Tag Archives: plural living

One of my former friends used to support me, comfort me when I was down over people harassing me for my F/O, but when they turned their back on me they said I was problematic for loving my F/O, and “forcing them” to do these things for me… Like, manipulating them into comforting and indulging me. I still fear that this is actually what I did without realizing it.

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Anon, the advice I give you depends strongly on an important factor.

Are your F/Os system members, soulbonds, or other real, people with agency of their own that you share your internal experience with in some way?

or are they just fictional characters that you write about and enjoy and play pretend with?

Because if they’re just fictional characters then it is impossible to manipulate them in any meaningful way. It’s like saying you’re manipulating a doll or a teddy bear. It’s ridiculous. There’s no need for you to feel guilty about any of it, because there is no real person for you to harm. Full stop. You’re fine.

If they’re system members, or other internal people with agency then it could be possible that you have been manipulative, or that your actions have caused harm.

Here’s what you should do if your F/O is a real internal person with agency that you worry you have been manipulating.

The same thing you’d do with any other partner you worried that you had caused harm to.

Talk to them about your feelings.

Communicate with them.

Ask them what they want, and if they feel harmed.

And if they do feel harmed, apologize, and ask them how you would like to proceed in the future.

a bit ago you got a (different) anon that was asking about the intersection between plurality and f/os, and you mentioned that the strong connection self-shipping can bring can form/summon (depending on your experience i guess) system members. we had this happen to us recently and honestly i don’t even know if there’s a point to this message i just like… got so excited seeing someone talk about this and say “yeah this is a thing that can happen.”it’s totally new territory for me (we have some fictives sure but he feels like… a different type of fictive i have no idea how to explain it) and i’ve never seen anyone talk about it, maybe because there isn’t a lot of intersection between the two communities, i dunno i’m not super connected so i could be wrong or just not looking in the right spaces but.we’ve basically been navigating blind which has been working but that doesn’t make the experience any less “lonely” i guess when you’ve never heard of it happening before yanno. and i’m also struggling with a weird amount of guilt around it— a lot of overwhelming feelings both positive and negative. i won’t go into detail because i don’t want to feelingsdump in your guys’ ask box lol, but… yeah.sorry i don’t even know what i was trying to convey here, feel free to ignore this, just seeing that ask made me do the metal gear solid “!” thing LOL.

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Anon, we are so glad to meet you, an so glad our posts resonated with you!

This part in your message stood out to me

we have some fictives sure but he feels like… a different type of fictive i have no idea how to explain it)

I think you should check out some posts over at our (very out of date) blog @soulbonder and see if some of the experiences talked about over there resonate with you.

Please feel free to put anything you like in our inbox if you want to talk more about your experiences.

Do you have…angry alters? I guess protective or maybe aggressive? Alters who won’t tolerate anyone’s shit and get physical fast.I do. And everytime there’s conflict that we both know could be solved by intimidating the other guy, she just…won’t quit. It’s a constant struggle between trying to make sure they know I’m not gonna be bossed around and trying to keep her from literally beating the shit out of them. She definitely arose from a need to be “strong” in my abusive family but I know I can’t do that to people. And it gets really stressful whether she does or doesn’t win, because there’s sense of failure either way.

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We don’t have any alters, anon, but we do have angry system members. I’m one of them.

Anger is like fire.

When fire is controlled, we can use it constructively.

We cook our food with it, warm our houses with it, ward away danger with it.

When fire is uncontrolled, it is dangerous, and consuming.

It burns food to ash, it destroys our home and our property, it hurts us and the people close to us.

Anger is not bad.

Fire is not bad.

It’s okay to be angry. It’s best when you can channel that anger.

Use your anger constructively. Don’t let it escape you, destroy things, and hurt people.

I think this advice applies equally to plurals and to singlets.

when I say a character “gets away from me” or “didn’t do what I told them to do” I 100% mean it as a euphemism. maybe I have to make more unexpected changes when writing that character’s POV than I typically do OR maybe I tend to get very inspired and write new ideas off the cuff when writing that character.

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olderthannetfic:

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And when I say it I mean the character literally came and yelled and/or cried at me until I changed it.

We are not the same.

Do you guys get angry if a different alter eats the food you made? /light-hearted What about other things, like drinks or movies or games?
– 🍉💌

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Sometimes we will play a teasing game of it, actually! And also we do like cooking for each other. There’s a few system members who are just abysmal cooks to the rest of us, so when they’re around someone else will usually switch in or confront to make the food.

🌀😎 and 🕷️😎 are both notorious for ruining food– last time 🕷️😎 tried to make rice without a rice cooker it was somehow both overcooked and undercooked at the same time. And don’t even get me started on 🌀😎’s “spaghetti and scrambled eggs.”

More often when people get annoyed it’s when someone switches out in the middle of eating something that the person switching in doesn’t like. ❄️💪 loves mountain dew and 😼🔪 and a lot of the rest of us hate it which has been a problem before 🤣🤣🤣

What do you mean “clinical”? Do you mean it’s language used by diagnosed DID systems, or is it like transmeds who use weird language to gatekeep who’s “really” trans?I keep hearing voices sometimes. I’m really excited to think I might actually have people up here in my head, but even that feels shameful because I’ve always heard “You shouldn’t want this, it’s hellish. You’re fucked up for wanting to have a system. You’re erasing the trauma it’s given me.”I…don’t feel singular. I never have. I’ve never felt like I’m just me. I’ve always felt people behind me, hand on my shoulder, someone taking my hand. Someone holding me when I desperately, desperately needed someone I could trust to not abandon me the way everyone else had. Facets, I called them. Masks, even though they felt so, so different to myself.But because I can’t find them, because it’s strange and vague feelings here and there, it feels…wrong to be excited? Wrong to be happy or to finally feel like things make sense. Like I’m still not allowed somewhere that might give me answers.
– 🍉💌

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What do you mean “clinical”? Do you mean it’s language used by diagnosed DID systems, or is it like transmeds who use weird language to gatekeep who’s “really” trans?

Both. It is language that is generally only used by plurals who understand themselves using the clinical model; and additionally system gatekeepers, sometimes calles sysmeds, police the language that they think people are allowed to use.

I want to assure you, plurality is not always suffering, just as existing as a singlet is not always suffering.

Do not let shame and fear stop you from pursuing knowledge, or the truth about yourself.

If you’re looking for support, and feeling like you don’t belong, try looking for these terms: endogenic plurality, pro endo, endo safe.

Do you think a system could awaken at any age? Do you think it’s possible for someone who’s been going through life dissociated but not…”shifted out” to one day suddenly develop an alter? What does it mean to have an alter “awaken”?
– 🍉💌

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It’s our personal belief, and the belief of many on the greater plural community, that plurality can manifest, awaken, or be discovered at any age.

Clinical purists of the “model of structural dissociation” often dispute this, but they aren’t even getting their own clinical arguments right.

We use the term “awaken” for our own system members because we believe that we have a broadly fixed system and all of us have always been here, but dormant.

Other plurals use the terms “manifest”, “appear”, “be created” etc to describe new members coming into their systems.

We don’t use the terms “alter” for ourselves as that is specifically clinical DID language.

Please feel free to ask follow up questions.

–🔬🐝

Hello. Uh I have a question about systems. I’m sorry if it’s weird and makes no sense but, do you think it’s possible for system members to like… I dunno the right word so I’m sorry if it’s offensive, but like do you think it’s possible for system members to manifest as an f/o?

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Hi there, anon! Thanks for your question, and don’t worry, it’s not offensive! That said, there are couple of ways to interpret what you’re asking, so, if I didn’t understand your question correctly, or you have more questions after our answer, please feel free to send a follow up message!

♦ The first way to interpret your question is “can you have a fellow system member that you treat as an F/O?”

The answer to this is resoundingly “yes.” There are lots of our system members are in romantic relationships with one another internally. One way that we share and celebrate those relationships is by treating them as “F/Os” online, and making posts about our relationships in that context.

For instance Harry and Peter are both members of Sinister System. They’re in a relationship. Harry likes to make F/O posts about Peter to show him that he loves him.

♦ The second way to interpret your question is “can you have an F/O that you later discover has become, or always actually was, a system member?”

The answer is also yes. An intense, intimate connection like an F/O relationship is something that easily create, awaken, or summon a system member of any type.

Even people who do not typically consider themselves plural experience this fairly frequently, and there is a lot of crossover with what is called a “soulbond” in this sphere. (please ask me if you want to hear more about soulbonds or check out the blog @soulbonder for more information.) Here’s one specific post you might find worth checking out.

I hope that answered your question, and if it didn’t, or if you have more questions, please let us know!

Please let me know if this is an invasive or rude question to ask but are you professionally diagnosed (not sure if that is the correct term to use so I apologize) as a system? If so, how would one go about getting that professionally diagnosed?

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Hi anon! This question isn’t rude, though it is a little invasive. We don’t mind though, and are happy to answer you.

Due to our specific experience of child abuse, followed by our experience of poverty through you adulthood in the US healthcare framework, we do not have any formal medical diagnoses of any kind.

While a formal diagnosis and therapy relating to our plurality might have been very useful to us when we were younger, at this stage of our lives our system has stabilized.

We have been living as plural for around 20 years now, and for the most part we now function in harmony. We are not seeking therapy or medication to address our plurality specifically, and we certainly aren’t pursuing integration.

Our plurality is informed by our trauma, but we consider ourselves spiritually originating as a system. It’s our belief that we are a cadre of souls bonded together through the cycle of reincarnation, who happen to be sharing a body on this particular life cycle. Our partner system, to whom we are married, feels similarly.

If you feel that you need therapy or medication to address your plurality specifically, then the first step would be to speak to a therapist about your thoughts and intentions.

We generally are of the consensus that a formal diagnosis is only useful in cases where you are actively looking for treatment.

There’s no need to have a diagnosis just to prove yourself to others, and due to the legal framework of the US and other governments there are many situations where a formal diagnosis can be actively harmful to you and your freedom.

Please delete this if you don’t feel comfy answering Do all of your alters share the same opinions about shipping as the main ones who run this blog?

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Hi anon! Thanks for the question!

♦️ First off (and we will probably add this to our bio) “alter” is a strictly clinical term that applies specifically to members of a DID system or other plural system under a clinical model.

You haven’t done anything wrong, but we want to make it clear that this isn’t terminology that we use for our system members, as it does not apply to us, and makes many of us uncomfortable to have used to describe us for reasons I won’t go into here.

When you don’t know what language a plural system uses to describe the people in their system “system members” is always a safe bet!

♦️ As for your actual question; there aren’t any members of our system who would specifically fall on the ‘anti’ side of things, but there are a lot of us who just don’t care, think it’s a stupid thing to waste energy arguing about, etc.

There are a number of our members who are squicked by the same kinds of things that typically upset fancops, but they are capable of exercising “don’t like, don’t read”.

For the record, there are ~25 members of Sinister, most of whom front in the body fairly regularly, but a lot of us have no interest in blogging/fanfiction/discourse outside of occasionally talking about their day or reblogging picture of themselves.

The handful of us you see posting regularly are the ones who are interested in those things for the most part.