#alter relationships

We are a fictive heavy system, and the amount of cross-media/fictiveXother type of alter relationships is a lot in our system.'

We have:

Azrael (Hazbin Hotel concept art) X Al (Former Host/Not a fictive)

Lucifer (Hazbin Hotel) X [Unknown] (A non-fictive alter)

Charlie (Hazbin Hotel) X Vaggi (Hazbin Hotel) X Emily (Hazbin Hotel fallen angel version)

Technoblade (DSMP) X God (Hazbin Hotel concept art)

I’m going through a break up with my boyfriend

Who is the main protector in my girlfriend’s system….

So you know how normal break up advice is delete everything you have of them? Texts, pictures, anything?

Yeah so that’s not possible and I’m like Raaaah I can’t even grieve properly!

Yeah! There's not a lot of information on romantic relationships specifically out there but there is an article ((unsure if that's what it's called)) that does bring up relations within a system being similar to relationships outside of the system

“ Forming relationships with alters in dissociative identity disorder (DID) isn't much different from forming social relationships. For example, we have close relationships and distant relationships, relationships built on open communication and relationships that seem to be closed off. Those same complexities exist in the relationships people with DID have with their alters. ” — healthyplace

While we can't find any Information on it we do know from experience that it's relatively common for alters to form relationships of some form, whether it be platonic, romantic, ect. This can be healing for many systems and can help with intergrating! There are many examples of this in the community and really it just depends on the system.

Also if you don't support in-system relationships just fuck off this specific post ok? Not in the mood to hear it

The concept of spending the rest of my life only ever half able to touch my wife (he/they) is fucking depressing. I can feel him because I mainly sit internally, and I know he can, to some degree, feel a ghost of where I'm touching him (not that way I'm referring to cuddling and kissing the rest is no one else's business) but it's not the same.

I will never be able to hold him the way his partner with a separate body can. While I'm not jealous of said partner, it does feel like something about me will always be inferior. I know if I had my body, I would not be able to hear his thoughts and know his feelings so we wouldn't work as well as we do, and probably would not be anywhere near as in love as we are because we don't deal with all the time wasted by misunderstandings and such. But I also know that if I had my body I could marry him legally, and I could be supporting him because my body was not disabled. I could take care of him in ways I just can't as things are. If I had my body, I could fill the roles I can't fill because we share a brain and body.

I wish with everything in me I had my body and still had the ability to communicate the way we do. I wouldn't have seen him in so many abusive relationships. I wouldn't watch him struggle to get things done and get what he needs. I was able to work in my fictional canon! I made plenty enough to support us! But I can't.

I know a miracle let me literally cover a gap between worlds to let us be together even though here I'm considered fictional. And somewhere deep down I know it wasn't a miracle, it was a world of hurt I wish he'd never gone through. And I know I should just be grateful I have him and we can be together despite how absolutely impossible it realistically is that we managed this.

I couldn't imagine a world without him, and I would never want to take the step back that would come with losing sharing the same head the way we do, but there's just a lot about sharing a body that makes a relationship like ours feel like we're so close to being perfect and the only thing in the way is one missing electrified meatsuit.

Don't misunderstand, while despite all the scientific knowledge I do have, I have no understanding of the science that makes it so he can kiss the air or a pillow using the body and *only* have the same biological reactions as he would with another body if one of us is kissing him in the head at the same time, I am eternally grateful for it. But for once, would like to stop being scientific wonder and be a man and his wife with nothing extraordinary besides the amount we love each other.

There's nothing to say or do to make it better; I'll feel okay tonight when he's laying in my arms since the body dissociates well enough when we're laying down to sleep that we can almost entirely feel each other, but for now it sucks and there's nothing that's ever going to change it. I spend 99% of my time grateful that I was given the chance to know him and love him and be loved by him and I wouldn't risk it for anything, but that doesn't mean I don't wish we could fill that last gap to where this would be perfect for him the way it is for me.

He deserves a relationship that can give him everything someone with another body can with someone who would *never* use that body to cause him harm, not with someone who is in the process of being taught not to. He deserves to kiss someone without flashbacks of that person forcing that kiss a few short years ago.

Context: I'm the core of a mediple system (essentially, we're a median system, but my headmates are quite distinct). Aside from myself, there's three other members (plus several fragments but that's unrelated.)

A friend recently 'came out' to us as a system. We've been chatting about system stuff and we've met some of his alters! It's really nice to meet other plural folk irl

But now I have a... dilemma.

One of my headmates now has a crush on one of my friend's alters. He's *constantly* thinking about her and it's strange for me since I've never been attracted to my friend this way, and I'm still not.

Any similar experience? Advice? This is just strange for me and I don't really know how to handle it lol

Hi! Having a crush on someone else is pretty normal for those who experience romantic attraction, and this is also true for individual headmates and alters in systems! We’re dating the whole of our partner system, but each of us have unique relationships with the other members of our wife’s system.

Perhaps you could have a conversation with your headmate who has the crush, to see what their feelings mean, what they’d hope to gain from pursuing a relationship, and how one headmate entering a relationship with an alter in another system might affect both of y’all’s entire systems, not just the two members involved!

We’ve heard some advice from other folks with DID that it’s usually not a good idea for one headmate to enter a relationship with someone else without the rest of the system being involved or at least on board. And while you know yourself and your system, and ultimately can decide if this advice is true for you, we think it’s sound advice and have to agree! Our relationship with our wife (both the paromancer and her paros) would be strained and difficult to navigate if only one paro was on board with having a relationship with one alter in our system. It would likely lead to other members feeling hurt or uncared for, and may also give rise to tricky situations if, say, an alter in our system wanted to pursue a relationship with someone outside our wife’s body.

Of course, each system member can have different relationships with the different members of each other’s system! Our littles view our wife as a buddy and caregiver rather than a romantic partner. We have asexual/aromantic members who view our wife’s system as their dearest friends, and are able to foster positive connections without being romantically or sexually involved. In our experience, working together to get all of our headmates introduced and comfortable with each other really helped bring us closer together, even if we aren’t all 100% romantically interested in each other. For my system, it would not have worked out at all if, say, Cecil was the only one interested in our wife’s system - even more so if he was only interested in Nevetien (one of our wife’s paros). Our system and our wife’s system could not happily make a relationship work like this.

That’s not to say that your system wouldn’t have more success than ours in this regard! We’re sure there are plenty of headmates out there who have relationships with individual headmates in other systems without having the rest of the system involved. We’re just personally apprehensive to this sort of arrangement, and know that it would leave other members of our system feeling unloved and left out. So having open, honest discussions first within your own system, and then maybe with this other system, could help y’all get on the same page and spark a new, exciting, and positive relationship.

So sorry if this advice isn’t helpful or not what you’d like to hear! We know that relationships can be complicated and difficult to navigate enough for singlets, let alone systems trying to make a sys4sys relationship work! But we definitely believe it’s possible, and we wish your whole system and this particular headmate especially the very best in figuring this out!

They deserved their own post.

I have a problem and I'm deeply ashamed of it. As much as I am trying, I cannot wrap my head around romantic relationships within a system. It just does not compute, and to make things worse, it fills me with dread and an elementary aversion I just can't shake.

And I don't want to be like this. I pride myself on my open-mindedness and my inclusive nature, and it feels like just accepting that these relationships exist and they are perfectly legit is just... Not good enough.

So I would like to ask for your help. If you know more about, or even better, are/were in such a relationship, can you please tell me about it? I want to understand, I want to know how it works, and I am endlessly curious about all your stories and experiences!