We’ve been meaning to post something here for ages, but we decided we’ll finally take some time and say hello. So, hey world, we’re the Riders and Racers system. You can call us . We’re a 20 year old transmasc/queer and neurodivergent plural system (basically multiple people sharing the same brain, most commonly known through DID, but not always), and we grew up with an alcoholic mum until she died in October 2021 thanks to a heart failure caused by her addiction.

It’s hard to know where to begin… but the biggest way our mum impacted us was in hypervigilance, feeling responsible for everyone and everything around us, and emotional suppression. We were constantly anxious about mum being sick again, and when she’d pick us up from school and we smelt that… smell of white wine and sweat, we knew we had to be on our guard again. What went through our head, time and time again was… until Dad gets home from work, we’re alone and have to make sure we don’t anger her (hiding our panic, being quiet and ‘good’), and watch over both her and us to keep us safe, because there’s always a chance she’ll fall or something and we’ll have to deal with it. We were always in some form forced to be an adult, constantly anxious and trying to keep everything together and going well, because if we didn’t, things would go wrong and we’d blame ourselves for ‘not being good enough’ or not ‘doing enough’ about a situation that we can’t control. That last part eventually turned into compulsive checking of news and endless worrying, preparing for the absolute worst that could happen, to try and both prevent it from happening, and to be ready if it did. There was always that chance us or those we love would be hurt, and it felt like it would be our fault if it happens. We had to save everyone, including ourselves, and we couldn’t be scared, or angry, or hurt.

We suppressed our anger at mum for ages, because it wasn’t safe to. Even with Dad, he was also hiding it too: he told us a few times to be careful who we told about it, as he didn’t want us taken into care and making things worse. Keep the lie up of a normal family… and never have any of your needs properly taken into care, and never be heard for fear of retribution by mum, even if it was a hypothetical. It still feels strange to this day being taken care of by others, and we’re still learning how to talk about our identity (being queer, neurodivergent and plural) and our emotions with Dad. He’s only recently accepted he has PTSD and was appeasing mum’s addiction, as he always thought that when she’d get better it would be the last time… he wouldn’t accept there was no point.

We don’t know what caused mum’s addiction. She had trauma she refused to unpack, despite getting therapy. She, somewhere, had a good heart. She loved us and was always proud of us, when she was able to express it. Other times, it came out as guilt, such as buying us gifts/being a bit more leniant on us then Dad was. We’re only learning to accept that now… and it hurts to realise that even the good things we saw in her at the time were marred by her sickness and her inability to change. It was denial that destroyed her heart, and her refusal to do anything lasting about it. She tried, but she would always give in. We’ll never know why, now she’s been gone for almost 4 years.

To be honest, we don’t really know what word to put to all of this. It’s abuse and emotional neglect mixed together, and it’s an awful, awful mixture to try and deal with. We… wanted to ask if anyone else has been through similar. How do you cope with hypervigilance and feeling like you have to save everyone? How do you start overcoming the fear that you will be the same? It’s taken us until this summer to be able to start drinking, and there’s still a fear that we’ll end up like her now, that we’ll someday not be responsible and make our fight to break this cycle and heal all for nothing. How do you start letting yourself feel things and know that… emotions are not a bad thing? How do you start feeling understood? How do we find our place in this world without a mum to guide us?

It’s complicated and weird and messy. But we’re here, all of us. Many of us system members are originally from our special interests: Kamen Rider (superhero J-drama series) and Formula 1 amongst other racing series, and other shows too. That’s where our system name comes from! Because when your outerworld is constantly unsafe, and you’ve got to hide to survive, you’ll look for ways to understand being a child of trauma, being undiagnosed autistic, and not knowing you’re queer anywhere… and it was these shows that became us, and our lives. (The system term for this is introjection, and the members from these sources are called fictives or factives respectively.) That’s why we are who we are. Many of us are determined, passionate and emotional heroes fighting to break family cycles linked to where our powers come from back in our source medias… and that’s who we are. Now, it’s about trying to let ourselves be people, and live… and not have to save the world every time something goes wrong. We do that, of course, we’re Riders etc! But… we also deserve joy, love and peace, just as anyone else on this earth. It’s a long journey to get there… but we’ve all been through this before, and we’re all here together to do exactly that: to make a life where we can all be at peace.