Fears, Insecurity and Trust

It's not been easy these past few months and in fact it gets harder as each month passes. We keep telling each other that it'll get better when we move out of the Parents house into our own home. We keep telling each other how much better things will be. So much now relies on this, so much has been built up on this premise I wonder how it will cope and I worry about how it can possibly stand such high expectations.

They've changed, they're different and I fear that they've been different too long. They don't all agree that they've changed but I see it, I feel it. The individuals have changed and that effects them as a one.
More of them dislike me now than before and I suspect those that still do don't as much as used to neither. And sometimes it gets hard to love them as much as I once did.

They tell me how I need to get help, need to see a counsellor again to resolve my issues. I'm homesick, not a lot a counsellor can do about that. I do have some issues I admit it, childhood issues that manifest themselves as anger. Situations where I shouldn't be so angry I become excessively so and it causes me to react more than maybe I would otherwise. But it's never without reason, something happens in our relationship that causes anger, sometimes me first sometimes them first and it escalates. I used to see a counsellor in the UK and I got as far as knowing what the causes where, just not how to better deal with them. So maybe I will find another counsellor to help finish what was started.
But am I the only one here that could probably do with outside help? No but I fear them seeing a professional as much as they do especially in the U.S. where it seems their condition doesn't seem to be tolerated as much, based on a lot of what I've read (and I've read a lot about it).

Today, this morning at least, whoever is "out" is someone that's not quite my biggest fan. Of course they didn't say anything along those lines but I know. It's one of the hardest aspects of having a relationship with a multiple that not all of them will like you and unfortunately it's something I am finding harder and harder to deal with. It's again related to them being different and that some of them are hiding away until we move just. When they were all present more often it evened it out a bit; I'd spend a bit of time with one of them that didn't like me but then later with one of them that did. With ever more frequency though that balance is shifted against me. I hope that if we move then the others will be out more often and I'll get to spend more time with those that like me and those that let me know they still want to be with me.

They like to tell me almost daily how it's not normal to spend so much time together, how they need their space. Fair enough I suppose, normally at least one person would be working. But they do work, maybe for just a few hours a day but we're apart a good 3-4 hours a day. Not long enough apparent;y though. They want me to find a job which of course is fair enough, I want to find work too, to have my own independence again but it's only too clear that they will like the additional hours they don't have to spend with me.
And in the evenings they rarely like me being around them (they say they don't like anyone being around them) and I have to hide away in the basement. Some of them say that if I got a job then it'll be different and we can spend the evenings together but for others of them they will not want anything to change.

Yesterday they seemed upset that we didn't spend the whole of the shower time together but today I got the feeling they didn't want me there at all. It's like that every day, sometimes they want me around, sometimes not. I don't know if I'm strong enough to take it, I don't know if I'm emotionally strong enough.
They say love conquers all. I sometimes say to them that our love is like a rock and they're taking chunks out of it. Sometimes I can form it back together again but sometimes I can't, the pieces are gone and the rock gets smaller.

One of the reasons they don't want me (or anyone else) around them in the evenings is so they can just be with their social media people. Fucking twitter and Facebook. There are those of them that would happily choose twitter over me and I doubt more than two or three of them (out of ten) that would choose me. As you can imagine that doesn't exactly help matters. I've never before been in a situation like this. It's something that's always come between us and the subject of most of our arguments.

Trust.
At least one of them broke the trust in our relationship. At least one of them has broken it several times. When the trust is broken it allows other negative aspects to creep into a relationship. A broken promise raises suspicions and weakens the trust further. Lack of respect for me and our relationship further weakens it some more. Paranoia creeps in (but as the saying goes, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean...) and too much time is spent wondering what's going on. Hyper-sensitivity to events, words spoken, words unspoken, body language, tone, actions, (I'm deliberately avoiding giving actual examples) it all mounts up. Then just as one tries to deal with all that along comes an alter that doesn't like me very much and even more thoughts and negativity set in. The frequency that they "let me know" that I should go back to the UK without them raises alarms too but I try to convince myself they're just being practical. But without trust how do I go back home, 4,500 miles away without driving myself crazy about what they're doing, who they're seeing, who they're chatting too.
I've NEVER been in a relationship where the trust was broken so I have no idea how to cope or how to fix it.

They wrote a post about how I deserve better. They tell me too how I don't deserve to put through all this. I'm not sure if their awareness of it all is a good or bad thing. Last night they said that if they knew in advance how miserable I'd be, being with them they would never have let me visit them that first time. Admittedly that particular comment was just about me being homesick.

Changes and Changes and Nothing Changes

[Quick recap: I am me and my girlfriend is Frank et al. Frankie has DID - Dissociative Identity Disorder or more commonly MPD - Multiple Personality Disorder. They have their own blog(s) just-call-me-frank.blogspot.com and I have this blog, for me, to write about living with the them, the et al partly to share, partly because sometimes I just need to get things out.]

Forgive me, it's been over a year since my last post. No, I'm not confessing though maybe I should. Perhaps it would help. Actually, I do confess, in a manner; I have people that allow me unload my thoughts onto them and they helpfully nod along, pat me on the head and say "there there". That's not really all they do, they're fantastic, the people that help me this way, that listen to my sins.
I've recently had the opportunity to speak to another poor suffering soul with a DID / MPD partner. I kid, he's not that poor... It's an eye opener, kind of. It's scary because his experiences are almost identical to mine and strangely I'm not comforted by that. This other person has been married for a long time (relatively) and he's totally "been there, done that, got the t-shirt, still got it, look at all these stains" and I respect that so much. I hope I'm as strong as he is.

So much change over the last year yet nothing has changed. We're still living in the basement of Frankie's parents. We tried to buy a small farm back in June but the deal fell through at the last hour. Four months down the pan. So plans have changed and we're looking for something, somewhere else. Something more local. So there, even when something changes (our location) it doesn't, or at least at this point, won't, have changed.

And I've changed. I'm not as happy as I used to be. I'm homesick, my disgust at this country I find myself in grows every day and the idea that we're going to be trapped here longer scares me. I'm depressed a bit, a lot sometimes. It causes us to argue too often and get at times it gets shouty. I've changed but I haven't. It all seems familiar. perhaps it is just me.

And they've changed. The situation has changed them. Them as individuals have changed and that has changed them as the one. A lot of them (there are currently ten that they're / we're aware of) just don't like being around "The Mother" so they hide and others are then stuck, some deal with this better than others but it's affected (effected? I can never remember which it is) them all negatively. Some of them might disagree with that, some of them actually do. One or two maybe it is true, certainly the ones that were always negative seem to be just as much so.
I used to know them all individually. I used to be able to know who was "out" but I can't any more. The traits that allowed me to recognise them has dissolved a bit and their unique personalities have merged a bit, the differences have become too subtle. Occasionally I get a clue but it's normally something that comes after the fact, often when it's not even that alter any more. They've kind of got what they always wanted, me to think of them as one because I have to now. So there you go, there's a change. But they're still Frankie so maybe at some level there is again change without change.

I'm hesitating about the decision to talk more about recent events. I used to, I used to post every time we argued. It was my way of getting my side across be it to those they've told or just so I can get my head straight about it. There's been a few recent issues and we've come close to splitting up over them. I don't know if this is the right post for it though.

Do I, should I, write about trust issues and "that" website and "that" person and "those people" and the destructive effect (? I've probably got this wrong again) other people, and me, and them, are having on our relationship and more importantly on / to them. The internal battle they have had to have and continue to have.
No.
This is not the right time.

We need to move. We need to have our own space again. They need to be themselves again and I need to resolve my issues.

Things need to change.

She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not

They are Ten and three of them love me. That is, three of them, Frank, Ivy and Catherine have told me that they love me. As much as that will make (all of) them wrinkle their nose and want to stab me / puppies / anything close to hand, three of them do love me, very much so. And of course I love them, all of them (some more than others, some a lot less than others). Bethany loves me too but only as much as a six year old can love someone.
Some of them I know will never love me, certainly not tell me as much; Sam being an obvious one as he's a boy and just not that way inclined. Brooke says she hates me and I believe her. Some of them can't for a variety of reasons love me, like Melody. Then there are some I'm just not sure about but if I had to put them in a group I'd put them in the former though I would always hope I was wrong. Emmie, Cassandra and Joy (Ten) are the three in question.
I don't expect all of them to love me, it's beyond statistical probability that so many of them even like me and it's not something that I feel is a negative aspect of my relationship with Frankie. I know and accept that when I tell them I love them that I won't always have it said back. To give an example of that, the very first time I told them I loved them I later found out their first thought was "I want a hotdog" (it's "I" because it's it was something said by Cassandra, internally).

[Note: Post was published then subsequently lost, what follows is as best a recollection as possible]

Last night we were laying in bed together and as usual, I said "I love you" and they said it back. This shocked me a bit as I was sure I knew who I'd spent the day with and that person wouldn't have said that. But I've been wrong a lot lately. The differences between them all have blurred a lot since we left Canada and after a while I stopped trying to work it out. It's not something that's truly positive in our relationship but I'll write more about that at a later date. All that matters for this entry is that I was 'happy' to dismiss it as me being wrong again. But after a few minutes went by, without turning to look at me they asked "do you ever wonder who it is that says they love you?". This intrigued me and also confirmed that I wasn't wrong though I needed to test this theory. "Not usually no" I replied "but I think that it was just said by someone for the first time". "yes" was the simple reply.

I turned to them and with my usual bated breath said "I love you Cassandra" and they (she) for the second time said it back to me.

I've already written more words about Cassandra than any of the others but in short, Cassandra has always held a soft spot with me. We didn't used to get along, she used to hate me being with them but despite that, she went to huge lengths to try and make things happy for the sake of the others. There's a post around here that talks about the turning point in our relationship, I'll try and get a link soon but even then, I never thought I'd hear Cassandra say those words and was thrilled that she did.

I'm really struggling to remember my words and thoughts from the day again. I'm gutted...

It's important for me to mention here that whether or not they are able to say the words back to me I love them, it is not something that effects that or is required.

I know I originally wrote a lot more that you see here but teh gist of it remains. If I remember more of the original entry I'll revise this one.

The Joy Of Eating Out JstCallMeFrank

Ooops, that should say "...with JstCallMeFrank"... dang... *childish giggle*

I'm English, for those that didn't already know. That means despite common misconceptions, I eat good quality food. Not saying that all English people eat quality food, vast majority probably do eat cheap nasty store brand value crap but in England we have access to high quality food, especially meats, dairy and vegetables.
Frankie grew up on a farm, spent the best part of eight years in Canada and is a qualified chef; therefore knows a thing about quality foods.
And that means, between us, we are bloody hard to please when it comes to eating out though this post is mainly about the joy of eating out with Frankie.

For those that follow my twitter account you'll know how much I dislike American food and with good reason. The meat is tasteless and entirely the wrong constancy caused mostly because of the 100% (over fed) corn diet. The fruit and vegetables are equally tasteless caused mainly by the forced growth factor. Even fast food, compared to the UK is of a seriously sub-par standard. A quick example of this: What's considered one of the best made to order take out pizzas where we are the states is on par with a UK Pizza Hut. The US Pizza Hut pizzas are disgusting.

Frankie is trying to give me the full American experience by taking me to lots of different places to eat including Denny's, Perkins, Texas Roadhouse, Buffalo Wild Wings at the lower end and some higher class places too (that I can't name as they could give away our location). It probably goes without saying that at Denny's, Perkins and Texas Roadhouse we sent food back and refused replacements but credit where it's due, the items were removed from the bill (which annoyed me as I was looking forward to the argument).

Again, being English means I'm good at gripping about things and have no problem letting people know I'm unhappy about the food / service. For example, when the woman at Denny's asked how the food was I gave her a dirty look and said "I pretty much disliked everything you served me" which seemed to shake her a bit.

But I'm talking about me and this is supposed to be about Frankie.

Yes, eating out with Frankie is a guaranteed night of amusement (at other's expense). Frankie doesn't like going out at the best of times especially if there are going to be other people around but at least with eating out, there's something that most of them can be happy about.
It starts with a waitress showing us to our seats. The more savvy ones can tell instantly they're in for a night of grief; even the less savvy ones must see that we're not going to be a joy to serve (helped by the fact that we dress up to go out and probably look, to these small town people, like "city folk").
I love it every time the waitress comes to our table. Frankie will immediately look at them once before turning their head away. The waitresses shoulders slump. They can sense the impending foreboding. "What can I get you to drink?" they say with a forced smile and mock-cheery demeanor. Frankie, without looking at them will either ask for "just water" or ask what the house wine is. If the latter then it's a certain that whatever the answer they won't be happy with it. More recently I've taken to just asking for Coke as despite the HFCS it'll contain it's easier than listening to the poor vapid bint reel of a list of gnats piss American "beers" plus some random import lager.
Then, 5 minutes into the food, over comes the waitress again. And again they're met with a dirty look and then no look at all. "How's the food?" *silence* Their (the waitress') smile disappears. Frankie eyes the forkful of food with great disgust and without looking at them tells them that it's "ok". *silence* Then my turn. Sometimes I'll get to say my bit about the food but more often than not Frankie will jump straight in - "the meat is overcooked / dry, the cheese on the fries isn't nice either, in fact, can you take those fries away and bring back something else" It's not really a question. I'll be grinning which just goes to confuse poor bint further. I know it's not their fault and they maybe don't deserve it but if you work somewhere where the food is sub-par you've got to expect some flack. Except they don't. They don't consider the food sub-par because this is America and it's ON-par.
This normally results in the manager coming over to apologise. They're met with equal contempt from Frankie. We're never stupid enough to ask for a replacement if the meal is really bad, we know that we'd end up with a plate full of floor food and spit.

Frankie honestly has the best look; in fact it goes beyond a mere look, it's an air of dis-interest, an aura if you will. Picture the most disgusted look you've ever been given by a woman, say, the first time you asked a girl out at school, one that clearly despised you. Now multiply that by ten. Ten people, ten disgusted looks all on one face. That is Frankie in the face of a waiter/waitress.

We still go out sometimes but it's futile, like I said, I know what food should taste like and so does Frankie, despite being American themselves. It's futile because this is America where Capitalism is taken to the extreme and cheap, nasty  produce is the American way, just as is a complete lack of quality standards.
But out we go and I'll always enjoy it, the experience that is. I love seeing Frankie's face when the waitress comes over, I love seeing the smiles turn into utter contempt, I love seeing how the cheery nature of the waitress only goes to complete the transformation from contempt to homicidal and I particularly like the pause, closed eyes deep breath and resigned hatred that starts every answer to every question Frankie is asked. And I really love the look on the waitresses face when they realise they're serving two people that remind them what a shit hole they're working in.
Are we somehow above them? Do we somehow feel superior? *shrugs* Meh.

Don't get me (us) wrong, regardless of the food standards, if we served by someone we think deserves it, they will get a tip, a good tip, above average.
But if they have the fucking cheek to try and engage us / them in conversation (as seems to be the thing in America) then the only tip they'll get, is not to expect one. Oh, and yes, they can take "that" look to mean they wish they (the waitress) would fuck off and die, that's exactly what that look means.

So if you're a... server, my best advice is this: We don't want a fucking conversation, how our day is is none of your fucking business. We came to your place of work / home to eat. Your job is to take our order, deliver the food to where we're sat and top up our drinks. If we need anything we'll ask. Take that how you may but think of it as us making your life as easy and simple as possible. And longer.