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I should switch and let somebody else do fucking something for a while I've McFuckin had it today and I don't need to be complaining anymore

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I'm just fuckin exhausted and feeling unsafe and idk what to do about it

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[Text: This person is a fictive–heavy system from multiple different sources.]

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hate when I have brain problems I'm diagnosed with and don't even realise they're the brain problems because they're such a normal part of my life

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*tiny mooing* 🐮🌻

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Out of our four usual fronters, I (Howie) have been around a lot lately, and it's just kind of funny to observe why. Especially when thinking about cognitive sympathy vs empathy and how it's distributed across the system.

I mean... Doc is high emotion/low empathy, so of course, she needs an assistant like Kim who is (repressed) low emotion/high empathy. So it makes sense that Manny, who is high emotion/high empathy, needs someone like me who is low emotion/low empathy. None of this being stuff we did on purpose, of course--just stuff our brain automatically had figured out on its own.

It also makes sense, then, why I'm the assistant out of the two of us who has been around more than Kim. Kim's emotions eat her up late at night, and just kind of fester the rest of the time. Especially when it's Jimmy (in our partner system) who is distressed by something. Sometimes, her strong desire to fix everything and care really hard is great to have! But I guess that's just the thing... lately, it's had us paralyzed. So then it's Howie to the rescue, I guess, because I honestly am not as phased by anything happening as Kim or anyone else is. Even when it's my boyfriend (Jason) struggling, it doesn't seem to bother me very much.

But, on the other hand, I do still care. Which is really the answer to the nagging question of "What am I even here for, when we have people like The Ladies who could do this job as well?" Because they can't do it *just* as well as I can. I am mostly Schizoid with some Cluster B traits, but it's really mild. The Ladies, on the other hand, are much stronger Cluster B traits--some might even say the worst* of us, in that regard. However, that makes it harder for them to care on the back end, as well as the front end, and a lot of them wind up unable to do anything with our problems because of it.

I don't know if this makes sense, but... For example: Vivienne is probably the next closest person to doing what I do. She's pretty textbook ASPD and is really good at stuff when she wants to do something. The trouble is, a lot of the time, she just doesn't want to. She gets bored and drained so fast. Me, though--I do whatever I want to do, but I actually *want* to do things and help. I still get bored a little easy, but not if there's sufficient enough dopamine involved for me. Viv gets bored of stuff even if she likes it and wants to do it; that's one of the hardest parts for her. It makes her way more impulsive than me, and that's saying something.

I dunno why I'm writing all of this out, except to help remind myself why I'm stuck here a lot lately. Because I've got just the right recipe of brain parts to tackle things right now and not get overwhelmed. I think I should be proud of myself for that. It's funny how much "character flaws" can actually benefit you when you learn to stop being so ashamed of your neurotype. I still have my struggles, but it's far from always being a bad thing.

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Having affective empathy deficits because you have ASPD and cognitive empathy deficits because you have autism is wild. Especially when you have a high need for cognition and a high cognitive capacity. It’s like constantly playing 4D chess.

Someone telling me a story about something I have zero personal experience with? I am SO useless. Usually I refer to past situations I’ve been in so I know how the other person might be feeling and what advice I would give but when I have 0 context and I’m already bad at cognitive empathy. And I can’t even relate to how they feel or ‘feel for them’ even if they directly tell me. It’s like idk what do you want me to say. That sure is a situation. Do fuck all for all I care. Except I can’t say that, because I know people are expected to care about that stuff… and on some level, if it’s a friend, I do care—but the barrier to my understanding is so huge that I end up only caring from a, like, theoretical standpoint. Like yeah in general if my friend gets hurt I care. But also. I have no emotions regarding how you respond to this specific situation. And then my ability to engage on the topic starts to slim down to frantic attempts to engage social scripts so that I don’t show what’s going on in my head.

It’s also insane because like. I always think that I have good cognitive empathy (for an autistic person) until the end of the day. And then I drop my mask and I realise how tired I am. Or when I’m at a social gathering for a while and I use so much energy I wind up practically hiding behind a friend so nobody talks to me. And then I realise that, yeah, I might be able to use it to function to some extent, but every time I do I’m using all of these mental functions that I barely even realise I’m using anymore that it just nukes me.

AuSPD is a pretty intense combo in that it really severely damages your ability to relate to other people. Especially when the impacts they have on your thoughts make it so that, often, your perspective is only understood by yourself. (Its why I enjoy online communities sm—somebody out there is BOUND to relate EVENTUALLY and I like seeing that I’m not alone).

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Our hair is graying, and physical therapy is harder than it has any right to be, and the only thing I can think is: "Aren't I supposed to be dead by now?"

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We started this and then haven't been using it for some reason... I guess it's kinda my fault. I ain't sure I've really recovered from the last time I tried putting myself out there. Having supposed friends/people you admired laugh at you blows.

Being an old fuck who grew up in fandom spaces trying to come out about/stop masking about diagnoses and shit you can't change is hard to begin with, but these days between purity culture and online ableism-disguised-as-inclusion it's basically impossible. We always get sick over what people are going to think, which ain't normally how we are. There's just something about the internet that don't help matters. Funny, considering IRL we don't give a fuck.

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[Text: This introject is down pounding his head against the kitchen floor.]

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[Text: This system’s psychosis symptoms fluctuate by alter.]

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[Text; This host loves their singlet partner]

Cursive version

[Text; This host Loves their singlet partner]

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Las serpientes son pajitas grandes

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when you scammed another businessmanthing out of 7k dollars after work: 💋💋💋💋

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source

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It's not often that Jimmy and I have what could be termed an "incompatibility," but at least when we do, it's something where we compliment one another.

Or, that's what I keep telling myself to keep from choking on my frustration that his priorities do NOT make sense to me at times. We have company coming over, and he has decided the OUTSIDE of the house is more important to clean up than the inside???

I guess that's him all over, anyway.

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Possible accessible OSDDID App Review

Simply Plural !

Facts:

What type of app it is: An app for tracking what parts/alters are fronting

Compatibility: Seems to be available for apple and android products, as well as browser support

Size: 66.5 MB

Internet required: Yes

Does it share my data?: You’re able to share your information with friends. Most things are set to be private initially

Lockable: You can log off as needed

Light and dark mode are available in-app as well as syncing with your device’s settings. There’s also a more accessible font option, which I thought was a nice touch.

~

Personal thoughts:

Personal difficulty using(0 being the most easy, 10 being impossible): 9

How easy to add your parts: 2

How easy to switch between parts: 7-8?? It took me a long time to figure out how to even do this, but once you figure out how its maybe a 5

Personal avoidance level: 10, no parts wanted to use this app

Safe to say, I’m perplexed by this app. Let me show you some screenshots

We start with this clusterfuck of options. As someone who’s dissociating and dyslexic all these different directions that hold the exact same weight as eachother are really confusing! A young or badly confused part might think User Report is the same thing as making a note of who’s out right now

Maybe this is helpful to someone, but to me, it looked like way too much even on a present day

This is the ‘Members’ list. Where all the parts are listed. There are a lot of symbols here that aren’t listed in any of the help sections that I’ve had to clumsily figure out by trial and error. Like apparently the arrows next to the names are.. Making a note of who’s here in the moment? I had no idea until just now.

Also they’re sorted alphabetically. Never in the history of Ever have I sorted my parts this way?? Sorry, this is the stuff I’m really specific about. 

Evidently the bottom buttons are how to view who’s fronting at the moment. I can’t figure out what ‘custom front’ is for

Here’s what a part looks like when you open them up from the list. You have a lottttt of info you can go through and add using the icons at the top. I like that it has this many options for people who are probably a lot more serious for the use of the app. 

When I first used it some years ago, I had no idea the Visibility was an option, so you might want to make sure it’s set to what you need it to be to feel secure (Private, shown to trusted friends, or shown to all friends)

Here’s the side bar, with lots and lots of options again, but at least these are a little more sorted and I would’ve preferred this for the main page.

Now, let’s look at Add Front Entry…

Okay, so there’s a detailed front entry and a quick front entry option. The detailed front entry looks like this:

….

My dear OSDDID friends, I ask you, Do you know how long the part previous to yourself started fronting, from the date, the hour, the minute?? and when they stopped???????? Not even you, the previous parts who were here.

I think the quick entry would’ve been better if you could add the hours options yourself, because most everyone I know with a dissociative disorder has a very different rate of switching, and 2 hours is not enough for the people who might switch once in days or weeks. (I personally shift from one group of parts to another every few days to a week) 

At this point if you’re thinking that “She just doesn’t understand, I’ve been using this app and it just takes a learning curve to use..”, I invite you to realize that this app has no margin for error, no lenience for our I Don’t Know Myself Disorder, no room for considering dissociation and it’s varying forms and general blurriness. 

I wondered for a moment why it was like this…

Ah-ha. 

The Plural Association is organization that hopes to eliminate the difference between OSDDID and non-disordered plurality, effectively de-medicalizing a Dissociative Disorder. 

I read some of these links and quite a few of them focused on the ‘beautiful mind of having plurality’ rather than the dark reality of where a dissociative disorder comes from, being a trauma disorder. Downplaying DID as ‘Not Getting Along With Your Headmates’ disorder. There was just enough reasonable and flowery language for them to sprinkle blatant misinformation throughout, tricking you into believing things that may be harmful if you actually have a Disorder that needs treatment. 

I have no doubt that people with non-disordered plurality are experiencing something. I can’t claim to know enough about someone’s mind to say otherwise, of course. I think saying Endogenics don’t exist shuts down people who might actually need help. 

However, the mixture of OSDDID and Endogenics like this is very very harmful when it comes to creating ‘accessibility’ like this. It takes away from the actual point of what would be helpful for someone with a DD, like communication between parts, the slow breakdown of dissociative barriers, and for many, the lesser separation between parts and goals towards coming together.

The Plural Association wants you to be separate, but also know all parts, which can be incredibly dangerous to venture into yourself if you have a lot of trauma(and therefore parts) you don’t know.  Integration, Fusion, and taking it slowly and at the pace recommended by a professional, are really wonderful and personal parts of healing and shouldn’t be snubbed out by the pressure to be As Plural As Possible. Exactly like this app does

Final thoughts:

This app is needlessly complicated. I mean, maybe it can be really helpful if you go through and learn everything about it. I’ve only been picking at it for a week and barely scratched the surface. I feel like it must be like an art program, it takes you a lot of hard work and practice to settle into using it.

The premise is not at all for me. Not in all my years of knowing and figuring out my DID have I ever found it useful to *just* have a record of who switched when. Sure, it can be enlightening. But I’d find a lot more use in a text app where my Personas can make note of what’s going on in the moment, how they’re feeling, why they’re there. 

Simply Plural is not at ALL simple or accessible to the common dissociated user.(me) Many times I peeked at it, I got confused easily and lost. It feels like a winding house where one room leads to the next and the next without hallways. 

It’s a lot especially for people who have less distinct parts too. or many of them! they’d all be placed in the same alphabetical order without any distinction between distinct and nondistinctive parts, or subsystems. 

I’m extremely uncomfortable that you could technically find people on here, and find their information if they didn’t have the right privacy settings on. I didn’t feel completely safe putting all my parts on here, capping it at the main 16. Even more so, there’s the ability to give someone a ‘token’, which is customizable access to your information, including being able to write and add things, as well as delete them. I could easily see an abuser use this for the worst. What in the world?!?!?

I try to keep my reviews light and positive because I believe there’s merit in any DID media to various ranges of accessibility for people. But this one I just cannot recommend. I hope you understand my points as to why

If this app works for you, dissociation and all, then I’m really glad for you! If you’re endogenic and don’t have dissociative issues, maybe it’s more suited to whatever it is you…do with your parts? ? (I don’t know enough, sorry)

Would I recommend this app to someone with OSDDID? Nope.