How the little ones came to be

     As soon as I knew about Jessica I started speaking to her out loud or in my spirit and seemed to get a response that was not my imagination. I thought she might not be the only one. Once I addressed "Jessica and anyone else who may be there--" and when I did I saw a large space with seven or eight objects, maybe even twelve, distributed randomly around it as if on shelves at varying levels. At the sound of my voice, every object--for they were alive--raised its head. They were just white shapes, like the shmoos (actually "shmoon") from the old comic strip Li'l Abner, with a sphere for a head connected to a bigger sphere for the body. It was just a flash of vision, a milli-second.
     Another time I said, "I want all of you to know you are safe and loved." Again, at my voice, every head lifted suddenly and silently--but I felt the beginnings of hope in their postures.
     So, I thought, we may be as many as a dozen.

     On another occasion, when I was praying to understand the relationships between my little ones, I saw this in my mind's eye as if it were happening at that moment:
     I was very small, maybe one or two years old. I was in bed between Mommy and Daddy. Then Mommy left (I now believe she went downstairs to fix breakfast or take my brothers to church and that this was a pattern) and Daddy kept me in bed and did things to me.
     That's when Melissa came into existence. She split off from the original me. In my mind's eye, I saw the infant me still lying with Daddy--or lying where he had been--but from that me appeared a new self, a few years older, whom I now saw in the foreground sitting at the end of the bed, doubled over with shame. Almost immediately, from this second one, two others split off simultaneously and in opposite directions. Jenny shot off to the left and became a nun so she could be pure, undefiled, and untouchable. Jess flew off to the right and became a boy, because Daddy was only attracted to little girls. So both of them found a way to be safe.
     Melissa ran into the closet and hid among the shoes.
     There were five parts of me in that vision. I don't know how I knew who each one was. I knew them but I don't know me. I don't know who the "I" is who watched this from across the bedroom and is reporting about it now. Am I an alter, too? A "primary presenter"? Do I have a name? I don't know where I came from or when. I feel as if I must have pre-existed the others. As far as I know, I'm part of the system but just as an objective observer.