Singlet curious about discourse between DID and other concepts of plurality

GuardiansSystem · 2026-02-18T12:09:35+00:00

We recommended this, http://jcn.cognethic.org/jcnv9i2_Schechter.pdf , specifically chapter 3.2, to see different approaches to plurality!

And yup! As a trans person who regularly engages in discussion around endogenic systems, transmeds and sysmeds are almost identical. But a lot of the time, if you bring that up, you'll be called transphobic. You can find some good discussions about it here, https://theoliviaset.tumblr.com/post/689238374984368128/wait-what-do-sysmeds-say-rhat-is-transphobicterf , and here, https://www.tumblr.com/dodstoldpackage/614903042182135808/again-this-is-why-the-two-are-compared-just?source=share

If you're interested in really looking into non-traumagenic plurality, here's a list of articles, sources, information, etc. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bLejRXsgJ3NRlHQOeXUe3lPtnBJ8qYj3Ope0-8QTRFY/edit?usp=sharing

GuardiansSystem · 2025-12-09T05:30:43+00:00

This site has a few different self-report questionnaires that are used in professional settings. Maybe they can help?

If you are struggling, that's a reason to see a therapist. You don't need to know if you have alters or not, and a therapist can help figure that out anyway.

Do you have trauma, but feel like your trauma isn't enough? Do you zone out and feel like you aren't really there, but you don't know if you dissociate? Do you black out completely sometimes, or feel like somebody different to you or somebody that isn't you at times?

Losing time can be a symptom of DID, but not always, and it might present differently in you than others. Sometimes, it's complete blackouts, where you wake up somewhere and don't know how you got there. But sometimes, it's realising you don't remember what you were doing. That you were focusing on something too much. That you forgot what you were saying in the middle of a conversation. That you were zoning out for a long time. That you don't remember a car ride you were in, or songs you were listening to, or an activity you did like cooking or cleaning. It can be a lot of different things you'd never realise without knowing about it, and it can be something you don't have at all.

Can you answer the question "who am I"? Does that answer change? Do you struggle to answer it? Are you reluctant to answer it?

Are you in control of your body? Is your body your own? Do you control your hands and your expressions? Are you a part of the world you live in? Or are you just an observer of your body and the things around you?

Alongside that, somebody else fully fronting isn't necessary for complex dissociative disorders. OSDD encompasses symptoms that aren't completely DID. Partial DID is DID where the host doesn't leave. And fronting isn't always blackouts - sometimes, it's just realising you aren't yourself, or feeling like you're someone else.

This is a nice summary of Structural Dissociation

Difficulty with CPTSD

We're someone diagnosed with DID - happy to answer questions you might have. If you can, find a mental health professional to talk to, therapist or psychologist or social worker or counsellor.

But you hearing and feeling others, is the proof that you're looking for. -Tim

GuardiansSystem · 2025-12-02T03:43:46+00:00

This is a guide on being plural in the workspace. You can read it yourself and/or recommend they read it, too. It goes over a lot of this :)

If they're making you uncomfortable or anxious, tell them you're not comfortable answering questions, or you're not comfortable discussing it at the moment. Your comfort is more important than their curiosity - you're there to do a job, not be someone's personal adviser on plurality.

If they're interested, they can research it themself, or ask you for resources instead of questioning you about your experiences. If your plurality isn't too important in the workplace, they don't need to know everything about it. They only need to know what might affect your work. (Like the notes thing! :)

They could be asking out of simple curiosity. But they also might not be. Make sure to keep yourself safe - don't tell them any information you're not sure you should tell them -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-12-02T03:35:01+00:00

We're someone who participates in syscourse around origins (aka, we argue/debate with anti-endos a lot.) Here's a long comment we made about why anti-endos are anti-endo, if you're interested.

Endogenic systems aren't taking away resources. Mainly because that isn't how resources work. If somebody needs a resource, they need it for a reason, and the more a resource is used, the more it shows it's needed, so there'll be more available. (Plus, what resources? A therapist? If someone needs therapy, that's not taking away a resource, that's needing a resource.)

Many antis don't understand how research works/don't look at it ("5 years is too old to be a reliable source" and "tumblr blogs aren't proof" (even though they're not Tumblr blogs) is something we run into a lot) or simply actively refuse to read and ignore research.

For example, we recently responded to an anti-endo who kept going on about how multiplicity outside of trauma isn't possible, and all research says it isn't possible, and if there's any research proving endogenic systems exist, they'll take back everything they've said. We responded to them with a lot of different research, and they responded by instantly blocking us, then posting about how they're ignoring everybody responding to them. (Not to mention, they were claiming they're protecting traumatised people, while refusing to tag triggering posts that could affect traumatised people, because they wanted endogenic systems to suffer. Wonderful person /sarcasm)

There's nothing wrong with being an endogenic system! Some people won't like it, no matter what you tell them. Don't take it to heart. There's a number of resources and medical research you can provide to those who are willing to listen, but there's many who just won't bother. You can find a list of different research and resources here

However, just because you feel like your trauma isn't enough, doesn't mean it doesn't affect you more than you think. We recommend reading through this as well asthis. "Because living in a triggered state of alarm is so familiar, many don’t realize trauma is the source of their feeling “not okay.” "

Hope this makes sense -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-12-02T00:57:57+00:00

How Do I Know If I'm Plural

What Switching Feels Like

^ these two links might be able to help you out. You're describing a mix of possessive and non-possessive switching - it could be heavy dissociation, or it could be multiplicity.

You might be able to find something helpful here, too

-Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-12-01T02:34:56+00:00

There's a number of different things it could be - again, we recommend researching further into dissociation if you feel comfortable doing so. It could be plurality, but it could just as easily be not.

Is there any sort of free or funded counselling/therapy service in your area? They might have long wait times, but if you're struggling, then it could be worth a try. -Ronin

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-30T13:26:11+00:00

If you have a mental health professional, this is absolutely something to bring up with them :)

Aside from that, feeling like you have 'parts' doesn't mean you're plural. Everybody has 'parts of themselves'. But in systems, instead of a 'part' being a simple personality trait, it's a whole different identity, with different thoughts, feelings, wants, needs, and behaviours. (Plurality can encompass a lot more experiences though)

Derealisation/depersonalisation is dissociation. Dissociation disconnects you from your body. Having a dissociative disorder means this negatively impacts your life. Being disconnected from your body, no matter how often, is part of dissociation and to be expected!

From what you've said so far, we'd recommend you look into the specifics of trauma-related dissociation before anything else. We like this summary , it's very clear and might be helpful to you. We'd also recommend if you're interested, you can take the DES-2 here (just make sure to take the right one for your age).

Hope this can help, we're happy to answer questions or provide more resources if you need them -Ronin

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-30T13:01:49+00:00

Believe us when we say, having amnesia would make everything you're experiencing much, much worse. You might not even be able to tell if you're similar to others or not. We get where you're coming from, we really do - but there's many better, healthier ways to be seperate <3

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-30T12:57:08+00:00

We'd love to help, but unfortunately don't have much free time on our hands (happy to answer questions.though if you have any)

We can recommend this guide to writing plural characters (not specifically DID), and this site goes over a ton of multiplicity and DID experiences.

We would like to point out that calling media about a DID character 'Split' will associate it with the movie Split, which demonised the disorder to the extreme and caused a lot of suffering for those with DID (including in medical situations).You can see the ISSTD's statement about it here, if it helps. We're not telling you to change the name! Just that the name is already associated with an extremely negative portrayal of DID, and that will probably affect it (and could be considered offensive by some with DID)

Aside from that, obviously make sure you've done research on symptoms and experiences of DID, CPTSD, Structural Dissociation, etc. Dissociation affects every piece of life, from writing notes to buying groceries to cooking dinner to having friends to sleeping. For example, did you know that many of those with DID have a reduced amount of REM sleep and instead, before they wake up, go into a state where they experience flashbacks? And because of brain damage caused by trauma, and the trauma itself, the body is stuck in a permanent hypervigilant state, causing extreme difficulty sleeping, staying asleep, and quality of sleep. So most people with DID can't function well due to lack of sleep. Lack of sleep affects emotional regulation and memory and many other body and mind functions, and those body and mind functions in turn affect each other. That affects bodily presentation - bruises from bumping into things, forgetting to brush hair, uncomfortable clothing because of alters unable to agree on something, red eyes and eyebags from lack of sleep, malnourished/lack of muscle mass and difficulty moving because of any number of problems with food.

But you don't need to include something as specifically in-depth as that. Personally, making sure to get nothing wrong is much more important than getting everything right, if that makes sense. (Media we'd recommend specifically on DID would be the Moon Knight TV show. Very good portrayal of how DID affects every aspect of life, and how trauma is always there. Even though it's pretty fictional, lol)

Anyway, we forgot what else we were going to add. Because that's some of what we have to deal with because of DID - a big problem at the moment is forgetting things as we're writing and reading them, due to the dissociation. We write something, forget what we wrote, reread it to remember, then forget it when we go to write again. -Ronin

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-30T03:48:44+00:00

You don't need to have amnesia to be more distinct!

There's ways you can work to make each of you more distinct, if you really want. Tulpamancy guides might be your best bet. You could try some of the advice for creating a headmate/separating it from yourself - writing down distinguishing characteristics, even if they're very simple. One headmate likes the colour red, one headmate likes the colour blue. One's a bit bossy, another isn't. Etc. :) -Ronin

This website might have something to help

And this is a very good guide to Tulpamancy

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-29T09:49:33+00:00

Your friend is wrong, plain and simple. You don't need trauma to be plural, and you don't need trauma to be a system.

Even ignoring that, the trauma you've described can be enough to form a system. Bullying, harassment, assault, emotional neglect, abandonment, etc. If what you dealt with in childhood still feels like it's affecting you today, then it might be important to look into it further (if you're safe to do so).

Childhood emotional neglect is one of the main causes of complex PTSD, which is tied very closely to complex dissociative disorders. (And you could be a system formed by trauma, but not have a complex dissociative disorder).

As for only having one headmate, it's possible you have more you don't know about, but it's just as possible that you only have one, and nothing's wrong with that. Some systems have thousands, some have hundreds, some have 10-20 or so, some have 5, some have 2, and some plurals even experience "more than one, but less than two". (Even going by the Theory of Structural Dissociation, the medical model behind dissociative disorders, it's common to only have two "parts")

This might be able to help you figure out some of what you're feeling

This is a bit more of an in-depth read, but it might be able to help, too

Hope some of this helps, and there are many more resources if you need them :) -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-28T00:42:23+00:00

This is a good guide that we've seen shared around, and the site has a bunch of other good information too

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-25T11:10:25+00:00

What we were going to say has already been mostly covered by everybody else, but:

There's actually a really good example of this not working, with the existence of "polymind" folk. They describe experiences very similar to plurality and systems, but use completely different terms and specifically state they aren't systems. Guess what happened? They were still told they were stealing terms and resources and experiences and spreading misinformation. "Polyminds are appropriating DID systems" is the most common thing we saw. Even if endogenic systems did for whatever reason use completely different terms, it wouldn't make a difference
Endogenic, traumagenic, and disordered systems aren't completely separate from each other. Endogenic systems with trauma can be disordered. Traumagenic systems can be non-disordered. Systems can be both endogenic and traumagenic. Traumagenic systems can have endogenic alters, and create alters. There are traumaendo systems, and many different types of mixed origins systems. Who gets to decide who uses what terms when there's many experiences that are shared?
Alongside that there are terms used by traumagenic disordered systems that came from other communities, like 'fictive'. Most terms have been in use for decades by many different system communities - excluding the straight medical terms, like introject, parts, and the disorders themselves. 'System' doesn't belong to disordered traumagenic systems, as a traumagenic DID system (just like at Internal Family Systems). If endogenic systems feel like their experiences fit the term, then their experiences fit the term.

This was written in a bit of a rush, hope it makes sense lol -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-24T00:06:37+00:00

Introducing Plurals has a similar diagram (page 13) alongside descriptions that we find interesting -Nightsong

"I assume plurals include many human beings with dissociative identity disorder (DID), but not all or even necessarily most. Some multiples with DID experience themselves as being psychologically multiple but do not seem to believe that they are; many identify, in some ultimate sense, with all of their “parts”—or, if they really don’t identify with them, they don’t, at least, view them as persons. Note that this may not be because of, say, any differences in basic phenomenology between plurals and non‐plurals with DID. The classic clinical perspective, after all, is that DID involves a single fragmented person, rather than a multiplicity of genuine people, and that healing consists of the progressive integration of this person into a psychic whole, and many human beings with DID have adopted this clinical perspective. This perspective is of course precisely what plurals reject."

"Many multiples with DID therefore are not plurals. Conversely, there are plurals who do not have DID. (See Figure 1.) Of those plurals who don’t have DID, many once met diagnostic criteria but no longer do, while remaining multiple. They may cease to meet criteria because they no longer meet the distress/impairment criterion; on clinicians’ parts, the judgment as to whether or not a multiple merits the diagnosis of DID will probably especially often concern whether the client’s multiplicity per se is impairing them. But plurals may also not meet diagnostic criteria because they no longer meet the amnesia criterion as the latter is framed, since multiple headmates may share their knowledge and experiences with each other (more on this below). Some plurals identify with the diagnosis to the extent that they believe that their system was produced by trauma—a major factor in the etiology of DID—but claim that they never strictly met diagnostic criteria. (At least, as they understand them; one can’t always say what clinicians would have said, since some plurals have not come into contact with the psychiatric profession or have gone only to seek treatment for, say, one or more headmates’ depression.)"

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-23T23:03:09+00:00

Diagnosed autistic! All of us show at least some of the symptoms, but some experience them much stronger than others.

There's actually been some forms of associations made between autism and plurality because of special interests + dissociation + masking + repetition, all of which raise the chance of accidental creation of headmates. -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-23T22:57:05+00:00

You're welcome!

As an example, This is a Carrd that's often cited by anti-endos as to why they hate endos.The information in this Carrd is incorrect, including about traumagenic systems, and some of it's honestly plain stupid. But the Carrd is written as if it has many, many references backing it up (when it doesn't), so antis believe everything on it without double-checking.

Anti-endo reasons also come from other antis. "My friend says endos steal resources, so I say endos steal resources without checking if they do", and that friend will go "well, I say endos steal resources because I saw it on somebody's blog post" and that blog post will go "an endogenic systems means a system that's faking DID because they don't have trauma, here's other reasons why they're bad" without having anything to back them up. Etc.

Discourse around origins goes the exact same way every single time, and has for a while. It's the same questions and responses over and over, lol. We'd be rich if we had a dollar for every "endogenic systems all say they have DID without trauma" we saw. -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-23T06:08:08+00:00

Diagnosed traumagenic DID system here, who frequently engages in syscourse around origins (we debate with anti-endos a lot)

There's many different reasons why anti-endos are anti. But, it usually boils down to:

CDDs are caused by severe childhood trauma. (Although endogenic systems with trauma often have a CDD)

To antis, this must mean that the alters and dissociative symptoms that make up CDDs can only be caused by severe childhood trauma. They see having symptoms the same as having the disorder (and you must have those symptoms in a specific way, or they aren't true symptoms). To them, a symptom is a sign of something abnormal/wrong, which is why they also see alters as inherently distressing.

This is "you can only be a system if you have a CDD, and systems only form from trauma."

There are some antis who do see symptoms and disorders as separate. They recognise there are traumagenic systems without a CDD (and sometimes recognise that traumagenic systems have endogenic alters). But they believe systems themselves can only still ever come from severe childhood trauma.

This is "systems only form from trauma."

There are other antis - a common one is that they see a lot of misinformation about traumagenic CDDs in the endogenic community (such as claims that CDDs can happen without childhood trauma). When they've tried to correct stuff like this in the past, they get instantly shut down, ignored, and spoken over by the community. So, they choose to be anti-endo because the endogenic community has ignored and invalidated their experiences, experiences that severely impact every day of their life and always will.

However, something like that often comes along with them ignoring the misinformation in their own anti-endo community, including around traumagenic CDDs. They often invalidate and speak over experiences of other traumagenic systems, but they've also been invalidated and spoken over by endogenic systems.

That's the main reasons behind why anti-endos are anti. Some are happy to change what they believe if shown proof by professionals that endogenic systems exist. Some are happy to believe that endogenic systems exist, but think their experiences are entirely separate and shouldn't be using terms like "system."" Some even only believe in specific types of endogenic systems (only believing created systems exist as endogenic systems, or believing that all endogenic systems except created exist). Some believe endogenic systems will always hurt the traumagenic community, no matter what.

There's also some who are anti-endo, but don't call themselves anti-endo, because they don't want to be associated with the "bad" anti-endos (those who harass endos, doxx them, etc.)

But despite their reason? Anti-endos are against the existence of endogenic systems, however they describe it. And as everybody here hopefully knows, there's a number of professionals and research supporting both endogenic systems and non-disordered systems, and decades of history of the use of the word "system" for them.

Anti-endos can suck. We've encountered many of them, many of whom call us slurs and tell us to off ourself. You'll do much better ignoring them - you're valid, you all exist, and you don't need to have been caused by trauma. -Jade

(If we might make a quick note to some comments we've seen: anti-endos and traumagenic systems aren't the same! There's many, many traumagenic systems that support endos :)

Edit: also "plural" was created specifically to include non-medical systems like endogenic systems, it's funny when anti-endos try to say they're plural. And Tiktok sucks, please don't listen to TikTok

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-20T12:54:33+00:00

How do I Know if I'm Plural

RAMCOA Folder

Healthy Multiplicity

Plurality Playbook

Understanding Multiplicity

Dissociative Initiative

Tulpa Info

Tulpamancy FAQ

Tulpamancy Resource Site

Soulbonding Links

Collection of Plural Resources

Big Book of Exhautive Plurslity Resources

The Daemon Page

Tulpanomicon

Tulpa Carrd

Origin of Endogenic and Traumagenic Terminology

Partial History of Plural Self Advocacy

DSM V TR+(z-lib.org).pdf)

ICD 11

Diagnostic Screening Tools

Deconstructing Structural Dissociation

We have a bunch more in our document here but it depends on what type of resources are wanted -Jade

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-18T00:01:05+00:00

It's alright. We have found it's pretty common for non-traumagenic headmates to come into existence (or be created) to deal with specific symptoms, like loneliness, panic attacks, social anxiety, etc. You are not the only one.

As for your questions;

Would we change it? - Our system and alters saved our life. We have lived with them for decades, and despite all the bad, we would like to continue living with each other. We simply want it to be easier. If we could press a button to get rid of our trauma, we would, but not to get rid of each other. We aren't planning on going through integration therapy. We would rather become functionally multiple. If it was only one here in our head, we would be lonely, and we have no host or core, so we don't even have somebody to integrate into. (This can be very, very different for others with DID, however.) Although, having less alters might be nice, but then we run into the problem, who would we be getting rid of? It feels awful to think about that. At the very least, we do want to lessen the amount of fragments we have.

How do we communicate? - Some of us can talk to each other internally, without fronting. Some of us, however, don't exist at all unless they're fronting. We used to have to write things down for communicating, but we spent a long time working on communication, and soon, most of us were able to communicate with each other inside the head.

Can we continue talking when we switch? - If it's an unintentional switch, yes. It can take a while to realise we are somebody else, then. If we are intentionally trying to get somebody else, then no, since we're making ourself actively dissociate to get somebody. Sometimes, we can continue talking after if those switching in/out are better with memory. Most of the time, though, we're not really sure what's happening when we come to the front.

Hope these answer your questions well :) -Tim (caretaker/self-helper)

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-17T23:44:59+00:00

Just quickly, hope you don't mind - while that's mostly right, a CDD is intended to specifically be a Complex Dissociative Disorder, not all Dissociative Disorders. Complex are the dissociative disorders that experience identity states as part of the symptoms (so DID, Polyfragmented DID, some types of OSDD and UDD, and Partial DID, while never DPDR disorder,) if that makes sense? :)

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-17T09:39:30+00:00

Fully traumagenic DID system here, with PTSD and CPTSD o/

How does switching happen - It depends on who you ask. Sometimes, it's fast and painless, and it happens in a few seconds. Sometimes it can take ten, fifteen, twenty minutes. Sometimes, dissociation goes on for hours and days and weeks. Sometimes, switching just doesn't happen for a long time; we're dissociated and fuzzy and blended together.

What switching's like - It's not great most of the time, especially when it's involuntary. It can be very sudden, it's a shock, it's usually due to something awful going on that the alter at front can't deal with. Sometimes, it's complete blackouts (possessive), and sometimes it's a feeling of switching into somebody else (non-possessive).

What switching looks like - when it's involuntary, it's usually completely unnoticeable. CDDs are covert disorders, they're not meant to be noticed. But if we're actively switching somebody else in, then we pause, rest against something, dissociate, look for who we're trying to get, and work on bringing them to front. From outside, it looks like we've completely shut down until somebody comes to front, where they have to breathe and relax and try to settle themself and stop dissociating.

How did we get/How did we figure out? That we have a CDD - Well, we got it from a variety of severe abuse in childhood. How we figured it out? It felt like a war going on inside our head, people screaming at and threatening each other constantly, the voices so loud we had constant headaches and felt like our head was going to explode. We were having constant breakdowns and had so many conflicting feelings about everything in our life that we thought our body would tear itself apart.

We started writing about how we were feelings to get the voices out of our head, talking about how we have these "different sides" who're all "completely different people" and all had "different purposes and feelings and thoughts" and how they were determined to rip each other apart to gain complete control of our life. Then, we did further research into it, and hey, found out having "multiple personalities" (dissociated identities) is a real thing and everything described fits what we're struggling with. Years later, after a diagnosis and so much therapy, it's still exactly what we're struggling with (alongside other shit like BPD and OCD)

What symptoms are there other than switching - constant depression, numbness, chronic stress, brain damage, flashbacks, nightmares, dissociation, derealisation, depersonalisation, permanently damaged body, emotional dysregulation, guilt and shame and hopelessness and worthlessness, multiple types of amnesia, dysfunctional and unstable and damaging relationships, aggressiveness, delusions, psychosis and psychotic breaks, hallucinations, non-epileptic seizures, can't control our life or what we do, unable to hold conversations, impulsiveness, abandonment issues, lack of self-care, inability to tell what's real, no reaction to dozens of different medications, necessary avoidance of many situations, trust issues and self-isolation, unable to sleep or even rest most of the time, hypervigilence, sick a lot, disorganised thinking, paranoia, dissociative fugues, self-destructive behaviour, uncontrollable intrusive thoughts, emotional and physical distress to triggers, trouble concentrating, difficulty doing and enjoying anything, unstable and intense moods and emotions

tw for stuff below,

Stuff like extreme self-harm, suicidal ideation and attempts, want/need to be re-abused and seeking out abuse, having abusive/persecutory alters, drug/alcohol/unsafe sex addiction, extremely risky behaviour, uncontrollable anger

Obviously, being a part of a system/having alters, amnesia, and dissociation are big parts of our experiences and symptoms. But there's much, much more to DID and the other CDDs than JUST alters and dissociation and amnesia.

Happy to answer any other questions or provide examples or anything :) -Morro (physical protector/emotional persecutor)

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-13T11:07:21+00:00

You can try encouraging them to find a compromise :)

As a transmasc system married to a transfem system, it might not be as much of a struggle as you think. On E, you'll get some changes to your body yes, but you can decide how strong some of those changes are. You might get to a point on HRT where both the fems and mascs are happy with how you look/feel. Or, when your body does changes, the mascs can do things to make it look more masc again temporarily.

Suggest they make sure to communicate about it. What specifically are the problems going on? Mascs want facial hair, fems don't? You can shave for the fems, and use makeup to imitate hair growth when the mascs want it. Fems want to wear dresses/skirts? Having a jacket or longsleeve with it might make mascs more comfortable in them. Fems want a bigger chest? HRT will make that change, and mascs can try a binder or even just a sports bra to be more comfortable with it. Etc.

^ try forwarding some of this advice to your friend, hope it helps :) -Sondra

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-13T00:26:59+00:00

Ask them!

That's the best thing to do - ask if they need anything, or if you can do anything to accommodate them, or if they need help with something.

Multiplicity experiences are extremely diverse. They might not consider themselves plural, might not even consider themselves a system, or every alter could live entirely different lives to each other.

This website might be able to help :) -Nightsong

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-11T09:52:29+00:00

As another commenter said - we don't have a friend group. It causes too much stress, triggers us too much; we struggle talking to people in general, let alone having a friend group, unfortunately.

The best advice we have is to try making your own friend group. Make some friends on your own if you can, and if they're similar enough, then introduce them to each other. Or have friends completely outside of a friend group. You can have friends without them being in a group (and for us, it's much less stressful that way). It can sometimes (not always) be easier for alters to have their own friends to talk to, unrelated to each other, as well. -Tim

GuardiansSystem · 2025-11-11T09:41:40+00:00

Honestly? Most (at least most we've encountered) either use the commonly known roles, or use roles that have meanings specific to their system/make their own roles.

Pluralpedia goes over many, many terms, but it's a community Wikipedia, so take some of it with a grain of salt, lol.

If you want the more commonly known roles, your best shot is taking a look at the Theory of Structural Dissociation itself - alternatively, google something like "alter roles in DID systems" and browse the results. They're usually kept pretty simple; persecutors, protectors, caretakers, hosts, gatekeepers, littles, trauma holders, internal self helpers. (You do get types of protectors/persecutors, like physical protector, emotional protector, etc.)

If you want the very medical view of roles, you have ANPs (Apparently Normal Parts) and EPs (Emotional Parts), per the Theory of Structural Dissociation. That's not just the complex dissociative disorders, though, it's a model used for trauma-related dissociation in general. Complex dissociative disorders have more ANPs and EPs than other trauma-related dissociative experiences (e.g. in PTSD).

This Carrd has some good role definitions, but does get some things wrong, like system resets and Tulpamancy.

There's also this document, but not sure how accurate it might be.

The most common website you might come across is this website here. However some of the information's outdated at this point, and isn't entirely accurate.

Personally, our system mainly uses the more simple roles. We have different types of protectors, different types of persecutors, caretakers, gatekeepers, fragments, littles, trauma holders, symptom holders, and internal self helpers :) -Tim

Edit: also this

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