I get so sick and tired of people who know about my DID telling me - in a voice like I have a knife - 'You're safe now. You don't have to do what you do anymore...the dissociation. You're all grown now.' Um... yeah - if there were a switch, I would have turned it off before I lost my damned job and my family! I am constantly looking for different things that I can do to help us not necessarily integrate, but certainly have consistent co-consciousness and to that end, I ran across EMDR - Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing.
The premise behind EMDR is to have several physical things going on at the same time that cognitive therapy is occurring. Some therapist will have the patient follow their finger as they move it from side to side while continuing on with something similar to exposure therapy - having the patient relive the trauma. This technique has proved to be most effective with those suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
There is some general controversy to using this on DID patients and some of the controversy in using EMDR for those with DID fall in line with the current movement of some mental health professionals to get DID removed from the upcoming DSM-V, and the controversy is this - because of the high hypnotic susceptibility of DID patients, skeptics question whether EMDR practitioners wouldn't involuntarily (or voluntarily) place false memories into the minds of DID patients during the EMDR exercise.
Honestly, I don't know - but I'd be willing to sit and follow a finger like a cat follows a ball dangling from yarn if it meant I'd get better and be able to get back out into society - whole and without the irrational fears that seem to have me paralyzed and so isolated. Now to find a therapist who 1. Acknowledges DID and 2. Practices EMDR and 3. Is willing to use it on a non co-conscience DID patient who looses time like people loose socks in the dryer.
Wish me luck?
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