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Told my therapist about C! (It went well)


Jamie

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(Just a random comment, but I think it would be nice to have a thread prefix for "Plurality" or something. Maybe not that word, but a prefix for threads about the experience of being plural, telling people you have tulpas, etc. Unless that does fit into General or Misc?)

 

So, just two hours ago, I told my therapist about my month-ish old tulpa, C. I didn't jump straight into tulpas: I basically told "The Narrative", but for plurality. I'm going to go over the steps I used, in case anyone else is thinking about it. The Narrative works on anyone, as long as you have a little time: family, friends, whoever. 

 

For transgender people, The Narrative is this big story you tell about how you realized you were trans. You go back as far as you can into your childhood and pull memories from that time you played with trucks instead of dolls, you talk about how you didn't feel like a "tomboy", though you were masculine, and you talk about how "trans man" felt right. 

 

The Narrative involves quite a bit of hand-holding and 101 stuff. You don't start with "'I'm not a woman, I'm a man, and I want HRT, I want SRS." It's like walking someone through the process you yourself had with learning what all the words and labels meant. After that, you both can have those conversations about "So, what does this mean for you and me?"

 

So, I told The Plurality Narrative. I talked about how "Everyone imagines how other people might react to their behavior" and my "internal radio". I don't think I've mentioned it here, but I almost constantly hear a blurry jumble of voices and noise in my head. It feels like my brain just generating stuff: I hear a lot of things that could be hook lines on Law & Order, right before they cut to the intro. I also hear "How old are you?" about 50 times a day, to the point where I've named that one thought Horu (How Old R U). I've tried answering internal radio, but I've never been able to interact with it. It's like listening into a surrealist radio station generated in my mind, hence the name. 

 

So that's the first step. Internal radio is not scary. It's an internal process that my brain has marked external. I kept coming back to this. It's all one brain. Most people mark everything in their brain as me, but my brain has a unique talent of saying not me. I talked a little about my history of dissociation, how I spent months at a time with that "imaginary dot of your mind, right in your head" floating two feet about my body. My therapist had already known about that part. 

 

Second step: talking about my first tulpa, who thought he was an alter and integrated/dissipated himself after about two years. I talked about how I would have an "imaginary conversation partner", and how one day, I decided he could be more than that. I allowed my brain to mark G as an external process, and so he quickly became sentient, and a great friend of mine. I talked about all the positive things he did for me, and also how confused we were to not know what G was. I talked about how G thought he was an alter, and how distressing it was when he decided to leave. 

 

And the end goal: I talked about how, two months ago, I found out about tulpas. I was able to recontextualize everything that happened with G and learned that plurality ≠ DID or general "craziness." I talked about how this felt like a missing puzzle piece, and talked about my motivations for making C. I did a little Tulpa 101 here, and my therapist expressed that she's going to do some research of her own. I introduced wonderlands by mentioning, "You know how in those relaxation videos, they say 'picture yourself in a peaceful meadow?' You make a place like that, so you can interact with your tulpa there." She was totally down with everything, and never made me feel crazy. The only thing she really asked me, outside of minor clarification questions, was who else I had told (No one IRL). 

 

I did still leave some stuff out: I didn't get into how C and I have switched, how I was visualizing him next to me on the couch the entire time, or how I'm trying to purposefully hallucinate his form and voice (imposition is a long-term goal of ours.) I assume next session she'll want to talk more about this all. I did mention how there aren't limits on what a tulpa looks like, so some people have ponies, dragons, whatever. I didn't want her to google "tulpas" and be surprised by any MLP or furry art that shows up. My "Plurality Narrative" definitely said "People make tulpas as mental companions, and it's a natural, psychological process that doesn't mean mental instability" and did not say "Some people have sex with or even marry their tulpas", even though I think that's perfectly fine (with consent and a lot of thought put into it, of course.) First impressions mean a lot. It's important to lay down a good foundation, before you can have those more finicky conversations. That's why we say "Two men can love each other, right?" not "Two men should be able to dance the horizontal tango!" because you'll set off the taboo alarms in people's heads. Avoid setting off the taboo alarms for "hearing voices = crazy" and "plurality = severe trauma or faking", and hopefully everyone will stay open-minded and not shut down the conversation. 

 

 

So, it all turned out well. C was apprehensive in the moment, but was ecstatic when it all worked out. (It's a pattern of his.) Prior to today, we had had quite a few discussions about whether or not to tell my therapist. After our last appointment, when C was there, and got to form his own opinion of her, he decided that she would be safe to tell. My biggest piece of advice to all closeted systems is only come out if you feel safe enough to do so. Heck, it works for queer and trans people, too. If you think you're going to get kicked out of your house, involuntarily hospitalized, disowned, have your livelihood taken away, beat up, etc., consider waiting to come out. 

 

 

But... if it is safe, and you're ready, I wish you the best luck. C says to be confident when you come out. 

 

-J

The world is far, the world is wide; the man needs someone by his side. 

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I told my therapist about Tulpamancy, but I told them because I felt like they needed to know about it in order for them to do their job effectively.

 

I didn't tell them day 1 "I'm a Tulpamancer", but I did tell them pretty quickly. I asked about DID and their opinion about it, figuring that it would be a test to see if they would respond well. Turns out they thought they met someone with DID, and not too long later I brought up Tulpamancy.

 

I was and still am really nervous about leaking the details on how Tulpamancy in my life works, so that in of itself caused me to only be able to expose small amounts at a time. Sometimes I would try to explain Tulpamancy but would just freeze up and stall in an awkward silence. Despite all of this, I am slowly getting more comfortable talking about Tulpamancy and my therapist never criticized me for it.

Meow. You may see my headmates call me Gray or sometimes Cat.

I used to speak in pink and Ranger used to speak in blue (if it's unmarked and colored assume it's Ranger). She loves to chat.

 

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As a therapist in real life, I would prefer you just shoot straight from the hip and say, "I found this thing called tulpamancy and I tried it out, and guess what, it seems to work..." If you do the convoluted story thing you expounded on above in my office, I would first, personally, wonder if I am being manipulated. Even with the trans analogy... I don't need to be hand held through a convoluted story line to be convinced of a thing. Yes, there are very specific criteria that individuals must meet to arrive at any one specific diagnosis, but if it sounds like someone has looked those up and is just running through the checklist, I catch on pretty fast... It feels different. It taste different. At worst, it could end up getting a person labeled with the wrong thing, such as Malingering. At best, it just delays or distracts from the real thing...

 

I like that you told your therapist. In general, I like to think therapist are reasonable people who explore things and go into depth... That isn't always true about counseling folks. There is some truth to the stereotype that counselors became counselors because they were trying to fix themselves and family, so on the whole they're just normal folks who come bias and prejudices and, well... they're just people. I would say most genuinely want to help folks. Some will be more Rogerian and listen, some will be more REBT and directive, like Ellis. I know too many therapist who would not be open to tulpamancy. You show up in my office, well, we're cool! I know some psychiatrist that cool with tulpamancy. I know some that are not cool with it, but reasonable enough they aren't going to slap you with a diagnosis based on the general narrative of tulpamancy and progression thereof. That doesn't mean you won't find one that will slap an inappropriate label on you. Meet five psychiatrist, you walk away with five different diagnoses.

 

Anyway, I am glad that you had a good experience, and hope that you have continued good experiences.

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Man, I've been wanting to talk to my psychiatrists about tulpas for a while now :P I probably never will, though, the ones I'm talking to now seem okay, but because of the way the previous ones handled topics like asexuality and me not liking group projects ("OK but how's that any different from a friendship then I don't get it??" "Can't you just work in groups until you like it??" (like, dude, I've worked in groups throughout my school life without an issue but I still don't like it and why should I)) and made me really uncomfortable talking about things, it just seems like a bad idea. Maybe they were just bad at their jobs, maybe the new ones are better, but still, probably never going to happen.

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Man, I've been wanting to talk to my psychiatrists about tulpas for a while now :P I probably never will, though, the ones I'm talking to now seem okay, but because of the way the previous ones handled topics like asexuality and me not liking group projects ("OK but how's that any different from a friendship then I don't get it??" "Can't you just work in groups until you like it??" (like, dude, I've worked in groups throughout my school life without an issue but I still don't like it and why should I)) and made me really uncomfortable talking about things, it just seems like a bad idea. Maybe they were just bad at their jobs, maybe the new ones are better, but still, probably never going to happen.

 

I have never liked working in groups. I absolutely hate group projects. You sound extremely normal to me! My experience with groups is I either end doing all the work, because I wanted some quality control, or I got parceled out to do the worst part of the task, or was given the more expensive task... and still ended up doing my own thing anyway.

 

the asexual component is a tougher thing for most people to grasp, but that is not a reflection on you, but how strong our personal and social biases are. Clearly, your first therapist/psychiatrist was not 'sex positive' (The term Doctor Lindsey Doe uses. Check out youtube sexplanations... there is even a video about asexual...I love her channel!) This does not mean all therapist are like that. Some will try and make a lack of interest or libido a symptom of a certain diagnosis, and it can be... But sometimes, people just aren't' interested. We're a continuum of potentialities. You're perfectly fine just as you are!

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