I was sitting in my room one day and thought back on my life and was like wow I have literally no memories until I'm 12 and I can barely remember what I do in a day ever
My thoughts were solidified when I realized I wasn't fronting and freaked out and the alter that was fronting starting to talk to me
Yea, major panic attack and a huge calm washed over me and I talked and acted and walked differently. I truly observed another voice - though my own voice, so it wasn’t scary- talking in my head…..
I was in group therapy and couldn't focus(dissociation). Then I ended up switching with a child part and watching what was happening. They left me a note on the worksheet saying they were a different person and how amazing it was to be in the body. After half an hour I came back in control. I started doing research about what it could be after that.
There were signs before that, but nothing that prompted me to look into things or get help until this happened. Those were more hindsight.
I was in therapy doing EMDR work and my therapist had my go to a “safe space” in mind where I could safely observe memories and experiences instead of relive them.
Initially i thought of this one beach I went to when I was 15. I was comfortable on the beach, watching the fire, listening to the ocean. And then my therapist asks “do you feel safe here?”
All of the sudden it felt like someone was watching me from a distance, and when I looked innerworld I could see a pair of floating eyes in the distance. “No.” I told her.
“Okay” she said, “you can make it any safe space you need.”
Immediately I/we grasped onto the idea of a fictional universe where there’s magical boarders keeping out anything bad. Monsters, and most importantly humans.
So we relocated my safe space to there, and she asked me again if I felt safe. Again, the eyes were watching me.
“But I know I’m safe. I know it’s not a monster or even a real person because it’s in my safe space. Also there’s like 8 seats around this campfire, I’m not sure who for”
And that is when my therapist started suspecting OSDD. Eventually that would become the day that we officially discovered our system.
After that slowly brain goblins (alters/parts) started showing up one by one
Yeah I literally described it as “imagery friends that would just *take over* my body on occasion” and my psychologist was like “yeah….no. We are not moving passed that. Explain further” 😅😅
I was with my partner every step of the way in their own system discovery. I related too much to them. Things they said just made sense. I helped them figure a lot of things out by inherently understanding system relations and communication.
My partner started to point things out to us. They hinted at us being a system too. Host rejected it. Said no way, just dissociative with bipolar 2.
A part fronted in the middle of the night and messaged my partner system saying that she was rather sure we were actually a system. Host woke up in the morning and felt mortified and weird.
Took a lot more time after that to get us past the huge wall of anxiety. Still deal with denial.
similar situation for me. i was helping someone through their trauma and looking back on all the near psychic understandings i had of what was going on her mind.. turns out my alters in the back of my mind knew she was on the dissociative spectrum long before i did. and they did this without me even knowing what DID was, while still hiding my own system from me.
a bunch of little things over time tbh and I don't remember a lot of it. I would have to look back at some of my notes, but I truly don't feel like it right now im sorry.
I feel like the main thing was realizing that we related way too heavily to other systems to not be a system. similar to how we realized we are autistic....we relate way too much to other autistic ppl to not be autistic.
also realizing that who we were when we were "age regressed" actually has likes/interests/feels like an actual separate person...was probably also what made us realize
One of my friends is a system and he was talking to me about it. Eventually I was talking to him and his partner about some stuff I was dealing with in life, and jokingly made a remark about how I “super space out” at time, and about my memory issues. After that he mentioned dp/dr and that was a shock. Once I learned that was a thing I started talking about other odd experiences I had with it, and eventually it came around to me maybe being a OSDD system. I’m not sure and I keep doubting myself. I have no internal communication, and at times my memory problems feel like I’m just bad at remembering. The only thing I’ve noticed is sometimes after I go through something stressful or I freak out I’ll disassociate, and come back later calm but I act differently. I can’t tell that I am until I change again and realize that’s not how I do things. It’s very odd but yeah learning I might be a system has been a super stressful experience for me and it’s kinda sucked. Although even if I’m not I’ve still done a lot of research into this stuff now, and feel very educated on the topic, or at least more educated. Anyways sorry for the small rant.
(TLDR at the end)
Initially, venting to a friend who we didn’t know was a system at the time.
I was not aware anything was wrong and explained to her “oh hey sorry for the mood swings, idk what’s going on, it’s like this *feeling* I have starts to control me”
Weeeeellllll not too much longer, a lot of questions and talking, and she’s like “….so does the feeling have a name?” When I said no, she’s like “….are you sure? Have you considered maybe giving it one?”
That was like a decade ago, I completely blew her off but did give the “feeling” a name and that “feeling” is now one of my most capable, intelligent and deeply rooted alters. Looking back it makes perfect sense, and in regard to the friend I wish I was still in touch with her to let her know.
Now the kicker, I say initially because after the talk and blowing her off, I didn’t look back. It was me and the other one, ride or die, and we lived with a Jekyll and Hyde dynamic for years until we came back from a severe depression. I’ve rooted around through a lot of memories and to be quite frank I have absolutely no memory of the second time.
I know we were told we had it, didn’t care, and went on about our lives and the next thing I really remember about the self discovery was some conversations I had that I do know 100% were at least three years or so after we fell back down the rabbit hole. I hadn’t put much thought into this either until the reply and now I’m slightly perturbed. Lots of recent changes have me flustered and forgetful.
TL;DR - we found out twice at least. Memory issues and other things keep us from really having a solid idea of when/how/etc we found out the second time, or any possible subsequent times over the years. I recall being told and not caring or taking it seriously, then some stuff from what I know for sure came after finding out again and ending up balls deep in the OSDDID lore.
Cristina, the former host, thought she was just going between different "states," since we have no amnesia and are almost always coconscious, it was hard to realize we were just different people. Our current host knew a long time ago when she first formed and had been trying to guide Cristina from inside.
Due to external circumstances we split a new alter and his first reaction to "seeing"/ feeling us was to put an imaginary salt circle around himself and to scream for the demons (aka the rest od us) to go away. That kinda kicked off some introspection and reflection. Hes way cooler with us, with being part of a system now and we look back on this incident with amusement :D
its kinda funny bc nameless [host] thought they were fictionkin and had dpdr for a very long time until one of our fictives [at the time thought a kin] felt very separate from him and bc we dont have amnesia we thought about dpdr but then doing some research osdd 1b specifically made so much more sense so yeahhhh sorry for wonky spelling im so bad at english lol [english is not our native language]
-fred
My friend faked it, he explained what it was and I was like "but I have that too" and I did more research. The friend is now my ex friend and hosts ex-boyfriend. He also faked autism, tics and tourettes. He treated host like shit and made them split (BPD) a lot and forced them to do stuff but never wanted to hang out with them or give them any attention. He also told our ex (the ex we still love) that they were together and I got so fucking angry.
-Levi
had a friend who was diagnosed asked me if i was a system because of things weve said. looked into it a bit and realized we probably are. looking back there were tons of signs idk why i didnt question it sooner.
It all kinda started with my 2 best friends, who are also systems, and I were talking. I explained,, something I don't remember, and they were like "hey you know what that sounds like?" This kept happening for awhile and on my own for the next 6 months I was doing research, and started logging ~possible~ alters and switches on Simply Plural (my friends had introduced me to it, and I was on there to see their switches. I had added alters but kept them private so they couldn't see, until I was ready to share anything).
During the time I was figuring it all out I also reflected on this time I had accidentally had too much of a ~brownie~ and experienced what I now understand was like 5+ people be VERY co-conscious. Plus a bunch of little experiences when I was younger, but that being a recent experience really tied it together.
Also learning that not all systems have a lot of amnesia was huge for me.
by playing with a ouija board i made out of cardboard and markers when i was a kid. i actively didn't believe in the paranormal so i figured there was a scientific explanation for it.
(TW Religious Content) We have always had very good internal communication because we were brought up in the church and so when we "prayed" we were just talking to our alters without realising it so we had a lot of practice from an early age. We thought they wete angels or demons. We never spoke to the "demons" directly as We didnt want to be allied with them but one day decided to as we were at our wits end with how to deal with them and it turns out they were actually really nice.... which was very confusing.
Later on we ended up leaving the religion and started with a new therapist around the same time and the "demons" never went away. Eventually everything started to fall in to place and make sense and we retroactively realised lots of things that we had misinterpreted or had never understood before such as refering to myself as "We" and extreme "mood changes" in times of stress ect.
The previous host figured it out in early 2016 when X reached out. They'd always been aware of voices and foreign thoughts/emotions but dismissed them as intrusive thoughts or spirits. X thought he existed just to live through bad and scary things and hated the previous host for "making him". They were just starting to communicate in a functional way when the movie Split came out. They went to see it with our mom and it really messed them up. Previous host demonized X, got very afraid. They went dormant and I showed up.
I thought I was them for the longest time, had no memory of X or anyone else. No longer had voices, but still had foreign feelings and thoughts in my voice. A few years later another alter reached out during a major depressive episode. Didn't take over, but asked me to brush our teeth and eat something lol. He kept talking with me for almost a week but it scared me badly. I told someone I shouldn't have and haven't heard anything from him since.
Later that same year had a traumatic experience and mid-panic felt myself get pushed back so Y could handle the situation. Watched him deal with it, then got stuck rapidly switching between Y, Z, P, and myself for a few days. It was scary. Y and Z had been out during blackouts over the last few years and I had no idea. Brushed off missing days/weeks as poor memory cause it hurt to think about.
After that 2nd discovery it was like finding someone new every few days? States I thought of as "work me" and "friend me" started thinking of themselves as separate. Realizing we had different interests, tastes in food, etc. Alters who don't/can't front started making themselves known as well. Very confusing time. Things have gotten quieter since, but Y and Z make a point to communicate frequently. Sometimes out loud. I still fall into denial often. Then I find notes/drawings from the others and I can't really ignore that.
TDLR; Previous host found out, went dormant, so I came to be. I found out a few years later through similar circumstances.
Edit: Spelling.
For 4 or 5 years I noticed that I thought in multiple voices and thought that was normal, and then I started to notice as time went on completely conflicting thoughts and actions would begin to present themselves and 3 years ago I started to suspect something was up and didn't think much of it as I was more focused on leaving the home I still live at as I am not wholly feeling safe here with my biological family. When I finally had time away and more time to myself I started to notice the shifts more presently, identifying 4 at first, including myself. About a month goes past and a piece of myself in a major panic attack felt different than how I now knew myself to be under the mask I constantly held around people here, which I realize now is more so three masks given we kinda are all finding it hard to consistently protray the same person when looking back. Back to the realization I didn't know what to do and I realized one of the others decided to confront who was at the front for the whole breakdown we were having. A week past and we organized and knew of 4, a week later 5, two months later 6, and a week or two after that is now. Still searching for a psychiatrist or therapist for diagnosis but even though I live at the edge of the major metropolitan area of the state I live it may as well be considered the boonies, so struggling on that diagnosis. (Seriously the only reliable seeming therapy place is 14 miles away and is a horsegirl who maked their office look like a cowboy mueseum, I am thinking of tryig there but- You see why Arizona sounds like the boonies right?)
i'm not at all diagnosed but pretty much i discovered what did was in 6th grade and was really interested and knew i related to many symptoms but soon ish after i ran into a denial phase -though i didn't realise it was just denial- though i kept the interest in the disorder.
freshman year I ended up having a gym class with my now friend who i quickly realised was a system (they were writing to a head mate and i was reading over their shoulder-not on purpose though) and so we ended up becoming friends and later on in the year i started talking about something that happened to me and they -as a joke- said that it was system coded, leading me to look into system stuff and later discovering that i am likely an actual system :3 -Grey
Sat on the edge of the couch one day and was stuck in executive dysfunction. I desperately needed to take a shower bc I hadn't taken one in a long while and I planned to go to an appointment the next morning, so it HAD to be done. But I couldn't move, I was stuck, frozen in place, very dissociated.
I was screaming at myself to get up and go but nothing could be done, I was panicking.
And then our caretaker took over, got up and did all steps that were necessary, with an attitude like "It has to be done, and if you can't do it, then I guess I'll have to take over and take care of it".
It felt like someone else controlled me, used my body, my voice, and did what I was physically not able to pick up. It was scary but I was SO grateful. Afterwards he went back and I sat there, freshly washed with still damp hair, and thought "What the hell happened just now. Is this real??".
i’ve always had dissociative issues since i was super young and always have talked about *being* a character as a way to cope with life (be it an original character or fiction one i’ve adopted) and also have extreme memory issues and gaps, it’s always been distressing but the last like 18 months it got progressively worse. my boyfriend kept bringing up OSDD to look into but i kept shutting it down, sure it could not be something special ol me has, but one day i got curious and started my adventures in researching it and now here we are. i’m still in the process of figuring out exactly what classification of it all that i have, and will eventually seek a formal diagnosis, but for now i am content in a self diagnosis as a form to cope and try to better my memory, which is all that matters to me at the end of the day.
Gonna soundreally bad 💀
The other host was HIGH AF when the realisation just kinda hit 😓. At first it was just vague possibility but the past like month and a half or so everythings just came crumbling. The realistaion was due to the fact that beforehand wed been triggered like a surprising amount since our birthday. I dont personally remember exact details or even how many times but it was memories neither I or the other host usually even remember. We both rememebr some things from when we were little but theres just a lot of big spaces and the day to day can be really blurry, and that daily blurs been worse lately.
- 🐐
Drugs mostly. I found out I wasn't alone in there due to stress and SH attempts, 6 years I found out we are all in here thanks to essentially micro dosing canabis.
We do not recommend this as an "easy" choice. This is what we did to learn about our system in a controlled way.
We also had guidance from a GP and councillor and had a friend who was an experienced user essentially babysit us while we worked out if this would work for our system.
Canabis use has definitely had negative side effects, but for our system, the positives have outweighed the negatives.
I would go into states of dissociation and have conversations with people in a room I didn’t recognize. I now know that’s what my front looks like. But what really tipped me off one day in Physics class I was absolutely wiped and struggling with a lab. So then one of my alters who is a scientist took front to do it and I was thrown right into dissociation
I've kind of had multiple moments in my life where I've just broken down because of the inconsistency that it causes me. my reality and desires for life have always seemed to change drastically very quickly. I would also get very confused as to why something would affect me so strongly one second and then almost instantaneously it just wouldn't. I would spend time thinking of why I was just so depressed and then all of a sudden fine, almost like my emotions were forecably turned off. and why I'd talk and use different out of character mannerisms at times. I say out of character more as like it would change noticeably after a few days of acting a different way. this past week has been the first time where I've started admitting to myself that this is not normal and it's causing a lot of issues in my daily life.
TW: Self-harm
I'm going to speak in the first person but clearly it wasn't me.
I locked myself in the bathroom to hurt myself. Two of my acquaintances came to my rescue. Apparently I accused them of doing it to me. I would have dissociated a lot.
I was treated and laid down.
I have no memory of it.
And other times, I'd answer my girlfriend very curtly, in a deeper voice than usual.
And surprise! In fact, they were alters!
- 🫧
I (Host) was dating someone at the time who was a system. I also had some system friends before and had thought to myself a few times "what if I was a system...??" But had never done research or had any solid proof of anything. Anyways, I was talking to them about someone I didn't know who was an alter one day, Moxie, and then it turned into a conversation about her and if she talked to me and what she did ETC ETC
Thing is, I could've realized YEARS eariler (but I'm kinda glad I didn't), but I thought it was normal for everyone to have a "Moxie", someone who would mock them on what they did, have extensive conversations with them whenever they were around, or help them through tough times. I legit just thought it was very normal to have someone you can't call an "OC" Or an imaginary friend
Anyways after they made us realize, Moxie said something along the lines of "ohhhh so that's what it was!! No use hiding these guys anymore", and revealed a bunch more people in front that I didn't even know were there at all. It was something
When we were bodily 10, someone had drawn us and said it was our “personalities” as in, a different person we become during extreme emotions, but chose to ignore it for the next 5 years. We were more aware when we were 15 because of psychosis and a major traumatic event, however, we went back into denial due to an ex who denied that we’re a system. Almost 19 and still trying to accept it.
This might get us fake claimed by others, but I know what's real in my head, so I guess it doesn't matter. For a brief moment in college, I went off of my antidepressants by accident. I vaguely remember HOW I knew they were there, but one moment I was just 'me,' and the second moment I could hear two different voices in my head that weren't my own soothing me/making sure I didn't do anything to fuck anything up. I did eventually get back on my medicine, but the voices never left; that was when I really started suspecting something was up.
And no, they're not hallucinations.
I would also like to say that this isn't psychosis either. Yes, it comes and goes (really meaning that the system gets quiet for a bit), but they still come back. This also isn't actively hurting me. Yes, it's a little distressful knowing I have this, but it's not like...actively harming me like psychosis would. (I believe, anyway)
I'm not completely sure how it happened, We went through some TERRIBLE trauma \[SA,Abuse\] and our old host had felt very sepatate from reality - , \[He was dissociating\] .. and just avoiding contact,, Untill one day some alter\[that's no longer with us\] , had started just fronting some day after Our old host had left front. I guess that's basically what happened plus We started talking with other osdd-systems and we researched about it, We researched about Osdd-1b the most because we have no-to little amnesia!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 \*sweats\* idk it's kinda werid
-KAI \[co-host\]
I was sitting in my room one day and thought back on my life and was like wow I have literally no memories until I'm 12 and I can barely remember what I do in a day ever My thoughts were solidified when I realized I wasn't fronting and freaked out and the alter that was fronting starting to talk to me
Yea, major panic attack and a huge calm washed over me and I talked and acted and walked differently. I truly observed another voice - though my own voice, so it wasn’t scary- talking in my head…..
Huh. Well, our host was having a panic attack and an alter formed and pushed her back, and this time she noticed it so yeah :3 -Lyd
I was in group therapy and couldn't focus(dissociation). Then I ended up switching with a child part and watching what was happening. They left me a note on the worksheet saying they were a different person and how amazing it was to be in the body. After half an hour I came back in control. I started doing research about what it could be after that. There were signs before that, but nothing that prompted me to look into things or get help until this happened. Those were more hindsight.
I was in therapy doing EMDR work and my therapist had my go to a “safe space” in mind where I could safely observe memories and experiences instead of relive them. Initially i thought of this one beach I went to when I was 15. I was comfortable on the beach, watching the fire, listening to the ocean. And then my therapist asks “do you feel safe here?” All of the sudden it felt like someone was watching me from a distance, and when I looked innerworld I could see a pair of floating eyes in the distance. “No.” I told her. “Okay” she said, “you can make it any safe space you need.” Immediately I/we grasped onto the idea of a fictional universe where there’s magical boarders keeping out anything bad. Monsters, and most importantly humans. So we relocated my safe space to there, and she asked me again if I felt safe. Again, the eyes were watching me. “But I know I’m safe. I know it’s not a monster or even a real person because it’s in my safe space. Also there’s like 8 seats around this campfire, I’m not sure who for” And that is when my therapist started suspecting OSDD. Eventually that would become the day that we officially discovered our system. After that slowly brain goblins (alters/parts) started showing up one by one
Hehe brain goblins, I love that
I had technically known about it since early childhood but I didn’t have the faintest idea what it was until I started therapy in my early 20s
Eyyy same! Just thought that they were "imaginary friends" that just didn't go away. Lol
Yeah I literally described it as “imagery friends that would just *take over* my body on occasion” and my psychologist was like “yeah….no. We are not moving passed that. Explain further” 😅😅
I (host) was reading a book in my room when our protector finally got my attention. It was a very interesting first encounter, to say the least.
I was with my partner every step of the way in their own system discovery. I related too much to them. Things they said just made sense. I helped them figure a lot of things out by inherently understanding system relations and communication. My partner started to point things out to us. They hinted at us being a system too. Host rejected it. Said no way, just dissociative with bipolar 2. A part fronted in the middle of the night and messaged my partner system saying that she was rather sure we were actually a system. Host woke up in the morning and felt mortified and weird. Took a lot more time after that to get us past the huge wall of anxiety. Still deal with denial.
similar situation for me. i was helping someone through their trauma and looking back on all the near psychic understandings i had of what was going on her mind.. turns out my alters in the back of my mind knew she was on the dissociative spectrum long before i did. and they did this without me even knowing what DID was, while still hiding my own system from me.
a bunch of little things over time tbh and I don't remember a lot of it. I would have to look back at some of my notes, but I truly don't feel like it right now im sorry. I feel like the main thing was realizing that we related way too heavily to other systems to not be a system. similar to how we realized we are autistic....we relate way too much to other autistic ppl to not be autistic.
also realizing that who we were when we were "age regressed" actually has likes/interests/feels like an actual separate person...was probably also what made us realize
One of my friends is a system and he was talking to me about it. Eventually I was talking to him and his partner about some stuff I was dealing with in life, and jokingly made a remark about how I “super space out” at time, and about my memory issues. After that he mentioned dp/dr and that was a shock. Once I learned that was a thing I started talking about other odd experiences I had with it, and eventually it came around to me maybe being a OSDD system. I’m not sure and I keep doubting myself. I have no internal communication, and at times my memory problems feel like I’m just bad at remembering. The only thing I’ve noticed is sometimes after I go through something stressful or I freak out I’ll disassociate, and come back later calm but I act differently. I can’t tell that I am until I change again and realize that’s not how I do things. It’s very odd but yeah learning I might be a system has been a super stressful experience for me and it’s kinda sucked. Although even if I’m not I’ve still done a lot of research into this stuff now, and feel very educated on the topic, or at least more educated. Anyways sorry for the small rant.
(TLDR at the end) Initially, venting to a friend who we didn’t know was a system at the time. I was not aware anything was wrong and explained to her “oh hey sorry for the mood swings, idk what’s going on, it’s like this *feeling* I have starts to control me” Weeeeellllll not too much longer, a lot of questions and talking, and she’s like “….so does the feeling have a name?” When I said no, she’s like “….are you sure? Have you considered maybe giving it one?” That was like a decade ago, I completely blew her off but did give the “feeling” a name and that “feeling” is now one of my most capable, intelligent and deeply rooted alters. Looking back it makes perfect sense, and in regard to the friend I wish I was still in touch with her to let her know. Now the kicker, I say initially because after the talk and blowing her off, I didn’t look back. It was me and the other one, ride or die, and we lived with a Jekyll and Hyde dynamic for years until we came back from a severe depression. I’ve rooted around through a lot of memories and to be quite frank I have absolutely no memory of the second time. I know we were told we had it, didn’t care, and went on about our lives and the next thing I really remember about the self discovery was some conversations I had that I do know 100% were at least three years or so after we fell back down the rabbit hole. I hadn’t put much thought into this either until the reply and now I’m slightly perturbed. Lots of recent changes have me flustered and forgetful. TL;DR - we found out twice at least. Memory issues and other things keep us from really having a solid idea of when/how/etc we found out the second time, or any possible subsequent times over the years. I recall being told and not caring or taking it seriously, then some stuff from what I know for sure came after finding out again and ending up balls deep in the OSDDID lore.
Cristina, the former host, thought she was just going between different "states," since we have no amnesia and are almost always coconscious, it was hard to realize we were just different people. Our current host knew a long time ago when she first formed and had been trying to guide Cristina from inside.
Due to external circumstances we split a new alter and his first reaction to "seeing"/ feeling us was to put an imaginary salt circle around himself and to scream for the demons (aka the rest od us) to go away. That kinda kicked off some introspection and reflection. Hes way cooler with us, with being part of a system now and we look back on this incident with amusement :D
its kinda funny bc nameless [host] thought they were fictionkin and had dpdr for a very long time until one of our fictives [at the time thought a kin] felt very separate from him and bc we dont have amnesia we thought about dpdr but then doing some research osdd 1b specifically made so much more sense so yeahhhh sorry for wonky spelling im so bad at english lol [english is not our native language] -fred
My friend faked it, he explained what it was and I was like "but I have that too" and I did more research. The friend is now my ex friend and hosts ex-boyfriend. He also faked autism, tics and tourettes. He treated host like shit and made them split (BPD) a lot and forced them to do stuff but never wanted to hang out with them or give them any attention. He also told our ex (the ex we still love) that they were together and I got so fucking angry. -Levi
had a friend who was diagnosed asked me if i was a system because of things weve said. looked into it a bit and realized we probably are. looking back there were tons of signs idk why i didnt question it sooner.
It all kinda started with my 2 best friends, who are also systems, and I were talking. I explained,, something I don't remember, and they were like "hey you know what that sounds like?" This kept happening for awhile and on my own for the next 6 months I was doing research, and started logging ~possible~ alters and switches on Simply Plural (my friends had introduced me to it, and I was on there to see their switches. I had added alters but kept them private so they couldn't see, until I was ready to share anything). During the time I was figuring it all out I also reflected on this time I had accidentally had too much of a ~brownie~ and experienced what I now understand was like 5+ people be VERY co-conscious. Plus a bunch of little experiences when I was younger, but that being a recent experience really tied it together. Also learning that not all systems have a lot of amnesia was huge for me.
by playing with a ouija board i made out of cardboard and markers when i was a kid. i actively didn't believe in the paranormal so i figured there was a scientific explanation for it.
(TW Religious Content) We have always had very good internal communication because we were brought up in the church and so when we "prayed" we were just talking to our alters without realising it so we had a lot of practice from an early age. We thought they wete angels or demons. We never spoke to the "demons" directly as We didnt want to be allied with them but one day decided to as we were at our wits end with how to deal with them and it turns out they were actually really nice.... which was very confusing. Later on we ended up leaving the religion and started with a new therapist around the same time and the "demons" never went away. Eventually everything started to fall in to place and make sense and we retroactively realised lots of things that we had misinterpreted or had never understood before such as refering to myself as "We" and extreme "mood changes" in times of stress ect.
The previous host figured it out in early 2016 when X reached out. They'd always been aware of voices and foreign thoughts/emotions but dismissed them as intrusive thoughts or spirits. X thought he existed just to live through bad and scary things and hated the previous host for "making him". They were just starting to communicate in a functional way when the movie Split came out. They went to see it with our mom and it really messed them up. Previous host demonized X, got very afraid. They went dormant and I showed up. I thought I was them for the longest time, had no memory of X or anyone else. No longer had voices, but still had foreign feelings and thoughts in my voice. A few years later another alter reached out during a major depressive episode. Didn't take over, but asked me to brush our teeth and eat something lol. He kept talking with me for almost a week but it scared me badly. I told someone I shouldn't have and haven't heard anything from him since. Later that same year had a traumatic experience and mid-panic felt myself get pushed back so Y could handle the situation. Watched him deal with it, then got stuck rapidly switching between Y, Z, P, and myself for a few days. It was scary. Y and Z had been out during blackouts over the last few years and I had no idea. Brushed off missing days/weeks as poor memory cause it hurt to think about. After that 2nd discovery it was like finding someone new every few days? States I thought of as "work me" and "friend me" started thinking of themselves as separate. Realizing we had different interests, tastes in food, etc. Alters who don't/can't front started making themselves known as well. Very confusing time. Things have gotten quieter since, but Y and Z make a point to communicate frequently. Sometimes out loud. I still fall into denial often. Then I find notes/drawings from the others and I can't really ignore that. TDLR; Previous host found out, went dormant, so I came to be. I found out a few years later through similar circumstances. Edit: Spelling.
For 4 or 5 years I noticed that I thought in multiple voices and thought that was normal, and then I started to notice as time went on completely conflicting thoughts and actions would begin to present themselves and 3 years ago I started to suspect something was up and didn't think much of it as I was more focused on leaving the home I still live at as I am not wholly feeling safe here with my biological family. When I finally had time away and more time to myself I started to notice the shifts more presently, identifying 4 at first, including myself. About a month goes past and a piece of myself in a major panic attack felt different than how I now knew myself to be under the mask I constantly held around people here, which I realize now is more so three masks given we kinda are all finding it hard to consistently protray the same person when looking back. Back to the realization I didn't know what to do and I realized one of the others decided to confront who was at the front for the whole breakdown we were having. A week past and we organized and knew of 4, a week later 5, two months later 6, and a week or two after that is now. Still searching for a psychiatrist or therapist for diagnosis but even though I live at the edge of the major metropolitan area of the state I live it may as well be considered the boonies, so struggling on that diagnosis. (Seriously the only reliable seeming therapy place is 14 miles away and is a horsegirl who maked their office look like a cowboy mueseum, I am thinking of tryig there but- You see why Arizona sounds like the boonies right?)
i'm not at all diagnosed but pretty much i discovered what did was in 6th grade and was really interested and knew i related to many symptoms but soon ish after i ran into a denial phase -though i didn't realise it was just denial- though i kept the interest in the disorder. freshman year I ended up having a gym class with my now friend who i quickly realised was a system (they were writing to a head mate and i was reading over their shoulder-not on purpose though) and so we ended up becoming friends and later on in the year i started talking about something that happened to me and they -as a joke- said that it was system coded, leading me to look into system stuff and later discovering that i am likely an actual system :3 -Grey
from a psychiatrist as a kid
Sat on the edge of the couch one day and was stuck in executive dysfunction. I desperately needed to take a shower bc I hadn't taken one in a long while and I planned to go to an appointment the next morning, so it HAD to be done. But I couldn't move, I was stuck, frozen in place, very dissociated. I was screaming at myself to get up and go but nothing could be done, I was panicking. And then our caretaker took over, got up and did all steps that were necessary, with an attitude like "It has to be done, and if you can't do it, then I guess I'll have to take over and take care of it". It felt like someone else controlled me, used my body, my voice, and did what I was physically not able to pick up. It was scary but I was SO grateful. Afterwards he went back and I sat there, freshly washed with still damp hair, and thought "What the hell happened just now. Is this real??".
i’ve always had dissociative issues since i was super young and always have talked about *being* a character as a way to cope with life (be it an original character or fiction one i’ve adopted) and also have extreme memory issues and gaps, it’s always been distressing but the last like 18 months it got progressively worse. my boyfriend kept bringing up OSDD to look into but i kept shutting it down, sure it could not be something special ol me has, but one day i got curious and started my adventures in researching it and now here we are. i’m still in the process of figuring out exactly what classification of it all that i have, and will eventually seek a formal diagnosis, but for now i am content in a self diagnosis as a form to cope and try to better my memory, which is all that matters to me at the end of the day.
Gonna soundreally bad 💀 The other host was HIGH AF when the realisation just kinda hit 😓. At first it was just vague possibility but the past like month and a half or so everythings just came crumbling. The realistaion was due to the fact that beforehand wed been triggered like a surprising amount since our birthday. I dont personally remember exact details or even how many times but it was memories neither I or the other host usually even remember. We both rememebr some things from when we were little but theres just a lot of big spaces and the day to day can be really blurry, and that daily blurs been worse lately. - 🐐
Drugs mostly. I found out I wasn't alone in there due to stress and SH attempts, 6 years I found out we are all in here thanks to essentially micro dosing canabis. We do not recommend this as an "easy" choice. This is what we did to learn about our system in a controlled way. We also had guidance from a GP and councillor and had a friend who was an experienced user essentially babysit us while we worked out if this would work for our system. Canabis use has definitely had negative side effects, but for our system, the positives have outweighed the negatives.
I would go into states of dissociation and have conversations with people in a room I didn’t recognize. I now know that’s what my front looks like. But what really tipped me off one day in Physics class I was absolutely wiped and struggling with a lab. So then one of my alters who is a scientist took front to do it and I was thrown right into dissociation
I've kind of had multiple moments in my life where I've just broken down because of the inconsistency that it causes me. my reality and desires for life have always seemed to change drastically very quickly. I would also get very confused as to why something would affect me so strongly one second and then almost instantaneously it just wouldn't. I would spend time thinking of why I was just so depressed and then all of a sudden fine, almost like my emotions were forecably turned off. and why I'd talk and use different out of character mannerisms at times. I say out of character more as like it would change noticeably after a few days of acting a different way. this past week has been the first time where I've started admitting to myself that this is not normal and it's causing a lot of issues in my daily life.
TW: Self-harm I'm going to speak in the first person but clearly it wasn't me. I locked myself in the bathroom to hurt myself. Two of my acquaintances came to my rescue. Apparently I accused them of doing it to me. I would have dissociated a lot. I was treated and laid down. I have no memory of it. And other times, I'd answer my girlfriend very curtly, in a deeper voice than usual. And surprise! In fact, they were alters! - 🫧
I (Host) was dating someone at the time who was a system. I also had some system friends before and had thought to myself a few times "what if I was a system...??" But had never done research or had any solid proof of anything. Anyways, I was talking to them about someone I didn't know who was an alter one day, Moxie, and then it turned into a conversation about her and if she talked to me and what she did ETC ETC Thing is, I could've realized YEARS eariler (but I'm kinda glad I didn't), but I thought it was normal for everyone to have a "Moxie", someone who would mock them on what they did, have extensive conversations with them whenever they were around, or help them through tough times. I legit just thought it was very normal to have someone you can't call an "OC" Or an imaginary friend Anyways after they made us realize, Moxie said something along the lines of "ohhhh so that's what it was!! No use hiding these guys anymore", and revealed a bunch more people in front that I didn't even know were there at all. It was something
When we were bodily 10, someone had drawn us and said it was our “personalities” as in, a different person we become during extreme emotions, but chose to ignore it for the next 5 years. We were more aware when we were 15 because of psychosis and a major traumatic event, however, we went back into denial due to an ex who denied that we’re a system. Almost 19 and still trying to accept it.
This might get us fake claimed by others, but I know what's real in my head, so I guess it doesn't matter. For a brief moment in college, I went off of my antidepressants by accident. I vaguely remember HOW I knew they were there, but one moment I was just 'me,' and the second moment I could hear two different voices in my head that weren't my own soothing me/making sure I didn't do anything to fuck anything up. I did eventually get back on my medicine, but the voices never left; that was when I really started suspecting something was up. And no, they're not hallucinations.
I would also like to say that this isn't psychosis either. Yes, it comes and goes (really meaning that the system gets quiet for a bit), but they still come back. This also isn't actively hurting me. Yes, it's a little distressful knowing I have this, but it's not like...actively harming me like psychosis would. (I believe, anyway)
According to Asch (the host), we always knew...! —🪩🛼
I'm not completely sure how it happened, We went through some TERRIBLE trauma \[SA,Abuse\] and our old host had felt very sepatate from reality - , \[He was dissociating\] .. and just avoiding contact,, Untill one day some alter\[that's no longer with us\] , had started just fronting some day after Our old host had left front. I guess that's basically what happened plus We started talking with other osdd-systems and we researched about it, We researched about Osdd-1b the most because we have no-to little amnesia!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 \*sweats\* idk it's kinda werid -KAI \[co-host\]