Helpful Points in Healing
Next Part Hindrances to Integration
Since most people have more than one alter, each alter needs an individual name to help you identify which alter you are speaking with. Sometimes alters choose for themselves demeaning names, such as Shame or Reject. I never use such names because doing so reinforces a lie they have believed about themselves. In fact, if they let you, consider using an opposite name such as Honour or Beloved. Sometimes alters choose normal but diverse names. Three alters of the one person might be named Jack, Bill and Brian.
It might slightly aid their sense of unity, however, if they could be referred to by the age that they formed. For example, if the host’s name is Jack, they might be called three-year-old Jack, six-year-old Jack and twelve-year-old Jack. On the other hand, even referring to them by age could be slightly negative by helping them feel locked into that age. A name can have such a powerful impact upon a person that, in the Bible, people’s names were sometimes chosen by God. I’ve seen alters profoundly helped by being given a significant, positive name. So choice of names is worthy of prayer.
We all love testimonies of people who, by becoming Christians, undergo dramatic transformations of beliefs and behaviour. We have explained, however, that until they are helped, alters are trapped in a time warp, and if the time in which they are trapped is before their host’s conversion, those alters will, as one would expect, be like non-Christians and have not yet experienced any of the spiritual transformations that the host enjoyed later in life. This situation will continue until the alters are specifically taught the gospel message, yield to it, and are trained up in the ways of the Lord. So it is not unusual for a Christian to have an alter that hates God or has other habits or views that disgust the Christian part of the person.
It is hardly surprising that when alters first surface after feeling despised and rejected for years, they are often bitter and unpleasant to talk to, just as almost anyone would be after suffering a tragedy and then cruelly treated, rejected and kept in solitary confinement, year after year. Please don’t add to their torment by letting their reaction upset you. Show them kindness and acceptance and minister the love of Christ to them.
Alters need to be loved and prayed for and coaxed into the kingdom of God. They need to be taught Christian principles that might now seem so basic to hosts that they have forgotten that they had ever needed to be taught them. Just like anyone else who has had little exposure to Christian teaching, most alters must be taught such basics as the need to forgive those who have hurt them, to renounce sins and any occult links and, once they have yielded to Christ, to learn the authority that they have in him. Each of these is a huge step, so be gentle and patient. If an alters' host has already surrendered to Christ, I find it easy to have faith for the alter to likewise yield, but keep remembering that alters are deeply hurting and so deserve great tenderness. Usually the trauma they suffered involved having their trust violated. So trusting anyone – God included – is highly challenging, possibly even terrifying, for them. Trust takes time to develop.
Not only are alters deeply hurting, they almost expect to be rejected and easily misinterpret even harmless remarks as rejection. They might act stony hard but it is simply an attempt to steel themselves against the pain of rejection. Deep down they crave unconditional love and acceptance. If they begin to feel they can find this in you, they will be keen to please, and any trouble they cause will not be due to not wanting to please you, although they might deliberately test you to see if you would reject them, as they fear. So discipline would not increase their motivation. I urge against speaking sternly to alters –even to very annoying ones. Don’t tell them off like naughty children. Each alter needs and deserves deep respect and lots of unconditional love and patience and gentle persuasion.
Being stern with an alter is likely to drive the alter into hiding. If that seems like peace to you, it is a false peace. If you have alters, they are an inseparable part of you. It doesn’t take much intelligence to realize that to hurt a part of you is to hurt yourself, and to not coax an alter into the open where he/she can heal, is to cripple yourself.
You’ll be astounded at how a few days of compassion and gently explaining the gospel will transform a nasty, God-hating, sin-loving alter into a delightful, God-loving friend and ally who is keen to live a life of purity and to please you and other alters.
Sometimes, when you have been ministering for weeks to a person with Dissociative Identity Disorder and yet another alter speaks to you for the first time, the alter has heard much of what you have told other alters. Often, however, the alter has not heard and you have to repeat it all over again to the new alter. This can sometimes be tiresome for the person helping, but it must be done. Often the host and other alters can help the new alter but I have frequently underrated how much I’m still needed to repeat what I have already told the person’s other alters.
Since each alter will behave rather like a normal traumatized person of that age and gender, the more skilled you are at emotionally supporting people, the better you will be at helping alters. For some practical tips in how to emotionally support people who are hurting, see the link at the end of this page, titled How to Comfort the Hurting. It is both very important and healing to parent child alters as you would tenderly parent a normal, deeply hurting, fearful child. This can be particularly challenging if you are inexperienced with children, but most new parents start off inexperienced, too.
Buy each young alter his/her own toys. Play them Christian children’s music. Hug them, praise them, tell them you love them. Sometimes even adult alters that seem very tough can desperately need such expressions of parental love and approval. For the sake of baby alters, you might even need to wear diapers, use a pacifier, and drink formula milk from a bottle. An adult man found there were often times when, if he did not do this, he would get so stressed as to fall into sin. But he found using baby items so humiliating that he had to learn over and over just how critical it was for his healing and his own peace.
Listen long and hard to each alter. Teach, guide, play with, empathize with and even joke with the alter. If a host finds times for certain alters to manifest themselves freely, they will be more settled at times when the host particularly wants them to be quiet.
It is important to know that God is eager to take alters into his temporary, intensely personal care. It is not unusual for the alters of Christians to enjoy times in heaven playing with God or receiving personal instruction or comfort from him. One child alter often played before the throne of God with several other, unrelated child alters, some of whom spoke languages that were foreign to her.
One of their favourite games was playing with what seemed to be a harmless ball of fire. An alter I know once found herself in what seemed like a pleasant and private heavenly hospital ward in which Jesus sat on her bed and personally comforted her. Not surprisingly, such experiences are deeply healing. Encourage alters to feel loved of God and safe with him and to spend much time with him. Wrote one alter in a written prayer:
We hide in you. You have a secret place for alters and we know it is a safe place. . . . Daddy, thank you for loving and protecting alters. We would be in deep trouble without you, but we are with you and you love us.
It is not uncommon for a host to feel overwhelmed by the incessant demands of several needy alters. Such a person is able to enjoy respite by handing one or more of the alters over to God for a while.
With the help of her host, one of Alice’s younger alters wrote the following to one of Jake’s younger alters about the games God plays with her. Do not regard these games as trivial. Imagine how healing bonding to God such experiences would be to a traumatized little girl who is never allowed to play, and for whom touch was usually painful, sexual, or both.
God plays lots of games. My favourite is “Tickles”. I love it when he grabs me and spins me around, smiling and laughing. Then he gently tickles me and kisses my tummy. I squeal in delight.
He dances with me too. I love to spin around in his arms and I feel so safe. We sing a lot together. I love to sing.
We play hide and seek. He pretends he doesn’t see me and I pounce in his lap. Then he grabs me and cuddles with me. Or I call him and he surprises me with where he is. Sometimes he is behind me and that isn’t fair ’cos I don’t have eyes in the back of my head. He clowns around and we giggle and giggle.
On another occasion, Alice typed as God spoke to her little alter. Here’s part of what he said:
Sweetie, you are my delight. I love alters. They are special people with special needs. When the world shuts them up I have a place in my heart for them. I love you and the times we play together are more than precious to me.
The Lord is far better at understanding and helping alters – and anyone else for that matter – than we are. Nevertheless, there is no avoiding it: people (alters included) need people. One host was so frustrated with his child alters that he sent them all off to God, hoping never to see them again. I understand his reaction. It was a huge trial for him. Some of the alters were not toilet trained. One wanted a pacifier and formula milk and couldn’t even speak. Imagine a grown man acting that way. In fact, his wife had left him because of it. The Lord made it clear to him, however, that, respite breaks and special healing sessions aside, the man must care for his own alters.
Seeing the wisdom of what God had told him, I pointed out to the frustrated host that he would remain fractured – and hence below his full, God-given potential – while his alters were not with him. God can heal in amazing ways but this man needed to bond with his alters, and they with him, for him to find true wholeness. Like any other human bonding process, spending considerable time with each other is essential.
There is much that people can do to help and comfort their own alters. In fact, when coupled with continually seeking divine help, I used to think that healing oneself should be the norm. However, an alter I had helped wrote the following to a man who had alters, and sent me a copy:
Alters are lonely people. It is so much better not to suffer alone. I needed to talk to someone outside myself, not merely with the host I split from. I needed a safe place to say some very personal stuff and talk graphically about the things that hurt me. I needed to trust someone and to know that I could be accepted for who I am. For me, Grantley was that someone. This has helped me so much and I am grateful both to God and Grantley for their help .
Before reading this I had been vaguely aware of the value of alters talking to people other than those who share their own body. Now that I have stopped to consider it, however, the importance is obvious. Someone in solitary confinement can, of course, talk to himself and God, and doing so would be invaluable. Nevertheless, anyone in this situation will develop a desperate need to talk to other humans.
This same alter explained why she would never reveal herself to a professional counsellor. An alters' most pressing need is for a friend, not a clinical healer or anyone paid to spend time with the alter. If you felt rejected and painfully lonely, would you pay someone by the hour to listen to you? Many of us would find that so hollow and humiliating that we would prefer to remain lonely! This alter believes she is typical of all alters in not wanting someone who, with an air of superiority, looks at her as a patient or a case study. She feels the same way about any do-gooder who might treat her as an object of pity or someone to be helped, rather than as a valued friend.
An alter’s self-esteem is typically so low that it could barely endure such a put down. Alters need and deserve a genuine friend – someone who not only gives a listening ear and shares insights but who values their friendship. And this is not hard to do. I’m not surprised that someone who has helped large numbers of people with Dissociative Identity Disorder said he has yet to find an alter he didn’t like. Of course, many need to be relieved of their pain before they become likeable.
Moreover, I have since discovered an alter who would let both a friend and me help him but refused to accept his host’s help. The host had previously despised and rebuked him for years, sometimes regarding the alter as his sinful “flesh” and sometimes as a demon. Even though the host had now completely changed his attitude, the alter continued to resent him for his past behaviour, thus limiting the host’s ability to help the alter. However, I was eventually able to help the alter forgive his host.
Another practical difficulty in someone trying to cure themselves without the support of anyone else is that when alters first surface their deep emotional pain tends to overwhelm the rest of the person, making it very hard for the person to think with sufficient clarity to effectively minister to his or her new alter.
I mentioned earlier in this series of webpage's my friend with D.I.D. who chose a psychologist as a prayer partner. My friend told him that he could not afford a counsellor. The psychologist replied, “Counselling is sometimes overrated. God is God. Jesus does the healing and it is his choice as to how he heals.”
The difficulty in relying solely on a friend for help, however, is that the friend would need to be a very special person, led of the Spirit and endowed with wisdom. For at least some basic preparation, both the friend and the person with the alters should, in addition to studying these webpages, read those on the link at the end of this page, titled How to Comfort the Hurting.
Whoever alters choose to confide in, it will need to be someone the alters (not just the host) feel relaxed with. I know a host who thinks a certain woman is wonderful but one of her alters cannot tolerate her because the woman reminds her of someone who deeply offended her. It is important that the chosen person believes both in the host and in alters, and is trustworthy, gentle, patient, faithful, unshockable and nonjudgmental.
Before sharing with anyone anything about your alters, question them about their understanding and attitudes concerning both demons and alters. Ideally, the person should not only believe in alters but also in demons, and preferably have had experience in casting out demons and also in differentiating between alters and demons. An alter may feel more trusting of one gender than the other. As the alter heals, however, exposure to an honourable person of the other gender could be healing.
It can also be very powerful (sometimes it’s the ultimate) for an alter to minister to someone else’s alter. Being alters, they can really identify with each other and gain acceptance. The ministering alter must, of course, be a strong Christian and able to withstand any insults or seduction that the other alter might try. Such contact should be supervised.
Alters – even ones formed as adults – can be so desperate for an approving mother or father that they would love the counselor or friend to become a substitute mother or father. It ends up being far safer and more healing, however, if Jesus and an alter or the host take on the parenting roles. That way there is availability 24/7 without any danger of abandonment due to the substitute parent burning out or leaving. Moreover, the healing advantages are obvious: the more deeply bonded the person is with Jesus and with every part of himself/herself, the better.
One of Jake’s alters used to call himself “Reject.” Despite him not being happy with his new name, we renamed him Beloved. In the following, he is replying to an e-mail from one of Alices’ alters who, coincidentally, also used to call herself “Reject”. It highlights several things about alters and the powerful way God ministers to them. I’m not hitting any of the other alters any more.
For the last few days I went to porn thinking that it would help me, but Terry [one of the younger brother alters he used to hit] keeps singing praise to God and I can hear him inside. When I go to masturbate he starts crying and praying and I can’t continue. I want to be like Terry.
I told Jesus to be Lord of my sexuality today and asked him to be my Lord also. Jesus told me, “Well done!”
Terry says that when I do bad things it hurts him, too. He just keeps praying for me and doesn’t stop. He is afraid of me. I don’t want him to be afraid of me. I don’t hate him anymore. He just loves too much. I am afraid to be loved.
Thank you for telling me that I am wanted. No one ever wanted me. Thank you for wanting me to live.
Jesus wants me. I am just scared at times of him. He has not hurt me, though. He took me to heaven with him for a little bit. He does love me. I am still confused sometimes, though.
I am Beloved of God. I don’t want to be Reject ever again.
When you sent the e-mail about Jesus blowing his love on me, I felt it blow over my spirit. I don’t really understand that, but he does love me.
By the way, it is important for anyone with D. I. D. who has the tiniest attraction to porn to place a porn filter on all Internet access. You cannot expect currently unknown alters to have the degree of self-control that you have, nor can you expect little alters to be able to tolerate what you can tolerate.
Disregarding this can cause significant setbacks in one’s healing. A link at the end of this page provides a list of porn filters.
A three-year old child who has been traumatized can be seriously triggered by television programs rated for general viewing. Something as innocuous as falling asleep in front of a T.V. can have most unpleasant consequences. When the host is asleep, little alters are often more active, not less, and the host is unable to monitor what is seen.
Next Part Hindrances to Integration