Still Unsettled [Me]

I got to listen in on Gracelyn and Boss discussing everything on the ride in this morning. They do, often. It's like I have two therapists comparing notes about my treatment, only I get to eavesdrop on the meeting. All my life, riding in the car has been the best time to have a discussion with someone else. You're both going to be physically present the entire time, and because you're both facing forward, eye contact isn't going to be constant. And some things are easier to say when you aren't making eye contact.

They talked about this weekend. Turns out there was a big fight between him and the metamour on Saturday night before he and I went to the club that I didn't know about. I knew there was tension, but not that it had erupted. Which makes his crash on Saturday night make even more sense. On one hand, he probably shouldn't have gone to the club at all; on the other hand, staying home would have been worse.

They also talked about individual alters. Gracelyn herself, which is unusual. But she hasn't been coming out much lately. His clue to that is that she hasn't been keeping the dishes done each night. That's her thing, that and driving in to work in the morning. Which she's also been letting slide for me to do. He's done dishes and not said a thing, which is pretty awesome of him, actually, since I know he hates doing dishes even more than I do.

Oddly enough, Kiara's been doing the dishes as often as anyone else. And she's been out cleaning our room and straightening up. It's pretty cool that she's doing some housework, but really it's not housework so much as OCD-work. She's always been soothed by organizing and putting things in order. One time when she was upset I got out a bunch of quarters and let her stack and sort them into piles, and that really helped her. So she's doing organizing to soothe herself. What worries Gracelyn and Boss is that she's doing a lot of solo stuff. Kiara's a social creature; she lives to engage with other people. And now she's avoiding doing just that. Boss feels that she's even pulling away from him a lot. And we know that the problem is that she's still grieving over Bear. And as you might expect, since she's had one of her Daddy-figures pulled away from her unexpectedly, she's pulling away from her other Daddy-figure, afraid that she'll lose him too. I don't know what to do for her. Gracelyn has suggested that perhaps getting her time with someone other than Boss, someone she cares about, might reassure her that there are more of 'her' people out there. I don't know; and there's only a few people that I can let go and trust to be good with her.

And when one kid gets messed up, the other does too, apparently. Paul came out last night, and he was eight, and he's been 'reset' somehow. He's always had access to memories of other members of the system, like reviewing the video tapes. But watching a video and being present aren't the same. So he had his memories, and the videos of ours. Suddenly, all of his memories have transferred over to video files, he doesn't have any active memories of his own. So last night it was like he was out for the first time. He knew Boss, but didn't have the emotional connection to him. He knew where everything in our room is, but didn't connect with it as his room. And he was terrified that Boss was going to want from him the same closeness they've had before - and he wasn't ready for that. However, Boss just reassured him that he was safe and could relax, and eventually he did. I woke up a few times with him still out, and then Kiara was dreaming - about doughnuts, of all things. And this morning, the sun is brighter, and things are okay.