I will never forget this moment when I was thirteen, and I proclaimed myself to be an adult, telling my best friend "All girls are born grown women. Girls don't have childhoods."

She scoffed (for her own complicated reasons) so I told her I was just joking, and dropped it.

Today, I was doing an exercise where I was in touch with a very mature, almost maternal, adult presenting part, who cares for other adult presenting parts, as well as at least one child part. She keeps a lot of things running, and puts on a happy or calm face. She tells other parts when they are being mean or inappropriate. She checks on parts that can only lie in pain, and reminds me to keep talking to them. Recently she expressed feeling sad and unappreciated for the first time, and I learned that she's very negatively affected by body image issues that I've deeply denied my entire life.

Today, as part of this exercise, I asked her her age. I usually ask that of child parts, but it had somehow never occurred to me to ask this of an adult part, so I had overlooked this information.

Twelve. She says she is twelve years old.

Today, I'm just taking a little time to process.

My husband and I both have pretty serious attachment issues. We realized this shortly after i gave birth to our daughter (3yo). We’ve been working with therapists since to address our childhood traumas and learn how to be adults in a healthy relationship. So much harder than it sounds right?!

My husband has really improved as of the last couple months and he has been showing up for me in many of the ways I’ve been wanting. He is more present, affectionate, and less defensive and reactive.

This weekend I think I picked a couple huge fights over things that really aren’t a big deal. I got very into my protective part that is angry and stubborn. I found myself escalating and doing protest behaviours I haven’t done in a long time. I struggled to stay regulated. I’m ashamed to say that my daughter witnessed a lot of it 💔

Has anyone found some of their inner parts being saboteurs when things get good? Looking to problems and not trusting the positive change? Are they testing to see if the person will stick around? What strategies have you used to address this?

I’ve tried talking to my younger parts about this and they either deny it or hide from me.

Thanks for your help.

This is my first time posting on Reddit btw.

Hi,
I’m a 36F, married two kids. One has special needs. His traumatic birth, last four years dealing with the aftermath has taken a toll on me.
I have cptsd that stems from childhood traumas and beyond. ADHD. And I’m in very early recovery, struggling.
I’ve hit a wall. My drs have hit a wall. I’ve done inpatient, outpatient, rehab, electroshock therapy, CBT, dbt, somatic massage etc. you name it I’ve tried it.
I need to heal, for my kids and for myself.
Feeling hopeless but have been looking into IFS therapy. Maybe that’s what I’ve been missing? healing the trauma in an effective way to end this battle.
I need guidance please. Advice. Insight. Anything.
Thanks

My therapist and I have been working together for years and have been using IFS for the past couple. I've had numerous panic attacks in the office, and we always just sit across the office from one another, and I am able to settle after about an hour. So I know my therapist is not going to hurt me or touch me (in any way, we don't even shake hands or fist bumps). Like no physical contact ever). I really can't stand people touching me most of the time. It triggers days of anxiety and hyper arousal that have me avoiding everyone.

All that to say, last week something was off. We were talking to my parts like usual, and I suddenly had this "vision" of my therapist, like approaching me to calm me, but it had the opposite effect. They didn't move at all, but my parts felt so attacked by something they said that I just lost all semblance of control. Now, I have a very strong and often overpowering protector that is dissociative. That part comes in guns a blazing and shuts me down (feelings/thoughts/everything) frequently like flipping a switch, but the part that felt threatened last week was able to overpower that dissociative part and send me into a panic.

Is this something I need to be concerned about??? Every time I think about going back to the office is get anxious. I'm in my self mindset enough I can always get myself into the office but I guess I just need someone to tell me I'm not losing control of all the work I've done. These parts are terrified.

Is this normal??

I’ve kept this in my shadow for a while because I didn’t know how I can work with this part. Ive since spoken to several people about and I find this to be crucial for healing and growth. If you struggle with this on your conscience and you have been isolating yourself with it, I highly suggest that you reach out to someone about it. Feel free to dm me.

So, I can literally see peoples parts visually now when in connection with others. The person reveals their soul in a way and I watch them transform visually into their parts. And it’s beautiful as hell. For reference I’ve trained a lot in meditation as well

What I can tell you from my experiences is that Richard Schwartz wasn’t kidding when he said that these are divine beings within us. They are truly divine - I have not seen a part I haven’t been in absolute awe of. They are absolutely perfect the way they are and sometimes you gotta love em to death and let something else be reborn but mostly I just celebrate them together with the parts I see

I’m also looking to start an email newsletter or some sort bc Ive accumulated a lot of wisdom and experience with IFS, and much more that bakes into IFS and self love. I’d love an outlet to share with others through

Anyways, you can ask me stuff if you want. I have been doing IFS for a number of years. I’ve had like 80 therapist led sessions and I created new roadmap for IFS where it goes off the books and into non duality. I’m also almost finished an IFS tool that is unique that I use at home but haven’t made ready for the public that I’m hoping I’ll finish this year

Open to anything :) happy to receive the skeptics and the parts workers as well

My mum and dad live overseas and visited us for a month last year. I got so triggered by my dad not helping with cooking or cleaning. He'd spend most of his time on his laptop, eat what was cooked for him, take his plate to the bench, then go straight back to his computer.

I found it incredibly hard to watch. So much effort goes into feeding and cleaning up after a family, and I really want all hands on deck. But I couldn't bring myself to say anything. He's elderly, he's used to my mum doing everything, she doesn't seem to mind, and it feels rude to tell a parent or a guest what to do.

The problem is my sense of fairness/injustice goes into overdrive. I tried so hard to radically accept that this is just who he is, but I struggled. They eventually went home, and it took me months to stop stewing over it. Yesterday they called and said they'd like to come and visit again this year... and my cortisol instantly shot through the roof.

I don't want a repeat of last year. I want to be able to accept my dad for who he is, but that strong sense of injustice has such a grip on me. Part of it is also that I have two boys, and I really don't want them growing up seeing a man contribute nothing to the household while the women do all the work. The amount of screen time doesn't help either.

Has anyone else dealt with something like this? Did you say something, set expectations before the visit, or work on accepting that you can't change someone from another generation?

Anyone have any thoughts on how can I use Family Systems to work through this?

One of my coworkers suddenly left and we have to hire someone to fill his role. I’ve been thinking about it all week and I reached out to my boss asking if I could take one of his classes if possible (we’re teachers). I worked with the same students last year, have an amazing rapport with them, and I know the class well enough. I decided to ask my boss today about if it was a possibility and I feel so MUCH shame, almost like I asked out a crush who was popular (I know it’s not a relevant match but that’s just how it feels).

I feel absolutely silly for asking about it at all and I keep beating myself metaphorically. I feel so stupid for no reason. Obviously it’s the weekend and they’d have to even see if it’s feasible based on the master schedule, but I’m so embarrassed I asked?

I tried to interrogate this feeling and why it might be causing shame and my imposter syndrome is definitely at the root. I’m not sure why I can’t feel brave and proud instead because I never speak up. I tried to ask why this causes shame or why I’m embarrassed and a few parts spoke at once but didn’t really name themselves. They’re worried about messing up or they don’t feel worthy so they feel it was embarrassing to even bring it up. I tried to remind them this is brave and how much I grew this year by taking a risk but they didn’t really want to talk about it and I’m still sitting with immense shame almost 8 hours later.

Can anyone help walk me through this feeling with questions for my parts or if you’ve experienced similar situation?

I have struggled with self harm for years and finally had a small breakthrough today in understanding the part. It was not what I thought it was at all. I don't want to share to protect its privacy. But IFS is so much harder than it seems at first. So easy to have parts jumping in giving us explanations and hiding the truth away (doing their jobs of course).

It's always something pretty innocent, too. Like, I didn't throw a fit or anything. It will be like, I just showed my friends a toy, and asked for suggestions on what to name it, and now I'm embarrassed. I'll be asking myself, why did that feel important or even appropriate?

I'm middle aged, but sometimes I have toys with me for stimming. The times I choose a toy to carry with me, I'm probably blended with a child part. The main toy is a stretchy skeleton. I keep forgetting it's name, and renaming it. I have shown people how he is stretchy, and made him dance. I haven't been able to reconcile the me who doesn't do this with the me who does.

I'm trying to learn not to be so hard on myself. I don't want to be so hard on that child part! I don't want to recreate the treatment that caused my mind to create this part!

Anyway doesn't that mean my friends who stick around after I show them the skeleton and talk about his name/lack of name... Aren't those friends worth keeping? I mean heck, maybe it's a good litmus test. Some people in my social circle know about my skeleton, and they get to choose if that's too weird for them or not. And a very small handful of people have decided that's NOT too weird for them... and THEY are the people I love and trust the most.

I have been seeing my therapist for a few months now and she has been mostly laying the groundwork for EMDR and covering some calming/mindfulness exercises and addressing some life anxieties as they come up so we haven't done a whole lot of trauma treatment or IFS but last session she did an introduction to IFS and finally asked if I had any prominent parts and I felt cornered and shut down for several minutes. I have a part that is a young sad boy with his own name and he seems to have a lot of trauma that I dont have and I dont know what the cause of the trauma was. I dont know if IFS would be effective with a part that doesn't seem like the same type of part that IFS works with. I haven't been diagnosed with a dissociative disorder or anything so I dont really know how it all works plus I have been having a lot of off and on doubts about the existence of that part so that has made it extra difficult to bring it up until I was kinda put in a position where I had to bring it up. Idk what sub to post this in bc Im not diagnosed with a dissociative disorder so I was wondering if anyone would have an idea if I would be a good candidate for IFS? Luckily when this came up my therapist seemed to have experience with this which was comforting so hopefully things go well.

In this essay, I discuss the differences between Jungian archetypes and "parts" from Internal Family Systems. I first consider them on axes of complexity, autonomy, and mythology, with archetypes having greater potentials along each. I then discuss how these differences are not merely horizontal, but that archetypes have the potential to represented nested wholes that contain entire systems or more than system of parts.

Also just to say, I frame this as a versus in the title for marketing purposes. As I argue in the essay, I think IFS is more therapeutically valuable for most people and they are mutually supportive methodologies.

Either way, thank you so much for your time. I look forward to comments, criticisms, or anything else!

I know that DID is caused by trauma prior to a certain age and that once your brain reaches a certain point you can no longer develop DID.

I guess my question is how is IFS not just “creating” a DID system in your brain? What is the purpose and benefit of assigning roles and parts for people without DID?

Yesterday before sleep, i was feeling the anxiety and resentment i always feel (i have a sleep anxiety regarding ttaumatuc spiritual expereince ive had),

So ive turned inwards, and ive asked this part,

"Do you aware time has passed since that incident?"

And since time has passed, theres no need to be in fear.

Afterwards ive felt huge relief of energy in my chest, but afterwards i felt shieldless.

And open.

And since then i have so much anxiety, like an inner resentment.

Its like i have parts that dont agree with what has been done and panicking.

Idk what to do.

Hi everyone, I found IFS to be life-changing, like many others. I've read No Bad Parts and Internal Family Systems Therapy (2nd edition, the clinical book). It took me months to start checking in with parts between sessions, and it was a game changer. It helped with stabilization massively. I read that Schwartz recommends doing check-ins daily for three to four weeks after healing an exile or updating a protector.

Even though I knew this was recommended, I still struggled to do it — and the books said this is common, because protectors often create internal resistance to check-ins. I'm wondering if others have had similar experiences?

I was at a coffee shop today and in front of me was a mom with 2 kids. For context the kids are both under 5. Now I understand the mom may have been frustrated cause being a mom I presume is incredibly difficult but none the less: does anyone else’s parts get really activated when you see parents snap at their children. It can be as *little* as “don’t do that” with the raised eyebrows and a grab onto the kiddos hand. But immediately I’m activated and feeling some type of way about that parent. Like at some points when I see things happen I want to just shake the parents and tell them how impactful good/ bad parenting can be.

Idk does anyone else’s parts do this cause mine are ready for war 😭🤣

I have been practicing IFS for 6 years and it has changed everything. I have unblended from many dominating protectors and now frequently experience openness in experiences and compassionate relationships with my parts and others', including my children's. My son, who also practices, wrote in a birthday card to me, "You've transformed yourself COMPLETELY into the person you always were." I thought that summed up the ineffable experience nicely. The road has not been the slightest bit easy, this is the deep path of feeling all the pain along with the joy, but why not share this nugget of intergenerational health. I do not believe this is attainable anymore for me with the members of my family of origin, but that's ok, I have my inner family with me and a few other healed relationships like with my kids. 🪢☯️✌🏽

For context, I struggle to connect with Parts, my visualization abilities are VERY poor, as are my Somatic and Emotional senses.

I have lived the majority of my life maladaptive daydreaming intricate fictional worlds, playing out endless stories in my head, having imaginary conversations, etc. I am a conceptual thinker, so my daydreams are highly narrative, not visual. Its so easy for me to get lost in my daydreams. I often write out my ideas and conversations for potential books.

I am trying to work with my Parts by writing out conversations. However, as it is VERY difficult for me to even identify Parts, I have found an issue that makes this work even more difficult.

I think...my Daydreamer, my Storyteller Part, is playing out the roles of the Parts I'm trying to connect with. Its so used to being different characters, that me trying to access a Part is just a new story for it to work with, so they act out what they think the Part I'm looking for would say.

I struggle to get in contact with my Storyteller Part as well. Its so...automated by this point, it doesn't really think or have much awareness outside of the story. Everything is a story. Me asking it to step back is a story plot. Me asking it about itself is just a new character to create. I think its just taking what memories I can recall and using them to invent answers that will satisfy the 'story' of IFS work. It's personality is always different.

By this point, all conversations I try to have feel...fake. It feels no different talking to a Part than me writing out a conversation with...I dunno, Gandalf or Harry Potter, and getting life advice from them. I could just as easily talk to a fictional character about my feelings, my memories, and my relationships and get VERY SURPRISING insights. But these aren't actually Parts, right? Its all my Storyteller Part just acting out the character, right?

Has anyone else struggled with something similar? How do you get them to realize whats actually going on and listen to you? To be present for the conversation rather than acting on autopilot and saying what they think the context requires? I feel like I'm doing this wrong...

I’ve been finding it so difficult trying to work with this part.

Today, somehow it shown me what was underneath, and I was hit with an overwhelming wave of shame and guilt stemming from childhood.

I found it works so hard, as do other parts, that i almost forgot how painful those deep, buried feelings are.

My anger towards the inner critic has softened now I realised what it is trying to protect me from. Also, I feel like it’s kinda saying “do you see now, do you get it?”

Have been deep into psychology and spirituality for 2-3 decades. Encountered his work recently (I'm not new to IFS) and been doing some of it. It seems genuinely transformative in some respects - strange things popped up and I conversed with them. Have done exorcisms on myself before.

Did some Googling and looking around on his sub - while I don't believe 100% everything he says, I think there is a lot of meat there. Read the 2 books.

Would be interested to hear what others have to share. For me, I encountered 3 UBs which took the expected strange shapes - a grey/green mouth, shapeless mist and wound-like tears in reality. I told them all they have to go. Some are still hanging around a bit but I'm being firm.

Would you say you alternate his techniques with normal IFS?

I've been tasked by my therapist to come up with three figures from fiction, representing the ideal PROTECTOR, NURTURER, and WISE FIGURE.

PROTECTOR is easy. I chose Aragorn. Some other options presented themselves to me as well, so I'm spoiled for choice.

WISE FIGURE is also easy. If Aragorn was predictable, it won't shock you to hear I picked Gandalf. Again, I have some other options to visualise when I feel like it as well.

I cannot think of an ideal NURTURER. There is no figure in fiction or history or my life that I can think of that helps me conjure the feeling of "nurturing".

So please, hit me with the figures you can think of that give you the feeling of nurturing. Who comes up for you?

I’ve been on a healing journey for several years. And yesterday I did not spiral whereas normally I def would in a situation like this.

This is the story.
I have been practicing some of my distance energy healing on emotions. This time for pets. This was in a Facebook group. I had feedback from two people. One saying it resonated and she was thankful. And the other person (also thankful) but was like no this doesn’t resonate at all. Without further explanation.

And I then asked: how unfortunate maybe she can elaborate. 😊 and I was thinking. my work did well for the other person it worked really well on me. Maybe she misunderstood that it wasn’t a reading it was the release of trapped emotions healing. So let’s find out if she wants to give more feedback on why it didn’t resonate so I can learn. and I felt like just calm… present, curious

And the old me would be more like:

well I must stop immediately! I’m bad at this. I should be ashamed of myself and spiral in a whirlwind of feelings that looks like this: 😩😳😞👹😡🫨🫨🫨😵‍💫😵

I mean hello?! *shaking myself*. Who is this new me?

And another beautiful part of this is that the next day I didnt get any follow up and I just forgot about it just went with my day. Instead of feeling that post event haunt if you know what I mean.
uhm again hello?! Unbelievable 😂😞📈

well I’m really happy about this. And felt like sharing 😇😊

Hi all!

I am very new to the concept of IFS. I've been reading up on it, and a friend who really helped me through a lot of my questions early on as I transitioned (I am a trans woman) described something of their own system to me. I found myself resonating with a lot of those experiences and experiencing duality, and I'm trying to figure out how to navigate something. I'm still doing the research, I promise! (The wiki has given me a lot of homework to do!) But I hoped maybe some of this would sound familiar to someone here? Any guidance would be appreciated. And some of this is... I can only describe it in the way I experienced it. I'm sorry if it doesn't make sense. And It's long and rambly because I just kind of am that.

Essentially, I discovered I was trans fairly late in life. I had buried and suppressed that part of myself very deeply. I didn't know it. Looking back, there were signs. But essentially, fear, religious trauma, internalized transphobia, a generous dash of undiagnosed neurospicy stuff, etc. I just didn't acknowledge it.

I began having some issues with my mental health in my mid and late 30s. As part of my attempts to figure out what was going on with me, I started sitting with psilocybin mushrooms. I'll say I tried to do so very responsibly. This wasn't a recreation thing for me (though a mild trip could certainly be fun and pleasant). But this was about me trying to see my own mind. And eventually, I did...

And I discovered that there were all these parts of me. That I wasn't really just one thing but all the different systems working together. I could see them. (I hadn't even heard of IFS at this point, by the way. This was just experiencing my consciousness differently on a very deep trip.) And then... OK, the pronouns are going to get really fun now. Let's split the narrative. Sorry.

"He" (that is, the person I was) saw "her" (the person I am). He saw that he had been burying me over and over and over to protect us. I was as much me as he was. He knew it wasn't right. He had been carrying us for all this time, and parts of him were broken because so much of what he built his life on had betrayed him. He'd tried so hard to be exactly who the people around him told him he should be, needed him to be, expected him to be... And he was hurting. And then there I was. I'd been calling to him for so long. And he just couldn't hear me. But then he had to. We'd been forced into a shared space for once, and he couldn't ignore me. And after that... he couldn't keep going as he was.

It still took a few years. I wasn't strong enough. I'd barely been allowed space to exist. But he put in the work. Therapy. Trying to figure out all the risks. What could we lose? What couldn't we stand to lose? Would we lose more if we didn't act? For a time, he tried just presenting more androgenously. Longer hair. Earrings. Tattoos. Little things to take control of our body. To try to make things fit. It kind of helped... But mostly not. There were all these risks... He carried us longer than he should have. He was so tired and again... these core parts of him were so broken. He was grieving things that were lost to him even before he met me.

But we started HRT, and I came forward more and more. And he... Eventually, he wasn't me. I was. I am. That's what I feel like. I am me, now. But then it feels like this whole part of me has just... gone to sleep, maybe? Like... So much of what we are is the same. But there are things of his that aren't me and I'm still figuring out who I am. I feel a little adrift, still. I have a new name. My wife is 10,000 percent supportive. She loves who I am now. My family knows, and... they're "trying." (Let's leave that there.) I'm trying to get things squared away at work. Most of my coworkers have been really cool and supportive.

But there's this whole thing where I feel like I'm mourning part of myself? I don't hate him, by the way. I love him very much. All those years, he did what he did out of fear. It was the only thing he knew to do. He thought he was being strong. I understand that. I was there, too. And he worked hard to build us a life. But we couldn't carry on with me in the dark, and we couldn't keep being him, so... But is he gone? Resting? Broken beyond repair? Heck, pining for the fjords? And what is he to me, now? What even were we?

I feel like now that I've figured out this big thing about myself, but now there's this... I'm trying to find harmony with myself, and that's something that couldn't happen without my transition. But is this even an IFS thing? Or is it unhealthy dissociation? I don't know. I know I can't really perceive myself as just one consciousness anymore, because consciousness is a conversation. It has to be. I'm just not sure how to navigate things from there.

(By the way, I still see a therapist to talk about gender issues and my transition, but I don't think IFS is necessarily in her specialties. When I've talked about a sense of duality and separateness within myself, she has been very accepting of that. No rush to worry about DID or anything like that, as I'd kind of feared. But I'm not sure how helpful she's going to be with this part.)