When mine combined into one, I didn't like it at all. Thought it would be OK & I could hake care of myself. Hasn't worked out that way. Still struggle everyday fighting to make the right choices in my life.

I'm so sorry you guys didn't experience something good. I don't think of my alters as leaving. I think of them as blending with me. One time I blended with one of them and still remained me = weird I know. I couldn't sing before I blended with one of my alters. Now I can. A friend of mine who has been one person for one whole year was weepy about losing parts of her that she considered friends, but realized that all the energy and creativity she had been expending to maintain her alters was now focused on maintaining and enjoying outside relationships - she's tackled college as well. I know it can be hard, but I really don't think your alters leave, they blend and give themselves to you so that you can be truly one.

Oh ... one more thing. Once you become one person, you still have to learn life skills and deal with the difficulties of life. Life is hard, filled with challenges. I'm a Christian, so I draw comfort from scriptures that call this time the age of sin and promise a new and bette age to come.

Yesterday, I talked to my friend who has been one person now for one year. She called and started the conversation about how she is having to go through the grief process for her alters. She said to her, even though she knows it isn't true, that it feels like they are dead. So maybe its normal to feel like that - I didn't grieve because I was so thrilled to have them blend with me, but that doesn't mean everyone else feels the way I did. So maybe intentionally working through the grief would be helpful.

I found that reality didn't change when I began to integrate, just my perception of it. It is hard sometimes to know that I can't escape in ways that I did before. It is like having all the doors ripped off of those inner rooms where they used to dwell separately. It is not as easy to hide anymore.

hi everyone the question about alters going away. we refer to this as blending also or mergeing or intergrateing each of those are done differently.. when we blend it is kinda like a mixer on low.. we can unblend if someone is uncomfortable about it... mergeing can be beautifull we have some wonderfull memories about it and there was no grief to work though.. intergrating is different,,, some of us look at it as dieing and we miss them so terribly bad that it is very stressfull to those that are left.. but we usually come to terms with that also but we do look at it as the last thing on earth we want to do,,, sometimes it is intentional and sometimes it is spontaniely but either way we grieve.. sometimes the intergratons dont take but that usually means that some issues were not dealt with before the intergration.. the best intergration is one that is spontanly... hope this helps

At one point we had 15 alters.
Now there are 6 of us.
Two of the ones that intergrated have been here for as long as any of us can remember.
We miss them both terribly, and I know our best friend (who had frienships with them both) misses them both as well.

But it's a step towards recovery. I keep telling myself that, as hard as it is or will be. It is so so hard to 'let go' as it were and let it happen.

We are now a very basic system, we are coping.....sort of.....we are living and carrying on. However hard it may be.

Mine have never merged together if anything I make more, I have never found a good doctor, the just are not in my area, my med doctor is o.k. he seems to understand and accept how I am. Does blending really happen??????

yes blending really happens and can be one of the most comforting events in you and yours life.. we had a person that had completed her purpose here and wanted to intograte and she wanted it to be memorable so she became filled with sparkles like unto a sparkler for fireworks and she let each of us walk though her thereby taking parts of herself into ourself she started with the littles and ended wit the bigs then she flew up into the sky and for use of a better word she exploded and the sparkles of her life fell down and touched all of us we were happy and glad that we still had a part of her her name was alex for alexzandia she was butifull we all remember her fondly some of you might object to the way she did it but it was her way of making it easier for us to morn she did not wish us to be sad and we arent.. we I ever think of it I smile yes I still miss her but wit a smile and graditude.. hope this helps

With my system, I have blended, unblended, merged and disappeared. I used to be Cindee a mixture of Cin and Dee, we served our purpose as a couple and are now separate, but we are able to go together and come apart as needed. Our two males and our dog disappeared when they were no longer needed. They are missed, but we understand that they served their purpose and were free to go. We have also had littles merge together...it helped them not feel so lonely (and gave us biggies less little to look after! LOL!). So, I think every system is different.

I know this question was from a year ago, but it is an interesting one!