I’m forever writing on here when I need to process conversations with my providers. You’d think that I did nothing but talk to them all day. I do do other things. For example, Wednesdays are my favorite day of the week because the pet therapy volunteer comes in with a beautiful dog. It’s literally the only physical touch I get all week, aside from the occasional covert fist bump. People try to hug me with words but it’s so not the same. I don’t think humans were meant to live like this, especially during times of extreme stress. Don’t other primates spend a lot of time grooming and being groomed? And physical touch has always been my hands-down #1 love language. It’s not like I want anything creepy! I’m just desperate for a normal, platonic hug 😭
But I digress. Lately, whenever I meet with my doctor, as I walk into the meeting, I remind myself that he is a kind man. This has been helping a lot. My propensity is to walk in expecting him to beat me up or lash out or something. Only now that I’ve met with him every day for almost a year, am I starting to figure out that all evidence is that he has a kind soul and wants the best for me.
As usual, I wish I had more time to write. The main thing I have to process today is that apparently Dr. X doesn’t actually think that I have Dissociative Identity Disorder. I thought he did because a previous therapist with whom I worked closely for years used to think that I had it. I had never heard of it before until she brought it up, and we spent ages making index cards with pictures on each one to represent each of my “ego states.” But Dr. X says that my memories of the events are too clear. I may have a foggy memory of certain things, but it’s way more than an actual DID patient would have. He clarified that I’m definitely spending time in a dissociative state, it’s just not actual DID. Which is amazing news. I am a bit worried that he doesn’t recognize the degree to which I actually don’t remember things. But the main thing is that the fewer labels I have to pathologize myself with, the better. I literally wasted years of my life believing that I had Borderline Personality Disorder until Dr. X scratched that horrific label. I might have actually had friends or a social life if I hadn’t forced myself to believe that I had “evil genes.”
All in all it was a good day. I know I’m complaining a lot, but it was. I’m back to my one and only diagnosis being C-PTSD, which is nice. Apparently that causes the dissociative symptoms and everything. It would be nice if I didn’t apparently have the worst case ever of C-PTSD while simultaneously feeling that I never had trauma bad enough to be worthy of the title. But at this point, if the Universe offers me a good day, I’m taking it!
