News Items and “What Is Poyfragmentatyion?”

Pornhub Loses Again

An email from Laila Mickelwait, founder of the Traffickinghub movement, arrived in my inbox with more inspiring news. It said:

“YouTube and TikTok permanently shut down Pornhub’s accounts in just one week!

Last week, after mounting pressure and reporting from organizations, survivors, and advocates, both YouTube and TikTok shut down Pornhub’s accounts for good. Why? Because impunity is finally ending for companies like Pornhub that knowingly profit from illegal content such as child abuse, rape, and sex trafficking. 

“First, I highlighted Pornhub’s presence on TikTok and asked my followers on social media to report the account. Then hundreds of #Traffickinghub advocates began reporting Pornhub on TikTok. When it came to the attention of The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), they immediately met with TikTok to flag the issue. Within hours, the account was shut down. Subsequently, NCOSE met with YouTube to share evidence of Pornhub’s involvement in child abuse, rape, and sex trafficking. The following day Pornhub’s YouTube account was removed. These victories came on the heels of Instagram permanently shutting down Pornhub’s 13 million follower account. 

“This is an example of what is possible when individual citizens, survivors, and organizations of all backgrounds unite around a just cause. Pornhub is the flagship site of the international porn behemoth called MindGeek, which has been named one of the largest “Criminal Enterprises” in the world engaged in profiting from sexual crime.

“Pornhub is now removed from all major social media platforms except for Twitter, and we are putting pressure on Twitter to shut down their account right now, even as you read this email.

“Let’s keep fighting together because we are winning battle after battle. We can see victory if we keep at it and don’t give up.”

Harvey Weinstein

Harvey Weinstein was found guilty in Los Angeles of three charges of rape and sexual assault against Jane Doe 1. He was acquitted of one count of sexual battery by restraint against another woman. The jury could not decide on the final three counts related to the two other women.

He faces 24 years in prison, in addition to the 23 years he is currently serving from the rape conviction in a 2020 New York trial. He has appealed the verdict in the New York case and is expected to appeal the Los Angeles conviction as well.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/12/19/us/weinstein-trial-verdict

Spencer’s News

My cat scared me half to death the other morning.

I was sitting at my computer and heard a rustling, which got louder and louder. Then he rushed out of hiding with the handle of a small paper bag looped over his head and raced back and forth through the apartment at full speed. I closed him in my bedroom, figuring I had the best chance of catching him there.

Indeed, he ran under the bed, his original safe spot. I crawled next to him, removed the bag, patted him a little, and left him to calm down. It took a good 24 hours for him to come out from under the bed.

Later in the day, I found my nail polish, nail polish remover, and nail files scattered across the floor. They weren’t heavy, just bulky. Poor kitty! How did he manage to do that?

What Is Polyfragmentation?

Back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, when I first started down this long, difficult, amazingly rewarding path, the word polyfragmentation wasn’t used in connection with multiplicity. I knew about it intuitively because that was the way my mind is put together. So did many other survivors, but we had no words to describe it.

As people began talking and writing about multiplicity, the idea started coming into focus.

Initially, the term was used to mean many alters – at first, more than 12 alters, then more than 100. I assume that means alters with names, ages, personal histories, etc. Some may be more fully formed than others, but basically, they are all like people. That’s a lot, but it seems to me that it’s more a crowd than a group of fragments. Though I suppose if you consider that all alters either come from the original personality or from alters that have already split off, you can consider all the alters fragments. But wouldn’t that be true of people with 79 alters, or 5, or 3?

Then the parts with only one function, or those formed during one specific instance of abuse, were studied. There might be a part that experienced terror and nothing else. Or a part that knows how to brush teeth and nothing else. These parts might not have personalities and probably are not fully conscious in the way we think of consciousness. They were split off from an existing alter and, because they are so limited, can be considered fragments.

There are more complex systems formed deliberately during mind control. The term fragments is sometimes used to describe parts arranged in layers throughout such a system. The layers are generally isolated and not in communication with the parts of the system in other layers.

I see that the system could be considered fragmented, but I can’t assume that the parts as fragments. They might have personalities, ages, and histories They all have a purpose in the system, a job to perform, either internally or in the outside world. Some “sleeper alters” may be dead, hidden, or invisible. Some might be clones – exact copies of an alter, complete in all details. But, as far as I know, they all are either people or things. That’s not my understanding of fragments.

My fragments are little bits of things floating around with no consciousness or purpose, sort of like dust particles in the air. When I want to do something, a number of these things coalesce into a clump, like a dust bunny. I don’t know how, but this little cloud of dust can learn to use a new operating system, write, tie my shoes, and do all the other things of daily life. After the job is complete, the clump disperses. The next time that job needs to be done, a new clump forms. A few of the tiny little pieces might be recycled, but not many. 

So there are no lasting dust bunnies that drive cars, sing in the shower, or talk to the furniture. There is nothing that holds them together once they have finished the task that they were assembled to do.

On a day-to-day basis, I don’t consider this confusing at all because it is normal for me. I can’t remember a time when I was not like this, and I have to work hard to imagine what it would be like to be organized in any other way. (If, of course, I am presumptuous enough to call myself organized.)

All this is very logical and simple to me…except…who/what decides what to do? Who/what selects the group of fragments? Who/what decides when the action is complete and the particles can disperse? I have never met anyone or anything in charge of making little clouds that function like a recognizabe American woman of a certain age.

Is each little fragment conscious in some way? If the little pieces aren’t conscious, what is? Is there a layer that I am not aware of that contains more formed parts that make these decisions?

If anybody understands any of this — please explain it to me!!

It sure seems that dissociated states can be more complicated than we realize. We survivors are constantly revising our instruction manuals in a desire to understand our inner workings and to heal. We have to figure out polyfragmentation for ourselves because there is precious little in the literature. When we learn more, we will teach therapists, who will then write articles that we can Google. We will decide if the articles apply to us or not and modify our instruction manuals accordingly.

P.S. To illustrate how diverse or minds can be, in the early 90s I met a man who described his mind as a slide rule. He lined up all the components of an action, and, if he got it right, everything went smoothly. If one part was missing, he froze until he could find it and put it in place. And if he picked the wrong part, he risked acting inappropriately.

Here’s an example. Phone rings. Select ‘phone.’ Select ‘answer phone.’ Woman says, “Hello, may I talk to Bill?” Select ‘woman.’ Select ‘identify self as Bill.’ Woman says, “Would you like to join us for dinner Thursday?” Select ‘mother.’ Select ‘find excuse.’ You get the idea.

It all happened at lightning speed. The only way he could analyze what was going on was to further dissociate and have a part look at the process as it was happening. After observing it many times, he found a simile for how his mind worked and was able to describe it to others. 

But, like me, he had no idea who or what was observing the process or who or what made the decisions – who selected ‘mother’ rather than ‘bill collector.’

Oh, Now I Get It!

Announcements are at the end of this entry.

I was rummaging through old files and found an interesting article I wrote around 1995. Of course, now I can’t find it to get the exact date.

I am amazed that I saw myself as polyfragmented back then. At that time, I was trying to fit into a model that included alters. I was imagining that there was a whole bunch of alters inside, without names or ages or genders or voices .and if I talked to them, I could teach them things. However, I wouldn’t know if they learned anything until I saw a change in the external, real world.

Now I think it’s not a question of alters but a wave of fragments that comes together, like sand blown off a dune. And the next time, the sand comes from a different part of the dune. 

Never mind. I still talk to them or it, or whatever it’s called, and I talk to my feet and to myself, and I talk out loud. Why brood about “who” is doing something?. The important thing is to put the vacuum cleaner back where it belongs.

Here’s the article I found.

Oh, Now I Get It!

My friend Sonya calls and learns I am having trouble getting out of the house and to the copy center. She says she will come with me to make things easier. Sonya and I are both polyfragmented, and we both have a series of alters who slide to the front to do different tasks. We talk about this in the car.

S: “I always think of you as high-functioning and am surprised when you get stuck and can’t do something. Happens to me all the time, but I don’t expect it to happen to you.”

J: “Ha! I see you the same way. I try to work around it. I assume some alters are frightened so I try to explain to them that it isn’t dangerous to do these things today.”

S: “Yes, and the more you get in touch with those alters, you the more you feel the resistance. But it isn’t always resistance.”

J: “What do you mean?”

S: “Some alters just don’t come out very often, so I have to teach those that are out to do jobs for the ones who don’t come out. For example, the one who opens doors is out a lot, but the one who closes them hardly ever is. So I come home and find every cabinet door, every dresser drawer, wide open. Makes the apartment look terrible.”

I have a very enthusiastic vacuuming alter. I vacuum when the cat hairs show. I vacuum when I am upset and need to calm down or think. Unlike other housework jobs, I enjoy vacuuming. Most days, the vacuum cleaner can be found in the middle of the floor, ready to be tripped over.

J: “Oh now I get it! I need to teach more inner folks how to put away the vacuum cleaner.”

S: “Right. It isn’t that you are lazy or messy, it’s just that they don’t know how to do it. I felt so much better about myself when I figured this out.”

J: “I always thought that it was inability to finish a job. A strange form of perfectionism – I can pretend that if I had finished it, it would have turned out wonderfully. But if I actually do finish it, I’ll surely be disappointed.

Or else procrastination. If things are half done, I can fret about that instead of the things that are really bothering me.”

S: “Well, those things are true, too. It’s always multi-layered.”

Initially, I’m excited. I have a new way to work around my hang-ups! Then I think of what a pain it is to teach children to tie their shoes or put away their toys. It’s far simpler to do it myself. I start spiraling into confusion. If there is a “me” who can teach, why can’t that “me” just put away the vacuum cleaner? These thoughts could drive me bats. I’ll save them for therapy – if I remember.

Bingo! An insight! This explains why I have such a long learning curve. Say I want to use a new piece of software. It’s a bright but frightened, anxious, and insecure child learning, not a poised, self-confident woman. And the poor thing has to go it alone, without a teacher or mentor.

Sonya explains that what worked best for her was to write out the steps involved in a task in excruciating detail. She pretends she is writing an instruction manual for a Martian on how to make a cup of tea. That way, if she switches, she only has to remember how to read, not how to make tea or close cabinet doors.

She then invites alters to listen as she reads the instructions. “Would some of you like to learn how to make a cup of tea?” Sometimes somebody wants to, sometimes nobody does.

In time, lots of alters learn all about making tea. The process speeds up as it goes along because there are more and more internal teachers. One fine day, the instructions are no longer necessary.

I’ve found it’s more effective to say things to myself out loud than to think them. “First you pull gently on the vacuum cleaner cord to unplug it. That’s right. Then hold the plug in your left hand. Bend your elbow. Wind the cord around your arm between your hand and elbow. Very good.” I’m so glad I live alone and don’t have to explain anything to anybody.

My guess is that this approach might also be helpful to people who aren’t polyfragmented. I can’t imagine any harm that could come of trying it a couple of times. It certainly is a gentler way of approaching yourself than scolding or putting yourself down for what you can’t do at the moment. You might feel silly at first (I know I will), but you might also get results

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Cat Update

It’s been a long ten days. Baker stopped eating and pooping, so I took him to the vet. They did an X-ray to make sure he didn’t have an obstruction and were alarmed to see a thickening of the intestine wall. They also saw advanced kidney disease and kidney stones. They recommended an ultrasound to get more detailed information and a “cell aspiration.” This entails taking cells with a needle – sort of like a biopsy, but with far fewer cells. I will know the results next week. It’s hard waiting.

On the bright side, he was given an appetite stimulant which I rub on his ear (easy-peasy!), and it works. He now is eating tuna in lots of water, not enough, but it’s a start. And for the first time, he spent most of the night in bed with me.

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We Need Some Help!

GrassRoots is starting to grow, and we can’t keep up with everything. What we really need help with is the website. We have material waiting to be added, but nobody has the time to do it.

So we need somebody to take text that has been edited and proofed and add it to the appropriate page. We would tell you where it belongs, and you would follow the same format as other entries on that page. It’s a WordPress template, so it should be pretty easy. 

We have a graphic designer who chooses fonts and colors, places images, etc. If you are interested, write us at https://grassroots-ra-mc-collective.org/contact-us/.

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Two new RA/MC drop-in groups

A new drop-in group joins the CUPP of Hope Wednesday night group! It meets on Mondays 5:00–6:30 PM Pacific Time

Register at https://grassroots-ra-mc-collective.org/events/ 

Holiday Zoom Open Houses 

It’s hard to get through holidays of all kinds – those you find on a ritual calendar or plain old “Hallmark” holidays. They aren’t quite so awful when you can share them with others who “get it.” Watch the GrassRoots web page for the date of the next one – I’m guessing it will be around the solstice.

For all questions, please contact joanies at cuppofhope@gmail.com.

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An Infinite Mind is accepting proposals for their 13th annual Healing Together Hybrid conference. Deadline is August 31. The conference will take place on February 17 – 19, 2023, in Orlando, Florida. Information: https://www.aninfinitemind.org/healing-together-conference

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RA/MC Panel at the International Human Trafficking Conference

I will be part of a four-person panel of RA/MC survivors of child sex trafficking. The title of the presentation is “The Interface between Sex Trafficking, Ritual Abuse, and Mind Control Programming.” It will be in two parts. Each part will consist of a recording of the panel discussion followed by live questions and answers. There will be a fifteen-minute break between the two sections. 

Our time-slots are 1:45 and 3:15 on Thursday, September 22. 2022. Read more about the presentation plus descriptions of all the other presentations at https://app.traffickingconference.com/schedule

Please come see us in (virtual) person! Choose the “Free Attendee Registration” option and remember to write for the registration code number. Register at https://www.traffickingconference.com/register 

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Upcoming Holidays

July
7/13 Full Moon
7/25 St. James’ Day/Festival of the Horned God
7/27 Grand Climax/Da Meur

August
8/1 Lammas/Lughnasadh
8/11 Full Moon
8/13 Friday the 13th
8/15 (?) Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
8/24 St. Bartholomew’s Day

September
9/5 – 9/7 Feast of the Beast/Marriage to the Beast
9/5 Labor Day (United States)
9/10 Full Moon
9/22 Fall Equinox
9/29 (?) Michaelmas/Feast of Archangel Michael and of all Angels

Dates Important to Nazi and Neo-Nazi groups

July 29: Hitler proclaimed leader of the Nazi party.
August 1: Lammas
Early August through October: Various preparations are done in readiness for October, the month with the largest number of celebrated dates.
September 22: autumnal equinox, “Fall Festival.
9/25 – 9/27: Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year)

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You can find more information on the following holidays at:

Candlemas – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/01/21/candlemas/
Valentine’s Day – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/02/10/valentines-
Beltane – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/04/28/beltane/
Mothers’ Day – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/04/26/mothers-day/
Fathers’ Day – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2020/06/20/ritual-abuse-and-fathers-day/
Summer Solstice (corrected text) – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/06/15/well-this-is-embarrassing/
Lammas – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/category/lamas/
and https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/august-ritual-dates/ 
Feast of the Beast/Bride of Satan: Part 1 – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/08/31/the-feast-of-the-beast/
Feast of the Beast/Bride of Satan: Part 2 – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2017/03/20/feast-of-the-beast-part-ii/
Fall Equinox – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/09/16/the-fall-equinox/
Halloween (personal) – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/10/11/halloween/ 
Halloween (background) – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2011/10/02/samhainhalloween/
Thanksgiving – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/11/20/thanksgiving/
Yule/Winter Solstice – https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/yulewinter-solstice/ 

My Home as a Reflection of My Inner Self

* Two hard days in May have passed – Beltane and Mothers’ Day. There’s a full lunar eclipse coming up on the 26th (they always occur on a full moon) and then a long weekend, Memorial Day. I wrote a short little blog post on long weekends back in 2016. https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/08/10/long-weekends/

And then we have a break until Fathers’ Day on June 20 and the summer solstice on June 2.

* There are two announcements after the main part of this post.

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I follow declaredominion.com, which is the website of Katherine North, a life coach. I need a life coach because I learned a lot about death as a kid, but life? Not so much.

Katherine sends me a “missive” every Saturday. Her missives are long personal letters with a moral. This week it was about fixing a gaping hole in her kitchen wall left by electricians. I could relate, having recently had not one, but many holes left by electricians. Now that everything is all fixed up, the lighting is awesome – I can actually see really, really well! The memory of the mess is fading fast, covered by a later of dirty dishes and thirsty plants.

Anyway, this week Katherine said, among other things,

“Our homes are such powerful metaphors for what’s happening in our inner lives!”

“If your home was a metaphor, is there anywhere your energy is draining out?“

“And if so, what is the GENTLEST possible way you could begin attending to it? Not with panic, not with shame, but with love and care, as a way of honoring your sacred energies?”

Our physical worlds are reflections of our inner ones, and we can shift the way we feel by shifting the spaces around us.”

And, just a reminder, “It usually gets worse to get better.”

Do I ever relate!

Inside, I am piles and piles of dust particles. Or sand particles. Or tiny shards of broken china. Teeny things, without form or function.

But somehow, who knows how, they come together to make a sort-of-me. Then they have a form and a function. The cook. The cat feeder. The blog writer. And when they have finished the task, they separate and collapse back into piles of tiny pieces.

I know it isn’t always the same little pieces that form the “self” that is needed at the time. The cook who is dropping things on the floor isn’t the same cook as the one who always manages to gently put plates on a flat surface. Then there is the cook who cannot remember how long it takes to boil an egg, the one who seasons things to perfection, the one who prepares five servings of fruit and vegetables, and the one who says, “Fuck this! I am having pizza and ice cream tonight.”

I do not know what holds these pieces together long enough to get food on the table. And I don’t know how the pieces are selected and assembled. I’ve never seen a me-part that was in charge of creating other parts of me.

Looking around my house, I see piles of tiny things. I also see piles of larger things waiting to be organized into something even larger. That makes me wonder if pre-assembled parts of my selves are lying around inside waiting to be used. It would be efficient, wouldn’t it? A chunk of knowledge, a chunk of competence, a piece of panic, and always two ready-formed left feet and one perfect right one.

It’s too bad there are no piles of physical things to use as spare parts. I’d like a brand-new heart with all its innate functions intact, a lot of new teeth, and, best of all, a lumbar spine in working order. When I think what a miracle that would be, I realize that the system I have inside with the intangible parts of myself is also a miracle. Imagine! At a moment’s notice, all sorts of people can appear – a mother, a copy editor, a reader of French newspapers, somebody who, oddly enough, enjoys math jokes. What a diverse bunch of interests and abilities lurk inside me!

So if Katherine is right, and we can change our insides by changing the outside, it would make sense to organize little piles into bigger, more coherent piles. I’m not sure she is, because an artist part of me may be making a mess to communicate that I am a mess inside. Tidying up would be shutting down that path of communication, silencing me as I was consistently silenced in childhood. Not helpful.

But tidying things up might just as well be an artist part trying to tell other inside parts, “Hey, look what’s possible! We can all become bigger and better and more competent and happier without giving up anything. We can become more ourselves, if we want, and we can do it in our way, not in obedience to anybody else!”

I think I will try this approach and see what happens.

PS Math nerds can enjoy fractal elephants at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DK5Z709J2eo and other “Doodling in Math Class” videos.

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Upcoming Holidays

May

5/12 (?) Armed Forces Day

5/23 Pentecost

5/26 Total Lunar Eclipse

5/26 Full Moon

5/31 Memorial Day

June

6/10 Annular Solar Eclipse

6/20 Fathers’ Day

6/21 Summer solstice

6/23 Midsummer’s Eve

6/24 (?) St John’s Day

6/24 Full Moon

July

7/4 Independence Day

7/23 Full Moon

7/25 St. James’ Day/Festival of the Horned God

7/27 Grand Climax

 

Dates Important to Nazi and Neo-Nazi groups

5/17 Shavuot (Festival of Harvest, Festival of Moses receiving the Ten Commandments)

6/6 D-Day (Invasion of France in WW2)

7/18 Tisha B’Av (Jewish Day of Mourning)

7/29 Hitler proclaimed leader of the Nazi party

(NOTE: Not all groups meet on Jewish holidays. Some groups also mark Candlemas, Beltane, Lammas, Halloween, the solstices, and the equinoxes.)

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* You can find more information on the following holidays at: 

 Fathers’ Day: https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2020/06/20/ritual-abuse-and-fathers-day/

 Summer Solstice (corrected text) https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/06/15/well-this-is-embarrassing/

 Lammas https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/category/lamas/

 and https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/august-ritual-dates/ 

Feast of the Beast/Bride of Satan: Part 1 https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/08/31/the-feast-of-the-beast/

Feast of the Beast/Bride of Satan: Part 2 https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2017/03/20/feast-of-the-beast-part-ii/

Fall Equinox https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/09/16/the-fall-equinox/

Halloween {personal) https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/10/11/halloween/ 

Halloween (background) https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2011/10/02/samhainhalloween/

Thanksgiving https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/11/20/thanksgiving/

Yule/Winter Solstice https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/yulewinter-solstice/ 

Candlemas https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/01/21/candlemas/

Valentine’s Day https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/02/10/valentines-day/

Spring Equinox https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2012/02/13/the-spring-equinox/

Easter: personal. (for background, see Spring Equinox)  https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2014/04/21/easter-blues/

Walpurgisnacht/May Eve: https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2017/04/20/walpurgisnacht/

Beltane: https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2013/04/28/beltane/

Mothers’ Day: https://ritualabuse.wordpress.com/2016/04/26/mothers-day/

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* Survivorship Regular Conference – Saturday and Sunday, May 22 – 23, 2021

Clinician’s Conference – Friday, May 21, 2021

Information on the speakers, topics, and registration is at https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-ritual-abuse-and-mind-control-2021-conference/

The May 2021 issue of SMART’s newsletter summarizes these articles about Elizabeth Loftus. https://ritualabuse.us/2021/04/issue-158-may-2021/ You can also find them at https://ritualabuse.us/smart/elizabeth-loftus/

 – A Brief History of the False Memory Research of Elizabeth Loftus

 – Ethics Complaints Filed Against FMSF Board Member Elizabeth Loftus

 – “Lost in a Shopping Mall” A Breach of Professional Ethics

 – Quotes: Elizabeth Loftus, Ph.D.

 – The Alleged Ethical Violations of Elizabeth Loftus in the Case of Jane Doe