Does anyone on here suffer with dissociation?

[Phoenix]

I've suffered with dissociative episodes for years but they seem to be getting worse - has anyone found anything that helps at all? I keep finding myself suddenly making stupid unplanned impulsive suicide attempts or self harming in visible places which the 'normal' me would never do. It's like I become another person and I have no control over any of my actions during that time

 

[Bootleg Astolfo]

The only way i found to prevent myself from doing dumb dissociated stuff is to be heavily distracted by weird/dumb stuff. Spending 12 hours in a row building a giant inverted pyramid in minecraft or watching documentaries about old victorian candy won't fix anything, but at least during that time i'm not cutting my face or whatever.

 

[Phoenix]

The only way i found to prevent myself from doing dumb dissociated stuff is to be heavily distracted by weird/dumb stuff. Spending 12 hours in a row building a giant inverted pyramid in minecraft or watching documentaries about old victorian candy won't fix anything, but at least during that time i'm not cutting my face or whatever.

I wish I had the concentration skills to do that I can't focus on anything for more than 10 minutes at a time :(

 

[Bootleg Astolfo]

I wish I had the concentration skills to do that I can't focus on anything for more than 10 minutes at a time :(

That's ok, just watch addicting short videos for 10 hours straight instead.

 

[DoodleBug]

In short: yes. Hell..tl;dr is imminent.

3 weeks before 1st semester finals at the 2nd year of Uni I've experienced a period of absolute..."ungluing" from my senses. My depression was eating away my chunks long before that time. I've been already keen on dancing between extremes in anxiety and anhedonia, but suddenly it was neither. Ive fallen in-between the states, so to speak. Tinnitus took me over for some time and ive realized its not just the world's noise, but me hearing. Then the world started being stuck at both 20% and 100% volume at once all the time.

My hand wasn't real and nothing was right. My bff told me then, that I look like I'm constantly reliving deep ptsd in my eyes. I was super chill, but my eyes weren't there.

It had "passed" after 17 days. I can't recall when It started like Matthew Perry smoking weed in "Numb*". Despite of that, I can clearly recall when it stopped. I just kinda returned to deeply calm while cooking a delicious pasta dish. A random sunday. It wasn't truly over, though.

I've been inspecting the ongoing collapse in my system, my mental health is reaching a breaking point. The few past months I've been unning purely on impulses while fighting the fog. What I mean by that is that I've been only working, gaming and smoking an ounce of weed per month. I had a few internet friends but nothing else going on. Ive realized that there are holes in memory. Ever since I quit alcohol, Ive started experiencing deep derealization states that really helped me at work.

I was still pretty clumsy when getting into working again after a month long break between jobs. The beginnings were hard. I was fucking up easy shit at my dad's place, but then I was fully up to the task and now im the 2nd most efficient worker in my department at a corpo warehouse as a forklift driver...although the statistics are unfair to some others, lmao.

I've considered those states a sort of a defense mechanism of my psyche, but I haven't even realized I was phasing through a portal, but slower this time.

Ive continued with my life and did good for myself this year. Ive bought 2 fresh pair of kicks and an adidas outfit. I got my forklift license and I started learning the sign language, with...questionable discipline at first...but I was never really there. Ive been noticing scars and bruises on my hands 5-25 mins after they appear. When you're at work and a piece of marble somehow pierces through your gloves and cuts your hand, you kinda..dont...feel it? The burn is there, but the slice doesn't feels registered. Then you see some red and sigh...again, a typical day at work, yes.

It'll get a little bit dark here, sorry, trigger warning, ye...

When the symptoms truly collapsed, ive panicked. There were 3 days when theyve intensified and it was...while I was sober from weed...16hrs at max during that period, the longest break this month.

I started looking at razors dangerously and caught myself touching my almost 3 year old scars on the left arm while waiting for games in dead by daylight. Now Im doing it almost all the time. My depersonalization symptoms are growing at an alarming rate, and I gotta slow down and consider some moments before I fall or ctb on impulse. I dont want to cut again, but I just stopped...feeling? I do feel empathy, yet Im neither here nor there on the grounds of any true 3d presence of mind. Shits 2 seconds slower at the least, 15 minutes if youre alone sometimes...

The sudden overconsumption of weed starting at 28th of march this year was a reaction to what I've started to feel that time. Its fucking hard when you never feel as anything's...I dont mean alive, but...in the same realm? Am I a mage stuck in the fog? Is it why I dont trust anything, not a single smile. A simple conversation has always been dangerous, but now im kinda hopping through cameras in the rooms...

Ive just smoked my last blunt and am writing this paragraph. The stash shall be empty and I plan to use it sporadically in may. Surprisingly, weed doesnt destroy my energy, it brings me...down? Feeling stoned is when im at my most present. It is when I clean and do shit. Work life efficiency is just...masks...handling a fuckton of shitty people and chatting with the few real good ones. Its selling your fucking time and ruining my sleep schedule sometimes, but its still a "good" job...(he said as hes bleeding all over with a great thirst to cut again...)

So yeah... if anybody got to read this shit, then, uh, yeah, thanks. If anybody has derealization issues, I can relate and am sending hugs...if either of us will feel the touch, though. Makes it more manly, kek.

I will be signing to a therapist after I make my "mental health budget" in 2 weeks. I dont want to self-diagnose, but my depression is already fucked by the shrinks. My addiction therapist has been pretty ok for the most part, so...why not try. Ye...

 

[BandAddict]

Yes, I dissociate almost daily. Last year due to mental illness and malnutrition I was dissociated like 24/7 for a month or so. It was horrible. I didn't feel anything, I couldn't hold a conversation, and I usually just sat in one spot all day doing nothing and constantly forgetting where I was and what the fuck was going on.

Sometimes when it happens and I catch it early enough, I'll sit on the balcony for a while, because even if I keep coming in and out, at least it's more peaceful than "waking up" to a box.

One exercise that sometimes works for me is bringing awareness to the senses.
-5 things you can see
-4 things you can touch
-3 things you can hear
-2 things you can smell
-1 thing you can taste

There are other exercises like holding something warm or cold, depending on your preference.

Sometimes I find I'm more present in the moment when I do that. When the derealization/dissocation is extreme, well... I just kinda sit there like a zombie until it passes. Sometimes looking at my hands and shit like "woahh...... are these real/attached to me? Wtf?"

 

[Soulless Angel]

I don't think i have it as a disorder or what ever the term is, but this is something I feel a lot, where I am I suddenly don't know or realise, I get from a-b and dont recall the journey in between, I forget so easily, the worst though is nothing feeling right or real around me, its horrid, its happening daily more and more.

 

[Joplin]

I have dissociative disorder (ICD11 partial dissociative identity disorder) and was able to mostly recover. But its not why I'd CTB. I recommend dearly 2016 Steele et al. Treating Trauma Related Dissociation. On zlib you can get it as pdf. Much love to you

Hi! Was about to tell them of the book you recommended ;)

I'm new here too and I loved reading your other post on being new to the bus stop. :)

 

[Phoenix]

I'm not sure if it's a disorder or such needing a diagnosis. They put everything down to my BPD anyway. I feel like I have absolute no control of what I'm doing. at times I dissociate for long periods of time and realise after I've self harmed badly, made suicide attempts, done things I'd never normally be able to do and found myself somewhere and I've forgotten how I got there. As if I blacked out for a moment, which was scary as I was driving at the time.

 

[Journeytoletgo]

I can't feel my emotions anymore either the last time I could was in my teens. I don't feel alive and sociable. Can't hold conversations.

 

[albino_elk]

whoever got the strenght to read more than 2 sentences-congrats i have faith in you to recover

 

[TakeMeBack07]

Dissociation is the worst thing I've ever dealt with. You said it right, it is like you are a different person. I've dealt with periods of that throughout my life. The most recent one lasted 2 years. Looking back, the things I did and said are so unfamiliar and strange to me because I feel like they don't fit my character. I barely remember most things. Most of my life is blacked out.

 

[Angst Filled Fuck Up]

mhmm. Brain fog, dissociation, feeling light headed, exhausted, out of it. Just scrolling through the same shit on the computer or phone. Staring at the wall, feeling like a vegetable. Poor memory and concentration. This will be my 8th year.

 

[Gsvko]

Dissociation is the worst thing I've ever dealt with. You said it right, it is like you are a different person. I've dealt with periods of that throughout my life. The most recent one lasted 2 years. Looking back, the things I did and said are so unfamiliar and strange to me because I feel like they don't fit my character. I barely remember most things. Most of my life is blacked out.

Could I ask how are you rn with that? Mine's now almost 6 months and first time. I have no idea who tf I am and have zero breaks from it. Does one ever come back?

 

[dissociation_statio]

I'm in a similar spot. Therapy 3x a week and I barely even remember those sessions, let alone the in between.

 

[TakeMeBack07]

Could I ask how are you rn with that? Mine's now almost 6 months and first time. I have no idea who tf I am and have zero breaks from it. Does one ever come back?

I don't know much about recovering from dissociation. I've only recently been able to attach the term to my experiences because I had no idea what it was or what was happening to me... I thought it was 'normal', or something I should get over myself. Guess what my upbringing was like, haha.
Personal experience, it never truly goes away, but it can get easier over time until the next drop comes, and that drop is inevitable.

 

[Gsvko]

I don't know much about recovering from dissociation. I've only recently been able to attach the term to my experiences because I had no idea what it was or what was happening to me... I thought it was 'normal', or something I should get over myself. Guess what my upbringing was like, haha.
Personal experience, it never truly goes away, but it can get easier over time until the next drop comes, and that drop is inevitable.

Sounds about right ha. I also didn't get any official diagnosis, was hard having nobody understand me. I defo didn't think it was normal. Guess recovery depends, but I think mine'll not go away either. Sucks, ty. Thanks for the thread too, OP