Multiplicity Survey

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SESSION PARTICIPANTS
LAURIE UBERICH JEWEL LIGHTRAYE




Only Laurie and I are filling this out because otherwise there’d be far too many people talking at once. My apologies.

1. How do you communicate? (Do you ever hear each others voices? Do you ever talk to/with each other out loud? Do you ever leave notes for one another? Do you ever communicate without words (using images/feelings/colors/etc)?)

(Jewel) We talk, upstairs, virtually every day. Sometimes we get ‘group talks’ together which I host online, and those can go on for hours. As for talking without words we’re still new to that, but the system jokes that it’s my ‘native language’ so I sometimes confuse speech with meaning, if that makes sense.

2. How do you find new members? (Do you find other members mostly through journaling? Or can you see and hear them?)

(Jewel) Oh geez, that’s… not set in stone? Sometimes people literally do ‘walk in,’ like Bro Strider did last month, but in the past I had to explicitly seek people out, often in their own native worlds, before they started showing up in our system. The people we refer to as ‘headvoices’ up here are a different group, though.

(Laurie) We just show up whenever the heck we feel like it.

(Jewel) Yeah, you guys literally just appear out of nowhere. Leon was the most surprising case of this, as he manifested entirely without warning last March.

(Laurie) And then I killed him because he was being a manipulative sonofagun.

(Jewel) And then he came back! But yeah, it varies wildly. As for journaling, I don’t know what you mean by that, but I can see and hear everyone on at least a general level. Perception clarity goes up in correlation to how ‘close’ I am to the person.

3. How do you choose who wears what? Do you argue over clothing styles?

(Laurie) No one is allowed to front but the red kid.

(Jewel) Or rather, me.

(Laurie) Yeah. We all tried fronting at some point but that doesn’t always work too well. Co-fronting does happen, and I have pushed J out of the driver’s seat a few times but I don’t do a thing about appearances. We all just roll with whatever Jewel does; it’s his call.

4. How are decisions made in the front (consensus/majority rules/one person makes them/other)?

(Laurie) Once again, that’s Jewel’s domain, but man does that boy ever need a lot of help.

(Jewel) All of you guys are helping me in one way or another, yeah. So would that make it more of a consensus thing? Because we do work by Spine’s dietary habits, and I have to be careful around mirrors if Nat is in them, stuff like that.

(Laurie) True. So we all just collaborate on that I guess.

5. Is knowledge shared equally or do some people have access to things that other people don’t?

(Jewel) Personal experiences within the system are private unless shared, but generally my life is accessible to whoever needs it, or at least in a broader sense it is.

(Laurie) Chaos and I get the secret stuff.

(Jewel) Genesis too. But yeah, there are some things I only discuss with the inner system, such as past traumas, significant emotional problems, things like that. Basically very volatile subjects that I don’t feel too comfortable discussing nonchalantly.

6. Can you remember things that other people in your group do? Are you aware of what happens in the front when you’re not there?

(Laurie) See above, if Jewel lets us see it it’s open to everyone.

(Jewel) But about the fronting, that’s usually only visible on a present-moment basis. Often I have to fill in non-present system people on what they need to know after it’s already happened.

(Laurie) Which is a problem because most people are never around.

(Jewel) That’s another weird one. Laurie seems to be the only one in our system who can walk right into the things if she wants.

(Laurie) Because I never sleep, that’s why.

(Jewel) Probably. But other than that, we all have our own dreams, as far as I know. Do you headvoice guys dream at all? I’ve never asked.

(Laurie) No clue, see above. That’s a good question though.

8. Do you all take responsibility when you wrong somebody as a group effort, more collective apology or do you expect the person who did the wrong to fess up?

(Jewel) ‘Group efforts’ concerning fronting aren’t a concern, but if Laurie is channeling and she offends someone then she’s responsible for apologizing, haha.

(Laurie) You usually cover all our tracks anyway.

9. Is there one in your group that stays in the body for more time than the rest? (How often do your primary front-runners change? How often do frontiers switch out? Is fronting a skill that has to be taught?)

(Laurie) That’s Jewel’s job. If there’s ever co-fronting then it’s either Nat or Spine who’s involved, due to body issues. Otherwise if we want to be around, we ghost.

(Jewel) That’s a whole other topic in itself…

(Laurie) No kidding. So Jewel fronts, capable people ghost, anyone else who wants in on it can just stick around in central headspace and watch things happen that way. It’s like a freakin' movie theater up here.

10. How do you parcel out time during waking hours between work, school, hobbies, social commitments? Is it left up to whomever is in the front or do you plan it out? How do you balance money/space usage?

(Laurie) Time concerning fronting isn’t an issue, but ironically that does make it tough for Jewel to spend time with us some days. That’s been a problem recently, hasn’t it?

(Jewel) Yeah. I’m the only main fronter so if my downstairs time is fully occupied, it often makes it very hard to communicate with everyone else. Ghosters can still stick around of course, but I can’t guarantee attention, and everyone else has to wait for me to slow down and show up.

(Laurie) We usually have to book actual time slots into his schedule just to talk.

(Jewel) Unfortunate but true. ‘Hey, I really want to talk to you guys, does Wednesday evening work?’ And if it doesn’t, things can get problematic. I try to at least get a short talk in every night but that doesn’t always work, just ask Chaos.

(Laurie) No kidding, you fall asleep on the poor guy sometimes.

(Jewel) I wish I didn’t! So constant communication seems to be mandatory up here, not only for the sake of information, but also because it seems to have a strong effect on my psychological well-being at this point. But uh, the question was something completely different, wasn’t it.

(Laurie) Haha, yeah. Just time management was all, actually.

(Jewel) Oh. Well hopefully we settled that coherently enough.

11. Are there noticeable differences with who fronts? How can an outsider recognize a switch? How would I know whom in your group I’m speaking to? Do you announce yourselves? What’s the most polite way to ask who I’m talking to? What if I want to talk to (name) but (name) is out?

(Jewel) EVERYONE can tell when Laurie is fronting.

(Laurie) No kidding.

(Jewel) As I said earlier, though, that rarely happens. Typically Laurie only steps in when the going gets really, really rough. If I cannot handle a situation, for psychological or emotional reasons, she likes to take over.

(Laurie) Hey, I’ve got a responsibility and I intend to live up to it.

(Jewel) You do. But besides Laurie, uh, no one else has really fronted enough for differences to be noticeable or even manifested? If anything, the personality shines through in terms of body language and speech style, I guess. And no, Laurie does not announce herself.

(Laurie) And if you want to talk to someone else, just ask, but chances are we’ll only be relaying messages.

(Jewel) Unless it’s text-based communication.

(Laurie) Yeah. That’s easier as it’s not a full front, just a channel. Hence these conversations.

12. Ever have someone stuck at the front? What makes you get stuck here or home?

(Jewel) No, that’s never happened, and it’s kind of a scary thought. I don’t think most of you guys could even handle that.

(Laurie) Probably not.

13. How do people compensate for not having their bodies out front (ex. not matching the body’s gender or appearance)? How does the physical body impact upon the consciousness? Particularly in cases where the gender or even species are different, does it have some profound effects on the way you’d interact with or view the world?

(Laurie) Compensating isn’t a concern for most of us, we know Jewel’s stuck in this thing just as much as we are.

(Jewel) Yeah, I get… bad gender dysphoria. I’ve been getting general body dysphoria too, lately.

(Laurie) Really? Why?

(Jewel) I’m used to being mental, spiritual. I’m used to being a reality warper. I can’t do that here! So that on top of the general gender issue can really mess me up.

(Laurie) About that. I know most, if not all, of us up here don’t front because of dysphoria. Leon gets gender dysphoria from it just as bad as you do, for one. Spine gets body dysphoria really bad, as she’s a skeleton, and I know Chaos and Genesis refuse to even try fronting because of the species barrier, and also because it’s seen as ‘your’ body physically, I mean come on.

(Jewel) That would be more than a little awkward, yeah. But I do sometimes ‘assign’ the body to Nat, due to the reflection thing, although ze still has problems with it too. But back on topic, appearance-wise I try to strike a happy medium with whoever has problems with presentation.

(Laurie) Which is mostly you.

(Jewel) Because I front. Even so I can’t get it to match me either, so we just make do with what we have.

14. What age range do you have in your system? Do younger or older front runners have a hard time not being in an age appropriate body? Do you have children/minors in your system? What, if any, restrictions do you place on their behavior, in-system and publicly?

(Laurie) Don’t even ask us about age, that is weird as heck up here.

(Jewel) We all operate outside of time on some level. Almost none of us have ‘assigned’ ages, due to having unusual growth patterns, multiple birth dates, reality splits… I mean really, if you’re going by years then Laurie is five, Leon is barely a year old, Chaos is either 79 or a couple thousand… age doesn’t really cross our minds in that sense.

(Laurie) Your kid isn’t even a year old physically and you’d never know by talking to hir.

(Jewel) Exactly! And hir development has nothing to do with hir physical age. So that sort of age dysphoria isn’t a thing up here, at least not right now. It’ll probably hit us all as the body ages, due to time-inflicted changes that none of us are familiar with at all. We’re almost all ‘adults’ up here mentally but our forms do reflect that, so it’s disconcerting for me to even think about human aging.

15. If you could call what you are something other than MPD/DID, natural Plural or Multiple what other term might you use? Or do you like one of the existing ones? Do you call yourselves a system?

(Jewel) Calling ourselves a ‘plural’ or ‘multiple’ system is a very new thing for us, actually. For years we just said we were a bunch of people living inside a limited form’s ‘headspace.’

(Laurie) But it’s like a freaking Tardis up here.

(Jewel) Haha, yeah. Honestly it feels like we’re just a multi-universal congregation that came together for a common goal centered around this one specific period of existence. And because of time and space constraints we all ended up in it in one way or another.

16. How do you all decide how much of yourselves is public? Do you tell everyone that you’re multiple? Are you more comfortable around other multiples than around singlets?

(Jewel) At the moment we are entirely ‘take it or leave it,’ at least online. We don’t hide any of this.

(Laurie) Physical reality is new though. Jewel has always had problems with it even on his own, let alone involving the rest of us.

(Jewel) If the topic ever comes up, though, I say it right out. No use hiding what we are.

17. How do you keep track of who is in your system?

(Laurie) We are still trying to sort that mess out.

(Jewel) People… wander. Multiversal central people walk in and out according to their own whims or responsibilities, walk-ins are rarely around at all, and headvoices have a great deal of headspace to keep track of regardless, with their various roles. So I might not see certain people for days, or weeks, but it’s not too hard to find them if I really need them.

(Laurie) I keep telling people they need to stick around central headspace as much as possible though.

(Jewel) True, but that’s not always doable.

18. Who are new acquaintances most likely to meet first?

(Laurie) Upstairs? Me. Downstairs? Jewel.

(Jewel) That’s a constant.

19. When did you all realize you were a group? Have there always been several people in your body since birth?

(Jewel) Julie was ‘formed’ when I was about 7, but I had many walk-ins even before her. Even my group with Ryman, Markus, and Chaos in 2003 wasn’t a ‘system’ because we all had our own lives to attend to outside of our group. Having a system wasn’t even a concern until Laurie showed up in 2006. Then it was inevitable. There was no reason for a stable, set group before that; people just came and went as they liked.

(Laurie) Now we’ve all got jobs and stuff.

(Jewel) Exactly. Now this is business, and it’s an awesome business at that!

20. Did something “cause” your multiplicity? Do you believe in the medical model at all, for yourself or others?

(Jewel) We’ve tried applying the medical model before, it does not work.

(Laurie) I’ve confused the heck out of quite a few therapists.

(Jewel) Which is why I don’t bring you up anymore unless asked, love.

21. Tell me about your ideas on integration and separateness. How does it affect your worldview?

(Jewel) We… tried reintegration back around 2008. A friend suggested we re-integrate Lynne and Nat due to a misunderstanding of the situation on all our parts. It… didn’t go well. Both of them resurrected a few months later, but they were strikingly unstable. Nat died twice after that, and remained dead from 2009 to 2011 until ze resurrected in a completely new form thanks to a change in her manifestation circumstances. I know Nat is affected by hir multiple deaths but ze still views hir life as one concrete thing, even with the huge breaks and form changes. Lynne was really shaken up over the whole situation but she’s doing okay now.

(Laurie) Separateness is a weird concept for us, I think.

(Jewel) Yeah. The headvoices and I all know that we’re intrinsically connected at some level regardless. As for the walk-ins that doesn’t affect them.

(Laurie) And Chaos is a whole ‘nother story, wink nudge cough.

(Jewel) Ssh, that wasn’t the question!

22. Does anyone in your household/group lose time?

(Laurie) Never did. Even when I’m fronting Jewel is still roughly aware of it, more or less.

(Jewel) Sometimes it’s even clearer watching you, oddly enough.

23. Does your system as a whole deal with other kinds of neuroatypicality? Do individuals?

(Jewel) I have no idea what that word means.

(Laurie) I think it means mental health concerns or the like. You’re allegedly an aspie, if that’s the case.

(Jewel) True. I’ve gotten some interesting diagnoses in the past in any case. But I’m the only one of us who’s been looked at, at all, and I see no real reason to delve into that as we all work just fine together up here.

24. How are your memories stored (each person has her or his own/different people store different types/some are personal and some are shared by everyone/other/combination)? Who has access to memories (only the person there/only certain people/anyone they affected/need to know basis)?

(Jewel) Memories are entirely personal--

(Laurie) Unless it’s you and Chaos again.

(Jewel) Laurie, that’s not the question.

(Laurie) Still a valid answer.

25. Is anyone’s identity tied to the body? How do people whose self-identification does not match the body deal with it? Does anyone in your group use the body’s birth certificate name?

(Jewel) Haha, that’s a big problem for me, as I’m the fronter! None of us self-identify with this thing. And it’s hard to deal with some days.

(Laurie) Most days, lately.

(Jewel) I just keep reminding myself that it isn’t me and it at least helps all of us get around. So that’s cool.

26. Do you have a group name? How did you get it?

(Jewel) I’ve started calling us the ‘Lightraye System’ in reference to my assigned surname, which is a whole other topic in itself. I use it more as a general descriptive term concerning our core existences here, branching out from my central worlds and experiences. That’s really abstract, I know, but it works.

27. How are relationships handled in your group? Do you have in-system relationships? Out-of-system relationships? Is the body functionally asexual, monogamous, polyamorous or something else?

(Laurie) Ahahahaha.

(Jewel) Heh, yeah, we’re weird. We have purely in-system relationships, as the body is off-limits and not of our concern. I wouldn’t even know how to handle an outside relationship at this point! I’m so used to the reality warping and nonphysical stuff.

(Laurie) You’re spiritually bound to a liquid alien and your kid is a sharkbug. And let’s not even go into the improbability of hir existence.

(Jewel) Rainbow interspecies ectobiological spirit kids ftw. Oh yeah, and we’re almost all genderfreaks, amusingly enough. You and I are neutrois, Nat is bigender, I don’t even know what Jo identifies as…

(Laurie) I think the only ‘normal’ gendered people up here are Lynne, Julie, and Leon.

(Jewel) Julie isn’t exclusively female. I know that from experience, sadly.

(Laurie) We won’t talk about that. Speaking of we’re almost all inherently asexual too because once again, freakin’ weird biology. Or lack thereof, notably.


(Jewel) Which allows for some incredible shenanigans. I love it so much.

(Laurie) You would. And on that note, 'polyamory' is not a problem up here.

(Jewel) I think everyone besides our core group is completely uninterested in relationships. That seems to be what our core hinges on, is connections of that sort, now that I think about it.

(Laurie) Makes a heck of a lot of sense, actually.

28. Do you celebrate any birthdays? The body’s? Individuals’?

(Jewel) We all have our own birthdays, or manifestation-days, or whatever, sometimes even a few of those…

(Laurie) Age is freakin’ weird, we don’t really celebrate that concept. But it’s always nice to realize that hey, I survived for another year, that’s pretty great.

29. Any advice for someone who is trying to figure out if they’re multiple, or for a new multiple just getting to know their system?

(Jewel) Don’t force yourselves to fit anyone else’s expectations or ideas. Find out what works for
you, and realize your own truths, and live by those!

(Laurie) Don’t label things either. That causes problems.

(Jewel) It does. Anyway I have no idea how to help people trying to figure out if they’re multiple or not, because I just stumbled across the term myself and I’m just using it because hey, it works well enough, right?

(Laurie) Exactly. That’s what I mean about labeling. If you go judging yourselves by everyone else’s standards, or trying to live up to them, you can get into some seriously deep trouble, to say the absolute least.

(Jewel) Just let things happen as they happen. Don’t force things, don’t rush things, just roll with it. Take time to communicate and understand each other!

(Laurie) I think that’s a good enough note to close this up on.

(Jewel) It is. So that’s our survey, hope you guys enjoyed it, see you around.