Samantha: It has been quite some time since we posted, hasn't it? Well, not much we can say - life doesn't change much for us.. but Merry Christmas to our readers, and I've got some things to talk about tonight. I'm not going to name names, and I'm going to shave details, because this is a personal issue.. so sorry if you're not gonna get the information you'd usually get from us.
You see, a friend of ours may have been diagnosed with something similar to what we have. There's been no final diagnosis, but they've got a lot of stuff we recognize going on with them. Where we are able to chat among ourselves and work together, they've not got this luxury. Their siblings are cut off, preventing any real communication. Kit's been asked to help with that - in that he's been asked what to do, and he's offered some advice (such as leaving notes for each other so the siblings can communicate), but tonight, our friend switched - and that sort of freaked out their partner since normally the sibling comes up when there's some sort of crisis.
And, see, they were having a good day, so a sudden switch could be a bit off-putting - especially if the only other time you'd met this other is during a crisis. I sat down with the sibling, talked things out, and explained what I thought was important: 1) communication with the prime individual. You're a guest, after all.. a permanent one perhaps, but a guest. 2) find out if there's any others. Each person is an individual, and you need to know who these people are, and if they're safe. Or, as Kit mentioned during a chat earlier - if you're going to see a doctor, they want to know if (a) you're a danger to anyone else, and (b) if you're a danger to yourself. In much the same way.. everyone in the collective needs to know if everyone else is safe, and what triggers or limits there are.
For example, Shawn. He's a bit of a prick - he gets under people's skin, and he's good at it, but he's not a danger, and we know why he's like that. He hates.. well, social niceties. He hates playing games where people dance around problems and try to wave off other people's faults. He's used this with surgical precision on Kit and the rest of us at times, which forces us to take hard looks at ourselves, but he's not a danger to us or anyone else. Dark, on the other hand, is a weapon. He's there to take down threats to us or those we care about. He's dangerous, and we are well aware of that. So, if he's coming up when he is not needed, we are prepared to prevent this.
But our friend isn't used to this. They've not been in this kind of situation for years, and haven't developed the kind of mechanisms needed to control this kind of thing. So, we were kind of glad to notice that their primary 'other' was a 'knight' of sorts - there to protect the host as necessary. This is good - we can talk to a person like that, and help lay out rules. Communication. Awareness. Discipline. And they understood. Which is good.
The other thing is - they're not sharing certain bits of information. Passwords, whether or not medication has been taken, etc. This is Bad. So this needs to be worked on. The first thing we did was try to teach how to get in contact with a sibling and bring them up (or, if necessary, push them down). This worked - which surprised me. I mean, we were suggesting techniques we used over a decade ago, when we were new at switching who was running the host. So.. we were suggesting techniques we didn't know would work - I mean, a lot of it is mental jiujutsu.
But it worked, our friend came back up, and we explained everything in a nutshell. So there's some relief there. However - their partner's a bit freaked out, and we can't blame them. Finding out your significant other has in-house siblings can be a bit of a shock. I mean, their partner's used to us, but even we came as a bit of a shock. Having this happen again, and a lot closer to home, can be hard. They're confused, and we sat down with them and talked a little. Hopefully it will work out.
But this is kinda new for us.. being on the outside, trying to help someone like us cope with this development. And it's kinda hard for us, because a friend of ours now has to try to deal with a partner who's suddenly gone plural. Well, we'll try to be there for both of them, but.. it's going to be a slow, learning process for us as well. Wish us luck.
