The topic is: Distancing past triggers from present scenarios. Talk about whatever “triggers” in you!
New Landscape ~ DID/MPD Support Group
New York support group for people with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) / Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD)
Ive been looking at some other blogs, and i see “trigger alert”. And i think, no problem, im past my past. Then a few sentences in and have to stop reading quick, because someone is panicking. I dont get it. Why does somebody elses experience set me off, when its not the same as mine?
If I am triggered, I think it’s because the scenario, or whatever someone is sharing/writing – is similar enough to my own experience that alarms start going off. Like the war vet who hears a car backfire – and drops to the ground because something inside registers it as a gun shot.
I still can’t identify my triggers all the time. I think it depends on who’s out sometimes as to what can be triggering. Gets complicated when everyone has different triggers. Though – there are probably a lot of triggers that are similar.
Apparently one alien was out and eating a sandwich – and white sauce started dripping down her hand from the sandwich – and she basically started getting all weird and freaking out and felt dirty and wanted to wash her hands right away. Well I’ve had sauce drip down my hands – and felt nothing one way or the other about it.
i tend not to worry too much about avoiding triggers because of this very problem: between the parts, there are enough triggers that i couldn’t possibly avoid every single one of them and still live a life. i mean, sure, there are some things that trigger enough of us consistently enough that we avoid or do something about those, but beyond that? who knows what might or might not trigger someone in here. so we learn to cope with them as they come up.
one thing i try to remember is that even if i personally don’t remember/didn’t experience something, it did happen to someone who lives in my body. so when someone does get triggered, we’re learning to acknowledge that it’s coming from something real, and that it’s worth taking the time to take care of whoever’s been triggered.
(with the sandwich example, this is a big part of why i don’t even bother with things like mayonnaise. there are enough parts who are upset by it that it’s not worth the trouble. so i guess that is a trigger i avoid. on the other hand, if someone outside my body makes me a sandwich and puts mayo on it, i can cope with that.)