I read people all over the place who talk about their host, their original part, the first part present in the body before there was a split. In English TDI groups they talk a lot about this, "the host" and I also find it in autobiographies of TDI people.
I don't like this concept at all !!! This would imply that a part is more important than the others, has more legitimacy to have the body ...
For me, adhering to this amounts to perpetuating dissociative barriers!
It may make sense to speak of the original part when the dissociation is in the form of post-traumatic stress disorder and the dissociative parts are just bits of memories and feelings, emotions. But in the case of a DID where the dissociative parts are capable of independent thinking and acting, I don't think that term is a good one.
The trauma was experienced by the person as a whole, why should we give more legitimacy and existence to one part rather than another? It comes down to separating and differentiating what was experienced, the good things for "the host" and the bad things for "the other parties ...
I think when we are born we are all capable of being angry, happy, serious, attentive, observant, caring, listening, defensive, protective of ourselves or others ... then over time, our behavior is smoothed out depending on what we are going through. We learn to take care of ourselves but also to share, to protect ourselves but also to forge relationships, to defend ourselves and to trust. We learn to live in society, to respect its rules, its prohibitions and to know our rights. By learning to recognize our emotions, we can temper them and adapt them to the situation and thus we become a "normal human being", one and the same in all that we feel, say and do. I quite like the image of the orange district. Originally, each child is an orange, each neighborhood represents the palette of emotions and feelings that he has in his possession. Initially, the districts are not completely glued, split from one to the other, they are under construction. Then as they grow up, they form a whole, a sphere, the orange, which comes to life as "I". But if in our childhood, we live traumas, and that certain emotions which we feel do not have the right to be expressed then the orange remains separate and each quarter sees itself as "I", the orange does not have. no skin to close it and the quarters are thus detached from one another.
I see the goal of 3-phase therapy as “putting those pieces back together”, those “orange wedges” until we come to be “I” with all that we feel, think, live.
When I read that word "host", I hear parts screaming in my head.
Like that, the "original part", the "true part" of this body would be the one which did not have to live the sufferings and the terrors? So all the others would only be "parasites" that will have to integrate into this original part?
But by what right?
Without us, without the parties who agreed to live and bear the brunt of the trauma, the host would have died! We the parties who have accepted to be strong, courageous, surviving we would in fact be insignificant parties, without values?
Without us, she would have died! We took the weight of the pain because she said she couldn't, that it was too hard, too excruciating physically and emotionally to bear! We did it because she was a coward! She's the one who called us!
and now it would be she who would reap all the laurels? That little coward, fragile and insignificant? Without us it would be six feet underground, puffed up by worms for a long time!
Why would one part be more important than another? In fact what I understand is that all my parts are important, all my parts are "me". And it is thanks to each of them that I survived! I am the "little cowards", I am "mum", I am "little cages", I am "the one with her blue coat that covers peace and love", I am the angry "warriors", I am the "intellectuals", I am "the guy", I am "the one who puts to sleep", I am "the one who freezes the feelings", I am "the rude", I am "the sexis", I am "the controls ", I am the" observers "... But PAN have no more legitimacy than my EPs. Each had a role to play in my survival, each was important, each is the "original self". Speaking in terms of "host" is like continuing to think that some things are "me" and others are "foreign" to me, not "me".
And last point, to speak of a host amounts to withdrawing the choice from a party. Basically, a part would have to integrate others, the parties would be forced to integrate into this one ... Why always want to control everything, put everything in "legitimate / not legitimate", "good / not good" boxes? It is yet another way of perpetuating this Manichean vision that we have while in order to cure DID for me it is just the opposite that we must do! We must help us no longer separate ourselves, no longer see ourselves as foreign to certain thoughts, experiences, and feelings. We must relearn to see ourselves as "one" and only one! We have ONE body, we are ONE. We are the sum of our dissociative parts. All our emotions, our experiences, our thoughts, our actions are "I, me, Leelah".
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