# 100% recovered



## spamdubs

Around this time last year I had depersonalization full blast. It started when I smoked weed and had a panic attack. For months I was in this constant state of not feeling real, not feeling emotion, and just not enjoying anything. I read just about everything on dp/dr that I could find as I'm sure many of you have. I heard people tell me that it would never get better, and that you just have to learn to cope with it which scared the hell out of me and made dp that much worse. For the majority of the time that I had dp it did feel like I would never get better, and that I would never feel normal and happy again. The truth of the matter is that dp/dr DOES GET BETTER! and not just better, but 100% better. I remember people saying that they feel better but not 100% and that always bothered me soooo much because I just wanted to feel like my old self again, not 90% of my old self. I'm telling you that you will feel 100% better not 90%. I want everyone to know that this is not a life sentence and it will not last forever. This is temporary. My dp/dr lasted for almost a year and didn't start getting better until the last 4 months or so, and when I say getting better I mean very very slowly getting better. I still had anxiety about it, and still felt "weird" but I could tell that things were slowly getting better. I would always hop on the internet and check and see what the signs of getting better are and getting worried that my signs don't match up with everything on the internet. Everyone has their own slightly different symptoms and going on the internet and checking everything does not help and actually makes things worse. I think what really worked for me is stopping the obsessing over it. That may sound hard to do but just slow progression with this goes a long way. For starters not visiting forums, and looking things up is a huge step in the right direction, and I believe that a LARGE reason that people don't post many recovery stories on here is because they forget about it, which is also part of why they don't have dp/dr anymore. For me staying active in life as hard as it was was important. One of the biggest things that will help, and takes time to get good at is not worrying about how you feel all the time. Once you can start being calmer about the way you feel and not thinking about the way you feel this will slowly go away. This took me a while to get down. I remember people telling me this and thinking how the hell can I do that when I'm terrified? You can do it and it will take some time but you can and will get through this. If anyone has any other questions about recovery let me know in the comments and I will try to respond. I made this account today because I forgot about this site and remembered that when I recovered I wanted to make one of these to help people and let them know that recovery does happen and 100%.


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## sunjet

1. What were your thoughts when you had full DP

2. Do you had setback, relapses, returning self-pity that this is not working? How do you dealt with them

3. What were your sign of recovery, your first signs and how do you know you got your old self.

4. How much did it took for you to recover after you applied all your knowledge.

5. Do you had ups and downs? Or days when you felt worse than before trying to recover from DP?

6. How do you know it's 100, not 90%

Thanks


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## Wrecked373

Congrats I am now having a bad time for the pasted few days I have web awful found out I now have vitamin d deficancy and tht runs with cancer an I smoke so I looked at my throat and what do you know looks like cancer and my stool has been sandy color and of course bad thugs wit that too so I deff feel you when thugs get rough


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## spamdubs

1. What were your thoughts when you had full DP

When I had full DP I had a ton of scary thoughts. One of the most prominent and scary thoughts for me was that I was dreaming and things weren't real, followed by the thought that I would never recover and feel myself and happy again. Kinda weird but I also worried that when I did feel better I wouldn't be able to tell that I was better.

2. Do you had setback, relapses, returning self-pity that this is not working? How do you dealt with them

Yes I had quite a few setbacks. Getting over this isn't a straight road. I had many times when I would wake up feeling dp or throughout the day start getting dp when recovering and thinking that all was lost and that I wasn't getting any better. The truth of the matter is that you are recovering, and you can't get too down about the bad days, because they do happen when recovering. I wouldn't call them relapses though because I wouldn't relapse back to the first time I got dp, I kept my experience with dp on the bad days and tried my hardest to ignore and be calm when I started feeling dp. Giving the dp symptoms as little attention as possible is the best way to deal with the days that you feel worse than others. It might still be scary and make you anxious but focusing on other things and trying to get your mind off of the feelings will help a lot in the long run.

3. What were your sign of recovery, your first signs and how do you know you got your old self.

Some of the first signs of recovery for me were the days when I would wake up and forget about the dp/dr and just live my life. This wouldn't last long before the dp/dr would come back, but just small parts of my day where I could tell I wasn't thinking about it and worrying about it as much, even if it was for 5 minutes. I also noticed myself getting excited for things. I'm super into tricking which is kinda a mix between gymnastics and martial arts (check it out on youtube if you are unfamiliar), and I remember trying to keep tricking even when I felt horrible. I was at the gym and had been working on double backflips for a long time. That day I tried a double backflip on the spring floor, and when I landed it I felt genuinely happy. This goes for many other things as well such as video games where I would enjoy playing them, but just getting small parts of my feelings back. Another milestone for me happened around spring of this last year, and I just kinda stopped caring how I felt, and tried to stop giving dp/dr attention, and this had been something I was trying for a while, but got easier over time and around spring I could tell I was less scared. It was still scary for me and I had days where I felt like it wasn't working at all.

4. How much did it took for you to recover after you applied all your knowledge.

Kinda going off of the end of my last answer it took me a few months maybe before I could really notice that things were starting to look up after I started trying to pay less attention to my dp. I remember hearing people say that it doesn't matter how long it took someone else to recover because everyone recovers at their own pace and I would still ask people this same question. The truth is that people do really recover at their own pace and it is incredibly important that you don't compare your recovery to someone elses. If it takes you longer than someone else who cares? You will recover but at your own pace. What set the recovery in motion for me was applying the idea of not giving the dp attention, getting back into life, and trying to eat somewhat decently.

5. Do you had ups and downs? Or days when you felt worse than before trying to recover from DP?

There were a ridiculous amount of ups and downs. One day you might feel really good, and the next day might be really horrible. This happened all throughout the recovery process. Although when recovering the bad days become less bad, the good days become better, and eventually the good days start to outweigh the bad.

6. How do you know it's 100, not 90%

I know that I am 100% recovered because it is hard for me to even think of how dp/dr felt anymore and everything looks, feels, sounds, tastes, etc. just like it did before I got dp/dr. I know what 90% feels like. 90% was a large portion of my recovery probably a few months of recovery and it felt like I was still somewhat "out of it" and could tell that 100% was very close. Trust me when I say you will know what it feels like to be 100% better when you feel it for yourself. When you are in the midst of dp/dr getting out of it seems impossible and I know that it seems like you don't even remember what it feels like not to be dp all the time, but once it starts fading reality and the life you had before dp gets much more clear.

I hope this answers everything you were asking. If not let me know so I can perhaps clarify a few things.


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## StandAlone

100% on point man, good job. So happy you made a full recovery.. This week i made a big breakthrough myself after having it severe for over a year. I never thought I'd ever get better, i was close to ending it.. I didn't have a buddy in sight to talk to, it was all me. I made it through the darkest place anyone could ever go so anyone can. I dropped out of school when it got to be too much with the severe anxiety, took a year to jump back into school(tutoring) and that helped a ton. Structure is sooo important in this, keeping a routine with something even if its as small as going on walks and working out to start off.

Some people say well I had 2 good days and 1 bad day, I feel like im back to square 1. You are not back to square one, your way farther than you think you are. I didn't have good days for so long, once i finally had a good day I couldnt even enjoy it cause I was cause I worried about having another bad day. As time went on I learned that when a good day came, to enjoy it and appreciate it. I said, don't worry bout the future but just the now. This is key in recovery.

I might write my recovery story when I feel a bit better, Its only been about a few days of feeling good haha but it was an extreme turn around. Ive chilled with a lot of friends just this past week. And not just get by, i had fun with them and they had fun with me! My guess is im about 50%, but the difference of going from like 0% to 50% is tremendous. I really hope it keeps getting better but i believe it will.

Thank you for your post, It's helped me out a bit. I think this post is for the people really struggling though. Its hard to absorb stuff when your in that messed state, but you just gotta read it closely. Parts will stick with you then and you can use them to your advantage. There was times i was going through this and I didn't even believe in god. I was like who the fuck would put someone through this. But i believe he had a reason he sticks us all through this. Maybe our life before this wasn't great at all, and you have to hit rock bottom before you can change completely. Idk bout any of the recovers, but dont you feel stronger than ever and more mature. This experience made me believe in god more than anything, he got me through this and he will help you guys, just keep pushing, its all about pushing.


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## spamdubs

That is awesome dude! It gets a lot easier once you get that initial breakthrough too! Your whole response is great but the part about feeling like you are back to square 1 is very relatable. I would always get down on myself for feeling bad on certain days, and think that I hadn't made any progress. This couldn't be farther from the truth progress doesn't always feel like progress, but it is nonetheless. Also keeping a routine and a schedule is very important because it gives you other things to think about and keeps you going throughout the day. For me this was school, gymnastics, skateboarding and video games. Do the things you used to enjoy before dp.


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## sunjet

Thanks.

In your way of recovering did you felt like your body is extremely sensitised, it's like always ready for blowing up a panic attack? It's like your nerves are sensitised and your muscle even twitch a lot.

So you said you get excited more easily. But now when your defence mechanism is down, how you manage your anxiety levels or triggers, if you have any.

Did you felt more anxious about things, on your road to recovery, and just avoided it or the DP was going down altogether with anxiety, and you was feeling calmer and calmer?

Let me tell how I feel, and let me know if you had this.

Now, when I'm living my life and ignoring DP, I'm starting to see what my brain was hiding me for. I felt a good anxiety coming up, like I was so sensitised, I felt that if I will find a trigger, my head will blow up of panic. But now I'm accepting this anxiety also and just living my life. Didn't had a panic, but I feel more accurately the anxiety I had all this time.

Do you?


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## spamdubs

Yes that is exactly how I felt. Everything seemed like it could set off a panic attack and I was always worried. I also did experience random muscle twitching in my eye. When your defense mechanism is down the best way to manage anxiety levels and triggers is to try your best to ignore the feelings, and do something to get your mind off of it. I also never took any medication, only b complex, and occasionally fish oil, although I'm not sure either really helped at all, so I had to learn to control the feelings on my own, or at least try to make myself less anxious about the way I felt. On the road to recovery both my anxiety and dp seemed fairly strong for quite a while and when I had a good day both seemed to go down equally, and vice versa. After coming out of dp more and more I definitely felt anxiety much more than I did dp. The anxiety wasn't any worse than when I had dp, but it was still prominent after getting rid of dp for a while. The way you explain how you feel is the right way to go about the dp and anxiety. At least that is what I did as well. The thing that everyone needs to know about recovery is that it isn't a walk in the park. Some days it was incredibly hard and frustrating for me to accept that I didn't feel great, and just had to do my best to let it pass and try to relax. This happened all throughout the recovery even towards the end, but as I stated earlier the good days become better and the bad days get shorter, and less intense. I think that if you keep up with trying to live your life and give the dp as little attention as possible you will get out of it quicker than if you dwell on it all the time, and don't get me wrong with my recovery there were many times when I would dwell on it and think of how bad it was but just try your best to stop that kind of thinking as quick as you can. One of the first times I noticed that the dp left me was when I was at a new years party last year. The party was horrible and I ended up walking home lol, but on that walk home I realized I was so involved in everything else going on that I wasn't worried and stressing over the dp and it just left me. This was the first time I noticed that recovery was happening and was possible.


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## sunjet

How about caffeine. Did you avoided it?


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## spamdubs

Yes that is a big thing that I forgot to mention. Once I found out that caffeine can affect how you feel and make dp worse I completely cut it out. After a while I had caffeine every now and then, and now I don't go out of my way to avoid it but I still try to find alternatives.


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## Nico111

A big thank you for posting!

Can you confirm that when dp is gone away..you definitely know it? no doubt all is "real" again?

I guess i would feel stronger and happy like never to feel "normal" again? don't you?

Congrats by the way man


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## spamdubs

Yeah once you get out of it you know for certain everything is real again and even the thought of "are things real" seems like a silly question when you are out of it even though that question ruled my whole life when I did have it. Yes visual symptoms were my biggest issue. The not feeling real one was probably the biggest since everything looked different, and it almost seemed as though I had no peripheral vision at times. Idk it is hard to explain but yes I did have visual symptoms and those were the most difficult symptoms for me to accept and not worry about.


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## MSP93

Great post and very relatable.

Basically just chill and stop thinking about a "breakthrough" completely. I know it's fucking hard but you need to distract yourself with normal everyday things. There is no breakthrough, the fact that you are so desperately looking for one means you aren't going to get one. You just need to let it fade away over the course of a few months, not thinking about it and doing other things.

I don't know about you OP, but coming back to this board after getting better has allowed me to see the obvious circles that people are going round and round in that are stopping them from really recovering. When I was in the midst of it I had no idea, probably because I was making the same mistakes


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