We are interviewing today.
Hi,
we're the...
we're The Double Gear System.
We consist of:
Hi,
I'm Alexis.
Uh,
my pronouns are it/its and she/her.
Um..
up in here.
There's also Ava,
she/her and Proto he/him or zee/zeem.
Thank you so much,
my name is Sarah Clark.
My pronouns are she/her;
we are a multi-fully fragmented system so,
we have a whole bunch of people inside.
But;
today I'll be talking to you,
so thank you so much.
Yeah,
I'm excited.
It's..
I used to do..
um..
the other..
the other end of interviewing,
for some gaming events and it's..
it's always nice to be on like,
the much less high pressure end.
You know,
I don't have to prepare notes or write questions;
I just sit here and respond.
Yeah,
nice.
Do you want to share where you are from in the world?
Oh yeah.
Um..
I currently live in Rochester,
New York with my..
uh..
wonderful fiance.
There's like a surprising number of plural people in upstate New York,
as we have discovered because of the plural gang server.
So,
maybe we'll just plan a meet up someday.
Who knows?
That would be so great to have an in real life meet up,
yes.
Uh..
We were in a DID conference actually,
the other day,
so we met.
Yeah,
we saw..
we saw the tweets.
It looked like a good time.
Yeah,
it was great.
So,
we live in the Netherlands and we live with our two cats.
Cats,
good;
cats are very good.
Right?
Cats are the best.
So,
um..
I want to give a short disclaimer,
our friend that we are here with,
the goal of understanding each other and,
each other's communities and not so much to agreement or anything like that.
So,
let's enjoy our experience together in this session.
Yep.
For me;
it's like a big bridge to build because I know that so many people are hurt in
your community by people from our community.
And,
um..
so I feel a lot of shame about that myself.
Yeah,
it's..
it's really important to me that we like,
as a..
as a..
as a traumagenic system,
it's really important that we build a community where everyone's allowed.
And so,
that necessitates taking a really harsh stance against gatekeeping.
But yeah.
Yeah,
it's exactly the same for me.
Um..so yeah,
I've been working on articles and videos around,
destigmatising,
you know,
other types of plural systems and..and to create the umbrella;
where everyone is welcome,
if they want to self identify as plural.
So,
that's great that we're both like,
doing activism and advocacy for this,
I think.
I kinda,
just like stumbled..
stumbled face first into accidentally being a plural celebrity and uh..
we're just..
we're just rolling with it and just;
I'm just trying to do good,
I guess.
Do you want to share a little bit about that.
It's called the plural gang,
#pluralgang
Yeah,
I can.
Here;
I will..
I will start from the beginning.
Um..
and I guess we'll get more into this later,
depending on what questions you have.
But,
uh..
so,
I realised;
we were plural on December 1st of 2018.
Uh..
It's actually kind of a funny story.
There were a couple factors that sort of led up to me,
being in the state where I was ready to figure that out and I can talk about
those if you want.
But,
um..
basically;
what happened is I had a friend message us and be like,
"Hey,
is um..
is Proto magical alt," which is like a meme fake account that a friend of
another friend of mine runs 'is Proto magical?' You're like plural out?
And I'm like,
oh no,
I'm not plural.
And then,
I started talking with this person about plurality and I kind of admitted that
like,
I'd always felt sort of like,
I guess,
like attracted to it and I was like,
this seems kind of cool.
You know,
I..it..
it came down to like this moment of like;
I kind of wish I had the happiness that plurality has given some people close to
me,
for myself.
And then,
it was in that moment that I realised,
oh my god;
the way I talk about plurality is exactly the same as the way,
someone who doesn't know they're trans yet,
talks about being trans.
And,
I was just like,
oh,
I guess I'm plural.
Um..
and so then;
over the course of the next couple of weeks,
um..
leading pretty much,
that entire month really.
A leading up to us coming out uh..
basically,
right at midnight.
Um..
we're just before midnight,
uh..
the..
on December 31st.
Um..
we spent a lot of time working out our system;
I learned to talk to Proto.
Um..
and it very quickly became a thing of like,
oh god;
this is so..
this is solving so many problems in our life.
Um..
but anyways;
flash forward to the,
I don't remember what the dates were.
Um..
H Bummer guy,
a big leftist YouTuber,
did a big long like;
50 hour charity stream of playing donkey Kong 64,
raising money for Mermaids UK,
a trans charity that,
a bunch of turfs,
namely Graham Linehan,
who is not a turf,
he's not a feminist;
he's just a terrible person.
Um..
Namely;
Gremlin hammer attacking and this was sort of his way of being like,
nah heck you.
So,
we raised money for them,
instead.
This stream blew up and raised like $300,000 and literally had like Alexandria
Ocasio Cortez on it,
talking about legitimate government policy while H bomber guy was playing Donkey
Kong.
Um..
and I guess due to being like,
are relatively well known speed runner um..
H bomber guy had like specifically requested like,
"Hey,
if anyone out there knows Proto magical girl,
get her on this stream."
And so,
we get up,
we get on the stream and we had already kind of decided,
like if we get on,
we do want to mention that we're plural because like this is good and important
and visibility.
And,
there was a running,
there was a running meme on the stream of like blank gang.
I think it started from teeth gang and I..
I couldn't tell you,
what the context of that is.
It just became:
literally anything gang,
you know,
Donkey Kong gang,
whatever.
And so,
I got on stream and was introducing ourselves,
and like;
"Hi,
we're a plural system." And then;
it was just like,
shout outs to plural gang.
Can I get some plural gang in the chat?
And;
I was expecting like a couple people and no;
Oh God!
It exploded!
I guess we should do like a formal introduction.
Uh..
for those who don't know us;
Hi,
we're Proto,
magical girl.
Um..
we are a plural trans,
speed runner.
We used to work for games done quick um..
and do a bunch of other speed-running events and stuff.
And,
uh..
yeah,
I guess a bunch of people wanted us on this stream;
don't know why,
but we're here now.
I mentioned,
I mentioned,
I mentioned
your work.
Oh my gosh.
No,
what you're...
No,
what you're the famous.
No I'm not.
No what?
By the way,
that,
that speed-run video I made;
I've been planning this,
for since then.
I just I got sick twice;
with different bad illnesses.
You're all famous here.
Everyone's famous.
Actually;
I see some..
some plural gang in the chat.
Can we get some more plural gang in the chat please?
All of our multiples out there;
we love all of you.
It's..
All three of us to all many of you
all.
Oh,
that is some good stuff in the chat.
Oh my gosh.
What is that?
It never stops.
It never gets better.
I take it..
I take it back.
Yeah,
the song was wrong;
Donkey Kong 64 never gets
better.
That's what the song was about,
right?
Donkey Kong
64 a person in the chat who said,
I've always referred to myself in my head as we,
is that normal?
No,
probably not.
You're valid.
Hell yeah.
Yeah,
it's not.
It may be,
it may not be common,
but that doesn't mean it's not normal or not.
That's true.
Valid.
Yeah.
You might be plural though.
Who knows the definition of normal?
We've,
we've been talking a lot about this.
Uh...
It exploded!
The chat was in nothing but plural gang for like 15 or 20 minutes after that.
It was absolutely incredible.
People were tweeting up a storm the after I'd gotten off the street and I found
people tweeting hashtag plural gang and it was just like,
oh gosh,
what have I done?
Meanwhile my Twitter account was locked down because of harassment.
So like it took a little while.
I ended up on unlocking later that night cause it was like,
okay,
we're far enough away from that and this is really important and you know,
finally I'm unlocked.
And I was just like,
oh my God,
plural gang,
this is amazing.
You're all wonderful.
And it just didn't slow down.
People are still tweeting and Hashtag plural gang,
I've seen so many people like realising that they're plural.
But the short answer really was,
I accidentally started a movement
change.
Right.
Well thank you so much.
Like when you thought of from like,
I'm going to mention on plural,
right?
So that in itself was plural activism and advocacy.
Yeah,
I mean I like,
I like,
I was thinking about this earlier,
I'm not like a smart activist.
I don't do the discourse.
I don't do the policy,
the politics,
the,
the sociology,
the,
the,
the arguments.
I just exist and I'm really bad at not talking about who I am.
And so as a twitch streamer,
it has just become sort of my thing.
And it's like,
hi,
I am queer and Trans and autistic and now plural,
and I'm playing video games here and I'm better at these video games than you
are and you're just going to have to deal with that.
Hi Proto um,
but yeah,
and it's,
that's just sort of how we do our activities.
It's just we just exist and we're just very,
very loud and we're just incapable of not doing that.
And so that that has just resulted in a lot of this just sort of stumbling into
doing good.
But Hey,
we're doing good,
Huh?
Yes.
Thank you so much for sharing your story and how the history of the plural gang
hashtag.
Um,
I think it's great that we recorded for the purposes of history alone and many
more purposes by them.
Yeah.
Awesome.
It's a great hashtag we've used it ourselves a couple of times.
I make it a point to check it all the time.
I try to like fave,
like every tweet that goes through it,
just I'm keeping it going myself.
If nothing else.
Are you open to explaining what the term plural means in your own words?
Sure.
Um,
again,
this is not normally what I do.
I normally just stumble into my activism,
so this probably won't be like the best definition,
but plural is basically the state of not being a singlet of there being more
than one or I guess like at least like not one,
cause sometimes not one single being in a mind basically.
So whether that's like separate beings or a like more complex,
fragmented,
modular being beings.
Schrodinger's plurality,
um,
are,
are both like a thing.
And then you know,
in some cases,
like for myself,
we a median system which is like sort of,
there's like one entity and then to sort of like separate half entities that
sort of share with with me but are also their own unique thing.
But really just anything that is not pure singlet would,
is plural in my estimation.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Cool.
Uh,
I will my definition in here from my original video because I'm going to mess it
up,
but I said something like
everyone is,
multi-conscious and/or is under dissociative spectrum.
Yeah.
The word plural is an umbrella word that we use for every one who has a multi
conscious experience.
This includes people who are disordered and people who are either no longer
disordered,
ordered or not this ordered at all,
which is very well possible.
If we look at the DSM five and the criteria currently for Dissociative Identity
Disorder,
both Braun and the Theory of Structural Dissociation explained that there is a
dissociative spectrum.
So this is a personal definition,
personal video.
I'm not speaking for the full community.
Always good to me.
If you want to know more about me or the work we do,
you can visit the website powertothepluralscom.
You can also find us on YouTube or on Facebook where we have a support group
called AlterNation and an empowerment group called power to the plurals.
My,
my biggest goal is through like gap that bridge between the DID world and the
plural world.
Cause I think that we need umbrella.
We are all not singlets right.
And we might,
we might as well share in the in that very interesting experience.
I mean I feel like most people know they cannot,
I mean like with any like with any stigmatised,
uh,
non-physically presented a condition,
condition in the most like neutral sense possible.
A lot of people just don't know that it's them.
I mean we didn't for a long time,
but then as soon as we knew it was like,
yeah,
I've been this way since at least like,
okay,
I have a rough idea of when Proto was created and it was a lot of years ago.
So like I can point to a specific amount that was like of this is one Proto
happened and it was like when I was 13 or so and so.
Yeah,
we've been plural for like seven years.
Just didn't know it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We also have that we can point back in time where for certain people came from.
Um,
is there a difference between plural and DID or OSDD or maybe just the
disordered variant?
Um,
I mean in my estimation DID OSDD um,
what's the other one that's like N-O N-O something.
There's one with an N,
Huh?
Yes.
DDNOS yeah,
that's the one.
Um,
those are all things that just more like more specific plural experiences that
fall under the plural umbrella along with,
you know,
and endogenic systems with tulpamancy systems,
with quigenic systems,
etc,
etc. Those are forms or experiences of plurality.
It's,
it's sort of weird cause like typically when you have an umbrella term,
the umbrella,
the unique defining feature is the cause.
But that's sort of the opposite.
In this case,
we're the umbrella broadens with causes and has the,
the common point of effect.
But yeah,
it's the,
it's sort of the common point of effect between OSDD,
DID,
DDNOS ,
I almost forgot it like 10 seconds later an endogenic tulpamancy blah,
blah,
blah,
blah,
blah,
blah,
blah.
Terms that for those who are not familiar with it.
And I will either talk with you in a second about it or we will put out
definitions on the screen for you.
So basically,
uh,
like I said,
we realised we were plural on December 1st.
And then like a couple of days after that we had a big event and we were really
stressed and then plurality sort of went under the rug for a few days.
There was a nice little stressful period was like I haven't talked to Proto to
like a week I already don't like this and I'm not even used to it yet.
Um,
but then,
you know,
kind of the later half of December we started learning to talk more.
I still remember the first night when we had like a real conversation with like
sentences,
like full tonal emotional.
It was,
it was incredible.
Um,
and so once we got to kind of the point where it was like,
this is,
you know,
this is not that we didn't doubt,
not that we doubted it was real,
but like this is like important to us.
Now this is something that is centralising our identity and the more we talk
about it and grow with it and experience it,
the less we want to hide it.
And so then it was,
um,
it was literally December 31st we had a like
13 hour travel day coming home from uh,
one of our partners,
our partners wedding were polyamorous.
So,
um,
and so we spent a lot of time on this trip reading particularly the articles on
Tulpa.io were really helpful to us because it was sort of beyond the level of
like,
what is plurality,
101 to here are real experiences of having you and other entities sharing the
same brain,
which were really helpful to us.
And then,
you know,
that combined with the feelings we mentioned earlier was like,
okay,
we don't want to not talk about this anymore.
And so then we decided we were going to come out,
uh,
before the new year.
I'm just like,
we're going to start 2019,
right,
with honesty.
And so we spend our last,
uh,
layover and plane ride writing a like massive Pastebin.
A Pastebin is basically just like a text sharing site is a document really just
in plain text.
Um,
and we wrote this massive like several pages long Pastebin um,
you know,
completely overexplaining stuff and completely like under-representing how
important it was because we were afraid of the singlets.
Um,
and we can,
we can get you the link to that also,
but we basically,
we got home,
uh,
from this long plane trip with this Pastebin written on like,
you know,
what does this mean?
Who are we,
what does this mean for you?
How do you have to act?
Why is this not fake?
I'm so on and so forth,
trying to really anticipate everything.
This was like the third time we've come out,
like we were,
were,
were a pro at this.
At this point.
It was just like,
okay,
sit down,
crank out the PasteBin,
get ahead of all the questions,
drop a bunch of resource links,
it'll go smooth.
Um,
and so once we got home,
we went over it with our,
um,
with our fiance and it was like,
Hey,
read this.
Does it sound good?
We also sent it to one of our plural friends and with their approval we posted
it.
And that was that.
Then suddenly everyone knew we were to then to now three,
but that was later.
How do you deal with rejection or a stigma if you've experienced this in your
coming out process as plural?
I mean,
usually I just block people and move on.
I have enough,
I have more than enough friends and community that support us through pretty
much anything at this point.
I mean,
we've thrown,
we've thrown everything out of them at this point.
We just keep diving deeper and deeper into minority identities.
Um,
so really it's just like,
okay,
well if you're not,
if you're not willing to put in the like 15 seconds of emotional labor to learn
how this works,
then screw you.
I mean,
I know that's not like the best answer,
but we,
we got tired of playing the emotional labor game after we came out as trans once
was enough with dealing with all the questions with dealing the,
I don't believe you prove this to me once was enough so we just don't do it
anymore.
Fair enough.
Fair enough.
I also make a lot of trans,
comparisons and um,
people get mad at me for it.
So,
um,
I'm glad that you as a trans person also use trends,
references because I see a lot of similar similarities as well.
Yeah,
I mean I,
I talk about that a little in the Pastebin as like the way,
the reason I realised I was plural is because I was able to compare it to our
trans experiences.
Awesome.
Yeah,
thank you.
For us,
the most frustrating thing about a singular normative society,
probably honestly just having to deal with explaining things all the time.
Like I did,
going back to more trends,
comparisons,
like when we came out as trans people knew what that was basically.
And this is something really interesting that I've been sort of thinking about
ever since,
uh,
realising we were plural is like the ultimate goal,
the most common ultimate goal.
I'm just going to throw in all the exceptions here.
When you're trans,
typically you want to be in a state where you blend in.
You know,
I'm not saying,
you know,
you have to transition,
have to get the surgery or whatever,
whatever it forever.
But in general,
you want to be in a state where you blend in and in,
in your more desired quote unquote normal way.
And now that's obviously not true for,
you know,
nonbinary trans experiences.
I'm only speaking to my own as a binary trans woman,
but plurality is sort of the opposite.
Plurality takes you farther away from the expected norm.
Once you know,
you can't just like,
once you're an out and more functional plural person just blend in anymore.
That's just not an option to you.
So for me,
the most frustrating thing is like I don't come out as plural in my college
classes because I just don't want to explain it to that many people.
It's just,
it's too much work.
I can't just blend in as plural.
Yeah.
You need to add a lecture too.
Like you're coming out
while they're going to misunderstand anyway,
when I there written interviews,
understand.
Yeah,
I know a problem.
Yeah.
Go tweet and Hashtag Pluralgang,
if you're plural,
endogenic,
tramagenic DID OSDD DDNOS and aren't mean to other people.
Anyone accuse you of harboring a violent head meets after he came in?
Uh,
I don't think that was actually one that we got.
No.
Um,
maybe some people who hate us,
but we block everyone.
So whatever.
There's a lot of people on the Internet who don't like us,
but I don't care.
I mean,
but no,
no one that we were like,
you know,
our or work close with a sudden,
anything like that.
That's good.
Maybe that's also a difference between saying I'm plural or we're saying,
I'm DID.
Um,
probably honestly,
cause I feel like the,
the Hollywood stereotype is more associated with the medical terminology.
But yeah.
Really?
Yeah.
I'm Kinda glad we didn't have to deal with that one.
Yeah,
that's good.
That's also like maybe a good hack for goes when DID we do want to come out.
But there like scared about that stigma.
We have a lot of non-human alters um,
including a lot of demons and so people like assume,
they are in bad guys but we also have a lot of angels and they are like a lot
more nasty than some the demons.
So we have to explain that to people and they like just don't get it.
Like
yeah.
I mean one of our,
one of our system friends had a persecutor that was a righteous angel
pluralities weird pluralities wild as hack.
And I love it.
It's just incredible.
It's just incredible to us hearing about other systems experiences,
particularly ones that are,
you know,
Poly-fragmented and or have like big vivid head spaces and have these incredibly
realistic internal experiences.
It's fascinating.
Like it's,
it's so cool.
Like for us,
we don't really have like an intense visual headspace.
There's just sort of like,
whoever's in front can sort of tell that the others are or aren't there.
It almost like it almost in a way feels like there's a little glowy color circ,
like a little like sphere of light that's you know,
brighter or dimmer,
but you can just sort of abstractly feel a presence and that's really about it.
And so hearing hearing about headspace experiences and like about more complex
beings than just,
you know,
random human is always fascinating.
Yeah.
We actually have a session in this conference,
um,
where I teach others how to build a headspace with self hypnosis.
So I might tune in for that.
So we do have a very big headspace.
We have around six different planets.
And then our main land is a castle where we live and by now we have a sort of
town,
I guess the right word is next to the castle or some other folks from
sub-systems live and they wanted to join the castle,
but he just got too overcrowded.
So we build a town next to it because
I think it's so cool.
I'm high-key jealous and I think it's so cool.
Yeah.
So,
ah,
um,
it sounds fun,
but like it's hard with time management for example is
yeah,
that's,
that's also true.
I have heard about a lot of difficulties with that,
but yeah,
we're never lonely though.
So there's that,
I mean mood,
right,
right.
That's probably the best part of plurality.
It's like,
yeah,
I have two super cool people around more or less all the time.
I play video games with Proto and we make Ava do our homework and everyone's
happy.
It's perfect.
That's nice.
Great.
Yes.
We also have someone in our system,
my name is Emma and she plays the Simes and she recently started streaming it on
YouTube,
so she's very happy with my that,
um,
12 years old.
So we are very careful with what she can do online.
Oh,
is always protect the system Little's they're so good and so pure.
Yes.
And especially Emma.
She's adorable and she edits are videos.
She's like such a wizz kid.
It's amazing.
And
it's better than me.
Really.
Yeah,
I mean,
I get lectures,
I get lectures on calculus from,
um,
we have a local system friend who lives like literally across the street,
which is like the best,
I get lectures on calculus from their,
from their eight year old had made and it's amazing.
Awesome.
Um,
so another question for you,
if you know,
is due plurals dissociate as well?
Um Yeah,
I mean I feel like,
so this sort of question kind of comes back to how do you define dissociation,
but for me,
when I've sort of been thinking about how I conceive of what plurality is,
you have one brain
and when that brain says this aspect goes with this identity and this,
you know,
this,
this trait goes with this identity that is dissociation.
You are dissociating things into a separation of some sort.
Um,
and again,
this is not based on like a medical textbook.
This is just sort of my assessment of maybe how this works.
And so I feel like just by its very nature,
plurality is the act of really just like de-associating dissociating in two
separate existences.
So the short answer is yes.
Okay.
But it's not like,
well,
for some people it's not a disordered thing.
Right.
where they,
I can have that.
I stare off into space for hours.
Yeah.
I mean I feel like dissociation has,
the word dissociation has a lot of contexts,
you know,
where you have that literal context of de-associating where you have the more
medical,
mental health context of what dissociating means and what happens when someone
dissociate.
And those are separate but related things.
Um,
I don't think we really dissociate in like the medical sense,
you know,
we individually but also we're traumagenic system.
So shrug we have dissociated in the past,
but that was more due to just like depression.
Right,
right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it gets worse with depression for sure.
[inaudible]
and like dysphoria and stuff,
which is always great.
So yes.
Do you have a different gendered had me,
yes.
With that while you're trans.
So with that comes dysphoria so it's not really fair.
Yeah,
it's been sort of interesting.
One particularly interesting.
And,
and by interesting I mean extremely difficult thing that we've been dealing with
as a plural system was in a lot of ways our personality interests,
uh,
want to end self perception versus ideal self perception with sort of an average
of what we individually wanted to until we realised we were plural in a lot of
ways in particular the average between me,
Alexis and Proto very much lined up with our actual body.
It to some degree separating us,
they thought a lot harder because,
you know,
we both wanted completely different stuff now and tack on Ava,
you know,
so I Alexis,
I'm a trans girl and I kind of accept that I don't love this body.
I have some better days with it than others.
Ava says she will insist that I'm not going to get into the actual technical
ramifications of what that means.
I don't care.
Um,
but she insists she despises our body and it makes us really hard for her to
front,
which sucks.
Um,
and then Proto isn't even a girl at all.
So he's sort of,
he regularly goes by describing his gender as drop tables,
gender.
Um,
but has been started warming up to the term demi boy.
So yeah,
it's been sort of an interesting experience as like a,
you know,
kind of trans girl meat suit with a trans girl,
a cis girl and not a girl as head mates,
but we find ways to deal Ava and I went on a big shopping spree a couple of
weeks ago and that was a lot of fun.
We went to America,
so we got to try.
Only American foods was a whole experience.
So I'm a,
another
few questions.
Um,
do you have control over and your switches all the time or plural folks in
general and what might not be traumagenic?
Um,
I mean,
I can't speak for endogenic systems,
but the assessments I have from running a 300 person server filled with all
plural people of all walks of life is that the answer is different for everyone.
Uh,
for us,
we cannot control them all the time.
Uh,
we can control them most of the time.
Um,
particularly like we have pretty strong control over like kind of quick pop to
the front pop to the back switches where you know,
if one of us wants to come out and say something or do a quick action and then
leave,
we can do that pretty,
pretty voluntarily.
But extended switches tend to sort of be out of our control.
Although I've been doing my best to learn kind of what triggers them and how I
can like use that to our advantage.
So it's like Ava hasn't been feeling great and she's been sort of hiding and you
know,
if I can bring her to the front by dressing our w our meat suit in a way that's
going to make her happy and spending time doing stuff that she'll enjoy that
might bring her to the front sort of deal.
So not all the time,
but some of the time and for certain kinds of switches and for other people,
I don't know,
you'll have to ask them.
I know you can speak for everyone,
but it's um,
you know,
more energetic people than I do.
So,
yeah,
it seems like most of them fall and kind of the similar in kind of that spectrum
of like,
yeah,
sometimes under some conditions for some kinds of switches.
Yeah,
yeah.
I'm just like trying to find the differences for instance,
if there are differences right because there are people who do not agree to
every yard the same.
So I think if we can show that there aren't that many differences.
Yeah.
I mean,
the interesting thing that we've sort of seen,
both talked about and actually seen happen directly is that a lot of endogenic
systems that created alters via tulpamancy or similar processes are actually
just top or at the are actually just traumagenic systems.
And they just didn't know it.
And they basically created what they created in quotation marks,
what was already there as sort of like a vehicle for their self realisation.
And so it's just like,
yeah,
we're all,
we're all much more similar than it would seem in sometimes very literally.
So in DID a lot of people experienced child alters,
which is linked to possibly,
um,
trauma or intense experiences in their childhood.
Um,
do you know endogetic systems have child alters?
Um,
I believe so.
I mean,
they're not like,
you know,
I mean,
especially if you're creating them,
you know,
intentionally,
voluntarily you can make whatever you want.
Um,
I can't think of a specific system off hand for which that is.
That is the case because again,
the server I run is like three people in it and I cannot remember everyone.
Um,
and I think most of the systems there are traumagenic and anyways,
it seems like even in these sort of mixed spaces,
um,
endosystems or rather uncommon,
uh,
we don't have any,
um,
Proto and I more or less share our age with the meat suit pro doesn't really
strongly tied to the concept of age at all.
He's too cool for practical body matters.
What's,
what's been sort of interesting for us as Ava actually feels like she's older
than our meat suit.
Like she would identify as like 30,
where as our meat suit is 20.
Um,
and so it's sort of reckoning with that has been rather
interesting.
Um,
I,
I feel like I in some ways do in some ways don't act a fair bit younger than
our,
than our meat suit,
which,
you know,
could relate to the sorts of trauma that created Ava and Proto in the first
place that I mostly experienced.
Well,
Ava,
Ava situation was sort of like ongoing forever.
Protos specific events,
like I said,
occurred around the age of like 13 or so.
Um,
but the,
I guess the short answer is no,
but like the longer answers,
I mean,
kind of maybe age is weird.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Thank you for sharing.
You have plans to one day integrate your others into,
to become one?
God,
no.
Oh God,
no.
I like,
no,
we've only been plural for two and a half months.
Yesterday was Ava's one month.
A pluralth day is what I've decided.
Those are called.
No,
I am so much happier like this.
Like when we realised we were plural,
things clicked into place and some things that,
some problems that were insurmountable for us became easily solvable.
Some things that about our,
you know,
stressors and mental health that made no sense.
Suddenly we're like,
oh,
it's just this,
I'm a big thing.
That right as we came out as plural,
we were kind of on the tail end of a basically three month hiatus from
streaming,
uh,
where we only streamed like once or twice.
And a big part of why that was happening was I,
in quotation marks,
had really conflicting feelings on how I wanted to run in quotation marks,
my stream.
There was a part of me that wanted the branding and the,
the alerts and the layouts and all the,
the fancy flowery production.
There was a part of me that hated all of that and felt like it was fake and
disingenuous and disgusting.
And then the,
and then I was plural.
I was like,
oh,
well that makes sense now.
So yeah,
no,
I don't really want to combine.
We're,
we're all extremely different and a lot of ways,
even if we are a median system.
So,
no,
I'm,
I'm good.
I also just like,
I like Proto and Ava,
I like having them around all the time.
They're great.
So yeah,
no,
God,
no,
absolutely not.
Yes,
we need her.
We
can you share what the plural gangs are or plural umbrella.
Um,
how do you see,
DID people,
and OSDD people?
Are they welcome under the umbrella of pluralist?
Oh,
of course.
I mean,
I'm a traumagenic system.
Most of the staff has the point of the gang discord is traumagenic.
Most of the membership is traumagenic.
There are very frequent conversations about,
you know,
trauma experiences.
We literally have dedicated channels for talking about trauma.
There's tons of people with DID and OSDD.
If I wanted,
I could probably pursue an OSDD 1B diagnosis,
but I hate therapists and I just don't want to try anymore.
I've tried to find good therapy for my many,
many,
many issues and it's just not happening at this point.
I've accepted that.
But the absolutely welcome like plural gang is for everyone.
Well,
unless you think it shouldn't be for someone specific,
in which case it's not for you.
I know that's not a redundant statement that doesn't turn around.
We do not tolerate intolerance and that does not go around in a circle.
Right?
Yeah.
You can tell me that it's fine,
when you want too but you don't have to,
right.
Yeah.
Awesome.
I see it as the same in the same way.
Good there.
Yeah.
I mean I think,
I think that's the objective,
the right way to see it.
So I'm glad you do.
There are lots of things that are up for,
you know,
up for debate and opinion especially are revolving around do you know,
invisible,
intangible,
extremely abstract mental conditions.
Again,
condition in the most neutral sense of the word,
but saying X,
Y,
Z,
people are not allowed in this community because they're different than me is
not one of those things that is something you'd know you,
you wrong objectively.
Yes.
I fully agree.
Thank you.
Um,
so maybe we want to like quickly go over some like,
um,
when your definition of a term is,
yeah,
that's fine.
I mean I can't,
I can't necessarily promise super smart definition sometimes.
Cause again,
I'm not,
I'm not the smart activist and I have not memorised the plural dictionary,
but I can certainly provide perspective.
Cool.
Okay.
So in your opinion,
what does the term endogenic mean?
Uh,
endo,
endogenic.
It's literally the prefix endo comes from within genic in origin.
It's a system that comes from within in origin.
You know,
whether I guess created basically whether through tulpamancy or you know,
self hypnosis or really strong intent to just split whatever that might be.
It,
it's a system created within,
it is a term that is opposed with traumagenic but not,
it's not a strict dichotomy.
Um,
and I know systems with a mix of endogenic and trauma,
quoigenic head mates.
So it's not a,
it's not a strict one or the others as well.
Yes.
We also see that a lot in the RA/MC world um,
on which we also have a session that in this conference can you in your worst,
can you explain what Tulpas are?
Um,
so as I understand them has,
are,
it is one term for a,
an individual entity in a mind.
The one that isn't to be original I think is specific to tulpas.
Tulpas are specifically created through tulpamncy um,
you know,
the,
the,
how do I want to explain what I'm trying to say.
Tulpas are the same in most ways.
I think I'm,
I'm speaking from secondhand experience are the same as you know,
traumagenic created,
head mates in,
in the way their existence works,
but they're called tulpas is just because they were created through tulpamancy.
basically.
And I like other kinds of head mates.
They can be complex or they can be for one specific function,
whatever that might be.
I always say that,
um,
tulpas,
the only become a problem if you include spirituality in your discussion.
So if you don't look at it from a spiritual point of view,
then there shouldn't be a problem.
Yeah.
I know that the term has its roots in a Buddhist that's yes.
And done a quiogenic I think her quio,
a quiogenic I think.
I think it's usually pronounced quiogenic uh,
this was one I didn't know until I was told it.
Um,
it literally the,
the prefix coy come literally comes from the phrase as Je nes sa qui,
which I don't remember exactly what means,
but quiogenic is basically,
I don't know.
Um,
or it's complicated origin.
It was so funny and I don't know what it means because I don't know what you
mean.
Y'All nice.
Nailed it.
Nailed it.
Let's go.
Um,
I also see a lot of people use it for,
um,
I lost my train of thought for basically just like,
I don't care to find out.
Um,
but it,
it's,
it's sort of like the third common term of,
um,
origin.
So Endo Trauma Quio is like,
Quio is not quite a catchall,
but it is certainly catch a lot of things.
Right.
Oh,
okay.
Interesting.
Thank you.
Do you have any tips and tricks for other plural systems that you would like to
share in this video?
Um,
so the most important thing that helped me,
and this was like a,
I had to totally shift this perspective when I was,
you know,
particularly once I had realised I was plural,
but then had to like kind of go through the process of learning to learning to
plural,
really learning to have internal conversations.
Because I think in a lot of ways the brain,
the brain is not naturally prepared for internal conversation.
And this is significant.
This is significant in a significant portion of this is because our society
doesn't prepare us for it.
And our society prepares us and teaches us that you're one,
mind,
one body and anything else is weird and wrong.
And so you get so used to acting that way that you could not possibly figure out
how to act another way.
Um,
so learning to have conversations was probably like the biggest,
most important and most difficult step.
Um,
but the biggest thing I learned was,
and this sounds obvious when you say it,
but it was not something I really considered until I had it said to me because
we don't see alters typically until we're told,
hey,
this is probably how you should see this.
Uh,
we don't see,
you know,
other entities in our minds the same way that we'd see another person in
separate body.
But the,
the biggest thing was like,
you need to treat Proto,
you need to treat whoever this other entity is like another person,
like a friend,
hopefully.
Um,
and so the kind of natural evolution of is that when you're trying to have
those,
first of all,
just be nice to them.
And when I was getting started,
I'm trying to figure out this whole plurality thing.
I was sort of pinning a lot of fairly negative traits on Proto and that was
extremely unfair because I just didn't know better.
And it was just like you'd think it would be obvious,
but somehow it isn't because we've been trained all our lives to not think it
wouldn't be obvious.
Um,
I just confused myself with that sentence.
But anyways,
so be nice to your head mates.
Um,
treat them like friends and then especially when you're having those early
conversations,
some questions to ask them.
That really helped me,
that really helped me get the ball rolling with Proto was,
um,
the big one was like,
what do you want in life?
You know,
who do you want to be?
Um,
and even just like who are you?
You start with those sort of basic questions,
but those will start to give you a really good understanding of who this person
is and what they want,
you know,
answering the questions.
And then the other thing is like,
you have to trust your gut in those early conversations because your brain is
not used to having internal conversation like this and it doesn't know how to
like frame it yet.
It doesn't know how to make it feel like it's a conversation.
At least that was how it was in our experience.
It was like,
no,
I'm just talking to myself,
but no,
I was not.
So when you get an answer,
when an answer pops into you,
your quote unquote head,
um,
you need to trust it.
I think those are,
I think those are the big tips because I know that was the stuff that was most
challenging for me was really making that early contact and learning to,
learning to coexist as plural.
Thank you so much for sharing with me,
it's been a while for me,
we get diagnosed in 2012 with DID.
So that's also when like,
well,
I guess our process started a little bit before our diagnoses,
but um,
yeah,
I I,
it's a long time for me,
so it's hard to remember sometimes.
How was,
well we just started,
I would say it's,
it's very nice to talk with you and to hear your perspective.
Yeah,
go tweet and Hashtag plural gang if you're plural endogenic traumagenic DID OSDD
DDNOS and aren't mean to other people.
Um,
and if you want to find more of my content,
I'm,
I'm on twitch and YouYube is Proto magical girl.
Twitter and Instagram is Princess Proto.
Um,
come join the plural gang discord server.
Um,
oh gosh.
I don't know where a link to that would be.
The link does exist here.
I'll,
I'll give it to you.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So during the portal game server with the link,
that is a bunch of random characters,
a discord.gg/something.
Um,
that's a really good place for poor old people.
We're trying our best to make it the best place it can be.
Um,
if you like listening to me talk about stuff like this,
I also have a podcast called setting the record queer,
where we talked to cool queer people about the cool stuff.
They do a,
okay.
I think that's enough plugs.
If you want to know more about me or an a work we do,
you can visit the website power to powertotheplurals.com You can also find us on
YouTube or on Facebook where we have a support group called alternation and an
empowerment group called power to the plurals.
Thank you so much.
No problem.
All right,
I'm gonna stop recording.
