Inside Where We Live (Alexandria)

hi im lexi and im 10. i wasn't always 10. for awhile i was grown up but that didn't work so good. i didn't get married but i was there like rite after we moved back after we got married and we had two baby girls and it was stupid and i couldn't figure out how to be a grown up and kaya was no help at all, like not even a little bit because all she cared about was shoes, so i tried real hard but it didn't work.

so i went to live on a island inside. there was a big keeper on the island. he wouldn't let anyone on the island and didn't let me off the island. i was gone from my sisters and kaya and betsy had to figure stuff out themselves because all i did was get in trouble and get the body hurt and almost get the kids taken away two times and make the husband mad and hurt us and the body. when i was around and married i made him mad a lot and the body got beat and burned and ignored and yelled at and tied up and put in bad situations a lot. they were better at not getting hurt then i was. i tried real hard but kinda figured out after a lot of failing that my job wasn't to be a grown up and i didn't know what to do. so i went to my island and stayed there til one day the keeper went away and i still dunno where he went. he was like a big stone giant guy. sometimes i miss my island.

i came back after a long time but i came back as a baby and i played inside and i stayed away from touchin anything outside so i didn't brake things. the outside life was real bad but i tried to help inside by givin sisters someone to snuggle an cuddle and playin games with them an they were nice to me and we all thought maybe i was the original person in our body but it kinda turned out that im not. we kinda thinked that maybe kenzie was too but she's not either. me and kenzie both weren't very nice to anyone inside or outside cuz we thought we were special and better and had the rest of the sisters to work for us but mostly we don't now and momma don't let that happen and daddy gets really mad when any of us sisters treat the other sisters bad and then there's consequences and trouble and a lot of not fun.

i love my family an our new life. no one hurts us here an i feel safe. momma and daddy don't let me lie, cheat, hide, or boss people around but i still try sometimes an then i end up in trouble but they take care of me and even tho i miss my island inside sometimes i don't ever wanna be away from my momma and daddy cuz even tho i dont always be good, they still want me and love me and buy me yellow things.

my favorite color is yellow. i love most anything yellow.


(kaya = cadie            betsy = zoey)

and we all fall down....

howard's nose, because its cute. he's a 1 year old black lab.

sometimes we fall down. a lot of times we fall down. maybe not so much literally fall down, more figuratively. but still, falling is falling, right?

it was walk time this morning. bella was out and mama suggested that bella take howard with her. howard is one of our family's 4 dogs. he's a beautiful and fun puppy and we adore him a lot. bella initially politely refused. she said she was too nervous to take him because she knows we zone out when walking and she didn't want to risk us dissociating putting him in danger. mama said she was more worried about us dissociating than she was about howard being in any danger because she knows he'd keep us aware and grounded.

so bella thought about it and decided to take him. we had a dog that was our everything. she kept us safe and we were super attached. we had to send her to live in a warmer climate for her (she's safe with someone we know loves her and will dote on her) and we've been hesitant to bond with the family dogs here since then because losing her was hard. it was right, but it was hard.

so anyways... bella leaves the house with howard. he's a little over a year and he's crazy and fun. he's so good tho and walks really good so that's helpful. about a quarter mile in, bella dissociates. howard responds by cutting in front of her and nearly tripping her. she told him he's a good boy but said "maybe next time you can be a bit more gentle?" haha. i thought it was funny. they continued on and she talked to him the whole time but it happened again about a half mile in. this time he nudged and licked our hand. she praised him again. they went a mile and then called it good for the day.

bella, and all of us, realized that walking with howard was actually a lot safer for us. mama said she thinks its a lot safer for us too. we realized today that we really can benefit from bonding with him and he loves the attention and time and exercise. today howard was almost like a service dog to us. if we keep taking him out, it may get to the point where he is basically our service dog.

we are fine in the house by ourselves, especially with the dogs. the only time we lose time and dissociate is outside of the house. so at stores, socializing, at events, etc. we all get overwhelmed by sensory stuff really easily and totally zone out and thats how we end up getting lost or scared and stuff. mostly mama and daddy keep us in eye sight when out but when we go walking we go alone and having howard go with us lets us go alone and have everyone be a lot more comfortable with it.

cadie

Inside Where We Live (Cadence)

graphic made for me by lisha... love you lisha!

thats kinda it. keep calm and let cadie handle it. i like to handle things, especially things that confuse or annoy my sisters. mostly tho, i like to do what i want. my name is cadence danielle. you guys can call me cadie. most people do unless i'm in some kinda trouble or someone's mad at me. 

im about 14 years old. mama says i have a serious attitude problem but daddy says i'm fine for him. kaysie says i save all my attitude for mama but really i don't put that much thought into it. she gives me way too much credit. i just am who i am. i swear too much, talk too much, eat too much, drive too fast, think too fast, and care too much.

i think wolves are the most wonderful creatures anywhere ever. inside i am protected by a lot of wolves. i've long since lost count because when i don't feel safe i find more wolves. most of the time they stay in the shadows and live their lives in the forest but they are never far away when i need them or they sense i'm afraid.

i have trouble making and keeping friends. i have trouble being a part of a family. i love my sisters very much and will be right there if someone causes any of them trouble but i don't mind tormenting them. i'm not much help with the little sisters, and i don't spend a whole lot of time with the older sisters. mostly i hang out with mia and lyssa inside. we have a resort with a water park and most of us "middle" sisters have been hanging out there. i have a room inside the main house that i share with lyssa sometimes, but lyssa is an age slider so she spends sometimes with me and sometimes with the littlest ones in the nursery area where bella keeps an eye on them at night.

out here i manage a lot of our online stuff and make sure our accounts are all in order and stuff. i like technology a lot and understand it pretty good. i have been around and active since like 2005 so i hold a lot of the late years trauma.

i love skulls, all things pink, wolves, butterflies, and shoes. i really love shoes.

love,

cadie

Understanding Ourselves....

Henry David Thoreau said "Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves."

We have spent the better part of our lives lost. We didn't really gain much for understanding ourselves.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with that. I just know that today has been rough, almost from the beginning. Jessa was out this morning, and she's struggling hard emotionally and has been for months now. She faced our first major trigger by  9:30am and then the triggers just kept coming.

We have been working hard at reigning in strong emotion and not forcing anyone to pay for our emotional fall out. We succeeded in keeping our emotions quiet so far today, but not with a lot of struggle and a lot of silent tears. We are losing time badly and aren't even positive who is out. I know right now I'm Layna, but I have no idea who was here or what happened in the last hour. Its Cadie's turn at 3pm and I hope we can get that together. 

I just now remembered that the youngest child is here in the house.  I was in a full blown panic because I could hear noises and I didn't know where they were coming from. I was sure that I was in danger... and it wasn't the fist time today we thought we (or someone we love) was in danger. Being faced with triggers like that, especially the big triggers, ends up causing intense fear, dissociation, and paranoia. When faced with big triggers together, like we did today, we become almost emotionally catatonic, or an emotional volcano. 

I hate when it gets like this. I hate when we are triggered so badly that we slide into black outs and losing time. I hate that we can't handle being alone at home for more than a couple of hours. I hate that we are so pathetic. I hate the messages from J and J. I hate the fact that we are expendable and second string. I hate that we are so easy to push aside and not at all worth chasing or talking things out with. I hate that I can not remember what I'm writing right now and I have to keep re-reading to remember. 

 

I hate that today we feel defeated and either useless or a fuck up (can't agree on which). I don't even know what to write about. Noises keep coming from outside and a couple of the dogs keep whining and crying and I have no idea whats causing any of it. The kids that are home keep asking whats going on and I don't have an answer which is making me feel more scared, pathetic, and useless. I've done chores around then house in hopes of proving that we are worth something.... have any kind of value.  Anything that makes up for these PTSD reactions. 

Its now Cadie's turn but we're having trouble switching.We seem to be doing okay co-con. We just can't totally switch. We are gonna have to work on that because Cadie is less emotional than me and I'm freaking out and no one comes home for another 3 hours. so she'd really be the best option. We will have to keep on working on that. I feel so alone. I can't tell if this headache is from the emotions or the cold we are fighting. My eyes burn too. Hoping its not a fever.

**Layna**

In a Land Far Far Away....

we have a story. a long one. doesn't everyone?

my name is cadie. i'm a member of a well established DID system. the body is 33 years old and the mother of 4 children under the age of 12. our system is made up of 10 of us, including the original. we have been hiding for a very long time and recently that has changed. we no longer have to hide.

for the first time in about 30 years, we are somewhere completely safe and with people who are determined to keep it that way. we are getting help parenting, and learning new skills, and learning to make better choices. in order to do this we had to move 2200 miles from the place this body was born and raised. all of that happened about 20 days ago.

there are 10 of us in this system. im cadie and im 12-14ish but im also an age slider so i end up all kinds of ages, but never over 15. the 10 of us consider ourselves sisters and are pretty much like your typical sibling group. we fight, argue, and irritate, but we protect fiercely.

lexi is 3. she's can't read or type so she won't be contributing here. truthfully she doesn't care about much except the color yellow, toys, and snuggles.

hayley is 4. she likes pink, and unicorns, hello kitty, and snuggles from mommy and daddy.

bri is 5. she likes unicorns, blue, and stickers with her daddy.

kenzie is 6. she's the core/original. she hates her legal name and refuses to have any part of it. she likes to be safe and feel loved.

josslyn is 9. she loves butterflies.

lyssa is 12. she's emotional, argumentative, and confusing.

jenna is 15. she's nurturing and calming. she takes on too much and overthinks everything.

layna is 16ish. she's the secondary protector. she can be cold, hard, and immovable. she often makes people wish they had never met us. she can be completely compliant, or completely definant/rebellious and there's rarely a good explanation of why.

jessa is 17. she's the main protector. up until recently she had no real emotions and no real use for anyone outside of our system.


many of us will probably be writing here. we'll be doing it more for our family and each other than anyone else, but we welcome new friends. see, our recent move, and the circumstances that led up to the recent move, seem to have shaken the system in a huge way. the move is a good thing. the best thing for us, but change seems to hit us hard.

we're finding that not having to hide, while being a relief, is really really really painful to adjust to. its something we need and desperately want, but it's like being in the dark for years and then stepping into the sunlight. its warm and welcoming, but its blinding and painful.

we are living with mama and daddy. they adopted us and are teaching us all kinds of things we should have learned forever ago. they accept and love each of us, and all 4 of our babies. they are amazing people with infinite amounts of patience, while keeping control and structure in place which is something we have never had. the structure and rules are comfortable like a hug. the organization here is intriguing because we've never experienced anything like it. the whole experience has almost been surreal so far, and is almost too good to be true. their neighbor is a goofy guy who has fallen into the "manny" role with surprising ease.

too good to be true.

we are terrified of fucking this up. we are so afraid of screwing it up, in fact, that we're an emotional disaster. to be fair there are other reasons for the emotional chaos right now too but that's a huge one. we don't deserve anything like this. we don't have a history of being good girls or making good choices. what right do we have to such an incredible life?

im having a hard time centering my thoughts i think. earlier today jessa fell apart and her emotions are affecting me a lot. she's afraid that she's messed up a lot of stuff and momma left to go run errands and jessa was scared to be alone.... she was sure she was going to fail at her job protecting us. right now we kinda don't need a protector because we're well protected and i think that's actually a huge part of jessa's problem. she's wondering what her role is. we're all wondering where we fit in and if we actually belong because we don't seem to have a purpose and we definitely aren't very useful here. when jessa freaked, layna went to comfort her and now we have no idea where either of them are and that kinda sucks and is really scary because we were alone and because we love them both so much and jessa is our gatekeeper. i don't think she realizes how good she does.

jenna has been with the littles, keeping them calm. they were really scared. a lot of this is scary but not in a bad way. its hard to explain. i just lost my train of thought tho and this is really long enough right now.


~cadence danielle~