It is no secret that I have multiple personalities, brought about from severe, repetitive, childhood trauma. The accepted term for multiple personalities has become dissociative identity disorder, which helps to describe the main cause and symptom: dissociation.

Everyone dissociates; so this can be understood as a spectrum. If you’ve ever realized that you’ve been “spaced out” for a period of time, and can’t really remember what happened during that time — maybe you drove home without remembering anything about the journey — you have experienced dissociation.

Multiples have perfected the art of survival to the point where their identity is compartmentalized, and different parts of their identity can be out dealing with abuse while another part is completely unaware of what’s happening, being safely tucked in a dissociative state.

For me, becoming a “singular” is not a goal. I feel like I have never been singular, as my abuse happened…