Just when you think the waters are all calm and steady things come along and rock the boat. Then you think to yourself is rocking the boat a bad thing after all? Perhaps it’s not but you just kind of find yourself getting use to the steady and rhythmic back and forth, You feel comfortable and like things are working they way they should. Perhaps you felt you were headed in the right direction but actually needed a nudge at the bow in the direction you were really suppose to be going in the first place. Then again it might be simply that you are traveling towards your destination and it’s time to speed the trip up with some back wind.
For Tanya and I the latter is what I feel recently happened. Allow me dear blog reader to back track a bit. The new phenomenon as it were started with mail arriving. Packages in fact from vendors on Amazon that no one could account for. This was not a big alarm to me as Tanya has quite an extensive wish list and well Kathleen has been known to order some things from time to time. The items in question were clearly from her wish list and usually very low priced items so it really was no big deal. The odd thing on the other hand was the appearance of grape soda cans, empty I might add, appearing around the house. We have a soda machine in the laundry room here at the apartment complex and yes that very brand of grape soda is housed there so where they were coming from was not much a of mystery. We have a rather large Hello Kitty coffee mug which is usually about half filled with quarters for laundry day and all the personalities know about that so accessibility is not an issue either. The question then was who was bringing them in the house?
Tanya and Kathleen both wouldn’t bother with it as it’s not a diet soda and they both would only partake of it as a treat if it were in fact diet. Lulu (who you will be hearing about soon enough) is too frightened to leave the house for any reason much less go get a soda by herself so by deduction that left Cubby. Now this was odd because I’ve taught Cubby that she needs to have me with her to leave the house unless it’s an emergency. Think of Cubby as though she were a latch-key kid, she knows to be inside safe and sound if I’m not around. The thing is these soda cans seemed to be appearing late at night.
Often times after I’ve gone to bed Tanya will stay up. If she transitions whoever she becomes eventually comes to lie down with me. It’s a pretty common pattern we’ve learned to accept and have become accustomed to. That’s all fine and dandy but I was kind of upset at the idea that Cubby, who doesn’t always know what is appropriate might be traveling from out house to the laundry room at three in the morning. I mean she could get up with just her pajama bottoms on (yes that means totally topless as she likes to be most of the time) and decide that was the right time to go get that “grape pop” she wants. My intentions were to question her and find out if she’s the one who’s been going out. Trouble is Cubby hadn’t been showing up much lately meaning I had no access to her to simply inquire about it.
Fast forward a week or so and Tanya and I were in the kitchen fixing dinner together a not too common occurrence as usually only one of us will cook and more often than not I get to be treated like a king while my beautiful woman fixes food for me. To be in the kitchen together is not all that odd but to both be working on a particular dish together was unusual. We certainly had a good day up to this point having managed a small trip out to the grocery store, played a board game and were now fixing dinner with intent to watch a movie that evening.
A siren outside.
We had the windows and front door open to allow the beautiful weather in. I’m now programmed to check on Tanya’s status when I hear a siren.
She looks different. My mind races. Is she still Tanya? Is she just shaken up by it?
“I’m ok.” she says without me asking but doesn’t even begin to look it.
Trying to roll with it though I press ahead and try and get her back into cooking dinner. I prod her to get back to what she was doing and a look of confusion briefly flashes on her face. It’s the kind of look the average person wouldn’t think twice about as it was there and gone so quickly, so skillfully that it almost wasn’t there at all. She looks at her hands to see what tools she held. A knife and a carrot. She looks at the cutting board and sees chopped carrot and begins to cut. Had this been an ordinary day when we were not working together on dinner she could have pulled this off. I would be sitting on the couch, seeing her and hearing her cut carrots. As we were working together however I notice she doesn’t cut carrots at all like Tanya. In fact she’s cutting carrots slowly but not cautiously and there is the real deviation. I put my hand on hers to stop her and she looks up at me. What was that in her eyes, was that a glimmer of worry I saw?
“Are you Tanya?”
“Yes” she answers but it’s the way she answers. I know it annoys Tanya to no end when I ask her if she is Tanya or not but every time she answers I know it’s her. This answer was nowhere near the manner Tanya responds to the question with. I knew it wasn’t her and asked if she was Kathleen.
Confusion and no response is all I got which inevitably meant she wasn’t Kathleen either. It wasn’t one of the children as they would never have started using a knife and in all honesty would have shrunk down in stature by now as well as acknowledged me as Bear. I was standing here, looking at my girlfriend who at this point was someone totally new to me.
I have to be honest and let you know that I felt a wave of excitement with this revelation. Then I felt guilt for being excited.
It’s one thing I think to embrace this woman’s condition and love every part of her but isn’t it a completely different thing, a selfish thing, a horribly self-indulgent and narcissistic reaction for me to have? What does this make me if I harbor these feelings when I see her change like this? As you can see I still struggle with this as it’s a true feeling I had and it’s been a couple months now since this event.
Turns out this personality seems to be a young teenage girl. Like the others she doesn’t identify herself as Tanya but has found that she can mimic Tanya with great success. To the point that to most people she is just Tanya who is maybe not feeling well that day. She is extra quiet and extremely modest. The last part there I feel is because she remembers every bit of the abuse. She doesn’t want her flesh to be seen or touched in any manner that could even remotely be deemed as inappropriate. That my friends is a first for any of the personalities indeed.
We spent the rest of the night just getting acquainted which means mostly sitting quietly watching TV talking a bit and resolving a few things. Going to bed was the most difficult part of the evening as she did not want to sleep with me. At the same time I have this need to have that body in the bed next to me. It comforts me and allows me to sleep. I also use it as a monitoring method because Tanya can barely stir at all without waking me and as I don’t know this new personality I need to know if she decides to wander off. This makes getting her into bed mandatory for me and closing the door to our bedroom so as to give me that one last alarm if she tries and slip off. I after all simply must get some sleep there is work in the morning and those tables at Chuy’s are not going to serve themselves.
I begin to talk to her about the other personalities and she lets me know that she understands what I am telling her even though she obviously doesn’t like it. “We all sleep together in the same bed, do you understand that?”
She nods that she does and slowly walks to the bed. I tuck her in and she pulls the covers up around her neck, effectively sealing herself in cocoon style. “You will not be touched in any sexual way tonight, I promise.”
Her eyes look terrified and doubtful.
“All those things Bob did to you are in the past and will never, ever happen to you again. I am here to protect you, not to hurt you. You don’t believe me do you?”
Her head slowly shakes back and forth almost guilt like. Perhaps she was afraid I would get mad and hurt her if she answered this honestly.
“That’s OK, you don’t have to believe me. It’s my responsibility to prove that to you. Cubby and Kathleen didn’t believe me at first either. They both doubted that I would be able to love them and not hurt them but I’ve taught them now who I really am. They have come to love me too. My goal is to have you love me just like they do and you will one day.” I lean down and kiss her forehead which causes her to shrink back into the pillow.
That was the last I saw of her for about a week. Cubby had made her return but she couldn’t tell me much about the new personality except that she “likes grape pop.” which I knew as it was part of the clearing things up conversations I had with her that night. Finally Kathleen shows up and I can get some questions answered. “Do you know about her?”
“I know she likes to buy things!” she says and rolls her eyes.
“Ahhhh so those packages were her ordering?”
“Yeah and the grape pop.”
“Well that part I knew. What else can you tell me about her?”
“Nothing really. I had hoped she was gone for good.”
“So she’s not a new personality?”
“Ummm no, but we have not seen her in years. I really thought she was gone.”
Well that was a wrinkle I had not expected nor was prepared for. At first there was relief that maybe I was off the hook inside for my reaction as this was not a new personality at all. It did not take my analytically based mind to rationale that I had in fact felt that excitement a week ago and that was real whether or not this was a new personality or just a returning one.
To sum up she appears every now and then. On her second visit I told her I needed a name for her. “If I’m going to acknowledge you as an individual then you need a name for me call you. No one has ever seen you as anyone but Tanya before have they?”
“No.” she simply murmured.
“Do you have a name? What should I call you?”
She shrugged and I knew she didn’t have a name to give me as she had never been addressed with anything all her own.
“Well that’s alright let’s figure out what fits you.” My mind began to reel yet again. Trying to come up with a name for this girl who was still quite unknown to me. I knew it had to be something that she would feel comfortable with. I’ve learned it had to be something important to her. There had to be a connection for her. Kathleen’s name worked as that was important to Tanya. Cubby worked because it was Tanya and I’s pet names for each other. Lulu worked too but I’ve not told you that story, so no spoilers yet. What could I propose that I felt comfortable with and she would adapt to.
“How about April?”
There was a twinkle in her eye with that. No shake of the head but no real acceptance either. Still that flash on her face told me I had made the right choice. You see, their mother was born in the month of April. It made sense that the name would work.
“Yeah I like that, it’s a beautiful name, just like you. I want to call you April is that alright with you?”
“Yeah.” she said and smiled.
“Well then, hello April, it’s nice to meet you.”
I now keep a case of grape soda in the house at all times. It’s April’s favorite treat. Others are allowed to have them too but the soda’s are really for April.
She's the one with DID, I'm just the DIDiot. 