Crossposted to my Pillowfort.
These days, there is a steadily-growing body of discussion around asexuality and mental health[1]. Over the past decade or so, the topic has recieved some much-needed attention. The relationship between neuroatypicality – particularly autism – and aspec identity is one we are beginning to describe, though there is still much, much work to be done. But while we are beginning to discuss the effects of autism, of depression, of PTSD, the intersection of asexuality and multiplicity has remained as yet mostly untouched upon.
The medical terminology for my perspective is vague, and muddled, and constantly evolving. Once, the default label was Multiple Personality Disorder, but that term has fallen out of favour these days, for reasons I won’t go into here. You’re more likely to hear my perspective referred to as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), or perhaps Other Specified Dissociative Disorder (OSDD), both from the DSM-V (sadly not available online). Personally, I lean in favour of simply using the catch-all of Dissociative Disorders, since many of the differences between them are fairly minimal. (It’s all disorders around here. One gets used to it.)
If we use non-medical language, of the type more common to what scraps of a community can be said to exist, then plurality, multiplicity and systems are the words we see most often[2]. But multiplicity politics is not the point here. The meaning of the words is simple enough, when you break it down. Plural. Multiple. More than one consciousness. To put it simply, I am not alone in my head. As one can imagine, this complicates a great many things, but sex, consent and attraction are some of the biggest giants to topple.
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