Plurals, how often do you hear a singlet say something like:

"DID is real, but 'alters' are just parts of one person. No one has multiple personalities. Anyone who claims otherwise is either delusional or attention-seeking."

Let's talk about the problem with this.

#pluralgang

These, "I'm not pluralphobic, but..." statements prompt Real DID Systems(tm) to come back with DSM-5 criteria, ISST-D articles, and the Theory of Structural Dissociation. Their goal is to help singlets understand that DID is a Real Mental Illness(tm). But there's a problem.

Most singlets know that DID is a Real Mental Illness(tm). What they don't know (or can't accept) is why it's okay for alters/headmates to function as their own people. If DID is a Real Mental Illness(tm), then why aren't you in therapy to help you realize you're one person?

Real DID Systems(tm) will typically retort that they ARE in therapy, thankyouverymuch, but healing takes time. This still sidesteps the issue. If DID is a Real Mental Illness(tm), then why should other people acknowledge (or care about) our alters/headmates as actual people?

As long as this question remains unanswered, a singlet will never care if all your alters/headmates are you at different ages/very straightforward "emotional parts" or if they're all Steven Universe characters. That's nowhere near where their respectability politics are stuck.

This is the thought process driving DID/plural-phobia:

DID is a mental illness. Professionals have proven that there can only be one personality per body and that people who experience themselves differently are ill. Therefore, I should not "encourage" people who ID as plural.

DID/plural-phobia does not care if you are an endogenic system made up of dragons, fairies, and svartalfs or if you are a traumagenic system made up of emotional parts. They only care if you are "getting help." Usually, they do not acknowledge plural-friendly therapy as "help."

Why? As long as plurality is viewed as a mental illness unto itself, nothing will satisfy pluralphobes short of us seeking therapy to de-pluralize ourselves. Most of these singlets don't know about therapists who consider cooperation/healthy plurality to be a good treatment goal.

The real question is, "If DID is an illness, why shouldn't singlets limit their acceptance to systems who feel like "parts of one person"? Isn't that the "correct" viewpoint? Why is it wrong for a singlet to call our headmates by the body's name or tell them to 'snap out of it'?"

"If DID is an illness, then wouldn't a singlet be 'enabling' us by referring to our alters/headmates by their preferred names or acknowledging them as separate people?" These questions may be cringey, but sadly they are the questions we must answer to get singlets on board.

Let's start to answer that question. For the purpose of this exercise, I will not really be addressing DID clients who see themselves as parts of one person and typically function as singlets. This post specifically addresses pluralphobia, ie: discrimination against plurals.

What pluralphobic singlets are missing is that plurality (diagnosable or not) is not a delusion. Plurals are not making a falsifiable truth claim about objective reality. Studies have shown differences in brain activity when DID systems switch. Our brains function differently.

You can see this in the way that some DID and/or plural systems require two different pairs of glasses because their prescription changes between switches. You can see it in the way that some DID/plural systems report MH issues that are specific to some (but not all) of them.

Plural systems (who may or may not be diagnosed with DID) sometimes disclose their plurality to loved ones and then ask their loved ones to refer to treat them as multiple people sharing a body rather than as one person with parts. To the uninitiated singlet, this looks terrible.

We do not disclose because we are "special." We do not disclose because we want you to collude with a "dangerous delusion." We disclose because it is harder for many of us to communicate with you when we have to present ourselves as a singlet. It is really that simple. I promise.

Not every system has a "host" who can be solely responsible for outside social interaction. Even systems who do have "hosts" cannot guarantee the "host" will always be fronting or even present when you message them or stop by or whatever. We want to prepare you for this reality.

When headmates have different beliefs, experiences, memories, opinions, preferences, etc., we can come across as "inconsistent" to those who don't know we're plural. A friend became convinced I made up an assault once bc she mentioned it to a headmate who wasn't aware of it.

The headmate said, "I know that person was an asshole, but I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say they assaulted me." Because another headmate had written an entire post about the assault, we now looked "inconsistent" (ie: like we were lying to our friend). This was obviously bad.

Another time, we switched from a fairly un-shockable headmate to someone who's very easy to trigger while discussing sexual topics. When the newly-fronting headmate said the topic was triggering, our friend got angry that we didn't say anything sooner in the conversation.

In the second case, we said something like, "It's fine to talk to Blood about that topic, but maybe don't bring it up to Annaleigh." The friend assumed we were just being difficult/that there was surely no validity to what we were saying. It created massive conflict between us.

It is not enough to simply say, "I was fine literally an eighth of a second ago, but now I am so triggered I want to jump off a building." It is not enough to say, "I'm blanking on that impassioned blog post I wrote about my trauma." Plurality explains these situations better.

Or for another example, someone sends a link and says, "You're gonna love this video." If you aren't excited about whatever it is, your friend will feel confused and maybe a bit rejected. You might say, "Oh that's more Lilly's thing, but she'll message you when she sees it!"

If you can't be out as plural, you are stuck either (1) having confusing and unproductive interactions with singlets, (2) only interacting with people when the "real" one is fronting and not letting the others talk to people at all, or (3) creating a singlet-sona for socializing.

Most people want to feel like their friends trust them and can be honest with them. Unfortunately, if you really experience yourself as plural, you cannot be fully honest with someone who views plurality as "attention-seeking" or as a pure delusion. So why shouldn't they?

Plurality itself is a neurodivergence. DID lives at the intersection of dissociation, dysfunction, and plurality. Recovery from DID does not necessarily mean recovery from plurality, and being nice to plurals does not "encourage" dysfunction. That is it. #pluralgang #pluraltalk