“I had a problem with what Jeffery called object permanence — in my case, understanding that people I depended on emotionally continued to exist when I couldn’t see them. Staring at the carpet, I tried to reconcile the information about his sailboat with the two versions I had of him. One was the Jeffery in a skin container whom I saw in my twice-weekly sessions. The other was an amorphous being whose molecules floated loose in the atmosphere. His magical version watched over me between sessions, knowing everything I thought and felt and did, day and night. But if his skin container would be sailing in New England, he couldn’t also be in the atmosphere. I would lose my connection with him. A part of myself I called Outside-Me understood that Jeffery was permanent and didn’t stop existing when I couldn’t see him. Inside-Me was still learning that. It’s what we were working on in therapy.”
An essay by a woman with dissociative identify disorder. It makes me think that she is so, so lucky to have found this therapist – and also makes me wonder about the people in her life and hope that they are able to help her in little ways in her days so that her environment works with her inner world.
I really want to read her memoir.
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