Honoring Parts

This is sort of a strange title for an article, I know. Yet such articles are needed as important reminders for those involved in the process of living with DID.

It is quite common for the diagnosis of DID to be received with dread, anger, dispair, and too many other intense emotions to mention here. Many see it as a sentence of dysfunctional doom! But this doesn't have to be the case. When we can begin to look at how dissociation is a coping mechanism and not a cop out we can begin to actually find some internal relief. Yes, honest.

"Parts" are there for a purpose. If the need had not existed, dissociation would not have occurred in the first place. This is an important premise. How, then, can we find some way to accept this condition rather than beat ourselves up for having it? Perhaps this next article from "Just Before Dawn" will shed some much needed light on this subject. It was written by a survivor who was finally getting to the place in her own healing process where she was learning to accept and honor the essential function her alters/parts played in her survival.

"Rachel" was this survivor's companion whose "job" was to hold the tears for the others who were not allowed to cry. This is her story.

"Rachel's Tears"

It seems that I think a lot about Rachel lately.

She was the one who held all the tears.

She never had much to say,

but every now and then you would look around for her

and she was gone.

Sometimes we would wonder where she had gotten to,

but it wasn't hard to figure out.

She had a way of quietly wandering off to be by herself.

We would find her most often in a corner somewhere,

sometimes behind the rocking chair,

or back hiding between the beds on the floor,

or in her secret little hiding place in the closet.

And she would be crying.

Again.

She always looked so little to me,

As if she were sadness itself,

despair embodied,

and so wounded and alone,

so timid and fearful, so fragile looking.

We never tried to tell her she should stop her tears,

knowing consolations would be empty and pointless.

We all understood the tears

and knew that there were no answers to give her,

so no one tried.

It just was the way things were.

I honor Rachel,

and the many like her,

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