
like child crying which is then conflict – although child crying is not
wrong/bad, but the sound could be conceived as bad (distressing), so the
previous victim worked up to his/her extreme could damage the child. Someone might say, not in its right mind, but
without better defenses (coming from the viewpoint of the angry protector part)
someone could be hurt. Is everyone within
the multiple system guilty? Going back
to the beginning “tied down with no defenses.”
Tied down meaning none personally, but wearing a big protector part with
murderous defenses? Or because of not having self-protective defenses from the
part of a victim part – they would be going through the distress part ... without
being able to change the scenario – no defense other to then switch … but to an
angry part? The part that fights and not flights? Thinking the 2nd original thought
of being alive, but comatose – again feeling but no protection … this is so
much like what is said to be the original abuses ... Small young children do
not have the wherewithal to fight abusive force – especially from family
(supposed love) members. And after reading another lead – if I know all the
parts am I integrated or no longer multiple … Think you would still be Multiple
just more conscious, and thus more responsible, but not necessarily integrated –
each part holding full personal strengths and weaknesses, but all responsible
to hold a bottom – safe line. Another line – “in our defense leads can only
help them when they are ready.” It seems as to being a Multiple one could ask
who would be ready – victim multiple or attacker multiple – who helps who? Both parts would have to accept the reality
of helping each other so the victim gains more of the attacker’s strength where
the attacker gains some of the victim’s charity. Both have to be ready to be
more like smaller extremes of themselves and include the other in their realm
of potential self – most likely without the consistency that others have at
their realms of self-control – they have to help each other become the better
person – with no actual mind yet to the more obvious abuser except to say all
human beings deserve “love.” Ok, really
reaching back to our Christian roots here, but we’ll move on for the sake of
argument. Plural Activism says, ““The
Power of Many” … nothing more, nothing less.
Not merely a diagnosis. Not a
pathological disorder, and not always a defense.” I believe them to be right. Human beings should always strive for self-care
and responsibility, ok and to love one another – whether internal or
external. Interesting another defense
mechanism – what about repression – forcing something internal down – I guess
it be a part of avoidance or flight still.
Being traumatically overwhelmed – would think that’s part of again being
distressed – helpless to an attack internal or external. Hmm, not using dissociative defenses means
being in real time and not accepting the inability to properly function. The skeptics call lack of wherewithal – a manipulative
maneuver. Maybe though it is not having
the appropriate person to help one develop, grow to an understanding of a
better self. Another flight defense
would be amnesia – that has to be worked through like another force to avoid
the distress.
Ok, worked things through to about 50 deep – we were at a 2%
score level as to things being weighted toward the word defense and we’re not
sure how all that works. Maybe it’s a
matter of how far it is buried in the article material we were accessing. I think the next part is that we have to
breath – maybe take our medicine and get our tomato sandwiches and go to the
washroom, and THEN maybe take another look at what we’ve been going on and on
about. What just happened through our
mental processes? Was there any headway
of understanding made? Think we’re up to
loosely that people have to be responsible for their own learning processes,
but frustrated that without assistance whether it be teachers, therapists or
close relationships – how much responsibility for doing what you are supposed
to be doing as a human … Like is it the same for a person who can go from A to
M mentally to be held the same line of accountability as someone who inertly
can go only from A to C? You know
general questions? BRB
Hi hi … we’re back again … it is already about 4 pm. We took a pretty big break after the last
thoughts … we posted them on FB and with the Plural Activism group. Rhymer was kind enough to respond back that
they made some sense. I’m grateful that
she was able to read it. I think looking
at it later I feel there were errors of logic made, but some of it is good so
we’ll go with it for now. It took a lot
out of us to be thinking like this.
After we posted, we laid on the couch and petted Dakota for a while
until we fell asleep. Good dog! Now he is out in the sunroom waiting for Rich
to come back. Rich left to visit his
mother, and we picked up in the kitchen so that it would be ready when he came
home to make spaghetti. I’m thinking now
maybe I should take a quick shower? Haven’t
done that for the day and figuring that we’re about due. Always nice to cuddle with Rich knowing we’re
at our best J WELL, just in case we do something like that!
Ahh we’re all done with that! AND, when we got out of the shower we saw
that Rich got home. He’s still working
out in the garage. He said that he
cleaned it today, but we’re still in pajamas so figured we could see it
tomorrow instead. Close enough. He says everything is put away by area – but we
heard there was no Ann area out there so then we weren’t real happy about
that. BUT, he has been busy today.
I think we’re going to end for the day – it’s about 4:20 pm
and we’ve got a lot of cutting and pasting to get all the pictures from this
entry from Word to the blog. Maybe we’ll
add something in the end, but I’m pretty sure we’ve covered our productive time
during the day. THOUGH we haven’t been
working on our mind map directly since this morning … I think for the majority
of the day from 5 am to now we’ve been pretty busy. Ok, there WAS that nice nap in the middle of
the afternoon – so that part was good too, but lets see now how we do with
loading all those pictures!
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