An update to my dissociation

This is a mess of a writing. I have been talking with others about dissociation. And I have been paying more attention to the role it plays in my life.

I am real. No doubt about that.

However I am still not done. I am not fully me. I need to keep building who I am. Right now I find myself dissociation in the only arena that truly matters: When I meet new people.

I notice how my personality, my expression clams up like crazy around new people. Still timid about rejection sure. Those I am more interested in pose a greater threat. More so, I am afraid to make choices with consequences. Because I don't yet know who I am I clam up and feel disconnected when I need to make those decisions with new people.

Secondarily, is the issue of how much "help" a person needs. When it is clear to me the person I am with is struggling with something, I easily bring out my i n s p i r a t i o n and fill the interaction with it. However when someone doesn't obviously need that I don't really know who I want to be. In this insecurity I again clam up and feel removed. I am shy, reserved, and timid to take any steps.

progress though

I know I am making progress. I have examples where I have been the one to take a step forward. To ask for something I want and see what happens. To say something about a person which may be hurtful or amazing with not a clear answer.

I struggle the most around the issue of sexuality and intimacy. I clearly want that. But I am not yet sure on what terms, and how I want it to happen. I need touch, but am always afraid of asking for it. I tell myself I would rather build a strong network of people who like and respect me, than to potentially lose alliances in the name of sex. Sex after all isn't that important to me.

non-disruptive dissociation

While I still expereince episodes of disconnection, they do not bother me so. Because I am still real. I am not dissociating into depersonalization, but retreating due to fear. And fear, is the entire beast.

I am currently with an older friend who has had one hell of a life. He's lived in many countries, had successfull life, relationships, and freedom of expression. He makes it painfully clear how someone with a less shameful/fearful childhood cannot truly grasp the struggle of fighting through DPDR. Sometimes it really hurts to listen to his stories. Sometimes it hurts even more when he tries to give me answers which are not so easy for me to perform. My foundation is different.

And that is the point. My starting point is fundamentally different than people without a lifelong history of DPDR. My basement, my foundation starts there. And this is what I must carry with me as I build the mansion on top of it. I will always be fighting it in some sense. Thankfully I can see the end of the build. The mansion is complete and I rarely am effected by the roots. I have already seen so much progress. And I know in another five years or so I will be drastically different. I will conquer the effects of my foundation.

Just gotta keep fighting