Episode Summary

When an experience is too complicated, painful, or too early to have words…

In this episode, we’re joined by Corinne Li, founder of canDID Expressions, a nonprofit organization serving people living with trauma-based dissociation and provides them with opportunities to explore and share their experiences through writing and expressive arts.

Corinne shares how art first became a language for experiences she literally could not speak about—and how writing, poetry, color, movement, and other forms of expression can create pathways for communication when words aren’t there.

This conversation took a delightful turn into the little miracles that happen when you build and lean into community.

And in case you’re wondering, you do not need to be an artist.

As Corinne puts it: You don’t have to be creative. You just need to be curious.

⏱️ Timestamps

00:01 — Meet Corinne Li & canDID Expressions00:04 — When trauma has no words: art as another language00:08 — From one writing group to an international community00:13 — How compassion for someone else can become compassion for yourself00:16 — “But I’m not creative…”00:20 — A space where trauma is welcome—but doesn’t define you00:22 — Why community matters in healing00:24 — What actually happens in a canDID Expressions group?00:29 — Finding belonging—including for therapists with lived experience00:34 — Are peer groups for DID/OSDD actually harmful?00:36 — What peers can offer that therapy can’t00:39 — Going public with DID: authenticity, stigma & safety00:48 — When DID becomes more than pathology00:52 — “Does this ever get better?”00:53 — What Corinne wants clinicians to know

About canDID Expressions

canDID Expressions is a nonprofit community dedicated to fostering connection and expression for people living with trauma-based dissociation through writing and expressive arts.

Their virtual offerings include writing and poetry groups, classes, community opportunities, and more.

And importantly: canDID Expressions works hard to make its programming financially accessible. Scholarships are available, and they don’t want cost to keep someone from participating. If something interests you and finances are the barrier, reach out to them.

Resources

canDID Expressions Website: canDIDExpressions.org

canDID Expressions Offerings & Financial Accessibility

Healing My Parts Website: healingmyparts.org

Healing My Parts Substack: healingmyparts.substack.com

Instagram: @healingmyparts

Thank you for listening! 🩷🫶💜

Welcome to something new from Healing My Parts.

Our regular interview episodes aren’t going anywhere. This is something we’ll be sprinkling in between them: Two Systems Walk Into a Podcast… — casual conversations between two DID systems on opposite sides of the Atlantic who discovered an uncanny number of similarities, plenty of differences, and an endless supply of things to talk about.

Every couple of weeks, we’re going to take one of the very real topics that comes up in system life, toss a whole bunch of them into a hat, pull one out, and talk about wherever it takes us. No formal interview. No pretending we have the definitive answer. Just two systems chatting about figuring out system life.

For our first episode of the series, we’re talking about comparing and despairing.

Because when you’re trying to understand your own system, it’s incredibly easy to look at someone else’s experience and start asking:

Should we switch like that? Should we have an inner world? Why can’t we make a system map? Does this mean we’re not really plural?

In this conversation, we talk about:

* comparison, denial, and feeling like a fraud

* the pressure to “look like” other systems

* what changes when comparison becomes recognition

* inner worlds and system mapping

* why pushing yourself to fit someone else’s version of DID can backfire

* learning to trust what is actually happening inside your own system

No formal interview. No pretending we have the definitive answer.

Just two systems comparing notes about figuring out system life — with the occasional side-eye, bucket hat, and “oh my God, you too?” moment along the way. 😂

And sometimes the most helpful thing may be putting down the checklist and getting curious about the system you actually have.

⏱️ Timestamps

00:47 — Introducing Two Systems Walk Into a Podcast…04:53 — Compare & despair begins08:00 — Fraud fears and professional skepticism10:53 — When denial argues with itself 😂11:48 — The system trust fall15:00 — Comparison vs. recognition17:04 — Why talking with another system can feel different26:00 — What newly discovering systems are up against34:53 — “Do I need an inner world?”37:54 — The pressure to system map43:30 — Taking the pressure off

For more resources visit healingmyparts.orgHealing My Parts Substack@healingmyparts on Instagram

Thank you for listening! 🩷🫶💜

Many systems spend years trying to get parts to behave.Skye spent 36 years learning to love them instead.

In this conversation, we’re joined by Skylar Lyralen Kaye, award-winning writer, actor, slam poet, storyteller, and openly plural, nonbinary trans fae, whose memoir Bachelorx does something most books about plurality don’t dare: it hands the page directly to the inner people and lets them speak.

What unfolds is a funny, heartbreaking, and deeply human story of a newly separated 62-year-old getting on dating apps for the first time, navigating intimacy, rejection, and falling hard for someone when the system absolutely does not agree. But beneath the dating story is something many of us long to know: what it actually looks like when decades of inner work finally click into place.

Inside this conversation:

* What it actually costs a system to date — and what singlets fundamentally don’t understand about it

* MICAH: the protector who kept everyone alive, never got credit for the grades or the poems, and finally gets the page — and the all-caps

* 17 therapists, 4 who helped — and what those four actually did differently

* How Brainspotting took decades of healing over the finish line

* Why IFS both normalizes and sometimes minimizes plurality — and how Skye holds that tension

* What system responsibility really means when a part goes rogue

* The chapter where the whole system disagrees about falling in love — in real time, in multiple fonts

* What later-stage healing actually feels like — not symptom-free, not perfect, just known

And at the very end, what Skye wants every system to take away from this book:"The humble gratitude of what it's like to fall in love with yourselves."

⏱️ Timestamps00:01 — Meet Skye: out, plural, trans fae, just off the paddleboard02:06 — Why the book opens with being outed on a first date09:16 — MICAH sets some limits — and the little kids feel protected23:24 — Coming out as plural to a date — and choosing integrity over a perfect cover story40:19 — Kids FIGHTING: writing the chapter where the system isn't unanimous46:09 — Giving MICAH the page — and the all-caps49:40 — 17 therapists, 4 who helped — what made the difference57:59 — What healing looks like now versus what it looked like in crisis01:00:45 — A message to the inner people listening right now

Resources:

Skylar Lyralen Kaye Website: https://lyralenkaye.com/

Bachelorx

Skylar Lyralen Kaye Substack

Additional Resources

Healing My Parts Website

WORKSHOP👉 Building & Using Your Inner World: Practical Tools to Make It Work for YouIf you're looking for practical tools to strengthen communication, cooperation, and daily life inside your system, this Live 90-minute workshop is designed to help.📅 Wednesday, July 29 | 7:00 PM ET🎥 Recording included with registration.💜 $37For more info & to register: healingmyparts.org/workshop

Healing My Parts SubstackHealing My Parts Instagram

Thank you for listening 💜🫶🩷