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denelleiologist
Two years ago (I think it was two) I was diagnosed with DID. And getting myself to accept this was a piece of work, I have to say. But I think I’ve also mentioned that my first diagnosis of DID was in 1995. I refer to my situation as “my system” (although Team Denelle might be more exciting; reminds me of when we had “Team Jolie” and “Team Aniston”. i was definitely Team Jolie. i like to run with the dark side) anyway, I call this whole business my “system”. Right? Because sometimes my sister will be talking to me, and I’m looking at her with a quizzical expression, and she says to me, “well I talked to one of you about this yesterday”, or “oh, it may not have been you I told this to”. That kind of thing. And I get mad at her. “Stop saying that! It’s ALL me!” Because it is all me. But she’s right, too.
Because she will tell me conversations we had the day before and I have no bloody idea what she’s talking about. I FEEL like I’m myself, but I’m actually not the same person that she talked to, so I don’t have access to those memories. I think I’ve mentioned that it’s like a Chinese Fire Drill. I have all these personalities in the same car, but not everyone is driving at the same time. Some are asleep, or doing I don’t know what, while others might be complaining about what I’m doing, while some of us are “driving” the body or navigating. Is this confusing?
Take work, for example. I might go to work as a certain person – the Driver personality, who likes to work her fingers to the bone and hardly ever take a break. But other people in ‘the System’ might want to come out, so they surface. And now I might be at work but be a ten year old kid, trying to figure out what I’m supposed to do at my desk. Or I might be both a ten year old and another personality at the same time, while my Driver personality is trying to get these kids to behave so she can get back to work. It’s complicated.
Anyway, my question to my self, to my System is, where is this original diagnosee? Someone was going to a therapist back in the day, and someone sat in the office and heard that she had Dissociative Identity Disorder, or DID, or MPD. She accepted this diagnosis – presumably – because she then told a very dear friend. And then what? Because the System seemed to evaporate that information, and it was completely unknown to me until this friend told me that this had happened fifteen years ago. So where has this side of myself been for fifteen years? Just hiding out in my brain or body? Has this person popped out in my life somewhere, unbeknownst to me? I completely don’t remember the situation that my friend told me about, are there other things I don’t remember from that time? Or that personality? Where has this missing time gone?
I know I’ve spoken about these issues before (Wild Child) but it’s a strange, bizarre, troubling thing, this amnesia I have. It makes me confused and curious about my life. It makes me wonder and question and unsure about my reality. I don’t really know WHO I am. Because I’m more than what I have come to think of as myself. And even that is suspect, because sometimes I think I’m myself, but my therapist or my sister will say I’m behaving differently, and in a different personality than I had thought I was. My people in my System are a mystery to me, and I must continually find ways to explore and uncover.
I always wanted to be an Egyptologist and go on digs to uncover old artifacts, languages, secrets of another life. I guess I’ve gotten my wish; I’m just a Denelleiologist instead.
confessional
One thing I have to discuss here on the blog is this craziness I’ve been talking about. If you’re new to my blog, ha ha, you know nothing about what I’m talking about, and don’t you wish you’d been reading sooner. If you have read a few of my blogs you know that I have frequently discussed being crazy.
I like to be dramatic, that much is true. But I actually am dealing with some mental issues. I’m not an unstable individual, or rather, I am stable enough to hold a job, and most of the people that know me would call me colorful over crazy. But if I told them the real issue, I think they would go “Oooohhh, I get it now”. It doesn’t seem to be a big surprise when I have told the few people I have told. No one has really had a hard time believing my diagnosis.
I have Multiple Personality Disorder. Well, nowadays they are calling it Dissociative Identity Disorder, but it must not be that common still because my computer is not registering the word dissociative. ha ha.
This is a fascinating and curious ailment I have. This last television season, a show that I love called MPD/DID the “granddaddy of all mental illnesses”.
It’s bizarre, surprising, sometimes scary, and sometimes downright hilarious.
I am forty years old, and have spent my entire life hiding this disease, or whatever it is, from everyone around me. Which, trust me, is completely and thoroughly exhausting. It’s no wonder I can only work part time, because dealing with myself on a daily basis is like running a three ring circus.
But honestly, I live a remarkable life. I see life in a way that others don’t, with a perspective that few can understand. I get to experience so many amazing things that I guess are unique to me and those of my kind. I love myself. Finally. I love who I am, and who I’m becoming. I love where I’m headed, and all the crazy shit I’ve lived through to get to where I am.
I hope that others can love me as well. I hope that this condition I have doesn’t make people afraid to love me, or trust me, or be my friend. I hope that people can see beyond the stigma and label of MPD and look at my heart, and enjoy me as an individual, and not fear me for what the paperwork might say about me.
I’ve survived a great many things, and I continue to surprise and amaze myself. I am in the process of writing several books about my life, and this blog is a way to share some of those ideas, writings, pieces of work with others. Maybe I’m trying to get my thoughts in order. Maybe I need a sounding board. Maybe I need attention. Or practice. Or the chance to be writing on a regular basis without worrying about whether or not I will get published. Whatever the reason, here I am putting it all on the line. I hope my story will be interesting, encouraging, inspiring or at least comical for those that read it. I hope these blogs will bring something to readers as well, some bit of laughter or perspective or irony. Anyway, this is the crazy that I deal with, my own brand as I’ve mentioned, and you’re welcome to share in the journey.
I say all of this, because the next blog is an excerpt from a journal entry of mine. It didn’t make sense without all the information I’ve just shared, and I wanted to put it up here, so I had to come clean. It probably still won’t all make sense, because there is much I am not yet sharing, but will probably disclose eventually. So there’s my background piece, and here is the next bit….