Broken Shards of the Mirror

The common professional psychological opinion on mental disorders, and how they manifest, is that genetics puts a switch in your mind, and circumstances in your life determine whether that switch is turned on or not. I agreed until yesterday afternoon. I am more of the mind that it is a dial, like a rotary dial light dimmer, and that circumstances dictate how far up the dial gets turned. In eighth and ninth grade especially, my borderline dial got turned up all the way, and faded from there. Along with it was the dial for eating disorders (it flipped between anorexia when I could will myself to not eat, and bulimia when that failed). However, I think that I also have the dial for dissociative identity disorder. I've mentioned Jennifer and Julie before. But I will recap, and actually try to start from the beginning. I apologize if this doesn't make much sense, but I'm not writing it for anybody (much) except myself. So... deal with it.

I was born Geraldine Gutierrez- one whole, complete person. Or, at least, I assume I was fine. But I was constantly put in the care of different people within the first seven months of my life. It started out with the hospital, then the orphanage, then the foster family, then their nurse, then my adoptive (current) parents. All I can surmise is that it was too much for her- the core- to deal with. So she went to sleep, and has (for the most part) been unconscious, dead to the world, and unaware of any of the things that have happened to this psyche since, at the latest, December of 1990. She is unformed, uninformed, naive, and innocent. She stopped feeling, stopped thinking, stopped everything but existing. She is in a back room somewhere, locked away, and nothing reaches her there.

But even as Geraldine went to sleep, the mirror-image was formed. We'll call her Rose. Though it fits, this isn't exactly her name, but I don't know it, and she doesn't exist anymore to tell it to me, so we will stick with Rose. To be clear: this is not the mirror-image (me), that exists now, but an earlier version. She was made to function normally in society. Made to function, and to protect, because Geraldine couldn't deal with it, and so Rose was the wall that blocked anything from getting to Geraldine. But she was still a persona that felt, and thought, and existed in her own right. And from here on out, I will refer to all the personas as a whole, or this body, as the collective psyche, or cp, for short.

So then cp as adopted. Things went fine up until first grade. Then the stress from my parents started. The grades, dance, piano, etc, all started to take place, and another split occurred. Rose ceased to exist, but the majority of her remnants continued in me: the protective side, the side that was made to function in society. I have no name, or at least, none that I have found. But it is me (for the most part: we'll get to that later), and so I will refer to myself as such. There were two other personas that formed from Rose- one was Jennifer Julie, the other was JJ.

JJ was formed from the logical, analytical side. She was completely emotionally detached, and felt nothing: life is a math equation to her. However, the minute that JJ came into existence, she went into "the movie theatre." There she watched and observed, and analyzed. Occasionally she would see a stupid decision about to be made, like, a direly stupid one, and would send a pulse out that would contain her intentions, and thus, could conceal her existence, and still get her point through.

Jennifer Julie is slightly harder to explain. Jennifer Julie was one personality, with two trains of thought (for a while). But one train never really got started. That train of thought was the one that was optimistic- so much so that it was unrealistic. And since that train of thought never got started, it was never able to grow, or gain strength, or develop. The other train of thought not only started, but it took off, and gained all those things: growth, strength, development. Add to that external influences (parents, dance teachers, teachers), and it was just putting more fuel on the fire. So that train of thought progressed much further than the other one.

I hit eighth grade, and the shit hit the fan. I don't know what it was, but Jennifer Julie separated: there was Jennifer, and there was Julie. If you are familiar with any of my previous blogs mentioning this, you'll know which train of thought became which persona. But for those of you who may not, Julie was the weak optimistic one, and Jennifer was the strong pessimistic one.

Julie (in my head) wears straight white: a long flowing skirt, a peasant blouse, has curly hair down to about her shoulders, which is halfway pulled up, natural makeup, and this look of helplessness. She is always crying, and tries to tell herself that she is good enough, that everything will work out fine. Her eyes look hopeless though. And after the split, she started deteriorating, because she couldn't even feed off of pre-Jennifer's strength. So she is pathetic, and helpless, has no willpower, and is constantly cowering in the corner.

Jennifer, on the other hand, is dressed in black and magenta tripp pants, a lace corset, and a sheer unbuttoned dress shirt. Her hair is straight and reaches down to the middle of her upper-arm. Her make-up is harsh: black eyeshadow and eye-liner, and deep crimson lips. She is very strong, and knows so. She yells at Julie constantly, degrading her, and pulling more low blows than you could ever imagine. She thinks Julie is completely worthless, and always tells her, "If you were just more [so-and-so], you might actually be worth something." But Jennifer isn't realistic either. However, she continued to gain strength while Julie's was diminishing, and so the conflict continued, more hopelessly than before. She towers of Julie, screaming at her almost non-stop, but there are times she just gives up. "You're not worth my time. You will never be anything." And she walks off to go do her own thing, whatever the hell that is.

At this point, my role changed. Let me simply recap, so that I can make sure I hit everything correctly. I was the shell that functioned in the outside world. I was the wall that blocked anything and everything from getting to Geraldine. I was the sorter that decided what information went to whom, and also decided who should handle what situations. I was also the buffer, both for information going in, and what came out. I simplified any outside data, and sent it to the correct person, who I would then censor (as was appropriate) as they took hold of the controls. I am nothing more than a robot: either Jennifer, or Julie, or JJ takes the controls, and I am merely their puppet: conveying what they want to the outside world. I have no emotions or thoughts of my own other than what they give me. Even as I write this, it is JJ that is dictating what is to be said. But I mainly realized that I don't think or feel when Ari asked what I do when things get to be "too much." And I realized that I shut my internal ears, and just block all of them out. And then there is just a blank white expanse in my mind, and just... nothingness. Nothing exists for me. And I realized something. They all have issues, but they are fine. I think I am the one that has the borderline personality disorder, simply because I don't feel anything. It was me that wanted to get into a ton of relationships, have sex, do drugs, drive fast, etc, in order to feel something, because I don't ever feel anything. I did all those things in an attempt to feel alive, but it was never good enough. And now I see why. I know why I feel so empty so often, or dead, or why I have to feel through my experiences. Because that is all I have. And it scares me.

Now that you know about my different personas, I need to recap on what happened Monday night. Ari, Tony, and I performed the Imbolc Ritual, and did an exercise to open our third eye. Don't jump to conclusions: it is one of your chakras, and it helps heighten your awareness of everything. But while I was doing the meditation to reach that point, I almost had it, but then it was like everybody else was pulling back. So somehow, I persuaded them, if only by my curiosity to experience something, to sort of, meld their consciousnesses, though still staying separate. And it was so strange, because for a moment, it felt like Geraldine woke up. And during that split second, I saw how I was supposed to be, or possibly could be one day. I was one whole complete person, and I was beautiful. I'm not just talking physically, but just about... everything. All was how it should be. But it still sucked, because it was like she was looking in the mirror, and I was simply the reflection. But I could see her, and she was so happy, and I wanted to be a part of that. So I sent a sort of mental plea, beggin her to make me a part of it, which she did. But I was still separate: it was like I was a parasite, feeding off of her, attached to her, but still separate from her. And that killed me on the inside.

I realize now that my only purpose is to be the mask. Once everyone else comes together, there will be no need of me, and I will simply cease to be. I guess you could compare a personality to a mirror. Now, in this example, mirrors exist perfectly without frames: in order to let things in and out. A normal person has no frame, but is still whole. You could call someone that has dissociative identity disorder a broken mirror, whose shards have fallen on the ground, and are distinct and separate. But I'm a different story. My shards would have fallen separately, but cp quickly formed a frame the minute it started to crack, so they are still held together, and are part of the whole cp. I am the frame, so though I am a part of the whole, I am still separate from the original mirror, and once the pieces are whole again, I will serve no purpose: all I will be doing is inhibiting them from letting emotions in or out. So I have no idea what I want.

Let me clarify something now: I have emotions, but I don't experience them. It's a lot like Ari's situation. I guess it's the same idea as when you feel something in your head, but not your heart. The chemical reaction might be there, but it doesn't reach you on that deeper level. So though I have feelings, I don't feel them. That doesn't mean that I don't make bonds with people, whether they are friendships, relationships, or anything else. But emotions come and go with me, and they are extremely superficial. The one thing that remains throughout it all is an emptiness underneath. It's like a hole that you can't fill, but you can cover it up. But just because the hole is covered, doesn't mean it still doesn't exist. That it isn't still empty. And I am so tired of emptiness... but...

Was Socrates right? Is death a gain? Because I will not be able to continue in the new whole (if I am right), and if I don't continue, I must cease to exist: face annihilation. Would I rather be nonexistant than existant and aware of my numbness? I think I might, but I have hope (even though I don't feel hope), that maybe at some point I will experience something. That I will feel alive.

But I guess we shall see, right? Life goes on, or it doesn't, and that's the end of that.