What Excites Us!

Episode 31: Tell All with Baggins

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Gwyn: Hello and welcome to What Excites Us, the podcast that discusses sex and sexuality through a lens of global acceptance and healing. I'm Gwyn Isaacs, a certified sex coach and educator who believes that everyone has the right to a personally fulfilling intimate life, even when our brains and bodies label us as different or disabled.

[00:00:32] Today I'm talking with Baggins a gender wobbly bloke doing their best with dissociative identity disorder, autism, and an undiagnosed chronic illness. They coexist with their partners assorted, ESA cats, and the traumatized children that share their body and brain. Baggins exists in a body that is 29 years old and for fun, likes to listen to video game info dumps from their partners, do house projects when pain allows and learn about paleo archeology because everything is long dead, so you don't have to be anxious about the outcome. They're presently working on figuring out this Etsy artist career thingamabob. [

00:01:20] Before we get into it, there are a couple of vocabulary words that you may not know but do come up and don't worry. I'll put these in the show notes too. So if you don't remember now, it's all right. Baggins describes themselves as being on the Ace spectrum. Ace is short for asexual, meaning people who don't frequently experience sexual desire. we discussed T, which is short for testosterone. A meta is a shortening of the word metamor, which is a term used in polyamory, meaning the partner of your partner, but who isn't your partner yet. That's, so it's sort of a chain your partner's partner and polyunsaturated means they're not looking for other partner.

[00:02:09] Oh, and if you stick around through the credits, there's one last piece from Baggins, our very own WEU after credit scene. And with that, let's get to it.

[00:02:23] Thank you Baggins, and welcome to What Excites Us! It is so delightful to have you here.

[00:02:29] Baggins: Happy to be here.

[00:02:30] Gwyn: Yay. So you are,

[00:02:34] Baggins: I, yes. I, I exist. It's an uncomfortable existence at times, but I exist.

[00:02:44] Gwyn: That reminds me of you know, all those memes where it's like, mama told me I could grow up to be anything, so I are crocodile

[00:02:52] Baggins: Here's the thing that's not out of the realm of possibility for a DID system. There are definitely animal altars who are there in other systems.

[00:03:02] Gwyn: oh, that is so cool. I had no idea.

[00:03:04] Baggins: One of my primary annoyances is that I could have been a dragon, and I am not. So annoyed about that brain. You gave me the option of existing and you didn't give me dragon. How dare you?

[00:03:20] Gwyn: Right. I think maybe the fire breathing skills were too difficult in a human body. I don't know. I, you know, I've

[00:03:27] Baggins: I do have a low spice tolerance.

[00:03:30] Gwyn: Yeah, so maybe that's it, all right. before we get too deep into the weeds and the silly, which clearly that's not gonna happen, we are going deep into the silly why don't you tell us why you are here, what it is about you that makes you unique?

[00:03:45] Baggins: So I am a host and a protector and a DID system altar, a Dissociative Identity Disorder system alter. And I exist. I am here and I'm polyamorous. I'm on the ace spectrum and gender is a wibbly wobbly concept. Yeah.

[00:04:11] Gwyn: Those are all wonderful and fascinating. And for those of us who have no idea what DID is, can you just give us a very brief overview.

[00:04:21] Baggins: Yep. This is with the clarification that I do not speak for the entire community of DID OSDD et cetera. And this is a very, very summarized statement. Basically, when you get a child who has the ability to dissociate, to enter their own head and escape reality, and then that child is in a series of high traumatic situations that they cannot escape at times altars or alternate states of consciousness will form.

[00:04:55] There is debate within the community as to whether there is a core state of consciousness and then others that have split off, or whether you start out with multiple states of consciousness and then fail to coalesce. I am a host, which means I am the altar, I am the state of consciousness that interacts with the world most of the time.

[00:05:17] People will also occasionally use host for the body itself. But I prefer to do the distinction given that I am the second adult host to be running the, for lack of a better term, meat suit. So I prefer to make that distinction.

[00:05:33] Gwyn: That makes sense. Sure. So who are your other altars?

[00:05:37] Baggins: Yep. So for adults, we have myself, going by Baggins for this one. And then we have Tabitha, who is the previous adult host. Who was the host, and that the person that most people interacted with from the ages of about eight to 26. And then we have two littles Little E and then Little M I'll be using abbreviations for this just cuz while they are not kids in the traditional sense, they are still children and want to be able protect them as best I can.

[00:06:11] Gwyn: Do they have respective ages that they identify as?

[00:06:15] Baggins: So Little M is a little boy about six to seven, there abouts. Little E is about seven to eight, but, and some people will know very much when I say this, autistic traumatized seven to eight. So acts a lot more mature than she actually is. And more forced maturity rather than actual maturity.

[00:06:42] Gwyn: Yep, the gifted program kid

[00:06:44] Baggins: Yes. Gifted burnouts only again, there because there is so much debates within the community. I will speak only for my system. Little E is for lack of a better term, the core that the rest of us formed to protect. She is adorable. She's fantastic. And now that she's feeling safe, but would really like to set our abusers on fire. Won't because she understands boundaries and limits. So there's an ongoing joke of arson. No arson, no arson, not allowed.

[00:07:17] Gwyn: Arson will end you up in jail. That would be bad. Okay,

[00:07:22] Baggins: So things like, okay, no arson, but we will have like a bonfire this summer and have marshmallows and you can do thing like burn the marshmallows. Marshmallows be fine.

[00:07:33] Gwyn: Oh wow. Voodoo marshmallows. That could be a whole new world. Draw little faces on them or what have you and

[00:07:39] Baggins: and then you could eat them. So like socially acceptable, like all that jazz too.

[00:07:43] Gwyn: Oh, that's so fun. So you mentioned genders. Thank you for that. Am I to assume that Tabitha identifies as female?

[00:07:50] Baggins: Yes. Tabitha is femme presenting, but non-binary esque, gender's a bit wibbly there. I, Baggins, am trans masc and basically is like for any listeners who know the gender queer Hobbit Fanfic, that, that's me.

[00:08:08] Gwyn: Beautiful. I love that. I want to hear from people who know that. Thank you. And you mentioned system that is what you refer to your, all of your alters together.

[00:08:18] Baggins: Yep we are a DID system. Often systems will give their own names. A common theme for systems is things like planetary systems or collectives or this, that, or the other system. We prefer Hawk Song System because we have a very strong connection with Red-Tailed Hawks and their symbolism.

[00:08:40] Gwyn: That's a beautiful word too. I like that a lot. It's evocative. Yeah lots of pictures come to mind when you say Hawk Song. I like that. Not that it's up to me to like, or not like being very clear. So when it comes to fronting, how does that happen? You mentioned that you are host and you are frequently the one in front, but how do other...

[00:09:03] Baggins: So it varies from system to system. Cannot stress again because there is capital D discourse. Gotta love that discourse going on. For the Hawk Song system for the most part it's by agreement. However, Little E especially, will sometimes jump to the front when very excited. Typically when engaging with one of my partners because my partners have taken on auntie, older cousin roles for her and for Little M.

[00:09:30] So for us it's like a nudge at like the back of the brain and then the person who is fronting will go back and down while the person who wants to come up will come up and out. It was very alarming when I first realized that was what was happening. And we have Little E to thank for letting us know that we are a system because I was made second host not knowing that I was second host or that I was part of a system at all. So what you're getting is the realizations and conclusions from over a year of like, oh, okay, that's what's been going on. Because there was a lot of unknowns at first.

[00:10:16] Gwyn: Sure. I mean, when folks have realizations who don't have altars, it can be intense and overwhelming.

[00:10:25] Baggins: And D I D at its core is meant to be a stealth disorder. It is the brain's way of protecting itself. Lots of people, lots of systems don't realize that they are systems until they're in their mid to late thirties which can be terrifying, especially like at that point you've got a well-established life, you've got things going on.

[00:10:44] In our case, it made a lot more sense than it didn't because one of the things that was going on is dissociative amnesia. Basically, the brain decided, no, you're not ready to deal with that. So you're not going to. So over the past year, there have been a lot of what we call memory unlocks and realizations I apologize for my French, Jesus Christ, that was fucked up.

[00:11:07] Gwyn: Yeah, I was gonna ask about that. If you recall things from when a different altar is fronting or if you're getting things fed to you, like as a trauma response, a lot of people will have amnesia from the thing, and then little drips and drabs will come in periodically. Is it kind of like that?

[00:11:27] Baggins: Yes. Some systems have what's called a gatekeeper which is an altar who is in charge of, okay. You get to go up front. The host gets this amount of information released to them at this point as far as we can tell, we don't have one of those. But for us, memory unlocks tends to happen either in response to a trigger.

[00:11:49] Now that we feel inherently safe, now that we are inherently safe we will get system-wide, which can be annoying because a lot of these things are things that the littles especially shouldn't have to deal with. We get essentially, for lack of a better term, system-wide updates. and everyone gets access to the new memory.

[00:12:09] We have a a series of phrases that we use in regards to like, oh, okay this just happened. So let our partners know what's going on. So like memory unlock is okay, something that was previously blocked by the brain just unlocked and it's fucked up. And then there's like memory puzzle piece, which is, I had access to this information, but it just connected to another bit of information and now I have more of the whole picture. And then we also use the phrase fanon versus canon a lot because we have what's actually going on and then what our brain made up what was going on.

[00:12:45] And then there's the difference of actual backstory versus lore. A lot of what we have is lore because we don't actually have a hundred percent of the actual factual what was going on. We have like multiple oral histories that have then been mistranslated and translated again and then interpretated through Christian monks instead of the original Norse.

[00:13:11] Gwyn: Yes. That makes that very clear. I get that. And in terms of day-to-day living for instance, do Little M and Little E know what happened at work today or that sort of thing?

[00:13:23] Baggins: They do for the most part. I'm currently working on building up crafts to sell at craft fairs because related to the memory unlocks for us, when we have memory unlocks, it causes chronic illness flareups. So we are now very, very lucky and very, very privileged that our nesting partner, that my nesting partner, their auntie has the ability to support two, two bodies. At the same time.

[00:13:50] Gwyn: Fair enough. But going to the grocery store and that sort of thing

[00:13:53] Baggins: They'll, they'll have basic knowledge of what's going on. Just like when they front, I'll have basic knowledge of what happened. There's like, for lack of a better term, a shared pool of information. But nothing so specific. Some systems have like really elaborate computer setups. We have amorphous clouds, which can be both a blessing and an annoyance.

[00:14:14] Gwyn: Do you know when you are gonna get booted out? And someone else is gonna come up to the front?

[00:14:20] Baggins: Usually because we have a pretty good ability to predict each other's movements. Typically it's the littles that will come up to the front. Tabitha's is not front often. Tabitha is exhausted and rightfully so being the previous host. So the littles will sort of like, for lack of better term, do a knock, and then I'll assess the situation. They're also very good at assessing the situation from in the back and then figuring out when it's okay. For example, Little E adores long drives and really impressive architecture. Like if we're driving and my partner's the one driving and like there's a lot of traffic, she'll come up to a poke and be like, Hey, is it okay if I come out and look around? Cuz New York City is really cool. But if there's like things going on where it might not be a good idea, but she wants to like, have that informed consent, for lack of a better term she'll poke out and be like, is it okay?

[00:15:17] And she has a very different cadence to my speaking voice and a very different body language. So it's easy for my partners

[00:15:25] Gwyn: Yeah okay. You mentioned that you're on the ace spectrum and I absolutely wanna dive into that, but I'm curious if the two adult altars have different interests and styles. So does that also play out in what happens in sexy times

[00:15:43] Baggins: Yes and no. We are both subs, we are both bottoms. Tabitha is what's known as a sexual protector and used hypersexuality to accomplish that. She does not interact with sex these days because she's working through personally a lot of shame of what she did with the body in order to get affection, in order to get what passed for love. And I don't engage with sex these days because both chronic illness, Ace spectrum. And I apologize for the potential trigger. A way that my partner puts it is the entire system has been hypersexual as a trauma response since age three. It's okay to take a break.

[00:16:27] Gwyn: Yeah. I concur.

[00:16:29] Baggins: There is that stereotype with ACE people, that they're only ACE because of trauma. I would make the argument that for us in particular, we are not ACE because of trauma. We were sexual because of trauma and ACE leaning in general on our own. It was definitely something that had to be figured out with my current partners. Because I, as a second host, was really relying a lot on the memories I had from Tabitha.

[00:17:00] I didn't realize that I wasn't Tabitha for a very long time, which again, is part of how the disorder works. So I was very confused as to why I had tried to be gay for so many years and why I tried to be queer for so many years and suddenly it was clicking. So Tabitha is primarily straight but would not kick a person out of bed except for the fact game of trauma.

[00:17:25] Whereas I Baggins am primarily trans for trans queer for queer, et cetera. A term that I've really started appreciating is neuro queer which is that my neurology has permanently altered the way I think about my gender and other's gender, though I'm not going to speak for others' gender. However, I am primarily romantically and platonically attracted towards people who also have alternative forms of neuro stuff and gender. So for broad spectrum gender queer, for gender queer.

[00:18:05] But it was definitely something that we had to work out because I was relying on these hypersexual memories as a state of being. And it was definitely a, oh, if I'm not of use in the bedroom, then what use am I? I'm not bringing in income right now. If I'm not serving in this way, will I be left? Logically I knew that was not the case, but it took a lot of reassurance for everyone involved. Which especially as chronic illness became more and more, oh, that's what this is for the meat suit. We looked up the statistics for the percentage of divorces caused in quotes by chronic illness and they were terrifyingly high.

[00:18:54] But then we looked closer at the statistics and none of those statistics are for queer polyamorous, traumatized neuro divergents. They were all for cis het presenting couples. But it is occasionally something that pings because while I don't have that desire right now, I have the memories of having that desire and I do occasionally miss it. And I do occasionally, like with my partners, be like, I am not jealous of your other partners for doing this with you. I'm jealous of their ability to do so.

[00:19:28] Gwyn: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So chronic illness leads to a lot of pain, which when your body is in a lot of pain, it makes a lot of sense that your libido is not running high as well. There are people in the world, about 20% of people who deal with stress through a rising, spontaneous desire. But for most people if you're trying to escape the crocodile that's chasing you, stopping to get lucky is not really on the table.

[00:19:57] Baggins: Yep,

[00:19:58] Gwyn: So just as a basic sort of reassurance. Also, thank you for talking about this because hopefully we can get more people aware and out there and have information to at least I'm not the only one sort of thing where we can build that awareness. Do you have responsive desire? So I hear you saying you don't have spontaneous desire. Is it something that interests you to even find out about, do you wanna play occasionally? Where's that at?

[00:20:28] Baggins: So Ace spectrum for me, which is that occasionally, like once in a blue moon, the stars will align and I'll have spontaneous desire. But it is less desire for sex and more desire for advanced cuddles, if that makes any sense. Especially because most of the desire I have in that moment isn't necessarily for sex.

[00:20:56] It's for a more concretely framed session of praise and comfort. I mentioned previously both Tabitha and myself are subs and bottoms. And if I have that desire, it's less for, I want bits to touch other bits and more I would like to negotiate me bringing you tea and being pat on the head and told I'm a good boy. That's mostly what the desire there is.

[00:21:23] Responsive. It's like shadows. It's like, oh, I can clearly tell the neuro pathways for a sexual response to this were there. They were very entrenched for a long time, but now it's more of a, that is attractive. Objectively that is attractive. Nothing's going on there though,

[00:21:44] Gwyn: Sure. So as a trans masc person, are you taking testosterone? Are you interested in altering your body at any way? Where are you on that spectrum?

[00:21:54] Baggins: One of the things that we find starkly humorous as a system, is that everyone under the hood would really like to yeet the teet. Everyone for their different reasons would really like these gone. Unfortunately, because of the prevalence of the body mass index used in the healthcare system, despite the fact that it's largely irrelevant for this type of surgery, it is highly unlikely that between the body's current chronic health conditions and fat phobia, that we are going to get that surgery anytime soon.

[00:22:29] So yes, for top surgery. Testosterone is a, we've tried it which then caused, you know, some panic attacks , like realizing, oh God, like I'm transitioning, do I have the right to transition? I didn't realize that there were other people in here, most of whom are femme presenting, you know, women types. Do I have the right to do this?

[00:22:50] Thankfully there was a generals like you're the one running the meat suit 90% of the time. Doesn't bother us that much. Go ahead. Would definitely look into testosterone again at some point. It is, and again, this is potentially triggering for some people, smelling, unwashed, testosterone crotch that near to us was a sensory trauma no-no. So it's something that we would like to approach again, but not without a lot of forethoughts and ideas and support around that. Because testosterone makes you sweat a lot.

[00:23:27] You smell a lot, and then your trans femme girlfriend looks at you and goes, you're doing this voluntarily. You idiot. In an affectionate way. In an affectionate way. But if you take testosterone when you're dating a trans femme, you open yourself to a lot of, why would you do this voluntarily?

[00:23:49] Gwyn: Fair

[00:23:52] Baggins: But then you also get like answers for questions of love. What's this thing going on? She's like, that's normal. I was starting it during mid-winter and I was like, I now understand a lot more why the boys in middle school and high school were going around without coats. I'm so hot.

[00:24:15] Gwyn: Yeah, yeah. Teenage boy shoveling in shorts.

[00:24:19] Baggins: Look, it's a northern New England stereotype for a reason.

[00:24:22] Gwyn: Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, my God, I can't even imagine. And I'm grateful that I don't have to. Yeah. Did it affect your interest in sex and sexuality?

[00:24:38] Baggins: when I was on T, it was definitely increasing things like to the point where there's like being patted on the head of, oh, you're so desperate for this. It's like, yet so cute. No, I'm like, tired. Go away. Which, you know, I'm the bottom, like, you know, okay fine.

[00:24:58] But that's also part of the hesitation is with the chronic fatigue and with the chronic illness and with the comfortability of settling into a spectrum, I don't necessarily want my body having that many reactions cuz it was constant. It was constant. And boxers are not designed to hold that much fluid. They're not.

[00:25:22] Gwyn: Right. These are just things that I would've never thought about. Thank you for bringing our awareness to them. Yeah. Yeah. No, that sounds unpleasant. Yeah. You seem more self-aware than so many people.

[00:25:43] Baggins: So there's layers to that cuz ogres have layers, onions have layers, this amount of bullshit has layers. Part of that is the abuse from my upbringing. I was relied on for parentification by being my parents' therapist for a lot. Part of that is my particular autistic special interests, which are psychology, sociology, evolutionary psychology and sociology.

[00:26:09] But basically I turned psychology, sociology various ilks into a special interest in order to just figure out how to function because human beings made no sense growing up. Part of it is the trauma, and then part of it is, and I do not speak for everyone and I do not speak for the entire, for lack of better term trauma community.

[00:26:33] When you have this level of baggage and this level of triggers and emotional responses and PTSD responses, while it is not fair, and while it is not just, it is your responsibility to, for lack of a better term, manage your shit it is your responsibility to, if you know that you are about to enter a thing that will give you a CPTSD trigger response. You need to let people know ahead of time and you need to make your own plans for exiting that situation.

[00:27:11] If I'm going to my partner's place for a holiday. I need to know in advance because we need to have a war council for both my trauma responses and theirs. I need to set firm boundaries for myself and not make other people feel obligated to be managing my boundaries for me. I have a lot of stuff that I need in order to function in day-to-day society. But getting that stuff is my responsibility. Managing that is my responsibility. I can absolutely ask for support, but I need to communicate that request for support and know that it may not come.

[00:27:55] it is not fair. It is not right. It is not just. And unfortunately society does not have a you broke it, you bought it to policy. There is a joke amongst the DID community that you should get a tax break per altar. But I'm self-aware because I have to be. I have to be able to figure out what's going on with my stuff so that it doesn't negatively impact the people that I love the found family that I found.

[00:28:23] Because I think a lot of people will relate to this. If you grew up in an abusive situation, there is always the absolute gut-wrenching terror that you will turn into your abusers. And I'm very determined to not do that.

[00:28:40] Gwyn: Yeah. Well not everybody has the same level of responsibility and self-awareness in the same package, so I appreciate you for that. I mean, for lots of reasons I think you're a goovy person as well. But I just wanna call that out cuz it's to be admired and I appreciate it.

[00:28:59] Baggins: One thing that my partners and I will continually look at each other and say, because I'll continually thank them for basic considerations and basic kindness around my chronic illness, and they'll be like, the bar is on the floor. The bar is on the floor here. I'm like, yeah, and you're in the stratosphere.

[00:29:23] Your reaction to this is in the stratosphere. Just because the bar is on the floor for a lot of things doesn't mean that you shouldn't appreciate it when people react in the stratosphere.

[00:29:35] Gwyn: Yeah. Yeah, I like that. I try to do the same thing, which is why I mentioned

[00:29:40] Baggins: Healing is not linear. Life is not linear. Progress is not linear. One thing that I find continually with my own stuff is that I'm so strong about this and I'm so passionate about this because I know my own tendencies. One of my tendencies is to squirrel away hurts and, you know, small things that then pile up and then I explode.

[00:30:06] I'm working on it. I'm going to continue working on it. That doesn't mean that the explosion doesn't hurt my partners and that I'm not then responsible for working on fixing that explosion.

[00:30:19] Gwyn: Yeah. Yep Yes.

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[00:31:15] Let's make this a two-way conversation at whatexcitesus.com. Thanks.

[00:31:26] So your partners, let's talk about that. You have partners, not just one. You have a nesting partner. Did I gather that right? And then there are others and they are, you are all comfortable with, with your brand of Ace, which sounds like is pretty physically based. You still enjoy romance. Is that true?

[00:31:47] Baggins: I still enjoy romance. I do not joke when I say that I found my found family in a gaggle of traumatized neurodivergent, gender queers. Because like attracts to like, and I think in a lot of reasons, in a lot of ways that that trans people prefer to be T for T. It's immensely helpful in reassuring when you don't have to explain 101 because they're already on 102 from their own lived experiences.

[00:32:14] But yeah, I've got my nesting partner who is fantastic. She's works in IT. She is, and again, some listeners will know this better than others. There are stereotypes of IT, trans femmes for a reason. Just there are stereotypes for a reason. Then she's also dating another one of my partners who's in town. And then my nesting partner and I are also both dating our boyfriend who's over in London. There, there are some trends in Poly that amuse me and one of which is, cool, I found this partner and now I'm just going to keep collecting metas.

[00:32:50] Gwyn: Well, how else do you get all the passwords to the TV shows.

[00:32:54] So, okay. When your littles, either M or E, are fronting, you've mentioned a sort of auntie type relationship, is it easy for your partners to know, or do the littles announce themselves when they're coming online, or how does that transition work?

[00:33:12] Baggins: Yep. For the most part the shift in cadence and tone and body language is very apparent. But also they will let my partners know. Auntie is one of my partners. The other partners are like older cousins mentors. And that's because other partners have their own siblings who like have the potential to have kids and are like, I want to be here. I want to be supportive, but I'm not comfortable in that role. Whereas my nesting partner has very much been like, I'm comfortable with auntie because that way I can teach you Irish fighting songs and you can sing them repeatedly and annoy Baggins.

[00:33:50] They will absolutely gang up with each other. Because again, there are stereotypes for a reason and my nesting partner is like, no, the young children shall know of anarchist memes and anti-capitalism and Irish fighting songs and labor songs. When the Queen died there was a meme going around on TikTok of Lizzie's in a box, in a box, Lizzie's in a box. Having the eight year old that shares your skull sing that is interesting. Having your nesting partner be told about this and then start singing along with her is interesting.

[00:34:30] Gwyn: Yeah, I mean that's well beyond the regular ear worms that that many of us have. Yeah. Willful ear worms.

[00:34:40] Baggins: Willful ear worms. That is an excellent way of putting it. My local partner who isn't living with us works in retail and is the originator of the arson meme she's like, no arson, no. but yeah, they will interact with the littles. They adore them. Little E is very much the I have safety and backup because my auntie is scarier than any of the things we've seen before and has my back unequivocally.

[00:35:08] Whereas Little M is every meme of how to kill a Victorian child. For another reference, think Steve Rogers as a child, but with a survival instinct. Small, scared Little M is what's known as an interject, which is means that he is not part of lived experiences. He is a group of stories and other things. Basically, he is terrified that the coppers will take us away for being Pagan queer, autistic, insane, et cetera. And is living in the body of a chronically ill pagan queer, who has DID and is living in sin with other people. He loves everyone here, but is continually terrified that we keep being and doing things out of the social norm.

[00:36:07] My nesting partner is planning how to introduce him into power metal. Because she's of the opinion that this child would be less scared if he gets to scream power metal at things. Which is honestly a good thought.

[00:36:23] Gwyn: Sure. I mean, Absolutely. I have a, a, a friend who is still a young person who is the embodiment of sparkly unicorn power metal.

[00:36:36] Baggins: That's little. That's little little E is Japanese baby medal is like, I am young, I am pissed and I'm going to make it everyone else's problem.

[00:36:45] Gwyn: Yes.

[00:36:47] Baggins: But also understanding the boundaries of I can't make things, other people's problems because that would cause problems for us.

[00:36:57] Gwyn: Well, that's very mature of her and I appreciate that. Is there a period of getting to know you when you meet new folks and they're meeting new altars for the first time, does it feel like an awkward party you've walked into where there's this like, oh, hi, and I'm a Sagittarius or whatever, like you know what I mean?

[00:37:15] Baggins: Yes and no. There's definitely like for most of the world I'm not Baggins. I am the body's dead name who eventually figured out trans mask. Who's no contact with his parents. But not willing to go into details with the wider world about why no contact with parents because my younger sibling is still there and

[00:37:38] Gwyn: It's also nobody's business.

[00:37:40] Baggins: Yeah, that too. So for the most parts, most people don't know that I'm not the original host or the original adult host. When people get closer And we figure things out. It's very much a case by case basis. It's definitely something that I've had to consider. Like I'm polysaturated, I am, you know, like I'm not going and looking for other partners.

[00:38:03] My partners have my consents based on their determination of their own partners disclose. Yeah, you know, this partner is a system. But if I were to date other people, it's not something that's, that has come up yet, but it is something that's like, okay, I'm going to need to figure this out before I go on any other dates with any other people.

[00:38:24] Because while I've got most of it, you know, settled for myself. There are occasional triggers that catch us by surprise. And depending on how automatically safe we feel with that person, a little may pop out. And that's not something that I feel you should pop on someone with no warning.

[00:38:45] But also DID is a very misunderstood disorder, and Hollywood has done us no favors. There's the stereotype of the evil altar. Oh, which one of you is the evil altar? Thankfully, I haven't encountered any of this myself, but we follow other systems on TikTok and the amount of fake claimers that they get because clearly that's the right thing to do with someone who's traumatized is to claim that they don't actually know what they're talking about. Sarcasm. But it is definitely something that I would have to figure out should I date again.

[00:39:18] Gwyn: So you figured out you were a system while you were already with these other folks, so, there wasn't a getting to know you as different altars were appearing because they had already gotten to know them.

[00:39:32] Baggins: Yep. Well, they had gotten to know Baggins and like they had been dating Baggins for a year to year and a half. At that point actually no timeline. One of my partners wasn't dating us until after we knew we were a system, but was just inherently okay with it.

[00:39:50] As I was figuring out that, okay, second host of a DID system, there was fear that I had somehow done a bait and switch with my partners. It was like, no, you thought you were dating this particular being, but what if I subconsciously lied to you? What if I tricked you into being with me? Primary reassurance for that is darling, no one under the hood is a good enough liar to pull off a long con like that. And the second reassurance is to what end? Why, what would you have gained out of this? If you were going to emotionally manipulate a trans femme in IT there are trans femmes who make a lot more money. Just like very practical answers for that.

[00:40:31] One of my partners had actually dated a system host before me. And when I was realizing things and having questions put me in contact with their ex. It was immensely validating because I described a few things. They were like, yeah, and you don't remember a lot of what happened in your life, sorry. So definitely like I immensely lucked out with the partners that I had when I was figuring things out. And I'll be forever grateful to them for that.

[00:41:03] Gwyn: Well, it sounds like you've really, got a lot more of a handle on things than a lot of people who are just living their day-to-day lives, going 40 hours a week trying to figure out why they get hot when they see a redhead.

[00:41:14] Baggins: Well, like, again, part of that is like you turned it into a special interest, and part of that is the personal sense of responsibility. Before I realized part of the system, I was very, very confused because again, like according to the memories I had, I had been trying to be queer for a very long time because of pressure from toxic lesbian parents.

[00:41:36] And I wasn't doing it, but then suddenly it all clicked. And for the mainstream masking part of events, you know, fanon versus canon, there's that story that you present to the wider world versus what's actually going on. For the fanon, I blame TikTok. I fully blame queer thirst trap TikTok. Because as a system we had never been exposed to millennial and younger generation queerness. We'd only been exposed to a very turfy, very toxic version of older lesbian. So we had never seen that.

[00:42:12] And then, in a fit of incredible loneliness because it was during the, like, the height of the pandemic I joined OkCupid. Again, not knowing that I was the second host paid the $50 to see who had liked my profile. And this trans femme had liked my profile. And her profile was five very long paragraphs about the different fandoms that she was in including one very long paragraph about Darcy Lewis from the MCU. And this was pre Wanda vision, or whatever the heck the show was called.

[00:42:45] This was just Darcy from the Thor movies and like a long paragraph about how awesome this character was. So literally my first words to her were so Darcy, right? And things just sort of snowballed from there. I thank her because she taught me what it was to feel inherently safe and she taught me what it was to feel respected and have my boundaries respected.

[00:43:09] And she introduced me to this found family and my other partners. And we will often like jokingly dark humor. It's like, you bitch, you made me feel safe. And now I have DID and chronic illness. Because for a lot of systems, they don't find out they're systems until they are safe. Because it is that stealth survival technique disorder.

[00:43:34] But yeah, it's just like I wasn't able to feel safe and therefore I didn't know about the DID and I was just sort of doing my best to muddle through. I had a stated goal at a doctor's appointment recently. My goal is to stop being surprised when people believe me. There can, especially with the DID, there can be so much like, there's no way this is real. There's no way this is actually happening. But in my case it was. And it is and it continues to.

[00:44:04] I'm very, very aware that my situation is not how a lot of peoples end up. So I keep that in mind when I talk about stuff like this because even like the DID support groups, because it is a traumatogenic disorder, a lot of us have continual issues with being in abusive relationships because it's all we've known.

[00:44:27] Whereas I know that, should I start dating again and I was not aware of red flags because I was trained to ignore those red flags. I have a bunch of people at my back who will be like, Baggins, those are major red flags. No. and because I trust them implicitly because they've proven that trust again and again, I'm able to feel that level of safety.

[00:44:51] Gwyn: Yeah, that makes sense. And it makes sense that that's when a system can reveal itself as a system, because our brains create these coping methods. And then we all create these weird, you know, quote unquote weird ways to function in the world. And that's exactly what makes us all quote unquote normal.

[00:45:14] Baggins: Yep. I will say that DID is a lot more common than people think. I've seen statistics that we outnumber redheads which people don't like to think about because it implies that there's that level of trauma going on with a lot of people. And there's a lot, again, a lot of capital D discourse around the validity of self-diagnosis versus professional diagnosis.

[00:45:37] It can be really easy to gaslight yourself. If you're terrified that you're gaslighting yourself, that you have DID. Like, I'm not going, I don't want to prescribe this. Because it, it is difficult to live with and it is difficult, but it is not nearly as outside of the realm of possibility as people like to think it is.

[00:45:55] Gwyn: And I'm gonna add to that and say that no matter what you think you might be struggling with, knowing is always better than not knowing.

[00:46:05] Baggins: Very much so. The likelihood that people are going to have the resources and the money to get a diagnosis is unlikely. And diagnosis doesn't mean resources. It doesn't mean that you get services for it. It means that you get something that could be used against you by healthcare professionals

[00:46:26] Gwyn: So choosing not to get a recorded diagnosis is a valid choice.

[00:46:30] Baggins: Yeah. Very similar alongs, lines of people who are high masking autistic. If you get the official autism diagnosis, it closes a lot of doors more than it opens up a lot of resources. It prevents immigration to a lot of different countries.

[00:46:45] I am long-term possibly going to get the diagnosis, but it's not top of the list. And that's more due to fatalism and fatalistic perspectives on my end. Because my body is already fucked, I'm going already going to have all of these chronic health diagnoses that are already going to close those doors. So it's unlikely that I'll bother to get another door closed via the DID diagnosis.

[00:47:11] Gwyn: Is there anything that you wanna make sure that you get out?

[00:47:14] Baggins: Just be gentle. Take care of yourselves. And if your first thoughts about hearing that someone is a DID system is, oh my God, what if they have an evil altar? Please don't express that to the person who you're finding out is a DID system and do some research because there's perpetually that terror that we will turn into our abusers and we don't need it from people that we've trusted with information.

[00:47:42] Gwyn: I think do some research is almost always a good qualifying statement. Well, I like to end the show with one final question. So Baggins, what excites you?

[00:47:54] Baggins: Today what excites me is the fact that there's an Aldis being put up down my street and I may be Ace, but I'm still a kinky bitch and I'm really looking forward to taunting my nocturnal partners with the fact that I went there at 6:00 AM to go get groceries.

[00:48:14] Gwyn: Oh my God. Thank you so much, and thank you so much for coming on and doing this. This has been delightful and educational and thought provoking. And yeah, I really appreciate you being willing to share. Thank you.

[00:48:36] Baggins: I appreciate being here and willing to be heard.

[00:48:40] Gwyn: Yay! If you enjoyed this conversation, be sure that you are subscribed so that you'll hear all the other great chats we have here. And if you have any thoughts or questions you would like me to relay to Baggins or any of my other guests or even me, you can leave me a brief anonymous voicemail at whatexcitesus.com. You can also leave your information, it doesn't have to be anonymous. Oh, and if you would like to come on the show and do a tell All with me, or if you are.

[00:49:17] In the sexuality field or sexuality adjacent, please let me know. Same way, leave me a message at whatexcitesus.com. It's right at the top. There's a speak to me button and please talk about this with a friend. Having more conversations will help reduce the stigma around these topics and sex and sexuality in general, which I really believe will help the world overall.

[00:49:46] What Excites Us is produced, edited, and hosted by me. Gwyn Isaacs. Our podcast host is tickle.life. All music is used under the Creative Commons attribution license. The opening song is The Vendetta by Stephan kartenberg and this is Quando by Julius H. You know what? I appreciate you and I appreciate you listening And I thank you so much. Have a great day.

[00:50:20] Baggins: Be gentle with yourselves. Hydrate more than you think you should. It's stupid and it's dumb, but it does make a difference. And I know that there are probably a bunch of brats who are going fuck you. Because again, there's a stereotype for a reason.