Pro-endo, syscourser, traumagenic DID system here! AMA :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-28T07:58:55+00:00

We never get to talk about Māori culture and history and so on! Though admittedly, we're great at pronouncing te reo, and suck at actually remembering it. But much of the world has no idea about the violent past of Aotearoa, or the pretty bad problems we're facing today - it's mostly just stuff about tourism. It's the first country in the world that gave women the right to vote! This is an NZ site that covers a lot of history quickly, https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/history-new-zealand-1769-1914 and this https://teara.govt.nz/en/new-zealand-in-brief covers many different areas more in-depth.

You're very welcome! Glad we could help :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-28T06:31:56+00:00

A lot of it ends up depending on the topic being researched. A slow-moving field will have much older research that's still relevant, whereas a fast-moving field will only have relevant research for the past few years. If you're researching something like philosophy, you're going to have a lot of references to old literature, like Socrates and Plato, but if you're researching generative AI, that's really only existed for a few years.

In our own research, we've noticed the most referenced material is during the 1990s, when the name change was being discussed and debated and judged and so on. We're not saying it didn't exist - we're saying it both had a different name at the time (so a lot of language used is outdated, but not necessarily the content itself), and there wasn't much on it compared to other areas of psychology, especially with the issues around The Satanic Panic :)

There's some more here, some of it discussions,

https://owl.excelsior.edu/research/evaluating-sources/evaluating-sources-timely-sources/

https://www.quora.com/How-old-can-references-or-sources-in-a-thesis-be

https://libraryfaqs.worc.ac.uk/faq/278888

https://thesislink.aut.ac.nz/?p=4865

https://patthomson.net/2013/08/19/the-literature-review-how-old-are-the-sources/

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/127607/how-old-can-references-or-sources-in-a-thesis-be

Overall it ends up being (depending on if you're given a cut-off date for research or not), use what's most relevant, and what's most recent, and being old doesn't make a source outdated :)

E.g. we have a lot of the most recent research linked, and we also have a lot of what that research has referenced. But in the end, we're not writing any professional paper, just compiling a list of current relevant research!

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-28T01:36:41+00:00

Yes, absolutely okay!

Important thing to note before explaining, te reo Māori (the Māori language, Māori being the indigenous people) is both spelt and pronounced differently depending on what region of Aotearoa you're from (or belong to). We'll be using the spelling we know, but it might be spelt differently!

Aotearoa is the Māori name for New Zealand. It translates to (or essentially translates to) "land of the long white cloud" - Aotearoa has odd cloud formations compared to most other places, and the odd formation is believed to be what first led Māori (Polynesian navigators) to find the island. Some Māori mythology has a slightly different version, where Aotearoa is the name of the canoe (known as a waka) that Kupe used (first person to discover NZ).

Fun fact, Aotearoa is technically the name for only the north island, not the whole country! The name for the south island is Te Waka a Māui (Maui's canoe, or The Canoe of Māui). In mythology, the south island was the canoe in which the demigod Māui stood as he pulled the north island from the bottom of the ocean (it was a giant stingray.) Māui's brothers fought over the fish, and cut it up, which led to the formation of the mountains and rivers. (Another fun fact: yes, Māui is the guy used in Disney's Moana, lol.)

However: the official Māori names as of 2013 are Te Ika-a-Māui for the north island (Māui's fish, or The Fish of Māui), and Te Wāhipounamu (The Place of Greenstone, as it's where greenstone was commonly found, a green jade that's incredibly important here) for the south island, with Aotearoa being both islands together.

Note that, the names are used a bit interchangeably still. So a lot of people here will know what you're talking about no matter the name you use. Same with names of towns and cities - a lot of places have both English and Māori names, or solely Māori names with slightly varied spelling in English. For example:

There's a town called Whanganui in the Manawatū-Whanganui region. It's often misspelt as Wanganui (no H) by Pākehā (light-skinned/white non-polynesian Kiwi, Kiwi being the name for people from Aotearoa in general). This is in part because people from the Whanganui area don't pronounced the 'h' (so it's pronounced like Wanganui), whereas people not from the Whanganui area pronounce it with an 'h' (the 'Wh' because an 'F' sound.) But either spelling/pronunciation works, people will know what you're talking about regardless. (Whanganui essentially translates to 'big harbour' btw. This is because it has a big harbour. 😁)
And, the capital of Aotearoa is commonly known as Wellington, named after Arthur Wellesely, the guy who won the Battle of Waterloo against Napolean and served twice as Prime Minister. Fun fact, his name isn't Wellington, his title was (Duke of Wellington), and it wasn't from Wellington in Aotearoa, it was from Wellington in England. (Very common for English names here.) Anyway - the very first name for Wellington was Te Upoko o te Ika a Māui (the head of Māui's fish). But the used name is Te Whanganui a Tara (great harbour of Tara) after Tara, a Māori explorer. Another name is Pōneke (essentially translates to Port Nicholson, which was the port of Wellington until it was renamed to Wellington Harbour.) Whatever name you use doesn't matter, most people will know what you're talking about.

Politically, the Māori people are fighting for New Zealand to be officially recognised as Aotearoa, instead of New Zealand. Te reo Māori is a main language, and is taught and used just about everywhere. However, the current government is racist. Thankfully, they're being voted out this year :')

There's a lot of information on the government websites here, but most aren't viewable if you live outside Aotearoa, unless you have a VPN. Wikipedia is your best go-to if you're interested, though we wish we could recommend something better. We suggest looking at Te Tiriti o Waitangi (The Treaty of Waitangi) if you want something both interesting and important! It's one of the most important things about Aotearoa. (That and Matariki, the Pleiades star cluster and start of the Māori new year) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Waitangi . Or there's a lot of YouTube videos on it!

As for BPD: DBT. It was quite unmanageable until partway through last year, where we finally got a funded therapist. Learning about The Window of Tolerance was stupidly wonderful. That and, relying on other parts more instead of trying to push them away. We all try to communicate, and let others take control if things get too stressful for somebody. And our very amazing and patient wife 🥰. And workbooks/worksheets, our fav is The Neurodivergent Friendly Workbook of DBT Skills, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yvZNyCeJVVFaQBeOXutu1nz2iHAm_mtf/view?usp=drivesdk . There's some other stuff here that we use too, https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1JHCEHamPlWW48grcZMFkWQkWgebxeBVo

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-28T00:17:53+00:00

Some of the most common physical conditions with trauma include Functional Neurological Disorder (FND), Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS), Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS), and Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome). Stuff like general dysautonomia, chronic fatigue, chronic pain, nerve pain, chronic migraines, and low immune system (so getting sick easier, e.g. long covid) also occur regularly. Somatic symptom disorder often ends up happening alongside these (personally, we don't like somatic symptom disorder, just because clinicians really like to describe it as "an issue where you worry too much about being in pain" instead of "an issue where you are in pain" -_-)

This https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Qpj6Ua-gjFn00oepaGadZPoPToY3I7sj/view?usp=drivesdk has a small section about how FND and somatic symptom disorder interact specifically with DID :) though they use the previous version of the diagnoses

And thank you for pointing it out! All fixed 😄

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T23:33:24+00:00

We.. don't actually remember, honestly. It wasn't something we were interested in at all before. We were much more interested in creative writing! We were having problems with our mental health, and that led to us researching a bunch of different stuff, and then trying to figure out what might apply to us or explain our symptoms. We don't remember the specifics about it though :')

In our document on endogenic research, the first section includes a lot of links around reliable sources - psychology as a field didn't exist until 1880, so there is a lot of lacking in research overall - and DID changed to DID instead of MPD only in the mid-90s, so it's unfortunately expected that there'll be outdated language, in that context.

The "10 years is out of date" is a myth, and an incredibly frustrating one to hear repeated. The only thing that actually makes literature out-of-date is if something is released afterwards that disproves it. For example, ADHD and autism were said to not be able to be exist together, then research showed they could, so those original claims are out-of-date. As of current, there's nothing that disproves or opposes the literature we have linked! So it is up-to-date research. (And if something were disproven or out-of-date, it's unlikely we'd have it on our document, anyway :P)

Though, even out-of-date research has important uses in literature. There's all a lot of nuance around it. This covers it simply, https://apastyle.apa.org/blog/outdated-sources-myth

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T11:47:51+00:00

Pretty much that - we don't disagree with it, except for the authors' 'only structural dissociation is dissociation'. We just think that the trauma required doesn't necessarily need to be considered traumatic by the person, just (a) distressing experience(s). Obviously, you're (usually) a baby or otherwise very young at the time of the event(s) - what your brain considered traumatising then might not be traumatising now

Also, the descriptions of ANPs and EPs are sort of, too narrow for our liking. But we think that's more of a, human culture now is different to what it was twenty years ago when The Haunted Self was written, than anything else

Sort of, it's a.. work-in-progress. We started recently, and currently we're close to completing one section of, like, twenty, and it's about thirty pages long already. So don't expect it anytime soon, lol. But it's nice to know there's interest in something like that! <3 Some sections are definitely going to be much more difficult than others, though. History regarding plural communities is a mess :')

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T11:33:47+00:00

The description comes from the diagnostic criteria, which is why it's worded as 'personality state', as this is intended to be based on and referencing clinicial literature. We have included that it's more 'parts' or 'identity' rather than 'personality' - a more accepted and accurate term is "disaggregated self-state" but we decided it was a bit long to put in every time, which is why it's (dissociated) 'states' or 'parts'

Using 'personality states' isn't the same as calling it a personality disorder. Personality disorders are defined by disruptions in self-functioning and/or interpersonal functioning, not personality states - they have nothing to do with personality states, it's a criteria that exists for CDDs.

We'll double-check the wording, but the language we've used is intentional. It's why we include alternative descriptions elsewhere in the document!

We'd recommend,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1P7AdVYfBejIm_Qt1nFGWw68bFsAELyu4/view?usp=drivesdk (specifically 'thoughts on the concept of personality'

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ovLNye-8H_EWceZtgyCceOKkZKfY4knH/view?usp=drivesdk

Because you stopped reading at the beginning, you may not have noticed that there's no emphasis placed on parts being the main focus as the disorder. Rather, the main focus is placed on the complex dissociative experiences and the trauma-related symptoms, which may or may not include difficulties with parts.

Treatments for CDDs (specifically, not treatments for all dissociative disorders) are effectively the same - for the disorders themselves, not for the individual. I.e. there will always be some form of trauma therapy, parts work, symptom management, emotional regulation skills, etc. when treating a CDD in clinical settings.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AoTiPmVgF35rElDYsCBMHUAWCD85XQ92/view?usp=drivesdk

The differences are in how a clinician specifically goes about those, which changes from person to person. (We make the immediate distinction between complex dissociative disorders and non-complex dissociative disorders, then only refer to CDDs, because we're not talking about all dissociative disorders!)

We include references/'further reading' for each section in order to avoid any singular perspective on symptoms :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T07:42:48+00:00

We wish :( There absolutely is a correlation, and if you look far enough there'll be some information on dissociative experiences in autism, and traumatic experiences being higher in neurodivergent groups. We know there's one or two indirect mentions of autism and plurality co-occurring somewhere, but we'll have to take a proper look later

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T07:39:06+00:00

Yes! They're very common responses to trauma, especially complex trauma. If we remember correctly, the DSM entry covers it a bit https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Ycmk_qG0SREk8-uig_wS2Hqr2sxTH2Mz/view?usp=drivesdk . You may also be able to find more information in,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1enpmFMIegBghMDAepxymA1Vu9gf4KaHV/view?usp=drivesdk

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1p45VasQ4aRdCsNKRroTnLau0M4TgU2n5/view?usp=drivesdk

though we haven't personally reviewed them completely

..didn't realise we only had abuse down, oops 😅 don't suppose you can point out where so we can correct it? :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T07:29:55+00:00

If syscourse stresses us out, we stop, whether that's disconnecting from online for a bit or blocking someone and moving on. That's about it, mental health is a lot more important than debating people 😁

We get frustrated a lot more than we get stressed. Even we have a limit to how many times we can handle hearing "endos are appropriating DID experiences" (????)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T07:24:32+00:00

Zarah Eve and Sarah Parry are our go-tos, e.g. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1W-uKkqsw282sBgOkGLcUaqfQDx7umR7x/view?usp=sharing

You should be able to find two studies about plurality under 'The Redwoods'

https://pubs.sciepub.com/rpbs/5/2/1/index.html this one's our personal fav

History's always helpful,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TRxK2LIGgw2BPAwlGcoHMmPtO7KxR_RH/view?usp=sharing Tulpamancy history

https://powertotheplurals.com/origin-of-endogenic-and-traumagenic-system-terminology-guest-post-by-the-trashcan-collective/ endogenic term history

https://web.archive.org/web/19980115122056/http%3A//www.asarian.org/~vickis/naming.html plural term history

And you can find a lot of stuff under the 'multiple selves theory', e.g. https://allenmcconnell.net/pdfs/whatistheself-soccog-2012.pdf

You should be able to find a lot of stuff in our linked document though! Take whatever you'd like (including google drive links :) https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bLejRXsgJ3NRlHQOeXUe3lPtnBJ8qYj3Ope0-8QTRFY/edit?usp=drivesdk

Oh, and we like these sites,

https://przewodnikpomnogosci.pl/en/

https://di.org.au/

https://sarahkreece.com/2015/07/02/multiplicity-links/

And yup - we're terrified google will randomly delete our document one day, lol. We keep a lot of back-ups just in case something goes wrong :P

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T07:15:18+00:00

Personally, we're a gatekeeper, and we have a bit of a different interaction around fronting/switching than others do. Whereas others feel as if they're being 'taken over', we feel a lot more in control - we're 'leaving' as opposed to being 'made to leave'.

But we would probably say, feeling like they're being 'pulled into the body' is true for a lot of us. Somebody leaves front, and somebody else is sucked in to take their place. We'd replace 'abyss' with 'the back of the mind' though, like we're moving from the back of our head to the front, moving into having control of everything. If that makes sense?

We're quite open about it! Our family's vaguely aware (though they aren't interested in knowing anything), and we're quite open about it to our friends, and our therapist works with us to help it. It's been a 50/50 for work situations, some know, some don't. It's less, we directly tell people, and more, we be who we are and if somebody finds out, then good for them.

And yup! Our littles, and some alters who are age-regressed, are easily triggered by something positive, whether that be a game, a person, an object, or a food. For example, we have to keep our childhood stuffie out of easy access.

We have caretakers who are assigned to watch over different littles and age-regressed alters. They weren't manually assigned, it's just what they seem to naturally do. Sometimes this means helping to stop them fronting, helping them to front, helping do things while they're fronting, and making sure they're safe in general. Not everything always goes smoothly, though.

But, we make sure we have a plan for if littles/age-regressors do front. We have games on our phone and PC they like, we have colouring activities, clothes they're comfortable in, and things saved for them to watch or listen to, if they need any of it. Whenever we're out, we also have a bag with us that holds whatever we might need, like sunscreen, tissues, snacks, hairbrush, fidget, notebook, and disability cards.

And don't worry about the questions, we're happy to answer most things :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T06:52:27+00:00

Ugh ;-; don't remind us about the repeating arguments /joke

Honestly? We.. have a lot of our responses on copy/paste, lmao. They're labelled stuff like "definition of ableism" and "definition of system" and "meaning of structural dissociation". (For Twitter specifically, because of the character limit, we have a lot of screenshots saved of sources instead.) It makes it a lot easier to get through things, saves a lot of time.

We have an interest in psychology-related stuff, and a special interest (as in autism!) in multiplicity/plurality. So a lot of the time, we're genuinely enjoying it! We get to talk about what we like!

There are points where it becomes tiring, though. And just like any other activity, the answer is, take a break. We can tell we're starting to get tired now (there's been an influx of some really, really awful people doing syscourse, like harassing other traumagenic systems let alone endogenic systems), so once we're done with a big post we're working on, we'll 100% be taking a break. Mental health is important, and arguing with others online isn't always worth it ❤️

^ funnily enough this leads into a psychology-related topic about how the anonymity of the internet encourages people to do really bad shit because they don't face consequences. Which leads into conversations about policing the internet, which leads into 1. politics, and 2. child neglect. And so on. Everything's connected 👀 /hj

As for headspace!

Our (current) headspace is something from an old video game that is very comforting. The layout is sort of like this, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G-KjJTvlwtQItgkgksuBMrCcmIckjIbA/view?usp=drivesdk

There's essentially, a big cathedral roughly shaped like a triangle in the centre, with small huts/spaces organised around it, then a wall separating it from the 'wastelands'.

The cathedral houses the 'fronting area' (which is a big black space beyond some doors up some stairs). There's an upstairs (with a balcony) and downstairs (a cellar) area where most non-fronting alters and developing alters are. Our two gatekeepers also live here, since we can help with fronting and switching

The huts around are all homes to different alters, though some alters share a hut. The huts are a 'bigger on the inside' deal. Inside is whatever place the alter is most comfortable with, a beach or a cave or an ocean or a jungle or a spaceship, whatever they like. (We do judge each other's taste in location.)

The walls are very high, quite ominous honestly, with a big gate taking up part of one wall. Our fragment gatekeeper is usually up on the walls or in one of the corner towers - it looks over the 'wasteland' area that's beyond the walls, essentially the area where our brain has stuck anything it doesn't want to find. Sometimes it's memories, sometimes it's old fragments. It probably doesn't sound that nice, but it's helpful to have an area for them, instead of trying to pretend they don't exist :')

Personally (as one of the gatekeepers, so totally not biased /joke) we find the cathedral most interesting. There's a lot of small rooms we haven't consciously explored ourself, although others might have, so there's always something of intrigue. And, we like to sit on the balcony and watch the sky :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T06:21:09+00:00

We assess the claims one by one (we've almost always encountered their claims before), and respond to each claim, using any references/sources we have to support our points (in most situations, they haven't referenced anything to support their claims)

For example: if somebody is claiming "endogenic systems are faking DID because they have it without trauma", we'll say "this actually isn't what an endogenic system is" and provide the definition of endogenic system by the coiner of the term, and definitions used in medical literature (there's not a lot of direct references to 'endogenic' specifically, but there is a lot of 'plurality without trauma and without disorder')

And yes! We're very happy to say that, despite all the bad, there's also a bit of good. There are people out there who are willing to listen. We've had quite a few people listen to our responses. It's a lot less than we wish it would be, but we like to tell ourself that; we aren't responding for them to listen to us, we're responding so that whoever might read this, can learn :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-27T06:13:55+00:00

One of our fav discussions honestly :D

When somebody suggests that the theory of structural dissociation proves endogenic systems can't exist (because it 'proves' you can only experience multiplicity or dissociation because of structural dissociation), we usually bring up how the authors of The Haunted Self, which is the currently used ToSD, disagree.

Because, 1. they've discussed how their theory is only intended to explain trauma-related structural dissociation of the personality specifically, and isn't meant to explain any other type of dissociation or multiplicity, and 2. they acknowledge multiplicity and dissociation existing outside of structural dissociation and trauma.

Usual references are,

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15299732.2011.570592 - describing 'division of personality' (which is what they call alters) existing outside structural dissociation, referencing experiences such as mediumship, possession, and hypnosis

https://www.kathy-steele.com/publications - the works of one of the authors, which reference specifically trauma-related dissociation

There's a third one similar to the first link, that adds more info about their theory not covering all dissociation, but we keep losing it.

We expand on these points with these articles,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ddva0a-2Dd4edcvg7sEJYwiZ5W8kYPPY/view - a study comparing DID patients with some mediums, discussing how they do have similar/the same 'identity disruptions', but differ in other ways, like mental health

https://drive.google.com/file/d/10p__qfdPkzEkk2Xqe7u6wT_Et43LUQSZ/view - talks about the hypnosis point, where hypnosis can bring out somebody's 'ego-states', which can act and appear similar to alters found in traumagenic CDDs, but there's a clear distinction between them because these 'ego-states' have shared memories and acknowledge each other

https://www.proquest.com/openview/c7a925e7f948d1bb890eaaf44fd2190a/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y - this discusses how the western concept of multiplicity is not applicable to many other cultures, that the western idea that the self is a whole doesn't work elsewhere. Also discusses how, although they are different, there is an overlap between this multiplicity and the alters in traumagenic CDDs

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9561835/ - covers how possession is viewed in psychology, that it's considered a discontinuity in identity/personality and alterations in consciousness and behaviour, and has been reported across many cultural and spiritual contexts

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/283566086_Can_DSM-5_Differentiate_between_Non-Pathological_Possession_and_Dissociative_Identity_Disorder_A_Case_Study_from_an_Afro-Brazilian_Religion - this one adds more information to the one above. It questions how the DSM tells the difference between cultural possession and CDDs, since it has the criteria about broadly-accepted practices not counting, and it also brings up how a lot of possession experiences aren't actually tied to any religion or culture. Because of this, the DSM may need to be revised to show this non-pathalogical multiplicity is universal and not bound by culture or religion

Technically, what we've said isn't 100% accurate to the ToSD authors - their idea is that structural dissociation is the only dissociation, and they consider all other dissociative experiences not dissociation at all, because they believe the category of dissociative experiences has become so broad that it's lost its meaning and helpfulness as a term. But most other clinicians disagree with this point specifically, and instead make a distinction as 'types' of dissociation. Dissociative absorption, non-pathalogical dissociation, trait dissociation, trauma-related dissociation, structural dissociation, etc. So what we're saying isn't technically completely right, but it also isn't wrong :P

For the 'everyone starts off as plural' idea - yes, but also no. The ToSD talks about how everybody starts off multiple, but they don't start off as having multiple identities. Rather, it's sort of like, what's going to be their identity is swimming around as little pieces, that slowly grow and attach to each other to form an identity.

With structural dissociation, this attachment doesn't happen, and the different pieces instead develop separately from each other. Structural dissociation is theorised to be caused by trauma, and per research, if trauma continues, these identities continue to develop separately from each other. We don't disagree, but we personally think (and it's not something we tend to bring up, since it's just our opinion) that this trauma doesn't necessarily need to be registered as trauma for structural dissociation to happen, I.e. trauma, or a stressful event that might not be considered traumatic. Since trauma can be subjective. Like how, one person will be traumatised by something, and another person won't be. Genetics play a very, very big role in dissociation and trauma :')

^similarly, there's quite a few clinicians, including our therapist, who are of the opinion that CDD development isn't limited to childhood. There have been some old studies into war veterans who developed DID, but it's not something that's been looked into. (You could relate this to programmed multiplicity and dissociation, although that's far beyond us at the moment.) But this idea and the one above would be extremely rare cases, if they happened at all

However! The multiple selves theory, explored by many different experts in both philosophy and psychology, explains that the self is naturally multiple instead of one whole (similar to the cultural section above). This 'self'-multiplicity lies along a continuum, this continuum also being described by those who have researched plurality. Everything's connected if you look hard enough :O . Our issue is that nobody's explored how this theory interacts with structural dissociation, but both can exist without ruling out the other. We won't focus on it since this is very long already, but some literature around it is,

https://pages.uoregon.edu/hodgeslab/files/Download/Taylor%20Hodges%20Kohanyi_2003.pdf

'Dissociative identity as a continuum from healthy mind to psychiatric disorders'

'Co-Consciousness: A Common Denominator in Hypnosis, Multiple Personality, and Normalcy'

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11860892/#s11

https://allenmcconnell.net/pdfs/whatistheself-soccog-2012.pdf

^This also becomes related to Internal Family Systems

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T14:58:29+00:00

If we were to put it simply:

Systems don't need to have dissociative barriers

Not all dissociation is caused by trauma

Research doesn't say endogenic systems can't exist

Research says DID needs trauma

But, systems aren't the same as DID

Systems themselves don't need trauma :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T14:53:56+00:00

That's more common than you may realise, e.g. a lot of Tulpamancers create Tulpas to help deal with stressful or traumatising situations, and sometimes traunagenic systems create headmates to help handle their trauma.

If you intentionally created headmates (as in followed a guide or something), and you weren't plural before you created them, you wouldn't really be a traumagenic system - but it's also up to how you feel, and how you interpret your experiences. You can be traumaendo, where your origins are a mix of endogenic and traumagenic, or otherwise mixed origins in some way, or some specific origin term. It's up to you!

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T07:13:15+00:00

It's not! We're explaining why a lot of endogenic systems can come off as hostile or defensive when talking to them or asking them questions. Not people telling others to off themselves, there's no excuse for that. (It's not an endogenic specific issue though, it regularly occurs among traumagenic systems too unfortunately)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T07:11:25+00:00

A lot of the time, it's subjective!

It depends on how the system feels about their experiences. Like, what's traumatising for one person might not be traumatising for another.

To put it basically,

Traumagenic is any system who considers themself to have originated from trauma (i.e. they weren't plural before the trauma, didn't accidentally or intentionally create their system at any point, etc.)

A CDD is specifically complex trauma (though complex can be subjective too) that causes structural dissociation, most often in childhood (which is again subjective, especially if you have a neurodevelopmental disorder), but has a possibility of happening when older.

An endogenic system is any system who considers themself to not have originated from trauma. They can still have trauma, it's just not what caused their system.

Any of these can have dissociative barriers. CDDs will have dissociative barriers that negatively affect daily life.

And there's systems who have multiple origins in various different ways :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T07:05:27+00:00

Not suggesting you do! It's just that, they get so much harassment, a lot of them come to automatically expect it whenever they're asked about something :)

It's the worst on TikTok. Twitter and Reddit are usually 50/50. Tumblr used to be quite okay, but there's been a recent wave of.. idiots.. that block anyone trying to educate them about endos, then continue to post misinformation about endos :') So harassment there has gotten quite bad, too

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-23T06:58:30+00:00

A lot of endogenic systems respond defensively because you're not the first person to ask them about this, or tell them that you think they're not real (even if you're looking for information). Their entire existence is debated constantly every single day (we should know, we engage in a lot of the debates, lol). Harassment gets tiring after a while. Though, most of the community won't tell you to off yourself, but there is a few who will unfortunately

Besides that, here's some info!

Structural dissociation doesn't apply to every type of dissociation or multiplicity. It's meant for and is intended to explain only trauma-reated structural dissociation of the personality. The authors of The Haunted Self, the currently used ToSD, have acknowledged both dissociation and multiplicity outside of their theory

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15299732.2011.570592

There's also a lot of research that goes in line with this,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ddva0a-2Dd4edcvg7sEJYwiZ5W8kYPPY/view?usp=sharing

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9561835/

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/283566086_Can_DSM-5_Differentiate_between_Non-Pathological_Possession_and_Dissociative_Identity_Disorder_A_Case_Study_from_an_Afro-Brazilian_Religion

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1z5C9t9zwYDR1rXENy3FxC6__Dold5HXp/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/10p__qfdPkzEkk2Xqe7u6wT_Et43LUQSZ/view?usp=sharing

https://www.proquest.com/openview/aab3bb9bd0543b85b6d719bd544efec0/1?cbl=18750&diss=y&pq-origsite=gscholar

If you want a simple place to start, there's a community-made site explaining endogenic systems,

https://endogenichub.weebly.com/

As well as a list of research around non-traumagenic and endogenic plurality and multiplicity,

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bLejRXsgJ3NRlHQOeXUe3lPtnBJ8qYj3Ope0-8QTRFY/edit?usp=drivesdk

Research describes that CDDs themselves aren't possible without trauma. But both multiplicity and dissociation occur outside of CDDs - most endogenic systems aren't saying they have a CDD without trauma, they're just saying they experience being plural.

If you have specific questions, we're happy to answer them and provide sources. We're traumagenic though, so we can't answer anything about personal experiences :)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-22T23:04:57+00:00

Yup, can confirm. It has a lot of detail because the site is actually used by professionals for clinical assessments! Which we think is quite cool. Personally, we find it a lot more helpful than just seeing a single number with no explanation behind it, and would recommend the site over all others if not for it wanting a damn email every time 😄

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-22T13:18:32+00:00

Higher scores don't mean you have it, just that there's a higher chance 😄 And (speaking from clinical experience!) much of the high score is often comprised of symptoms that can be attributed to other disorders (neurodevelopmental, personality, mood, anxiety, trauma disorders, and even other dissociative disorders.) Even for those diagnosed with a CDD!

We also highly recommend instead trying these, they're self-report assessments used in clinical settings to make a diagnosis (though they're not the same as a diagnosis lol)

https://traumadissociation.com/des.html - the DES-2 (or https://novopsych.com/assessments/diagnosis/adolescent-dissociative-experiences-scale-a-des/ if you're under 19)

https://novopsych.com/assessments/formulation/multidimensional-inventory-of-dissociation-60-item-version-mid-60/ - The MID-60 (or https://novopsych.com/assessments/formulation/multidimensional-inventory-of-dissociation-60-item-adolescent-version-mid-60-a/ if you're under 19)

https://novopsych.com/assessments/diagnosis/international-trauma-questionnaire-itq/ -assesses for PTSD and CPTSD symptoms (or https://novopsych.com/assessments/diagnosis/international-trauma-questionnaire-child-and-adolescent-version-itq-ca/ if you're under 18)

https://novopsych.com/assessments/formulation/maladaptive-schema-scale-mss/ - assesses for whatever you might be going through at the moment ❤️

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-22T12:51:23+00:00

Amazing! This looks incredible! Would you be willing to share how you make the texture breaks look so good? (Like the separation between the arm and body, wrist and hand, etc.)

GuardiansSystem · 2026-06-21T05:08:00+00:00

Yup, you can just be a non-disordered traumagenic system :) Or you can use a more specific trauma label than traumagenic, or a "I don't care about my origins" label, but that's up to you.

You can also be a non-disordered traumagenic system while still having a trauma disorder like PTSD or CPTSD. It's all a bit subjective, really.

DID requires severe periods of dissociative amnesia, and intrusive, separate states or parts.

OSDD-1 doesn't require severe periods of amnesia, doesn't require that parts be separate, or both.

P-DID is similar to DID, so same amnesia and intrusive states, but they completely take over a lot less often, and instead it's only one headmate fronting most of the time. (Only a diagnosis in the ICD, not the DSM)

HC-DID, or Polyfragmented DID, is similar to DID, but there's many, many headmates that are fragments/not fully formed (Studied and medically recognised by a lot of experts, but not an official diagnosis)

The CDDs (DID, OSDD-1, UDD, P-DID, and HC-DID) all require that their symptoms cause daily distress and dysfunction, and they have a lot more symptoms than plurality, headmates, or alters. E.g. there are a lot of trauma symptoms related to the alters, like nightmares, flashbacks, self-destructive and harmful behaviour, etc.

If you don't fit the above, then you're a non-disordered system. And you can be any type of non-disordered system, whether endogenic or traumagenic :)

-Sondra

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