uhhhhhhh so this is gonna be a little weird, but. my alters and I (I have dissociative identity disorder) have been able to establish better internal communication, and I've been working in therapy with my therapist to find 'undiscovered alters'. I...was skeptical I would have any, but one emerged today in therapy. she's a trauma holder....she's also six. I'm very bad with children, but everything I've read about having a child alter says you need to treat them like a real child, make a safe and loving environment for them, and all that. so, with that said.... anyone here good with kids? what do you do with a child? how do I go about handling this? and how do I make a 'safe and loving environment' for this kid?
Uhh, I have three younger siblings but I'm not sure what to suggest here... I'm not sure how you would interact with a child that you can't, like, yourself actually speak to. I guess just tell friends and family to be nice and understanding to them should they come to the fore ? I'm not sure what else you would want to do... I'd totally give tips on how to be pals with kids in the family or w/e but I'm assuming seeing as this is a DID thing you can't actually interact with them directly so I'm stumped. Edit: Didn't you already have a kid alter? Surely you'd just treat the new alter sorta similarly, if that's been working before?
well, since we've developed somewhat better internal communication, I can...talk to them, sort of? it doesn't always work, and it's still pretty faulty, but with the help of my therapist it's almost like the alters are....closer to the forefront, I guess, and they can actually talk to me directly? and then I can write things down and read them aloud, and they hear me saying them, and then they can answer. it's....pretty convoluted and difficult, but it's easier than trying to hold a conversation with just writing notes whenever they happen to front. so...I can kind of talk to her? I'm basically mostly struggling with how to interact with her, what to say to her...like, I've forewarned friends who are in the know, so if she should come to the fore, and start fronting, they are prepared and as ready as they can be to deal with a six year old. but...I personally don't know how to deal with her or how to create a 'safe and loving environment'. like, alters are consistently aware of what's going on, so I probably shouldn't be exposing her to, say, Criminal Minds, but I don't know how to deal with her or take care of her without inhibiting my life. I've gotten better at stepping aside and letting others front, so hopefully she can front in my next therapy session and the therapist can talk to her some, get a good idea of what's up, but until then I'm really struggling with how to deal with her, what I should and shouldn't expose her to, what to keep around in case she does front....
I don't think it's fair that you'd have to avoid doing certain things that aren't child friendly. She is after all a part of you, and you are not a child. Hmm... My best tips for getting along well with children generally just boil down to "show that you're interested in what they're doing/saying to you" (even if you're not really), and try to get involved if they want you to. Also if it's a family member let them know that you care about them. I guess in your case you're probably not going to be playing building blocks with an alter but maybe the second one still applies? I think that this is a fairly different situation from the norm so usual ideas of what works best with/for kids might have to be re-worked somewhat.
I agree with that, but at the same time, I really don't want to traumatize her more by watching things that are full of blood and guts, and she is, in nearly every sense, a child. she split when I was very young and she's not aged or anything, and she acts like a child, she talks like a child, but she's also heavily traumatized. she...doesn't deal well with, say, lots of screaming, and Criminal Minds is full of that...so I guess I should maybe figure out her triggers and try to avoid those, at least? as for that....well, there is co-fronting. I'm not very good at co-fronting, and still can't manage it for very long, but I suppose co-fronting would enable me to, say, color with her, or do building blocks with her for a little bit? and I can certainly try to be interested in the things she talks about or expresses interest in. like, if she expresses interest in My Little Pony, I'd certainly be open to co-fronting for a bit while she watches it, or watching it myself while she also watches it without the co-fronting part of it. and I'll try to let her know I care about her, which I hadn't thought of doing. this is a different situation from the norm, but some stuff of what helps with kids has gotta apply somewhat, I think....? I don't know much about her, though, and I don't know what knowledge she has, or if she's older in some ways than a normal kid, or what...but everything I've read thus far, which I've been trying to find stuff written by professionals or DID sufferers, it says you gotta try and treat kid alters like actual kids. some reworking is almost certainly necessary, but I figure hearing what people do with kids usually will help some.
Question; how does co-fronting work? Do you talk to each other aloud, or like, in your heads? Are you only peripherally aware of each other, or is it more intimate? Is it, like, reading each other's thoughts? Do you both control your body at the same time, or does it switch periodically? Or is like one person in the driver's seat, and the other is just more "present"? (Actually this post probably better belonged in the "ask questions about did" thread didn't it)
eh, it's cool, you can ask here, this is a DID-related thread after all. co-fronting....it's like...the body is a booth, and sitting at that booth is me and another person. one of us has control of the table, controls the body physically, and the other person watches, and the person who's controlling can switch, but only if the first person relinquishes physical control and moves back to watching. so it's sort of like one person in the driver's seat, other person in the passenger's seat, and then the rest of the alters are in the backseat. both of us can speak aloud if we choose to, the control of who speaks is able to switch just by choosing to speak, and we will hear each other, but more direct communication is available--it's much easier to speak directly to each other internally while co-fronting. I can't read their thoughts and they can't read mine--that kind of blending of two people takes months of work and co-fronting and talking and digging through the trauma and memories they carry, it's the beginning of what integration is, so I'm told. we are only peripherally aware of each other. if we really split the co-fronting evenly down the middle, then we'd control the body together, but that is, again, the beginning of integration--you have to be able to literally know what the other person is thinking to achieve that kind of perfect, simultaneous control.
one thing i've noticed helps kids a lot to handle and process upsetting or scary things that happen is to give them some sort of explanation and context for what happened, and what kind of emotions you might have about something happening, so they're not left to infer and try to figure it out all on their own (because usually at that age they can't). it can be hard to do that in the moment when dealing with your own emotions-and-events-that-caused-them and processing them yourself, so it helps to use fiction to establish some of this stuff to refer back to later to help them understand what's going on. things like 'she didn't know she was being mean to her friend, but her friend is sad anyway' or 'he's scared because he thinks there's a monster' is a whole hell of a lot easier to explain to a kid when you're talking about cartoons instead of real life stuff happening Right Now i dunno, this is probably not super coherent because it's cobbling together bits of information i've observed from dealings with children, but i hope it helps a bit; that sounds like a tricky as hell situation, friend, good luck
that is...actually pretty helpful. I wasn't at all sure how to approach helping her to process the shit that happened, the thing she's witnessed and the memories she's holding on to, so I was going to try and just let my therapist handle that, but he's not exactly a child therapist and may not be the best at it. I can definitely try and give explanation and context and such for what's going on, and try and help her deal with it, since it seems like up to now she really hasn't, probably because she can't. I can try and find some fictional things to use to explain what happened, but for the most part I'm pretty good at setting aside my own feelings and stuff to help others process things, and then deal with my stuff later. it is a tricky as hell situation, but I am hoping it will work out okay, and your information definitely helped, I wasn't sure at all how to approach anything like talking about what happened in the past. so thanks!!
welcome, friend, and all the good luck!! :D i also sent my sister a text asking if she has any pointers/guidelines for How To Explain Thing to Kid, too, since she has way more day-to-day experience with raising kids with this method than me and probably has a treasure trove of tips and tricks on the subject
okay so I talked to a friend who understands my situation and works with kids, and my psychiatrist who has knowledge of DID, and I've established some stuff: - she has to go to bed at 8 - she can have some comfort items in physical space, probably a plush or blanket, and I'll buy some toys for her to play with when she's fronting or co-fronting - she can co-front if we're eating something she wants to try, so that we can try and figure out what she likes - if she's co-fronting, then I'm only going to watch and do kid-friendly stuff, but the rest of the time she's going to be kept entertained by other alters so that I can have time to do non-kid stuff - she can co-front to try and figure out if she likes certain things, like if I'm going to watch a show that she hasn't seen she can co-front to see if she likes it - she can co-front or front by herself (if we can manage her fronting by herself) once a week for physical playtime, and the rest of the time other alters will keep her entertained for daily playtime so hopefully this works. I will apparently be getting a lot of practice with co-fronting...and yes, alters can go to sleep before the body does. it's an interesting phenomenon. the other alters apparently have a lot of ability to talk to each other, and they think they can keep her entertained telling stories and such. (we don't have a headspace. I'm pretty sure the idea of a headspace is total bullshit.) I'm also going to see if I can invite some in-the-know friends over for when she fronts that one time per week for playtime, so that she'll at least have some contact with others and some playtime with other people, rather than just being left to her own devices. I'm going to buy her some toys tomorrow when I'm out, and also probably a comfort item or two for her. she's also going to try and co-front tonight so we can find out if she likes cheese pizza.
I don't have any solid advice to give, but the thing I normally say to people who are unsure of how to deal with children is: Treat them like people, but don't treat them like adults. Kids aren't stupid, they just have less-developed brains than adults do, and less information/experience to work with, but there are things they're not equipped to handle, and decisions they're not prepared to make. (Like "should I expose myself to this potentially traumatising material" which is part of why rating movies is a good idea.) It looks to me like you've got a handle on this. Good luck!
