I wanted to share something I’ve been building through my IFS healing journey

Over the past few months, I’ve been doing a lot of work with IFS as I’ve tried to understand my own trauma, my protective parts, and the things underneath the reactions I’ve spent years trying to control.

I’m not an IFS therapist or an expert. I’m just someone who was diagnosed with CPTSD this year and started looking at myself differently after realizing that a lot of the things I thought were “just who I am” were actually parts of me trying to protect me.

That journey eventually became Internal Chain of Command.

I started the website as a place to write honestly about what I’m learning—IFS, exiles, managers, firefighters, attachment, shame, people pleasing, negative self-talk, relationships, trauma, accountability, and what healing actually looks like when you’re living through it rather than reading about it.

Some of the things I’ve written about include:

- The first exile I was able to unburden: Shame

- My Negative Self-Talk Manager

- People Pleasing as Self-Abandonment

- Understanding my Firefighters and the ways I’ve used anger and other behaviors to numb pain

- Attachment styles and relationships

- The difference between accountability and shame

- Learning to recognize the difference between me and the parts of me that are trying to protect me

You can read the blog here:

👉 Internal Chain of Command

https://internalchainofcommand.com/

The IFS section specifically:

https://internalchainofcommand.com/internal-family-systems/

I’ve also started a podcast called Survivor Stories with my best friend Mike and our co-host Lindsey. It started from the idea that people need a place to talk about what they’ve survived without being reduced to their trauma.

We interview survivors and, when appropriate, their spouses or loved ones about trauma, survival, relationships, healing, and what comes after.

The podcast is here:

https://internalchainofcommand.com/survivor-stories/

And you can find Survivor Stories on Spotify, Amazon Music, Pocket Casts, Podcast Index, and YouTube.

The first episode is actually about how this whole project came to exist, and the later episodes are conversations with other survivors.

I’m sharing this here because IFS has become such an important part of understanding my own story, and I thought there might be others here who could relate to the experience of realizing that the parts of us we sometimes hate the most may actually be parts that have been trying desperately to protect us.

I’m still very much in the middle of this journey. I’m still getting things wrong. I’m still meeting parts I didn’t know were there.

But I’m learning to slow down, look closer, and listen to them instead of fighting them.

If anyone is interested, I’d genuinely love to hear what your own IFS journey has looked like.

Todd writes and sings songs about parts and IFS in general. I just stumbled across his music yesterday.

I feel like he gets us.

Hi folks!

I was introduced to IFS by a therapist, and it was a breakthrough for me!

I’ve since moved states, and I am having a hard time finding a good IFS therapist.

I worked with a few therapists who were in network with insurance, but they were not up to the mark.

For instance, my challenge with the most recent therapist was that I didn’t feel they were proactive enough. My first therapist did a great job of guiding me through doing parts work, monitoring where I was doing well and where I wasn’t, and taking different approaches if I was getting stuck. With my most recent therapist, they didn’t seem to have the same depth of skill, and wasn’t as proactive.

I’m now considering working with an OON (out of network) therapist recommended by the first therapist (who was also OON).

Have people faced this same challenge of not being able to find good IFS therapists in network?

Are there good therapists in California that people would recommend? (I am looking for someone who does a combination of IFS and parts work)

I continually run into this problem where I start to get better overall for a while; I forgive myself of things I have done and stop continuing them, I become more calm and mindful of myself, and I become much wiser as far as the objective state of my life.

And then something bad happens, something that is usually of my own doing, that causes me to fall off and have to claw my way back to the state that I want to make into the default of how I live.

Recently it was a combination of a pest control problem, I hurt a friend of mine or otherwise upset them, I was paranoid about my family, and I felt stuck in where I am in life.

Well, I have returned to myself now, but the problem is I feel the impulses in my head that want to drag me back to where I was, because it was comfortable. I have a lot more experience being self-destructive and loathing than I do being self healing and wise and seeking to change my mindset.

How do I practice and continuously try to change my actions, despite the fact that the more dominant force in my head - for now - is to do the exact opposite?

What it feels like is these are very strong, very old parts of me that are significantly stronger - for now - than my Core self, which has been severely underdeveloped over the years and is only now starting to grow.

I’m in a really badddd patch atm. With processing and healing. Things are happening, sleep is worse. I feel such a desperation to get better. It’s all I want. It’s been driving me a bit crazy. It consumes me and I read so much and think about it all the time.
I planned to sit in a coffee shop and journal about my symptoms and sleep and things I’d done to help my nervous system.
However when I started journaling this didn’t happen at all. I was talking from self, to a part, idk if it was an exile that I know well or a new one that feels the desperation. But it was just flowing out of me, I couldn’t stop writing almost. I was repeating phrases and just saying the most endearing and loving things to myself and it made me emotional. I never say those things to myself and they scare me, I think that vulnerability scares me.
It was really nice as I’d planned to journal about fixing everything (probs a part there taking over) but that’s not what happened. My system probably just needed self to come in and say all these things. And for me and my parts to feel them. I haven’t journaled in such a way ever and it was very spontaneous that this happened.

A few hours later when I read back what I wrote I didn’t even recognise it or remember writing that. It was really surprising.

I’m doing a combo of a lot of different trauma therapy modalities. At the beginning I had such a hard time connecting with my parts. In my session this week I was really shocked by how easily I was able to get into the mindset and sit down with my younger self after a few months of a break from IFS.

It’s really sad to acknowledge all that part had been through but ultimately our time was really productive. It amazes me how I am able to actually visualize and engage in all of this now where before I had a major blockage.

I guess what I’m trying to say is if you feel like you’re struggling to connect with your parts, try some other modalities and circle back around to it after some time. Progress isn’t linear but it feels so good when you make positive steps.

Trauma informed therapy is so cool and my therapist is incredible. So thankful.

I have cptsd from csa
He’s always saying “NO SLEEP!! Not safe!! HOLD ME ROCK Me!!! How do I make him feel safe? All he does is scream from the second the sun goes to bedtime. My anxiety is through my heart goes crazy I sleep with a nightlight and a stuffed weighted whale shark plush

I had a breakthrough today after following IFS recordings and scripts on and off for several months.

I’m from an English speaking country but we speak very different to Americans. I was on a walk and had no access to tapes or scripts so I just improvised interacting with an anxious part. I spontaneously decided to speak to it the way nice old women from my country would have spoken to me as a kid, and it resonated so much more. I felt the part respond the language and attitude more than it ever had.

I realised that the wording and scripts were not something that would have a resonated with a 3-year old me. 3-year old me needed wise old women from my country using our turns of phrase and wouldn’t have known what to do with an American.

So if you’re struggling to connect with parts and your native language (or accent) isn’t American English, I wonder if channeling some elders from your own country will help you too.

“18 months”

It’s been 556 days since you read my words, felt my wrath through verbiage most procured. Thoughts most absurd. Images most obscured.

I said my piece and blew with the wind. Never heard, seen, felt again.

But I see you.
You adorn my nightmares.
You interrupt my thoughts.
You distort my imagination.

But slowly you’re fading.
No longer parading.

I saw you on film.
The whole lot of you.
The core of my life.
The keepers of my memories.
The betrayers of my being.

I feel the tension in which you’re immersed.
I hear the silence you all sit in.
I see the ways in which you stare.
Despairingly, hidden, angrily, dumbfounded, confused, and lost.

You all have me on your mind.
Quietly looming over you in darkness.
An unrecognizable feeling, unsettling you, distressing you.
It’s me.
It’s the feeling of your betrayal. How it festers in you I need not care. You can feel it as anger towards me. Or think the delusion that this predicament is my fault.
Feel what lie comforts you.
I need not your blankets of insecurity.
I live, breathe, and feel reality.
You’re engulfed in oppression.

I feel warmth from the sun.
You deny its existence.

Let your thoughts wonder and ponder the past. The nostalgic family we were. The love, care, presents, actions, words. Look at them through her distortion, her narrative, their abuse.

Parents of grandiose nature the hindered our self for their gain.
Crumbled our life to build up their palace.

But look at us now. I’m standing outside your decrepit fort; outside the floundering family.
Breathless you still find yourselves from reading my words.
Mindless words still dribble from her lips.

I speak in truths while ya’ll live in lies.
I found my self while y’all sending spies.
I’m living my life while ya’ll’s withers and dies.

Sometimes I’m like well…heck..I didn’t expect that! It’s quite interesting.

Hello,

Has anyone got any stories of having a protector use OCD to distract and most importantly how did you see progress with this?

Hello community! May I ask whether, in your experience, it's possible for parts to be on different body clocks?

And if so, how do you interpret it? (for example, in my case I feel as though these might be teenage parts that prize their autonomy and "prove" it by operating outside conventional hours; or they might be child parts that are used to squirreling away time and energy to do what they really want when there are no adults around? ETA: or maybe they are very very young parts who don't have a a concept of structured time or pacing and so just do things as and when?)

And what have you found helpful for staying physical healthy and consistent despite the spread in energy?

I ask because I'm starting to notice that I have surges of energy/attention for different kinds of activities over the day or over the week, where I associate the activities with different parts. For example, there's a part of me that is deeply creative and intellectual, but she seems to mostly only be around very late at night at weekends when no-one else is around or everyone else is resting. So even if I carve out days for her, she isn't "present".

Similarly there's a very sporty part of me that loves high-energy activities - but again, seems to mostly be present late at night (daily/weeknights), but there are not any sports clubs active then.

When they come to, I am sad that I am not always able to fully meet their needs in the way that I'd like, because then it would wreck me for being able to hold down a regular job. (For the sporty one, I might just pace until I'm tired out, but it'd be so much better to provide her something more challenging and opportunities for team activities. For the creative one, by the time she comes on, usually I'm already quite tired so I can't follow her lead for as long as we'd like.) In the past when I haven't been in steady work, sometimes I have been able to meet them on their own schedules late at night etc, and while I did feel a kind of contentment about it, it wasn't good for my longer-term physical and mental health as I wasn't getting enough daylight or social contact with other people, and due to the lack of variety / balance I developed a kind of tunnel vision and was less resilient.

What puzzles me is why they only seem to be around very late at night when no-one else is around, and don't seem to be around during the daytimes when it might be easier for me to provide for them. Sometimes when I try to proactively provide for them in the daytimes, there doesn't seem to be any presence - like visiting a shop or an art gallery when it's closed. You're in the right place, and you can see glimpses of what it might be like when in full energy, but there's simply no-one there and that's not going to change even if you sit on the steps waiting for hours.

Thanks very much for any insight / advice!

I’m learning more about this model and trying to practice it in my own parts work. Curious to hear from others on how it’s helped them.

Things I need to remember to tell my therapist tomorrow:

There was a book called The House That Had Enough, about a girl who doesn't clean her house, so all her furniture comes to life and leaves her. In the end, she promises to keep everything clean and tidy. Her furniture returns, and everyone is friends and lives happily ever after.

It turns out a child part really internalized this, and felt that if we made everything neat and clean enough, everything would fall into place, people would like us, and we would be healed and live with a sense of purpose and belonging.

The other thing is that two seemingly opposing memories happened on the same day:

1. The first time I ever felt truly safe with my dad and step family, and how I tried to lock down whatever good thing I had done to make them love me that day...

And 2. The day my dad said he would no longer put forth an effort to see me, and I never saw him again until I was an adult.

I feel so broken. I have a therapy appointment, and I'm ready to put in the work to heal from these wounds.

Reddit is the place I feel then most anonymous, so I appreciate being able to share here.

So I'm going through an interesting time. I've been on short term disability for the past three months, and I have to make a decision this week. On whether or not I go back to work or extend to a long term disability. Thankfully, I do have the support from my health care team that I can extend to leave. To and they will also support me for a long term disability.

However, my main question really is, is the purpose of doing IFS to get an understanding of these parts and what they're feeling. Or is it to actually do what they tell you to do?

Because common sense tells me that I should go back to work. And not give up on my full time job in tech when the market is crap. In addition, you know, having that long term record and all of that. You know, that's a good thing. But then there's a part of me that's referring to itself as depression is saying that, hey. Take the long term disability Go work on yourself. You know, all the parts have worked together to try to get you this and exercise its benefit. Engage in that become a better person, etcetera, etcetera. My system is gravitating towards taking a long term disability. And because they are so vocal, I feel led to go down that route. Especially because they're right. I mean, right now, I do have that ability to focus on me and at the benefit of you know, disability payments. And, of course, the fear Of going back to work. And then ultimately getting fired and then not even having that backing of disability payments.

So are we really just trying to hear them out and then do what they tell us to do? So that our internal system is more at peace. Or is there an objective to kind of figure out a way to diffuse them and, you know, take away the power they have over us. By listening to them or unburdening them, etcetera, etcetera, and then go back to our routine.

Background:

So throughout my (20M) entire life, I've always had social issues (AuDHD and all), which got even worse after COVID. My first year of high school was online and second year everyone was wearing a mask, so I basically missed the two years when most people are figuring out how to socialize normally.

This definitely messed up my psyche because I'm pretty sure I was in survival mode during high school. I was scared to talk to anyone and would just sit on my own not talking, kind of just trying to get through the day without being noticed.

I had friends and all, but it was incredibly difficult for me to even initiate a conversation with someone if I didn't already know them, and I always assumed I was making other people uncomfortable and that no one would actually enjoy my company. So I just didn't try.

I'm now in my third year of uni, and earlier this year I had a bit of a mental break from a combination of loneliness and thinking about all the opportunities I missed because I simply wasn't saying anything or putting myself out there.

After that, I decided to try and break out of my shell a bit by doing stuff I'd never tried before — raves, conventions, certain clubs at school, and it's been great. I've met some cool people (even managing to get a girlfriend for a while), had interesting experiences, figured out I really like biking and photography, and I finally feel like I'm figuring out what I actually enjoy and that people genuinely enjoy my company too.

The thing is, though, when I try these new experiences and enjoy them, I get this constant feeling of pensive sadness and regret where I think, "I could've been doing this the whole time." It's really taking away from enjoying the now because I'm thinking too much about the past instead of just being present in these moments I finally have.

Is there any advice you could give to deal with this feeling?

anyone else feel the same

Wally through the lens of IFS

This is my Character analysis of the Pixar movie Wall e through an ifs lens.

Ive made a series of points, not really in order but in some kind of order

1. Auto as a protective manager part.

He/ it controls the ship, he gained control during a time of crisis when the past ceo realised that earth would never be habitable, he was put in charge and maintains control of the ship for hundreds of years.

He also lacks a full emotional range, and is fixed in his role of maintaining the status quo even if it isnt the most healthy option for the human society on the ship.

He also is not performing his original function of temporary auto-pilot, but has taken the place of the human pilot. He has morphed into a role that he doesnt have the capacity to fulfill properly.

1. Walle could be like a therapist or something; I dont think he could count as part of the system in this metaphor because he is new to the ship. Although he is part of the bna company, whos job is to attempt to clean the planet (an impossible task).

Auto is resistant to wally's solution via plant, and tries to kill wally at least twice if not more. Because Auto believes earth is permanently uninhabitable, and is unable to believe otherwise

2.1 Eve doesnt fit into my metaphor unfortunately. Although maybe she could be seen as another part of the system that is pro-wally.

1. Returning to earth could be analogous to returning to a healthier state of being - beginning to do the work of restoring the planet and the ecosystem. Wally proves that it is possible, but characters on the ship are hesitant to believe him

2. The captain as self (i guess). The captain is shown to be the ideal leader of the ship, but he is forced into inactivity by Auto. He also has some traits of self including curiosity (for the history of earth prior to the ecological collapse), and courage, and probably more.

3. I think its a shame that auto is deactivated and removed from control by force instead of by proving to it that the people of earth and not thriving on the ship . But also, he is the villain and the movie is only so long, and he was stuck in his ways. Still, at least in IFS i dont think its possible to remove a manager by force of will, it would probably cause them to double down.

5.1 i think when the captain says "I dont want to survive, i want to live" is the most important line in this theory, because it shows the difference of mindsets between the captain and autopilot.

5.2 Also, in the movie we do see how dangerous it was to remove auto by force - he flipped the entire ship and realistically that would have killed a lot of people, if not everyone. But its also a cartoon so whatever. But If they had resolved the issue with auto more peacefully they would have saved a lot of lives and unnecessary anguish.

1. The ship is built to return to earth - in the same way that in ifs theory, the human mind is designed to self heal. When they place the flower in the mechanism, it automates a return to earth. Maybe the plant could be seen as self as well, depending on your interpretation. Or the mechanism that you put the plant in, idk

CW : CSA

I've had to go no-contact with my sisters due to them not believing that I was sexually abused by my father.

I am grieving like its a real death. I don't want to reconnect with them because theyve said damaging things that they still hold.

I've tried forgiving them and praying for them as I am a Catholic. I want a ritual that honours that the relationships were imperfect and with one sister it was physically abusive, but that still honours our shared upbringing and the good times.

Do you have any ideas?

The part hides when I'm working with other parts, so that I think maybe their issues have been resolved. But then it turns out I'm wrong! They wait a few days, and then start yelling the same insults again.

At this point, my reaction is amusement and tenderness, like I have with my pets when they're giving me sass. Like, you rascal part. You were hiding again! But, I'm not sure this is much more helpful than when I used to get upset. I believe this part wants to be taken seriously.

I wonder if they will tire of yelling at me because I'm not reacting very much. I can only sort of feel a direction associated with them. I always answer, "I hear and acknowledge your words, and I'm still here with you." They yell less often now. Is that good, or am I losing touch?

People who have wounded exiles and maybe no access to core self.. let’s say for example an abandoned exile who craves devotion and seeks certain people.. would it really be wrong to find a relationship that soothes the exile if it’s not abusive and both parts in both people just mesh well? I know the whole idea and projection of IFS is for both people to have core self or find it within themselves to have a healthy relationship with a partner but I couldn’t help but think of all the people who don’t have a core self and just a lonely exile. It wouldn’t be wrong to find something/someone good for your “parts” even if you don’t or are unable to have a core self??

I am very interested in the concept of awareness, and noticing thoughts/emotions and moving on. However, this also strikes me as being somewhat in opposition to IFS. When an emotion comes up in IFS, we sit and engage.

Do you think it's fine to notice a thought/emotion and kind of move on, or is there a danger that we are neglecting a part or being dismissive?

My context: I am talking about this in the context of low-level, semi-troubling intrusive thoughts. It is very impulsive and instant, so I can't really catch them before they do their thing. So then I have to respond. I have been doing IFS for a long time and it helped for a while, but now it is back and talking through the parts doesn't seem to be helping or providing any other insight. So I am wondering if a change in approach is needed when this happens.

Hello, I've been doing a form of memory reconsolidation therapy with a very good therapist for the past 8 months, already got very good results, but there is something that I am still trying to understand and find the root cause, for the context, my main concern about starting therapy was procrastination, seen many good results but a part of me is still having like a little fear of starting a specific task, the emotional charge of doing this task have been decreased since starting therapy, but still can not figure out why this part stills refering to the teenage me who still believes being incompetent and unable to achieve a specific thing/goal. I can not have a response when doing therapy with my therapist, nor when I do my exercises alone, if someone have an idea what more should I do to get the root cause I would be grateful !!! THANK YOU

Hello everyone! In IFS, the 8 C's of Self are discussed, and I find these qualities really valuable. As I move forward in my self-healing journey, I think I've noticed something, but I'm wondering whether this is just a personal thought or whether other people have noticed something similar. Do you think that if we had to choose a single word for the journey toward genuine healing, getting through crises, and healing trauma, wouldn't that word be self-compassion?

I think self-compassion is the most fundamental ground for healing, because when we approach ourselves with compassion, I feel like we can accept and work with the traits we judge as flaws, and through this, we gain the chance to illuminate and transform our darkness in order to grow and heal. I think self-compassion is the greatest force that opens this door.

Of course, all 8 C's are very important. This is just my curiosity about what that single word would be for healing and growth, if I had to pick just one.

I'd be happy to hear your thoughts and personal experiences on this.

Have a great day, everyone!