In the twilight between dreaming and waking, he was there. He always is.
His rage is appalling. I can only tolerate his presence for a few seconds. His thoughts are violent, distorted, disgusting, profane. No wonder I split him off years ago: my animus. His name begins with J.
He changes it regularly — Jason, Joseph, Jupiter — but it always begins with J. I do not yet know why. He is the only one of my alters who has a name. The others all have titles.
This morning he had climbed on top of me. He was pushing down on my chest so forcefully I could barely breathe. I thought he would let up if I lay still but he didn’t. Finally I promised to listen if he’d just ease off. He did. And I waited.
What came were scattered bits of memories and dreams, both distant and recent, including last week’s random but powerful encounter. Tiny clips spliced themselves together in my head, a few seconds each, and concluded with the seminal event.
Oh, my God. The tools. It was the tack hammer.
I came fully awake then. I had a splitting headache and could hardly sit up. It was like I’d been blown apart. When I could finally stand, I was wobbly. I stumbled to the kitchen for coffee.
The motion detector on my little Studebaker radio jacked up the volume.
Michael Stipe declared, “It’s the end of the world as we know it.”
I started jotting notes on Post-Its and sticking them to my closet door. There’s a bigger story but I cannot write it today, nor do I want to. I need time to recover and reflect. It’s important and I need not rush the telling of it.
The traumatic seminal event that precipitated J’s split was relatively innocuous. But after years of family dysfunction, it was the last straw. I have since been hostage to the past, manifesting as a history I gave over and over, dialogue that never seemed to change.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness recently published an article by Catherine Klatzker, a memoirist, poet and retired pediatric ICU nurse of 22 years.
She wrote, “The stigma surrounding dissociative identity disorder is formidable and real, and those of us who live with it have an uphill battle in being heard and understood.
“… Many people think … of movies and films about sensational characters with ‘a bunch of different personalities’ … they do not know about the human beings in pain …
“Ultimately, I believe that the only way those of us with DID can eliminate stigma is if our lived experience becomes real to other people.”
I’m hoping the history I recite today is broader, more illuminative, more insightful and forgiving. All I’ve got to say is it’s about damn time.
I’ll bet some of you just said those very words yourselves.
You know what? I’m laughing now. I hope you are, too.
The photo is of a sculpture by Kina Crow titled “Om.” I don’t know if she’s one of us but she certainly gets what DID is like, disorder, distraction and even humor. Mental illness can be funny if you have the right friends.
The CatWirks 
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