Multiple Reflections

So we had therapy today and we told Cec about the creation of Dragon and his memory that we’ve known about for years, but for some reason, it has surfaced quite a bit these last few months.  Actually that “some reason” has to do with sexual triggers and desires from some of us adults in here to try other sexual positions with Sean but we continue to be highly triggered by it and can’t cope or do it.  And as we told Cec, there is sadness and grief with how the sexual abuse affects us as adults now.  I just want to be “normal” and to be able to try different sexual positions or different things with the man I love without constantly being triggered and unable to cope with it and having anxiety and panic inside.  It’s one of the things that can stir a hint of anger inside at the father, and I’m sure there is deeply hidden anger at the other abusers as well.

After therapy we went to our car that was parked in a small parking garage with few cars and few people coming in and out.  We laid down across the front seats and dozed/napped for 2 hours.  I had this bizarre dream that included a bunch of our personal papers and other personal stuff that we were trying to keep close to us and with us and we had far too much stuff compared to the other girls we were around and with, and anyway, at some point, we were separated from some of it and it was scattered and strewn about and even in the middle of the street for cars to drive over and for it to fly away.  At some point we were in the middle of the street trying to gather it up and dump it all together as quickly as possible together and then we had to somehow get it up to the house where we were staying, but it was going to be bad to do so, because we weren’t supposed to have all this extra stuff and there wasn’t room for it anyway, but we still had to have it with us, because it was so deeply personal and attached and connected to us.  There were a variety of other scenes in relation to our personal stuff but those scenes and info are really hazy and so I don’t want to try and describe them.  Plus there was some other stuff in the dream, but that’s the biggest piece that I keep remembering about it.

I think we’re getting closer to telling and writing here about Dragon and what happened to him.  It seems more of his memory and what happened to him has spread throughout the system and there is more of an ‘acceptance’ of sorts that it is real and true, although whenever we go to tell someone inside (hmm, meant to say outside, but that’s an interesting Freudian slip), anyway, whenever we go to tell someone outside (like our group or to Cec or thinking of writing it here and telling here), there is an immediate surge of some others inside that are quick to shout (more or less) that it is untrue and it didn’t happen, etc.  And yet, strangely, (though someone inside disagrees and says it isn’t strange and explains to me why it isn’t), that 9-10 years or so later since the initial memory of Dragon, that there is greater belief by many inside that it is true than there was years ago, and even say several years ago.  We also hear those inside strongly asserting that it didn’t happen and it isn’t true, etc., whenever we begin thinking more about it and trying to get ‘closer’ to Dragon and his memory or simply thinking more on it and trying to connect to that past point in time.

If I allow myself to feel and not push hard against it and not run from it… if I inch my way towards it yet carefully trying to not have it suck me in like a vortex ready to suffocate me, I can feel deep sadness for Dragon.  I am sad with what happened to him.  It is still very dissociated from me and I am unable to relate in virtually any way that it happened “to me,” because it flat out didn’t happen to me.  It happened to him and to any others inside who were part of that moment in time before, after, and perhaps during.  His story, his creation, is just so sick and wrong and sad.  Sadness that something like this could happen to such a young boy/dragon.

One of the things that someone inside uses to try and convince those of us who believe his memory is the age and time reference.  I vaguely recall on a knowledge level only that when Dragon’s memory was revealed and we learned that he was a young boy or boy dragon or shape shifter or half boy and half dragon (it’s still kind of unclear), that he was 5 1/2 or 6 years old.  For some reason, I keep thinking he said or someone spoke for him and said he was 5 1/2 years old.  And so someone else inside always discusses how what if Reed and Doug didn’t live there when the body was that old and thus, it couldn’t have happened at that age.  But then someone else inside reminds others and says that the body could have been older but Dragon may have been created as a younger age for some reason, irregardless of the body age.  After all, alters/insiders can be created with ages far beyond the body’s age at the time of their emergence within the system.  I don’t know.  I wish I could ask my mother to see if she recalls or if there was some way I could find out.  There might be a way since their family was in the military like ours and we know the entire family’s first and last names.

And then of course, there’s the whole thing about finding out and learning that Doug and Reed and their family were living there when we moved there or at least moved there shortly after we moved there and thus, it matches up with the body’s age and what I’ve come to understand or hear about from those inside.  And then all the abuse becomes that much more real.  Of course, I’ll be wholly confused and thinking I’m totally fucked up and wrong and screwed up if I discover that they moved there years after we did.  I know the abuse happened, I mean, I really do remember that.  They were definitely living there when I was 7 years old, and pretty sure when I was 6 years old too, because I remember my brother turning 5 years old and he was all excited about spending the night at Reed’s house when he turned 5 and there’s a picture of him the day/night he left for his first sleepover.

So anyway, we think we’re getting up the courage to tell Dragon’s story and his creation and memory.  We apparently have had the courage to say Reed’s name and even Doug’s name aloud to our group and again today with Cec.  Usually we just say the “neighbor boy” and “the neighbor boy’s older brother.”  That’s always felt safest and often, just hearing Reed’s name would cause anxiety and icky feelings to emerge.  Thankfully it is an uncommon name and to some extent, so is Doug’s name.  So amazingly, we are ready to say their names and enough inside are ready to tell and have this secret shared and known and heard.  So perhaps tomorrow or the next we will dip our toes in or jump all the way in.  I’m not sure.

Julie/s (and others or ??? around)