A Junkie's Journey

Five

Peacefully drifting. Dissociation sounded like a harsh word, so in his head, Tristan called it 'peacefully drifting.' Dissociation was much more complicated than it sounded, but it wasn't hard for Tristan to do. In simpler terms, dissociation was checking out from reality and taking a break.

Tristan had a new therapist now, Marissa, and she told him he had characteristics of Dissociative Identity Disorder. It had made a lot of sense, but there was a catch - Tristan hadn't gone through a trauma that he knew of to cause him to dissociate. He came home and called his mother, told her about the dissociation, and she told him about when he was little.

Before Tristan was a year old, he had a babysitter during the day because both of his parents worked. His father would leave before his mother, so his mother was the one kissing Tristan on the head after she let the babysitter inside. Every day, Tristan would smile up at his mother after she kissed him goodbye.

His mom told him that one day, she kissed Tristan on his head like she always did, but it seemed as though he zoned out. She was confused; she tried to get Tristan to look at her, waving a hand in front of his face, grabbing his hands, etc. etc. She didn't know what happened back then, but she knew now that he was dissociating.

She knew something was wrong, so his parents set up something where it would record sounds when the babysitter was with Tristan.

When his parents came home, the babysitter was all smiles before she left them with Tristan. They put Tristan to bed, then listened to the audio recording from earlier that day. They could hear his babysitter talking on the phone and Tristan crying. She would yell at Tristan periodically, and at one point, they heard a noise that sounded like a slap.

Tristan's mom was crushed. She couldn't look the babysitter in the eye - she blamed whatever Tristan went through on herself. She made Tristan's father fire the woman; he drove to her house one afternoon, knocked on her door, fired her, and all this woman did was say, "Okay," and close the door. Those actions showed how much she had cared about Tristan, and finally, his parents had realized it.

After his mother finished telling Tristan about the possible abuse, he had dissociated. His mother also told him about things she had been researching that had to do with Tristan's dissociation and past.

When someone went through trauma before they could possibly remember it, the person would be triggered by things without knowing why. If someone went through a trauma when they could remember it but dissociated instead, therapists could work with them and uncover the trauma, which would give them reasons behind their triggers. Since Tristan supposedly went through trauma before he was old enough to remember, it would be harder for him and Marissa to figure out his triggers and the reasoning behind them.

It had been a while since his mother had told him all of this, and his dissociation had gotten worse.

He told Marissa about his hallucinations a while back: Jay, Jon, Max, and two other girls he didn't know the names of.

Jay was the first one from the group of people Tristan had seen. He had been with Tristan for around four years now - he would act as a devil's advocate, making Tristan feel like he had to purge, self-harm, starve himself, and whatever else Jay could think of. Jay was tall, had blue hair, and was sickly underweight.

Jon was another person Tristan saw. Jon symbolized how Tristan wanted to be; the only reason Tristan hadn't become like Jon was because Tristan knew it wasn't healthy to be like him. Jon was the type of guy that fucked around, partied, and drank. He was overly cocky and thought too highly of himself. Jon had dirty blonde hair and was friends with Jay.

Max appeared on a bed next to Tristan's when he was anxious. Max physically wasn't able to talk, so Jon was the one who told Tristan Max's name. Max was dressed nicely and seemed like he'd be attractive if half of the skin on his body wasn't missing.

One of the girls seemed to be around Tristan's age. He called her 'Shadow Girl' because she was usually seen in the shadows. She had black hair and her skin seemed somewhat gray. She was on Tristan's side; she would argue with Jon and Jay about things they were making Tristan do, and after she was done talking to them, they would back off.

The last girl was young and had blonde hair. She seemed like she was enjoying life, and she was playful. She reminded Tristan of stereotypical horror movies; when Tristan was anxious about being alone in the dark, he would hear her laugh.

After Tristan finally told Marissa about his hallucinations, she told him that they weren't hallucinations. The people he was seeing were parts of Tristan that he was personifying, and the people had to do with dissociation.

What he didn't tell her, and what he wasn't planning on telling her, was Jon and Jay were now more like alters of Tristan's than hallucinations. Tristan didn't know a lot about dissociation, but he didn't want to research more about it due to his personality. If he researched something, his mind would trick him into becoming whatever he was researching. He didn't want to "pretend" he had full-blown Dissociative Identity Disorder, because Tristan knew he didn't have DID.

The last time he went to an appointment with Marissa, they did EMDR. EMDR, also known as Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, was a type of psychotherapy usually used to treat PTSD; dissociation was a symptom of PTSD in some cases. EMDR was used to reveal past memories and traumas that were forgotten or blocked out as a defense mechanism.

Tristan didn't like the words Marissa used - they both thought it was awkward, but it worked for him. Marissa told Tristan to envision a safe place and to invite all his parts there. He thought of a beach he had visited; Jon and Jay were the only two 'parts' that had shown up. Then, she told him to think of a place where Tristan and his parts could talk and get to know each other. Tristan thought of a restaurant on the beachside.

Jon, Jay, and Tristan all went to the restaurant in his head. Marissa told him to envision a projector screen in the restaurant. She told him to see it as a split-screen; Tristan could control the images on one side of the screen, and the parts of him could control the other. Marissa said to have one of his parts show where in the past they were stuck in; Jon was the first one to volunteer.

Jon was stuck in the memory of Tristan's past partner breaking up with him for good. Tristan had went to the garage and laid in front of a space heater, screaming and sobbing. That was the reason why Jon wanted to fuck around and do whatever he wanted; Tristan had felt that way whenever his partner left him. Marissa told Tristan to show Jon his life, on Tristan's side of the screen, to help Jon realize that Tristan's life wasn't like that anymore, but Jon wasn't listening or watching.

Marissa told him to give Jay a turn since Jon wasn't cooperating. Jay showed Tristan that he was stuck back in seventh grade, when Tristan's disordered eating started getting worse. Tristan didn't know what to show him to make him feel better, but Jay understood.

After Jay, Marissa told Tristan to imagine an infant-Tristan. She told him to show the infant how Tristan's life is now to make the infant feel better. He showed the infant his parents, and it made the infant feel better.

Tristan hadn't agreed with EMDR before this point. To be completely honest, he thought it was a load of shit and it didn't work for him. Since the EMDR had made Tristan feel calmer, he was willing to cooperate more with Marissa and her EMDR.

Even though he dissociated, Tristan didn't like placing the blame on events he lived through, because he was the one that made the choices putting him in his current situation. Sure, the events could've made him lean towards bad choices, but Tristan could've chosen the correct paths he encountered instead of the bad ones.