Circle of Tall Trees

Category: Wild Collective Heart (Page 2 of 4)

A collection of stories from our lived experience with dissociative identity disorder. We share this life and tell its stories together, in our individual voices.

Back Into Hand

September 7, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 20


Content Warning: Trauma, dissociation/DID, coercive control, trauma bonds, psychological manipulation, disrupted therapy, and references to COVID-19 illness and distress.

I brought us back to him. I had to. I had a dream that he was dying and wrapped in bandages from head to toe, and he was asking for some solace only. I sat across from him at a cafeteria table, and I felt intense terror in losing him. I remembered his email and contacted him. He wrote me back immediately, telling me how loving and kind I am. That was who I remembered. Not how they talked about him in therapy.

-Essie

The world had changed in the COVID crisis, and my system was deeply activated during that time. We excel at surviving, but it takes a toll, and parts of us searched for the last known handler to feel safe again and be told what to do. It didn’t matter that I had all my know-how for emergency times from my upbringing. We were still lacking the comfort and the love we needed to feel safe in our foundations.

The contrast was a tug-of-war inside us that would not end. And finally, I was worn down from lack of sleep and fear and having gotten sick with COVID, and my system took executive control and did the unthinkable after so many years of therapy under our belt by then.

I don’t blame us. I understand it painfully.

-Robin

We were also in the middle of trauma processing in therapy. After years of stabilization and learning how to stabilize and function in our life together, we’d chosen to begin processing the trauma that created our internal structuring to begin with. That meant somewhat reexperiencing the trauma for the first time together, as parts of us began encountering trauma that hadn’t previously been known across our system.

Between that and COVID and our regular in-person therapy being disrupted, it was too much for the world to deal with, let alone us. So it makes perfect sense to me why we’d trigger back to where we had last felt some kind of safety.

-Raven

Essie’s not going to, so we should explain. She’s a part of us that split off when we’d met our ex-Dom, and her primary function was to be somewhat of an introject of him and bring us back to him. We had just learned of her months before COVID even happened, and it may have been likely she was always going to try reaching out to him again and COVID just gave the opportunity for her to.

-Rogue

Great observation and point. This was going to happen as long as we didn’t connect with Essie and all align, and typically these things do happen at the height of stress. It’s not surprising or shameful. We were in the process of healing, after all.

We found ourselves back with the man so willing to be there for us when we found out we had DID, our listener/Dom, again. He was all too happy to have had us come back into hand, too.

-Raven

Straight Through

September 7, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 19

Content Warning: Trauma, dissociation/DID, spiritual possession narratives, family invalidation, psychological distress, and references to mental health treatment.

I excelled at therapy. I treated it like high school and really worked at it. The alternative was to sit in the trauma with no relief, and so the incentive to help myself and be supported was high. Also, I had that whole pesky narrative to disprove for all parts of me, the one trying to strip us of our humanity and frame a well-known mental health condition as spiritual possession or not even real.

Our mind was broken. Our body was broken. Our spirit was seriously questioning everything we’d known to be true. That person online had joined the wagon that I was possessed, along with my family, before he blocked communication with us. From all sides, my world collapsed. The only way out was straight through that bullshit and into understanding myself and listening to my inner parts. Supporting myself.

-Raven

I was there in therapy, but mainly just checking out the psychologist to make sure they were safe for us. I didn’t really feel hopeful much could change and get better. My whole life was a trauma loop just waiting to come back around. If not for Raven, we wouldn’t have chosen therapy for ourselves at all. We would have kept in the loop, in the shame, and in the crazy-making for the rest of our life. I love her more for making us do the hardest things and acting as whatever we needed to heal. A parent, a friend, a sister, and a guide.

-Rogue

And they entrusted me enough to make solid changes in our quality of life as a DID system and as a people. That’s so difficult for many internal people to do.

-Raven

Yeah, but it took an enormous amount of patience from you to get us aligned with similar goals and safe enough to need at all.

-Rogue

Thank you.

-Raven

I Became Who Would

September 6, 2026 / / 2 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 18

Content Warning: Childhood exploitation and trafficking, psychological abuse, coercive sexual dynamics, dissociation, trauma reenactment, family abandonment, and threats of institutionalization.

I ran like hell from everything leaking inside of me and from those people back there I’d thought I’d known.

Our “Listener/Dom” broke it off with us, which was intensely cruel, as there were parts of me who saw him as their protector, their lover, their handler, and so on. Even though it was ultimately for our best outcome, it was still a nightmare. I learned there were parts inside of me that could not stop themselves from following the patterns he’d set for them each day. They were stuck in a trauma loop, reenacting over and over, making sexually explicit videos and pictures as though they still had to perform for him. It took months for our nervous system to calm enough for it to stop. We had these parts hand the videos and pictures over to us each day instead of sending him anything. For a time, I kept us without a computer to ensure all parts of self were safe.

He’d had parts of me who were trafficked as a child performing for him, and they were so overwhelmed by the loss of who would take care of them that I became who would.

I got us in therapy. A few duds, and then the psychologist I was on a waitlist to get in with finally had a patient opening. I knew that it was safest for my entire system that we be in therapy and working on healing.

My father had turned my family of origin against me and wanted me committed to a mental institution, where he happened to work. He told my family, and even extended family, that I was spiritually possessed. I knew that I could not be safe again, and I felt my life might be in danger, so I got help, which posed its own complications. My system was told never to speak about anything in our past or the most severe punishments would find them.

Well, we clearly did the work needed to find freedom.

-Raven & Rogue

Sketch

September 6, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 17

Content Warning: Psychological abuse, coercive sexual dynamics, food restriction, sleep deprivation, dissociation, and family abandonment.

He’d called me a pig and told me to snort for him. I laughed my ass off and left. I didn’t know yet who he was or the damage that had been done. I just knew my Rogue was into something, and it was time to get her out of it.

After some investigating, I learned this guy was our support person from a website promoting trained mental health support with kind and compassionate listeners available to chat.

So… why was he in our email? He was acting as our support person and our Dom?

Sketch.

I started watching and reading, desperate to get a grasp on the reality of our current events. I looked at anything and everything around us. Books, rooms, emails, pictures, whatever was in front of me, trying to piece it all together. I had parts of myself I never knew of and traumas I had never been exposed to coming out through the seams of our skull rapidly.

I watched our body collapsing along with our mind. I had skin rashes, my hair was falling out, I’d lost 55 pounds. We weren’t eating. We weren’t sleeping.

He’d supported all this by telling us we were a pig and needed to put down the fork. Giving us an article about how eight hours of sleep wasn’t necessary. Broken-up sleep patterns were superior time management.

I looked like a ghost, a zombie in the mirror. I felt terror. My family was in tatters, and it all hit at once. The past abuse coming up in us. My family turning away and choosing to side with my father.

I begged for help. I told my mother, “I am not okay and I need help.”

My mother spoke to me as if I was dead, as if I wasn’t speaking to her.

She said, “It’s like she died and I don’t have a daughter anymore.”

And I knew I was on my own.

-Raven

I’m No Victim. I Clap Back.

September 5, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 16

Content Warning: References to childhood physical abuse, choking, coercive control, dissociation, BDSM, emotional manipulation, and abandonment trauma.

I liked him well enough. He was a bit crazed like me. I found him relatable in that he could be incredibly psychopathic, and at the time I was viewing myself as potentially fucked up enough to be so myself.

Turns out numbness and a purely evil tongue when triggered does not make a psychopath, just a hurt girl dealing with her own complex trauma responses. I have tons of empathy and go numb and into survival fighting when triggered.

It had been how I coped, trying to put myself in other people’s places to understand them and relate so that I didn’t have to carry more pain over how willfully and diligently they chose to hurt the shit out of me.

But I’m no victim. I clap back.

The last time I clapped back at my father when I was younger, his rage pinned me to the wall, his forearm choking me as he screamed red an inch from my face. He apparently was teaching me never to stand up for myself against his authority.

I blacked out. I still wonder if I was choked out or had I just dissociated. Probably both.

Clapping back at my ex Dom meant he’d punish me until I was exhausted and just wanted it to stop. Assailing me with criticism. Threatening me he’d leave, which was my biggest trigger. Abandonment wounds for the win.

He’d actually leave too, which was a pain I cannot yet put to words. I fought and kept fighting it and then submitted. At least I fought. That’s what I held onto to comfort myself after.

Otherwise though, I loved the BDSM.

-Rogue

I Liked to Read

September 5, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 15

Content Warning: References to childhood sexual abuse, coercive control, sexual conditioning, dissociation, and punishment.

I looked for peanut butter when I woke back up. Carried it with me, licking my fingers from the dip. Where I found myself was nice. Clean and warm. The windows let light in and weren’t covered up. No terrifying dogs to navigate around. No Auntie though, no one to tell me where I was and for what.

I started talking to him and realized, oh, this is a handler. Okay, so there was someone to tell me what was up.

He was very kind. Usually handlers get to business faster, and I pushed him for it a bit because the waiting made me nervous, like I couldn’t be done with the job, and I sure wanted done with it.

It was very hard to figure out what he wanted me to do, too. I had to tell him I didn’t know a lot of things he’d been talking about, which was a scary admittance because I was unsure if he’d punish me for it.

He recommended some books about sexual chemistry, and I glanced through them. I liked to read. They were interesting, I guess, like how to read sexual energy between partners and how to respond to it.

So then I wondered, was he a client of ours and I’d misread the whole thing? Still wasn’t sure, but was leaning toward that due to the books he’d given me.

Then I learned he was training me.

Definitely handler.

Those first weeks I got my footing and learned how to make him content. He’d leave afterwards or punish us with accusations. I got worn out real fast and couldn’t keep front long enough to gather what he was up to.

-Bear

It Took Surprisingly Little

September 4, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series

Content Warning: Candid reflections on trauma, grooming, coercive control, dissociation, and spiritual manipulation.

He knew me intimately. We’d met on a chat site where people listened to others to support them. Something about his attention broke me from my sleep on the inside, and I began trying to speak with him. I had no understanding of current events. My age. My circumstances. He really valued my spiritual and divine nature, and this flooded me with good feelings I wasn’t prepared to manage at all. I could barely form sentences, not used to communicating. I stuck to single words and built up to three words and then eventually sentences. It was difficult because I could see what I wanted to communicate in visions, and I had no words to speak it.

I was dreaming of him each night and felt it meant our meeting was by divine design. My spiritual framework from childhood in full effect, guiding me safely and securely into his hands. All he needed to do was be there, and I practically handed myself over to him. The overwhelm was so much. He loved my name. He saw value in my spiritual visions. I needed a replacement for the man who had been my god, my first husband, my whole world. Without him, I felt very lost, and the sadness made me tired.

He understood me. When he told me I was not as important a part of us inside, I went back to sleep for him and would not hear from him again until four years later.

Four years later, I woke up and we were with him again. I knew him immediately. He had laid enough familiarity and groundwork of his own that first time we’d met for me to do so. It took surprisingly little.

-Star

Who Would Take Care of Me?

September 4, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 13

Content Warning: Grooming, coercive control, power exchange, and references to trauma and dissociation.

He told me he knew that I was good and not bad, not a demon. I’d never heard such a thing before. No, no, I am demon. I do demon things and host my little demons inside. What the fuck is this about being good and not bad and not a demon? It felt like Pop Rocks on the tongue as I repeated after him out loud.

Curiosity lined my insides and I buzzed with the desire to learn more. So he had thought I was bad, but I proved otherwise? How? Is it my nature to now prove him wrong? Maybe. Depends on what this is.

He knew my Star, which is improbable. Only I know of her and one other external person. Handlers sometimes trade us around, I guessed. We didn’t have one to turn to at all, it seemed. Who would take care of me? He said he would.

He gave advice and instruction. He gave time and attention. He listened. And so a contract constructed itself between us that seemed feasible. I learned I needed to heal and that was why I was in therapy. So the energy between him and me would serve that purpose, to heal by.

My Star trusted him, and I wanted to trust him, but handlers usually do have their scary sides. I knew to be aware of that. And sure enough, some months into the power exchange dynamic, he let slip a bit of his scary side.

-Lilith

Halloween Is Our Favorite

September 3, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 12

Content Warning: Childhood distress, dissociation, and mature themes.

My favorite holiday is Halloween. Every part of me can agree on this. There was a time my father banned the holiday as the devil’s holiday, but looking back, I think it was more a money thing. He didn’t want to spend all the time and money on costumes for four, then five, then six kids, plus candy to pass out.

It was pretty traumatic to us as a people inside to watch all our peers enjoy the holiday spirit and know we couldn’t join in. My father was like that. He’d just decide holidays weren’t celebrated for a time, and we weren’t allowed to bug him about it, our mother being his mouthpiece and managing our upsets.

Halloween is our favorite. I’d decorate and carve pumpkins by myself and let Rogue watch the scary movies she liked. The poor thing just wanted the simplest stuff. I could never deny her, other than the vibrators. That was a bit much, in my opinion. Or, I concede, too much for me to deal with without her.

Dissociating from overwhelm is just a part of life to us. Not a problem necessarily, because ivy grows anyway. It just reroutes itself around obstacles and keeps shining those waxy green leaves.

There was a time I was terrified to be any bit different, and now I know that’s not fair to every part of me. We all deserve a life we can create in.

-Robin

Holy Balls

September 3, 2026 / / 0 Comments

From the Wild Collective Heart series: Part 11

Content Warning: Childhood sexual curiosity, religious themes, and mature content.

Every single Sunday, I looked forward to that drive into town for one reason alone. Horse balls.

As long as I can remember, there stood a stallion statue above the sinner’s den where alcohol was consumed by trade of cash. This thing was life-sized and packin’. That horse was holy to me.

I’d get to trembling as the family station wagon drew near, roll onto my back, and look up through the window, in a time before seatbelts were the law, and too many kids meant some rode in the trunk, lying down low so the cops didn’t spot us.

Holy balls, that horse’s stuff swung low, sweet chariot, right into an eyeful.

I felt all hot and tingly, wondering if my future husband would have one like that. I’d carry such thoughts with me right into church and smile, stars in my eyes, with such a secret.

For religious purposes, of course.

Future husband worshipper in training.

-Lily

« Older posts Newer posts »

Receive new posts by email

Content Notice
Audience: Adults (18+).
Rating: Comparable to an R-rated film. Contains mature themes, sexual and sensual material, trauma, and spiritual content.

© 2026 Circle of Tall Trees

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑