Ok - so last night was going so great (it ended up being great still but more on that). I finished my first pop'ish song set with my chord pattern, melody, and lyrics (Imagine This, Just a Kiss) and was reflecting on the feelings and started down this path.
When I dream or solve problems, I usually have a complete original composition playing at the same time in my head. I don't know if this creates excitement or gets me in the mood or what but this is how I've always operated. I had someone ask if it's feeling based.
The first thing I remember is such a happy thought - really it's such a happy place for me. Traveling alone, in deep space for years and years. No sound, no people, nothing - just the sound of my breath and a piano composition that I had only ever written the base part down (I wrote this when I was probably 7).
I still use this place in my head when I'm solving problems, computer programming problems or just thinking. This is such a calm place for me.
This instantly made me feel so happy just thinking about it - like I was "untouchable"... and then it hit me like a ton of bricks. I realized that "this" might truly have been my first DID experience because suddenly I felt a wave of other emotions. While I, Aaron, escaped to this place - there was another, "Samantha" who had to endure being raped almost daily from just before I was 7 years old to sometime after I was 9.
Now, I felt sad, guilt, horrified. It brought new meaning to my "safe happy place" and that feeling of being untouchable! So, realizing I was about to go off a cliff here, I set a timer for 5 minutes and then let myself feel. I can not explain to you the flood of things I all of a sudden remembered. The pain, the size of this man when he'd enter me, the bleeding after, the shock, embarrassment, and to my utter surprise - sense of accomplishment, pride... This made me sick to my stomach.
What I realized is that Samantha has integrated into me, Erin. Her memories are mine now and things that were kept away from me really came flooding in just because of that trigger. My timer went off and I started to "see" my surroundings, feel my chair - tried to breath. I started to think about this differently - instead of guilt and horror of what I, Aaron, did by leaving Samantha alone to deal with being raped... I started to think in gratitude. I am so thankful for Samantha allowing me to survive - allowing me to be "untouchable".
Then I started to turn this even more - I started to think that now, NOW, I get to gift this feeling of safety, calm, alone, "untouchable" to Samantha. She gets to feel these feelings for the first time because she is now me. I'm amazed that during that time there was a part of me frozen - who's innocence was not lost. Samantha never got to grow up. However, when I do "new" things for her - touching the bottom of the pool at the deep end, dancing - moving my hips, singing, getting my finger nails painted... I can feel her happiness.
To be honest - what I just did is also why Aaron chose to integrate into me as well (something I wish Vanessa would've taken the time to understand my dynamic better). While those feelings of guilt are there from him, I can now feel him breathing - relief - like real relief. What I had done was something that just a year ago, Aaron was incapable of.