Dealing with Black Alters

Being a survivor of ritualistic abuse, there was just so much pain and horror. The stories just seemed to get more and more horrific. I was running a delicate balance within my system trying to keep the destructive personalities at bay while I worked through the issues that gave them power.

I've been asked by jumpinginpuddles on a comment on yesterday's post, More on Stage Two of My "Real" Therapy to describe how I kept my destructive alters under control.

First off, we had to come together in a united front. Putting aside individual differences was most important. The overall health of the entire system had to become more important than individual wants and needs. There was no way we could heal with a bunch of internal fighting.

My healthy personalities had the undivided co-operation of all of my internal victim children. Those wounded children believed what the healthy personalities taught them about therapy, the process and the healing.

They believed therapy was a safe place and they would not get hurt there. They believed that therapy was the way to heal from this horrible abuse and the people there would understand and support us no matter what secrets we held. They believed that the therapist and the people in the support group would be there for each and every one of us.

Those beliefs kept the system calm and quiet. No one ventured forward unless they were instructed to by my therapist personality. While a personality might trigger off of something externally, it only came to the forefront when directed by the internal therapist. Feelings were only dealt with when it was safe. Those things made it harder for the dark ones to reek havoc.

In addition the young alters would no longer listen to the enforcers nor would they talk to them. The only internal communication was positive and about the therapy and healing process. This meant that all internal self deprecating behavior was stopped. The rules of my new rule book were strictly adhered to. (See the posts on Garbage Feelings) That meant no calling ourselves ugly or stupid or any other negative things.

This co-operation took the power away from the enforcers within. Just like external offenders they needed the personalities divided, in pain and fighting amongst themselves so that they could take over the body. When the system was united, the enforcers were crippled.

Without inner turmoil, the enforcers had nothing to feed off of. Just like external victims who learn to use their personal power to take charge of their lives and heal, my internal victims took back their personal power and overcame the enforcers.

To convince the children that they were indeed safe, the problematic personalities were imprisoned in separate rooms but away from each other, within the system. Huge brick walls were built in front of the doors and even the smallest children participated in adding bricks onto those walls.

Also, pages were added to my new rule book telling the enforcers they were not welcome. The children did artwork on those pages and as many pages were added as children who needed them just like the other rules. Some of the children made themselves scary masks to wear against the dark ones. Others just told them to go away and whatever else came to their minds.

All of these things took the power away from the dark ones. And as long as our system operated within these boundaries, we were able to keep them at bay. Despite the tremendous programming by the cult to assure that I would self destruct before I ever told their secrets, I didn't have a single attempt on my life, no cutting, no self destruct.

multiple personality disorder MPD dissociative Identity disorder did depression therapy