# Existential OCD / hyper awarness / DPDR / awakening ?



## soupdejour (May 10, 2018)

hello everyone!

i'm a 30 year old girl from hungary and 2 years ago, i was diagnosed with depersonalisation and depression. i got medical treatment and i felt really whole and healthy again. until this january when one day, i started to feel that nothing is real. it was a horrible feeling so i started to search on the topic. i've found out that i may not have have depersonalisation but hyper awarness of existence or existential ocd. i've found a forum topic where someone wrote exactly what i'm experiencing.

'life itself, existing in general freaks me out. Being alive freaks me out. Im overly aware of my own existence and my consciousness... i look around and can barely even look at things because everything just seems so surreal and insane that we are here on this planet and that we are alive being able to perceive and interact with things. Its like I'm FEELING reality itself... reality itself scares me. How are we even IN reality.. I'm obsessing and obsessing over existential things to the point where i feel like i can't return to normal.. i feel like I've opened this window in my consciousness that cannot be closed. I just dont understand how we came from nothing and now we are here. Its like i just look around at reality and I'm terrified of it. I feel like an alien among people, how come people dont ever stop and think to themselves... what the hell are we doing here.. how am i able to do these things how am i IN a reality... i feel lost and i feel scared... but most of all i feel hopeless. I miss my old life so much I've became depressed and everything seems boring and pointless. *I question human anatomy constantly and how it all works* so i can't even connect with people on an emotional bases. I look at things i used to think looked beautiful and it doesnt anymore... its all just products of the universe and existence.. which I'm terrified and bored of.'

what i want to add is that in my 30 years i haven't think about how life works once, i don't have beliefs, i have always been a 'reflex person' and since these kind of thoughts started to appear it's like i was in a dream and now i woke up. i'm constantly searching for answers to existential questions which i learnt that cant be answered. this frightens me so much and without explanation i don't feel a whole person. i don't know if this important or not, but when i was 16 years old, i had a really bad trip (while using marijuana), i thought i will go crazy.

also, sometimes when i go to sleep and close my eyes i imagine the little parts of my body and start to think that how these connected and where am i in that body? it frightens me so much, that i cant even sleep. i don't want to do anything, because if i move or think an existential question always pops up concerning the activity (how can i do this, how my fingers move, where thoughts are coming from?). it is really frustrating and i think i will never have a 'normal' life again.

so what i did so far is i go to a psychologist (i dont feel any improvements yet) and i started to meditate (which i read that if someone is suffering from these kind of mental problems, it can be very harmful).

does anybody feel the same or have cured oneself ? i would really appreciate any help ! thanks !!

sorry if this is a bit messy, but i'm also trying to figure out what it is.


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## solus (Mar 20, 2018)

Hi soupdejour,

I went through the same thing several times, and was tormented with existential questions. All the examples you mention and quote in your post I have thought and experienced. I had sudden, random existential thoughts that in the worst instances caused panic attacks so bad I collapsed to my knees. I fully recovered every time. [Some relevant threads I posted in with advice: Spirituality ruined my life; Please help my mind come to a conclusion; Convince me free will is real]

You will absolutely feel normal again. Follow the core advice given by almost everyone who recovers, and you will soon be free of it! (For a start, see the Recovery Stories posts linked in my profile.)

Based on my own understanding and experience, I think what you call existential OCD and existential hyper-awareness are both symptoms of dp/dr, and cannot really be experienced except in such a peculiar and extreme state of dissociation. The dp/dr state is fascinating in the way it facilitates existential perceptions, and, more generally, feeling emotions about abstract and impersonal things (such as your anatomy and psychology). Here is a metaphor I used recently:



> When our emotions are dissociated/disconnected from our self and/or the world, the emotions are still there. But it's as if they've been locked up in a dark padded room in some corner of our mind where they can do no harm, dissociated from perception (including self-perception) and memories. We can usually still feel them, but they're free-floating, unshackled from real world experience, and follow our thoughts with total freedom. Our thoughts tend to gravitate strongly toward threats, and in this state the conceived threats are abstract and overwhelming. The emotions tend to be fear and anxiety, and the anxiety perpetuates DP.


By the way, meditation didn't work for me. Mindfulness can help with anxiety, but at the same time it can make you feel more dissociated (more detached/non-attached and like an observer). I think your "meditation" practice should be active emotional engagement with life. 



soupdejour said:


> hello everyone!
> 
> i'm a 30 year old girl from hungary and 2 years ago, i was diagnosed with depersonalisation and depression. i got medical treatment and i felt really whole and healthy again. until this january when one day, i started to feel that nothing is real. it was a horrible feeling so i started to search on the topic. i've found out that i may not have have depersonalisation but hyper awarness of existence or existential ocd. i've found a forum topic where someone wrote exactly what i'm experiencing.
> 
> ...


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## adamh123 (Dec 18, 2017)

I am in tears I am the same way I am so lost I am so sad. I don't think meditation is good because its asking u to focus on things that are foreign to us when we have this existential mindset. I don't know what help this is so horrible.. may peace save us god bless


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## just_liviu85 (Jul 1, 2016)

Me to for about 2 years in this hell can someone tell us can we forghet about this discovery because is strange to be human to exist in this reality is strange to see to hear is only in our brain man i need to forghet this afull info that anxiety gave me before dont notice is starnge to see to heard like now i see the afull truth about us that was unhidenn scuse bad english pace WE NEED SOMEONE THAT CAN HELP US IS CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY


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## magical (Nov 21, 2017)

Hello! Privatban tudsz irni?


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## soupdejour (May 10, 2018)

szia, sajnos nem tudok radirni es ha jol latom ezt mar majdnem egy eve irtad. en sajnos megint itt. ha meg te is, akkor irj itt es megadom az elerhetosegeimet !


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## Chintu (10 mo ago)

soupdejour said:


> hello everyone!
> 
> i'm a 30 year old girl from hungary and 2 years ago, i was diagnosed with depersonalisation and depression. i got medical treatment and i felt really whole and healthy again. until this january when one day, i started to feel that nothing is real. it was a horrible feeling so i started to search on the topic. i've found out that i may not have have depersonalisation but hyper awarness of existence or existential ocd. i've found a forum topic where someone wrote exactly what i'm experiencing.
> 
> ...


How are you now..can I contact you? Going through the same thing


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## Chintu (10 mo ago)

solus said:


> Hi soupdejour,
> 
> I went through the same thing several times, and was tormented with existential questions. All the examples you mention and quote in your post I have thought and experienced. I had sudden, random existential thoughts that in the worst instances caused panic attacks so bad I collapsed to my knees. I fully recovered every time. [Some relevant threads I posted in with advice: Spirituality ruined my life; Please help my mind come to a conclusion; Convince me free will is real]
> 
> ...


Can I contact you somewhere? Need help


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