| apparently normal part ( adj.) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Applies to | headmates |
| Coiner | Charles Samual Myers |
| Origin | Psychiatric Terms |
Apparently Normal Parts (ANPs) are the rational and present-oriented headmates that handle daily life. They can be in charge of caring for the body, getting work done, or dealing with certain situations.
With trauma, they typically exhibit avoidant behaviors, feelings of guilt and hollowness, and lack of identity. ANPs do not often hold severe trauma, or have some level of emotional detachment from it. They are also typically very dissociative.
Many systems rebuke this label for any number of reasons (including the "parts" terminology and the use of "normal"), and it should only be used for the purposes of self-identification, not the classification of others.
History
ANP, EP, and other ideas of Structural Dissociation come from Charles Samual Myers, a psychologist who worked with soldiers during World War One. He put the "shell shock" (now PTSD) into the scientific lexicon in the early 1900s and described it in the context of dissociation. Later, researchers Ellert Nijenhuis, Onno van der Hart, & Kathy Steele proposed the theory of Structural Dissociation in 2004 by incorporating Myers' terminology into more modern understandings of dissociation and child development.
Related Terms
ANPs, and their opposite, Emotional Parts or EPs, were presented and defined in the theory of Structural Dissociation as two classifications for alters or headmates. There are also mixed parts, but they are less common.
Typically, a system's host is an ANP, but that is not always the case.
Gallery
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ANP flag by neopronouns.
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Simplified ANP flag by neopronouns.
