#caeafsposts

so first things first anon, yeah it's normal

i just really needed to get that out of the way. you're valid. there's no need for self doubt. i mean i know it's gonna happen anyway lol but please don't be too hard on yourself.

second things second though, there's kind of no "normal" with did or osdd or honestly ANY dissociative or trauma related disorder for anyone - system or singlet. everyone reacts very differently to trauma and experiences and coping mechanisms vary wildly right alongside them

there are systems who rarely switch or systems who can only really cofront with the host, just like there are systems with no hosts

there are systems for whom switching often is a good sign, it means that the day is going okay and no one is frontstuck and getting overwhelmed dealing with dailies. there are also systems who usually only switch when something has gone terribly wrong, and who view a day with a lot of switches as a Very Bad One

there are entirely nonhuman systems with hugely diverse appearances and preferences and personalities and roles, all of whom play some role or have some stake in an incredibly detailed inner world and who very much all feel like they are different people

and there are systems who are all different versions of the host with no inner world. who may feel like one person but divided into separate experiences

i can literally not stress enough that every system i just described is still a system. none of that is a sign of faking

did and osdd are insanely personal by nature and their symptoms overlap with so many other disorders that they're really hard to set any guidelines for other than basic grounding techniques and tools to cope with trauma, flashbacks, flooding, panic attacks, ect

just because we personally switch fairly often (on a good day lol) doesn't mean that that's the standard for anyone else. and vice versa

it's possible, and according to some studies, co-occurance can even be considered kind of high (though this is also thought to be caused by the overlap of symptoms, misdiagnosis one way or another, ect. especially since in the first two issues of the dsm, dissociation was associated with schizophrenia spectrum disorders rather than dissociative disorders being their own thing. studies are still fairly shaky)

us, after coming out of an 8h dissociative episode to still not know who’s fronting:

Us: wow?? we actually did pretty good????? the whole period sucked but we got through????????

--> One week later

The alter that split and took all the stress: steps forward