Pieces of Me, page 29
I’m still trying to understand how my brain works. How does it do this stuff? I’ve got so many books on dissociative identity disorder and dealing with trauma that I don’t know how I’ll get through them all. I have a new notebook—a binder—so I can take notes on what I read and put them all together in one place for my reference. I keep it in the living room so Mark and Mom, or anyone else, can read it when they want to get a better understanding of our system.
Because of all that reading, I know the new alter will reach out when she’s ready. I have to be patient—not one of my strong suits. Lannie spoke to her briefly and told me she seems nice. Apparently, she spends most of her time outside tending to the flower garden she’s planted. It makes sense to me that a caretaker like Dali would transfer that sense of nurturing to something else. And a garden is something Scratch could have complete control over. Anyway, I hope she feels comfortable enough to introduce herself soon. It’s important to welcome her to the system, even if she’s technically always been here.
Someone—I think it was Mark—suggested I start a YouTube channel, but there are a lot of DID-awareness channels out there that are much better than anything I could put together. I don’t feel like I could offer much more to the topic, and unlike my brother, I’m not that comfortable in front of a camera.
Probably why Mark got another commercial recently. This one’s for a designer cologne. It’s pretty cool, because it’s going to plaster his face all over network TV and maybe even lead to some magazine work. I don’t think he ever gave much thought to doing modeling before this, but living this close to Manhattan, it can’t hurt to at least give it a go. Who knows? It might lead to some acting gigs.
So, while Mark gets his chance at the spotlight, Connor and I are working on a graphic novel about a character with DID, and Mom suggested I look into having a showing of our art. Pretty much all of us like to draw or paint, and we each have our own style and preferred medium. She’s going to check with a friend who owns a gallery. I’m excited. Even if it doesn’t work out, it’s still something to work toward.
I’m also going to start taking some art classes in the new year. Nothing too strenuous, mostly some online stuff that I can do at my own pace. They have a forum where students can talk and share their work, and that’s mostly what I want it for, so I can talk to other creators. I miss that. One of my favorite things was being in a class where we all drew the same thing and yet every drawing was completely different. It’s kind of what it’s like inside my head.
Bella video-chats me once a week. Sometimes I talk to Angie or Dad for a few minutes. I’m so happy my half-sister is okay. Travis never got a chance to hurt her, and I give myself full credit for that. He’s been released on bail. Obviously, somebody put up a lot of money to get him out, but he’s not allowed to go near any places where there might be kids. He’s going to trial in the spring, and when they find him guilty, he’s going to be a registered sex offender in addition to doing prison time. I’m okay with all of that.
Oh, yeah. Two more girls have come forward and said he molested them as well. Fucking bastard.
I’m not sure if Dad has forgiven me yet. It’s not like he blames me for anything that has happened to me, but I know there’s a small part of him that blames me for not telling him when I was a kid. It’s tied up in his own guilt, though. I didn’t need Dr. Zhao to tell me that, so I don’t claim any responsibility. That’s on him, not on me. And I’m not mad at Dad for feeling the way he does. It has to be hard finding out your brother is a monster. You can’t just wipe out years of love no matter what the person you love has done, not even if you’ve already begun to hate them.
Dad said that Travis “couldn’t live with the guilt” and that was why he tried to end his life. But he was living with the knowledge of what he’d done for years. I wasn’t the only kid he abused, and he lived with that knowledge just fine. It was the idea of having to pay for what he’d done that drove him to it. I don’t have any sympathy for that.
“You saved Bella,” Angie said to me before they left for LA, and she hugged me so tight I couldn’t breathe. “Your dad knows that, too.”
I nodded. Dad and I will be okay, eventually. I know that. Some night he’ll call and we’ll talk and probably have a cry. I can’t imagine finding out that Mark hurt my kid like Travis hurt me and would have hurt Bella. I wouldn’t want to believe it, even if the truth was undeniable.
I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a relief when Dad, Angie, and Bella left for LA. It was like checking off another box in taking as much stress as possible out of my life.
There’s been some press. Not too bad, because Mom hasn’t made her big comeback yet, and no one else in the family is a major celebrity. Still, it’s out there, along with the fact that I have DID. FORMER CHILD STAR JENNIFER TATE’S PERSONAL TRAGEDY was one headline. Mom’s gotten some phone calls and emails from various gossip rags looking for quotes. I told her that if anyone from Oprah’s network calls, we’re taking it. I don’t care if it means talking about my disorder in front of millions of people. I’m not ashamed, and I want to meet Oprah, damn it.
But until that happens, I’ve been keeping busy with art and therapy. I’ve also started trying to stay on top of eating well and exercising, because it’s all supposed to be good for mental health. I’ve even taken up yoga. Mom and I go to a class a couple of times a week. She’s going to be starting rehearsals for her play in the new year, but until then, I have a workout buddy. She and I have always been close, but lately we’ve gotten closer. She’s been getting to know the others as well. I can’t imagine what that’s like for her, but I appreciate the effort.
Mark and Izzy are still together. They’re getting pretty serious. I don’t mind that she spends so much time with my brother, because we still make time for each other. She and Lannie have become pretty tight as well. Mark has started making himself available more, especially for Vincent. The only one he won’t hang out with is Kaz. He says she’s too weird. I have no idea what that means, and I’m afraid to ask. Kaz just laughs whenever I try to ask her, so … yeah.
Connor and I have started having dinner every couple of weeks with his grandfather. We’ll pick up takeout or grab some groceries and cook at Paddy’s house. It’s fun. He likes to dig out photographs or old movies and show them to us. Connor says he’s gotten to know his grandmother better in death than he did in life. I think that’s kind of sad, but also sweet.
I don’t know how long Connor and I will last. I want to believe in things like forever, but Mom and Dad wanted to believe in forever when they fell in love, too. I know I can’t compare us to them, but I don’t want to have unrealistic expectations.
Can’t you just enjoy what you’ve got? Lannie wants to know. He likes you and you like him. Stop overthinking it. She’s right, but I don’t tell her that.
If someone had told me a couple of months ago that I’d learn to like the people in my head, I would have told them to fuck off. I do like them, though. They’re my friends. Yeah, sometimes they’re a pain in the ass, like when they switch out when I don’t want them to, or they stick their faces into my business, or buy things without permission, but sometimes they’re a comfort, a source of love and security. That’s pretty cool.
Actually, I guess family is the better comparison. You don’t get to pick your family, but you can choose how you decide to deal with and interact with them. That’s what “the Posse” and I are working on. We’re slowly making it work, and the more we get to know each other, the easier it’s becoming. Is it perfect? Not by a long shot. I still spend most of my time exhausted and confused because someone’s been out when they shouldn’t have. It’s better than what I had before, though. And now there’s no one in my head telling me I’m terrible.
Maybe we’ll have more integrations in the future, I don’t know. There are people who seem to think that’s the way to go and others who think all you need is good system communication. I’m not sure what side of the fence I’m on, but I do know that we’ll figure it out.
Together.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First things first—I did a lot of research for this book, which included studying the work of people with way more experience and expertise in the field of dissociative disorders than I could ever have. The research and knowledge are all theirs. Any mistakes are all mine.
A long, long time ago, my best friend looked at me and asked, “Do you ever lose time?” I asked her what she meant, and she told me that sometimes she’d realize that hours had gone by and she had no idea what she’d done with them. I told her that I didn’t think I’d experienced that, and we didn’t talk about it again. Years later, after our friendship had come to an unfortunate end, I heard that she’d been diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder. I knew only what I’d seen in movies and on TV, so this prompted me to learn more. The more research I did, the more I could pick out certain indicators in my old friend’s behavior that backed up this diagnosis. There is a part of me that has never gotten past the fact that I didn’t see it at the time. DID is amazing at hiding itself. It’s also a disorder that can vary greatly among those affected.
I have tried to make Dylan’s experience as realistic as someone without DID can. I’ve watched countless videos by people who have the disorder (shout-out to DID YouTubers), read as much as I could cram into my head, and joined a now-defunct Facebook group that had been set up to raise awareness of DID. One thing I learned is that every system is different. All experiences of DID have some core things in common, which is what allows for diagnosis, but every system is as different within the scope of the disorder as the alters themselves. My goal was to be as accurate as possible, but I still needed to make Dylan’s struggle accessible—and make it fit into a book. I left her in a good place, but realistically, there’s no “easy fix” for DID and I in no way meant to imply that there is. I have the utmost respect for people who live their lives with the disorder, and consider them amazing examples of human survival.
I want to give a huge thank-you to someone who took so much time out of her busy schedule to answer my questions, provided me with invaluable answers, and also beta-read this book. Heather Scarboro, psychotherapist and owner of Healing Selves Therapeutics, you are a rock star of the first order and a tremendous inspiration. Thank you for your assistance while I worked on this book. I’ve been totally overwhelmed by your generosity and I admire you so very much.
Thanks also to the team at Wednesday Books for helping me tackle this important subject. Vicki Lame, you are awesome. You had me at “hello.” You complete me—you get it. I freaking adore you, girl.
FURTHER RESEARCH
The following are just a sample of the sort of research I did while researching Pieces of Me. YouTube has a huge number of videos on the topic. I cannot vouch for the validity of any of them, but there are many that provide scientific studies, psychological research, and personal experience. I invite you to investigate them for yourself if you want to learn more on this topic.
Books:
Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Internal Self-Alienation by Janina Fisher
Coping with Trauma-Related Dissociation by Suzette Boon, Kathy Steele, and Onno van der Hart
The Dissociative Identity Disorder Sourcebook by Deborah Bray Haddock
The Flock: The Autobiography of a Multiple Personality by Joan Frances Casey
Understanding and Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder by Elizabeth F. Howell
Movies:
Waking Madison
Frankie & Alice
YouTube Channels:
Multiplicity & Me
The Entropy System
DissociaDID (There’s been some drama around this channel. I am not a health professional, and cannot give an opinion on their actual diagnosis, but they have presented a lot of good research into DID, especially in the early days of their channel.)
Also by Kate McLaughlin
What Unbreakable Looks Like
Daughter
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
KATE McLAUGHLIN grew up in rural Nova Scotia with only her imagination and the Bay of Fundy to keep her entertained. That imagination was encouraged by her mother, and Kate began writing at age eight. She’s published more than fifty books under different pen names, as well as What Unbreakable Looks Like and Daughter. Kate, her husband, Steve, and her four fur kids live in Connecticut. You can sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Epigraph
Me
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Them
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Us
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Acknowledgments
Further Research
Also by Kate McLaughlin
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
First published in the United States by Wednesday Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group
PIECES OF ME. Copyright © 2023 by Kate McLaughlin. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.
www.wednesdaybooks.com
Cover design by Kerri Resnick
Cover illustration by Nicole Rifkin
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-26434-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-26435-0 (ebook)
eISBN 9781250264350
Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.
First Edition: 2023
Kate McLaughlin, Pieces of Me
