# What is recovery?



## Devon (Oct 28, 2011)

I see a lot of posts from people recovering (or trying to) from DP and DR, but I am not totally clear on what it truly means to be DP/DR free. Personally, I've had DP most of my life, and cannot truly recall a time when I wasn't; hence it is hard for me at times to imagine what it truly is like to be recovered. Does time make sense? Do the memories of all the past, and the time spent in DP come back? Are you able to feel alive and live the moment? Do you care about everyday things again (i.e. the sound of raindrops, feel the breeze of the air in autumn, the warm pavement under your feet n the summer, etc.)? Is feeling truly enough to live a content life?

Perhaps we need some stories/description of what recovery is truly like (from those healed), and also what other people who are suffering from DP/DR think recovery is (as these 2 may not coincide).

For me, I cannot conceive of a "cure"... I simply accept that my reality is flawed (existential trap requiring greater purpose than I can conceive), and desire to change it such that in this new reality, recovery exists. So, essentially, my recovery is having a new mindset where I can escape from the mental anquish of the flawed world which I see us in.


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## opie37060 (Jan 9, 2010)

Devon said:


> I see a lot of posts from people recovering (or trying to) from DP and DR, but I am not totally clear on what it truly means to be DP/DR free. Personally, I've had DP most of my life, and cannot truly recall a time when I wasn't; hence it is hard for me at times to imagine what it truly is like to be recovered. Does time make sense? Do the memories of all the past, and the time spent in DP come back? Are you able to feel alive and live the moment? Do you care about everyday things again (i.e. the sound of raindrops, feel the breeze of the air in autumn, the warm pavement under your feet n the summer, etc.)? Is feeling truly enough to live a content life?
> 
> Perhaps we need some stories/description of what recovery is truly like (from those healed), and also what other people who are suffering from DP/DR think recovery is (as these 2 may not coincide).
> 
> For me, I cannot conceive of a "cure"... I simply accept that my reality is flawed (existential trap requiring greater purpose than I can conceive), and desire to change it such that in this new reality, recovery exists. So, essentially, my recovery is having a new mindset where I can escape from the mental anquish of the flawed world which I see us in.


We do need some stories/descriptions of what recovery is like. I have been on this site for two years now and alot of people say they are recovering but I have yet to come across anyone who say's they have completely recovered. So these stories are probally few and far between.


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## rightwrong99 (Apr 17, 2011)

I imagine that if people ever fully recover, they don't come back to this website. And their journey to recovery probably involves a departure from this website a long time before theyve noticed that all of their symptoms have disappeared.

Does anyone assume that the only people who have DP are on this website? lol Cause I assume that there's even more people who have it that have no idea this website exists and that just go on with their lives and maybe recover at some point with just therapy or meds or naturally. And so of course we are unaware of those stories.

BEWARE of all the people on here who post that theyve recovered only to come back on in two weeks.

Or the people that say theve recovered 89.2% or 99.4% but then say they still feel like theres plastic wrap between them and the rest of the world. Saying youve recovered and then describing yourself with DP symptoms is a wonderful example of an Ignorant Recovery. But if you feel good anyway, then great!

The recovery percentages are ridiculous. There's a doctor Ellen something with a B. She describes DP as being like arthritis. Wax and wanes, hurts more, hurts less, not noticeable for a month then back with a vengeance. Its chronic and a part of you. But you can probably learn to manage it.


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## Gabriel (Sep 18, 2011)

Hey.

It is possible to feel normal again.

I've been almost completely free of dp for years, meaning that I don't experience it 24/7 anymore. If I had to guess why I feel "normal" again is that I accepted that I'm just different from other people and started sort of embrasing the feeling of being disconnected from this world. Once I didn't worry about going crazy anymore I started to loose the feeling of constant pointless terror and fear, and these days I can enjoy those things you mentioned for example.

Getting better is possible.

Gabriel.


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## Devon (Oct 28, 2011)

It's good to know that people are feeling better. But some recovery stories I've read seem simply to imply feeling better and adapting to the current DP mindset. For example, say DP is like losing an arm. Yes, at first we are depressed, our view of life changes, but we can overcome it and live well (sufficiently) with just 1 arm. And sometimes you can get so caught-up that you forget temporarily that you only have 1 arm, and this can be so for most of your days. But is that true recovery? How is recovery defined? IF DP is not permanent, wouldn't recovery more imply the re-growth of that arm?


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## perd (Oct 17, 2011)

yes alot of people say ther are 90% recovered and some say they are recovered but still feel it a little, others they don't feel it for 2 days and think they recovered so they put a post. i think people should wait at least a month before they post after they recover.

but there are posts of people who have recovered fully and never came back.


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## insaticiable (Feb 23, 2010)

I never posted about this incident thus far on this site, but I guess it is time to do it now because it is relevant to this thread.

I recovered 100% COMPLETELY from dp/dr in April 2011. I went to a psychiatric hospital on March 28, and was there for a week. On the 4th day, I was sitting on my bed very depressed when I decided that I wanted to go wash my hands in the bathroom. I don't know what happened...I don't know what triggered it, but I SWEAR to you...all of a sudden, I felt like something purged out of my soul. If you have ever seen the movie Freaky Friday with Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis, it is kind of like that earthquake scene where they get back inside their own bodies. It was a remarkable, astonishing, and truly indescribable moment. I felt like something came out of my soul. I looked around and sure enough, my DR was gone. GONE. I could see everything clearly. That veil/transparent sheet that had remained in front of me had gone away completely. And my body...it felt so light. Not this heavy sensation that I used to get. I felt euphoric, I felt peaceful, I felt GRATEFUL. I felt like God had finally answered my prayers.

The next morning, (Saturday), I reported to my doctor that my DP of 14 months had completely gone away and if it was possible to go home that day as I felt fine enough to leave. He said it would not be a good idea to leave right away because he said it was important for my mind to get used to that ''safe'' feeling I had achieved and to let my body get adjusted to this new state. So I stayed till Monday.

The day I left the hospital and came home, I decided to go for a walk in the park. I kid you not, as I began walking, I noticed just how bright and beautiful everything looked around me. How vibrant and full of life I felt. The world looked like a lollipop and I just wanted to taste it!

Again, I was so thankful to have come back to ''reality'' and really started believing in God once again. I wanted to get a tattoo of a representation of Him on my arm to remind me that He is always there. I began functioning again like a normal person (showering, leaving the house, etc).

Here is the very sad part, but I feel like if I have shared all this so far, I have to be honest:

About 3 weeks after I had recovered, I noticed that I began feeling like a ''Mindless Drone.'' There is no better way to describe it other than that. I was feeling very robotic and slightly depressed, but I kind of shrugged it away. Several days later, I noticed that I began experiencing very severe out of body sensations. Like I had totally left my body. At this point I was very alarmed and knew that something was wrong. Long story short, things kept getting worse and worse, and I totally relapsed again. When my DP/DR first started, I began with really terrible DP. I had never experienced anything like it. I wanted to commit suicide it was so bad, and after seeing my pain and agony, my psychiatrist decided to prescribe me Risperdal to keep me from going completely nuts.

I know this is not one of those ''happily ever after'' stories although I so desprately wish it was. I believe that the 3 biggest contributing factors to my recovery were:

1. I felt safe (on the inside).
2. Things seemed non-threatening in regards to my OCD symptoms. My OCD actually improved a LOT while I was at the hospital. I was spending much less time performing my rituals.
3. My heart felt at peace and contentment.

I know most recovery stories don't happen in the fashion that mine did, but I felt it was necessary to share my story.

Oh! And after I recovered and came back from the hospital, I did not come back to this site. In fact, I didn't return till about July of this year. I just felt no need to come back on and the site didn't interest me anymore.

If anyone has any further questions about my recovery, please don't hesitate to ask.

At this point, I don't know what made me relapse or what triggered me back into this horrible state, and I don't know if I will recover any time soon, but I am thankful, that for 3 weeks, I lived in complete happiness. I think I deserved it.

That is all for now.


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## Quifouett (Sep 13, 2011)

You already posted this story before...

http://www.dpselfhelp.com/forum/index.php?/topic/29396-how-do-i-know-when-ive-recovered/page__p__242403__hl__hospital__fromsearch__1#entry242403


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## Rev (Aug 27, 2011)

Its only one way to recognize the recovery. To start enjoy your life.


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