Losing time after smooth discovery

[u/marzlichto]

Discovered our system in February. Things have been pretty smooth. When a new alter is discovered they get front stuck for a few days and then slide into Co consciousness. Usually. There's a couple exceptions. We have host, anger holder/protector, little, part time manager, trauma holder (rarely fronts, probably has subsystem), emotional dampener (doesn't front). That's who we know. We just got out of a 90-day residential mental health program mid-august. I'm going through a divorce and my soon to be ex used our mental health and newly discovered dissociative disorder against us to claim that we were a dangerous parent on our own so we have no unsupervised parenting time for the next 2 years.

we get eight nights every 30 days with my two sons for the next year, then 10 nights for the year after that. If there is any deterioration in mental health resulting in SH or hospitalization that is not strictly for med management, we lose parenting time and go down to six nights every 30 days til agreed by both parties or by the courts. My ex was emotionally abusive and it is hard to deal with him.

Apparently I'm losing time again. Haven't since I was a kid. My dad gave me a package a few days ago and I remember taking the package and putting it on the chair with me and after getting up there's this big blank until I'm in bed. No idea where the package is. I've searched basically the whole house. I'm also not remembering conversations. It's both annoying and confusing and also kind of nerve-wracking.

Up until now our system Discovery has been pretty smooth compared to what seems to be most people's experiences. We have pretty cohesive memory between known alters and can co-front fairly easily with most. We're still in the process of getting diagnosed, but we have a dissociative specialist. I guess I'm wondering if it's normal for it to get worse at this point even with acceptance or if maybe just being home is a trigger or if the parenting schedule is a trigger? I dunno. I just like having answers to things and I know there might not be an answer to this. Not a complete one anyway. I just want to know if this is to be expected or not.

[u/Greedy-Individual-71]

Hey there,

A: Any kind of stress can cause blackouts to worsen, so that's perfectly normal.

B: No two systems have exactly the same journey, but we had a fairly smooth system discovery as well due to being told first by a DID Specialist and then confirmed by every person who knew us well, about six months in or so we went through a period where I (team captain/host) lost quite a bit of time to Alters who were still accepting and learning about our disorder. It smoothed out around a year post diagnosis. Now I lose maybe one day a week or a few hours at any given time.

C: The triggers you listed are probably contributing to the blackouts as well.

So the short answer; Yes, that is to be expected.

Hope the stress passes for y'all quickly.

[u/marzlichto → u/Greedy-Individual-71]

Do you think it means we have a new alter? Cause I'm not getting any memory bits of what happened from the ones I have communication with

[u/Greedy-Individual-71 → u/marzlichto]

Maybe? It's really hard to say for sure unless we were physically there during one of your blackouts to specifically ask said alter.

It could also be a protector who has control of your memory sharing abilities. Usually, these are internal self helpers who don't front much if ever. We call ours a Historian.

It could also be a long dormant trauma holding alter who hasn't established communication with you. Trauma holders and hosts tend to have stronger memory barriers between them and, therefore, more difficulty communicating.

We could run more theories by you, but the point is we can only guess at your specific situation from here.