Getting ZodIntersection left / right from instance

[CodeSmith32]

Background

Most types support mechanisms for getting the sub-types defined:

// objects have 'shape'
const type = z.object({
  foo: z.string(),
});
type.shape; // { foo: z.ZodString }

// arrays have 'element'
const arr = z.string().array();
arr.element; // z.ZodString

// unions have 'options'
const union = z.union([
  z.string(),
  z.number(),
]);
union.options; // [ z.ZodString, z.ZodNumber ]

// optional types have 'unwrap()'
const optional = z.string().optional();
optional.unwrap(); // z.ZodString

Question

If I create some ZodIntersection type, e.g.,

const type = z.object({
  foo: z.string(),
}).and({
  bar: z.string(),
});

how do I then extract the left / right sides from the resulting type object?

It appears I can use the _def property, as one could with any other type,

type._def.left; // z.ZodObject<{ foo: z.ZodString }>
type._def.right; // z.ZodObject<{ bar: z.ZodString }>

But is this safe or recommended?

It appears to be one of only a few types that don't allow actually getting the subtypes without drilling into _def. Another example is getting valueType out of a ZodSet.

(If this is normal, that's fine. It just struck me as odd.)