# I need to tell my story..



## missjiller (Sep 8, 2006)

I am new in this community, but by no means a newbie to dp/dr. My problem wasn't a problem for the longest time, it was a flash of odd thoughts that would go away... I would be having sex with my boyfriend.. and all of a sudden he would look so alien and strange to me ... but I would just shake it off, or I would be drinking with my friends and look in the mirror and freak out because it didn't look like me... so I would just shake it off... because then ... I COULD shake it off... it was only periodic thoughts... it was never full blown. This Easter I was having supper at my boyfriends house and I started the feeling of the world being strange... I didn't feel like me at all... and the feeling was NOT by any means going away. I told him how I felt because I was intensly scared... I thought for sure that I was going insane... I was frightened out of my own body. I tried to keep my cool but the more I tried... the more my body felt like someone elses. It lasted for about 3 days and then faded... but only for a few weeks. I started a new job working as a business manager at a car dealership... the job was incredibly stressful and in the beginning I handled it like a pro. Weeks into the job I began the feeling again of not feeling like myself.... customers would come in to coverse with me about financing and I had to force myself to act like I was fine... but really my voice sounded so strange to me... so alien... I would look at myself in the mirror taking so many bathroom breaks to check and make sure that I was still "me" in the mirror. On my way to work one afternoon... I was looking up at the sky while driving and all of a sudden the sky seemed incredibly strange to me.. like it wasn't even real, I started to panic like crazy... sweating... dp/dr getting worse & worse by the second. I went into work and told them I could not stay... that day I decided to quit... I needed some time off to get my thoughts together. I went to the doctor who prescribed me Xanax for my anxiety then sent me on my way. The xanax didn't help at all... they chilled me out a bit but if anything my dp/dr was worse... I was so zoned out that all I did was think about my dp. My thoughts over the next months were as follows:
-freaking out when looking in the mirror because my face looked so alien like I had never seen it before in my life
-constantly wondering what the point of life is... why i exsist?... why does everything exsist? when will it be over? what happens when i die? when i die am i just done and i don't know it? 
-everything looks fake.. like it's not real... trees and the sky... everything looks like a salvador dali painting to me...
- wondering if i will ever be anything else besides a person... is it just me in this body for the rest of my life and thats it? it seems pointless?!
-looking at those closest to me and wondering if i really know them or if they are strangers to me.... they look like strangers... do they even really know me?
- is my personality still the same...? do i act different? i don't feel the same ... yet no one can even tell the difference... ! if i didn't tell anyone about my problem than they would never even know and i would suffer inside of myself forever..
- am i making the world up? in my head am i just making up everything that i want to happen and my life is just one big dream? did i already die and now i feel weird because im in some sort of "made up" afterlife?

my thoughts are agony.... after about a month of letting these thoughts control me completely... i went to the doctor... broke down crying and told her my feelings... she told me i had "depression"... and perscribed me .50 mg's of ativan 3 times a day and 10 mg's of celexa a day. I only used the ativan to put me to sleep because I had such a problem sleeping. I used it for about 2 weeks then I stopped because I was told it was addicting. I had no anxiety at all within a months treatment of celexa... it kicked in and I was able to do everything I wanted to do... swim.. go back to work... be with my boyfriend & go to parties and out for supper... I was no longer depressed (at least not enough to stop me from doing things). I still had depersonalization & derealization... but I am convinced that I will have to deal with it for a while yet. I have good & bad days... some days I will look at the sky on the way to work and think that the world is just going to dissapear.... and it doesn't give me anxiety... I don't like having those ideas... but if I try not to focus on them... then I feel better... The feeling that I have quite often though is still feeling like I can't believe I am going to be this person for the rest of my life and that's all I will ever be... it just seems so odd... I don't know if anyone can relate to that .. but if you can I would love to hear from you.... It's just a complete and utter feeling of weirdness.... I feel as though it's not right that all I will ever be is me... a person... It seems as though it's not enough for me.... this thought really bothers me... but I have learned to deal with it..

I know I got sidetracked from my story but you get the main idea im sure.... if anyone can relate to anything that I am feeling... just post back or write me a pm... i'm sure someone has felt this way... I've read lots of posts and we all share the same feelings. It feels good to know I'm not alone with my problem.... but I still feel alone as a person.

I have my boyfriend who loves me deeply & I love him back...
My parents I love & we have a great relationship... 
but it just doesn't seem like I am who I have always been..
I am not the girl who I was a few months ago...
WHY?


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## faith31 (Sep 14, 2006)

hello
everything you explained and felt i have too, that feeling you mentioned about looking at the sky and thinking its not real, horrid i hate it. the other day i was driving to the shop, and suddenly i did not feel like i was real or that any of it was real, i felt like i was in a dream i felt like i had had no past and that i had only just woke up. i constantly ask my husband if i am still here he must think i am crazy, sometimes i hate waking up i have suffered from post natal depression but thought that was gone it seems to have been replaced by dp the only time it goes away is if i am drunk hate it hate it
love faith X


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## Luv_a_nurse (Sep 14, 2006)

Hi,

I can absolutely relate with your story. I used to have sporadic thoughts like having people close to me looking unreal or wondering if I really knew them but they used to not bother me.

Now, I have dP most of the time. Whenever I am connected with myself I feel very blessed and I enjoy every minute of it. However, most of the time I feel disconnected, unreal and I have trouble connection emotionnaly with other people.

I hope that someday this will go away. I feel that although this is a horrible way to feel if ever it goes away, we will appreciate life so much more. It's great that this forum lets us see that we are not alone, because it sure as hell feels like I am sometimes.

Take care

Chris


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## eddieviv (Dec 7, 2005)

You'll be somewhat comforted to know I hope that I've had it on and off now for about 40 years I'm in the middle of a bout that I've been in now for the past 5 years. I'm on Clonazepam which seems to help a little, don't have those nasty panic attacks as much as I used to. I'm also still here, not crazy or psychotic, a little older perhaps but for the most part still here in the now whatever that might be.


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## JEANO (Oct 2, 2006)

You are not alone. I suffered, and I do mean suffer, from depersonalization for a number of years when I was younger. This was back in the 1960's when no one seemed to know what to do about it, even the psychiatrists. "It" came on me suddenly, and was really terrifying, although I never talked about it until I went to a psychiatrist. I felt like my brain was frozen, and everything was unreal around me. I thought I had something wrong neurologically, and went to a neurologist, who put me through tests (EEG at that time) and then referred me to a psychiatrist. He game me a number of medications, mostly antidepressants and then valium. I took valium for almost 10 years, and it helped the panic but the foggy feeling and feeling of unreality remained. Finally, when I was at a university in a relaxed setting (if you can believe that), I stopped taking the valium and began to feel better. My sex drive returned, which had probably been stunted from the vaium. I can still feel a little spacey at times (and I'm now "older") but for the most part I feel great now. For a while, I viewed the depersonalized feeling as a friend because it allowed me to hyperfocus when in graduate school and studying and writing. I like to think that we who experience this thing are sensitive and intelligent and creative. We just have to learn to cope with it....sometimes the more you fight it the worse it is. If you can relax and not focus on it, you'll do better. Good luck.


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