NIMH does the smart thing, ditches the DSM

[naamah_darling]

The National Institute of Mental Health is abandoning the DSM.

This is potentially monumental, and I've seen very little mention of it anywhere. Partly, I think, because people don't really grok how big a deal this is.

This is a very good thing, and for those who don't grasp why, I will try to explain. (Though the link does a really great job of

Comments

[naamah_darling]

I would be SO HAPPY to discuss my girls with you. Come at me with questions, I don't care what they are!

Back atcha.

and she liked to soothe people and comfort people, even victims before feeding.

That sounds SO MUCH like some of the characters I have had. Some of the most unlikely characters have had powerful nurturing/protecting instincts. Eve, the evil superheroine?* Mama bear all OVER the place. Literally the last thing I expected out of her, but turned out to be a core feature of her personality. I liked her a lot better after I realized that.

And then there's Horatio, who is one of the primaries, and is like . . . ice cream and backrubs, and is pretty much essence of "let me help" and nurturing and loving and generally being like the nicest person EVER. It's not surprising coming from him . . . he's a nice kid . . . but I've never had a character so genuinely good and sweet and playful at heart, and it's really odd having him around because he has an innocence and a trustingness that none of the others have ever had -- that *I* don't have. He feels really bad about injuring someone who was probably going to kill him, FFS. IDEK what's going to happen when it gets to be time, game-wise, for him to actually have to fight bad guys and potentially kill someone. Poor pup. :(

She was someone I CREATED but she had a LIFE inside my mind. It was very obvious I did NOT have DID - when I told my doctors about it, they said, "It sounds like you have a very, very creative form of healthy multiplicity, a good coping mechanism."

^ Exactly that.

I'm curious about Serena in that she has evolved from the original source. Does she still have a backstory? I mean, has that evolved, too, or is she more of a presence whose existence is now completely created by and living inside you, and not derived from or referring to any other continuum/outside-of-you reality/storyline? Jesus. I am not sure that question made sense. It makes sense in my head.

It's just . . . when it's a thing that you cultivate deliberately, you're aware of the character's origins, and I'm wondering if that changes for you, because it never has for me. A LOT of them -- most, by a huge majority -- never get past the fourth wall; they may be aware of me -- some aren't -- but aren't aware of the existence of this world as separate from theirs. At best, I could describe their awareness of me, the ones I talk to but who don't understand what they are, as being like . . . they are interacting with me while *they* are in a dream state, or like I'm an imaginary part of them, to them. Part of this is partitioning, I think, because there's the issue of What is Canon. Most are RPG characters; time moves in fits and starts for them, and too much tampering risks changing them from them as a character to them as the person I interact with, separately.

But then I can have someone like the Baron, who does not give me a choice about it. Who is like, "I see you there, I know who you are, and I know how this works. Thanks for letting me access your brains, btw. Makes it much easier. Now I know as much about your world as you do. Now, here's what we have to do. . . ." He is explicitly aware of all of it, and will interact with the others, too, with ZERO fucks given about continuum or timeline or anything. He'll play with people on the internet, sometimes.

And all of it sounds completely insane laid out like that, when it's really not as crazy as it sounds. It's just . . . discussing the interior mechanics of a very odd coping strategy that creates its own logic as it goes along. So it sounds REALLY bizarre.

*Yes, evil superheroine. Not supervillainess. Still evil, retired from being a villain, now working on more or less the same side as the good guys.

[dubh_ceol]

Oh. Your Baron seems much like my Liam. My lads (well, and one lady.) are the ones who take over when Bad Things are happening and keep me from shattering. I tend to keep very quiet about the folks who live in my head and occasionally take over...most folks in my day to day life don't know about them or haven't heard about them, mostly because I can't afford a DID label to be slapped on me.

[brightlotusmoon]

That's an awesome question. Serena does have a backstory, and it has evolved, in fact. :)

Check out my latest post - it's all about answering and asking questions and such.