Hiya everyone, my name is Vivian, and I think I'm plural

I'm not asking that anyone engage with this directly. I am Vivian, I function as one unified self 99% of the time. I really vibe with the name Vivian, I'm a trans woman, she/her, all that. These are all for the most part true no matter what state I'm in, and at no point do I mind being seen these ways. You can treat me like one person, it's fine, this is entirely just an internal thing.

Me being plural is not me being crazy.

The statement of calling any behavior "crazy" is unprofessional and not a clinical term. Whether or not someone is deemed as being "crazy" is more a cultural statement than anything else, and when the dominant culture holds ideas of sanity that are batshit and out of line with the nature of the mind, whether or not one counts as "crazy" is irrelevent to their actual functioning and mental health.

Plurality is not inherently an experience that is disordered. My brain is structured in a segmented way, but it is not broken. That simply is the structure that it is

I maintain my memories across these gaps of presentation, of conceptualization, of these states that define who I am. I do not have DID. I probably have OSDD

However, I am on that dissociative spectrum. Dissociation is just kinda... baked into my brain. It's always been there, ever since I was a kid. The states I occupy are distinct, they feel different ways about different things, and they can, and do, argue with one another. I think everyone has some segmentation, but mine is noticeable enough that it's important for me to call attention to it, at least for myself.

I relate heavily to the experience of living with plurality. When I read comics regarding it, I relate to the things experienced quite heavily. Two that I enjoy a lot and will be soon adding to my stories I enjoy page are cuteosphere's brain bunnies' comics and gray/Dupe's Plain or Simple.

I related to them from the second I first read them. The ideas have always fascinated me. I've never not felt like my brain has multiple states of self within it. I've always felt like there's something else to my mind.

All facets of myself are me, which is why I've largely ignored it. There are no voices in my head that are foreign. I just have multiple internal monologues running at once quite often.

There's no time I ever occupy a state where I'm not Vivian. But Vivian changes from time to time, and there are different states that she is contained within. She is not wholly localized to a singular sense of self. Rather, she is split between multiple diferent perceptions. Multiple different states that have differing opinions regarding things. This is not a negative thing, it's not something that causes you to be broken in any way, it's simply a statement of fact.

And this is okay. To be plural is not to be broken, it's not to be shattered. It simply is the construction with which your mind has been constructed. To feel different at different times is normal.

You've proven to yourself again and again that this is a perfectly valid model of human behavior, that the mind can very much be structured like this, and that you're passionate about the issue.

Why would you research it so much in your free time if you didn't relate to it?

I mean, that's what you did about being transgender back at the starts of the 2020s.

You get into dissociative states pretty often. You've always had a tendency to zone out. You've done this since you were a kid. You get caught in daydreams, you like to tell stories of different characters speaking to one another. You like to speak about yourself fairly often in the third person. You are doing so now. Is that not a sign of plurality? If you were singular in your minds construction, you would see yourself as an I, as a singular self.

I am speaking to myself, but that self is distinct from the state I am currently within, so it is a you.

This is not a sign of psychosis, that is simply a recognition of the structure as it exists. To deny that would be to fall into psychosis.

You can't deny the reality of things, and the internal reality is just as real as the external one. Everything comes through the mind, everything is interpreted through it.

You're a transgender woman. You've already broken free from the cultural grasp on your identity. You are living separately from that which a large cohort of society wishes for you to live. And you are far happier for doing so. You feel right, you feel normal, you feel correct like this. When you act feminine, when you are seen as being feminine, girly, she, her, it all feels right.

Is plurality any different? I don't think that it is. It's simply a more internal model for understanding a different set of things about how your mind works.

You've been grappling with these feelings forever, and they're not going to go away.

You're plural, and that isn't going to change.

Your mind is whole, but it is segmented. And this is okay. To try and mend these gaps would be ridiculous, as they are baked into the structure.

To break them would be to only invite yourself into psychosis. This isn't a thing you can fix, it's a thing you must accept.

Just as it was for you being transgender. You can't fix being transgender, you simply are, and you must take the steps to account for that in how you live your life.

You have done this for your transgender identity. And you will do it for your plurality. There is simply no other option, Vivian.

I am a median system. I have multiple localized senses of self. I am able to argue with myself. Fronting is a metaphor that fits my behavior. The different perspectives I take sometimes take control of my form, and they have differing conclusions.

To get myself out of bed sometimes, some facet of me has to front that guides the rest of me through it, soothing myself and encouraging me to go about the things I need to do.

These aren't things that make me broken, they are the ways in which I am whole.