# Recovered from DP four years ago



## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

I was on this site a number of years ago under a different user name which I've since forgotten.

I had dp/derealisation from 1991 until 2008.

I had anxiety and panic attacks with it. From 2003 the anxiety resolved itself into classic agoraphobia.

In 2006 I sought psychological help for the agoraphobia and was referred to a psychologist for CBT.

I didn't take the programme of graded desensitisation for agoraphobia seriously until the spring of 2008. Once I started following it my agoraphobia and anxiety levels quickly reduced.

But the DP/DR also evaporated! I feared that it would never go, but it did.

I am now in the process of getting back to paid work after many years of being without work.


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## Guest (Sep 8, 2012)

Great to hear you recovered man! CBT is cognitive behavioural therapy, correct? or something along the lines of that. How was your recovery like? Was it gradual, or did you just wake up one day and you were back to normal? Again, great to hear you recovered- have fun with a dp/dr free life!!


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## jenny1 (Aug 21, 2012)

great news that you recovered... can you give us a few more details as to how the dp vanished? it sounds like you had it for a long time so it must of felt amazing when it left you. Do you think it was because the therapy was helping lower your over all anxiety levels? were you taking any meds?


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## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

I got chronic DP after suffering a panic attack at a wedding in 1991. Before that I had suffered from a number of bouts of severe depression between 1986-1989.

CBT is cognitive behaviour therapy. I suffered from a sort of "free floating anxiety" between 1991 and 2003 which meant that I didn't attend crowded events and some other events.

In 2003 the anxiety resolved itself into classic agoraphobia, which meant that I tended to suffer from anxiety and panic attacks when in open spaces, etc. They eventually didn't have to be very open spaces and my life was becoming more and more circumscribed. I also could get anxiety feelings even if I was in my own house.

I asked to be referred to a psychologist. The CBT basically consisted in us discussing my problems and how they developed and visiting parks and other open spaces.

I resisted his encouragement to take on graded desensitisation for myself for about a year and a half. I was seeing him every 2 months or so.

Finally I decided to give it a go, after he said I would be cured of my agoraphobia if I visited a park for 20 minutes every other afternoon for a period of weeks.

I started by sitting in the park for 10 minutes or so, and then gradually increased the time spent there.

After about 6 weeks to 2 months of visiting the parks for increasing amounts of time I noticed that

(a) The agoraphobia seemed to have evaporated.

(b ) My overall general levels of anxiety seemed to have evaporated.

( c) The dp/dr had reduced to negligible or non-existent levels.

I thought at times that I would be stuck in the dp world forever. I had it chronically for seventeen years from the age of 24 to 41.

I thank God I got out of it. I know every case is different, and some are more different than others. I hope this may be of some help to some people and give them hope and maybe direction to some.

I haven't been completely free of panic attacks. I rarely had one recently when I went to the seaside. I still need to do some work in visiting the seaside and coast on my agoraphobia. But I know what to do to get rid of residual problems, and the chronic dp has gone.


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## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

*Jenny*


> it sounds like you had it for a long time so it must of felt amazing when it left you.


The strange thing is I didn't go crazy with joy when it left. There's just this sense of quiet relief now it's gone. I have other things and problems to think about now, but whenever I remember that the dp has gone I have a sense of thankfulness.

Re meds, I was on small doses of valium to be taken as and when at the time. But it was the CBT that cured me and led to me being even less reliant on it than I was, such that It is extremely rarely I would feel the need for it now.

I am also on long term lithium carbonate for the initial bouts of depression and mania that set this off.

I'm now on a low dose of paroxetine (15mg) but I'm sure it's not therapeutic. I know that there are withdrawal symptoms with seroxat, so I'll maybe eventually come off it very slowly with the liquid variety. I think before I got better of the dp I was on 30-50 mg a day.

I don't look upon the meds as being important in my getting better, but the CBT. The meds - daily seroxat and valium when needed - kept me going when the anxiety and agoraphobia were at their worst, between 2003 - 2008.


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## Roza (Sep 9, 2012)

ed said:


> I was on this site a number of years ago under a different user name which I've since forgotten.
> 
> I had dp/derealisation from 1991 until 2008.
> 
> ...


Wow that sounds like a long journey! I'm so happy for you it sure sounds like a relief. Your story inspires me as in it gives me hope that dp is curable however at the same time it worries me that it took so much time for it cure, ive only had dp for 1 year and a half and ive been diagnosed with depression and anxiety and been taking cipralex for a year but no help. I finally decided to reach out to psychologist for CBT and I dont know if it will ever help







ive really given up and there are days I feel like committing suicide cause dp really scares me. what do you people recommend to treat this illness, i'm really running out of options


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## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

Roza said:


> Wow that sounds like a long journey! I'm so happy for you it sure sounds like a relief. Your story inspires me as in it gives me hope that dp is curable however at the same time it worries me that it took so much time for it cure, ive only had dp for 1 year and a half and ive been diagnosed with depression and anxiety and been taking cipralex for a year but no help. I finally decided to reach out to psychologist for CBT and I dont know if it will ever help
> 
> 
> 
> ...


There are all sorts of suggestions on this website which may be of help.

Personally speaking, I was six years with chronic dp before I found out what it was and that other people had it. It helped to find this out and to visit the Maudesley in London and meet one or two of the doctors that were researching it. They weren't able to fix me, but at least I knew someone was looking for a solution and I wasn't the only one, and that my condition wasn't so unusual that others didn't have it.

My faith in God through Jesus Christ helped me to put my life and condition in context.

"Dutch consolation" can sometimes help:


> "Dutch comfort" or "Dutch consolation" - where somebody might say "thank God it is no worse!" or atleast I'm not as badly off as him or her;


I just had to live with it, although I did no paid work from 1991-2005. After 2005 I did a little paid work at home, nothing too stressful. I knew that people were living their lives in paralysis and in wheelchairs, and mental ill health, including DP, isn't the only nasty thing that can happen to you - although it's certainly one of them, a big one.

From about 1991 I was on various antidepressants, mainly SSRIs which I believe alleviated the symptoms of anxiety and panic attacks.

Try and persist with the CBT, especially if it encourages you to face your fears progressively in little steps. If it is anxiety that is behind your dp, as it was with me, it may well challenge the anxiety that is behind it.

Remember also that people can recover from chronic dp quicker than I did, and that there are certain things that can reduce it, or awareness of it, in the meantime.


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## Mandy L. (May 24, 2010)

It's completely worthy trying psychotherapy, afteral you didn't get a "condition" for free.

CBT is really good with treating fobia, but I guess for people who were abused or with childhood trauma a behavioral approach isn't the best.

I've been also healed, but I'd say doesn't matter if your professional help is the best if you're not fully engaged.

So brotip, try your best and you will have the best outcome


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## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

*Amanda L*


> CBT is really good with treating fobia, but I guess for people who were abused or with childhood trauma a behavioral approach isn't the best.


I didn't have childhood trauma in one sense, but my father - whom I was very close to - died suddenly when I was 12.

It may have led to depression when I was 19, and chronic DP when I was 24.

I think the CBT curing the agoraphobia/anxiety and DP has led to me understanding more clearly just how badly my father's death affected me in leading to a build up of anxiety and then depression, and therefore there has been healing of that, too.


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## Mandy L. (May 24, 2010)

ed said:


> *Amanda L*
> 
> I didn't have childhood trauma in one sense, but my father - whom I was very close to - died suddenly when I was 12.
> 
> ...


Hi ed!

Btw i'm really happy it worked for you, but let me just add some detail

What happened to you can't really be called a childhood trauma because of the age and then it would sound more like pathological mourning, it doesn't mean that it doesn't imply into (huge) suffering. Usually what is referred as a childhood traumas are about the 1st and 2nd childhood, after that the child behaves to trauma almost the same as an adult, ( for example young children rather ignore death or accidents or become hyper for a while and they use to bring the content of the trauma into play, playing getting shot/shooting after seeing a person getting shot, rather than become "depressive". That's why childhood depression is different from adult depression and so on).

Usually the earlier the trauma the more severe because the child is developing very basic and important functions at that moment, memory is not mature, the cognitive ability is incipient causing confusion. This individuals development will be delayed or even impaired based on severity/length of this trauma/abuse and the life they will have thereafter .

Since cognition is so incipient in younger children (specially younger than 7) this lack of _cognitive maturity_ will prevent the CBT approach from working on the principles on which it is based; *cognition and behavior* since you cannot desensitize the person as there won't be much specific to work upon.

Often attachment problems and other earlier development problems that CBT is known not be so efficacious upon are present.
Attachment problems, sympathy, development of emotions, self awareness, social boundaries, personality disorders and identity crisis (from what I remember).

Why?

Because these things are very primitive, very early in human development and the "cognitive" "place" for them is not even there, as it is different for an older individual in which it might be "damaged".

I'm not saying that CBT is bad, it's a very good approach in my opinion but such as medicine it doesn't work the same for everyone, or not as efficient for every case + there is the individual factor in there, great part of of the therapy depends on the person to person relationship, so a psychologist who is not good attaching with his clients in a healthy way won't be a good therapist regardless of his approach.

I am not sure if I am making much sense here, but I'm trying to say is that when the trauma happens very early it's worse to work on it with CBT.

Obs;This is not me guessing I've been studying psychology since 2009, and I was going to graduate etc, but I gave up the course, and this is also based what I heard from my professors that worked with children in therapy for many years, so I hope you enjoy the post and that it shed some light


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## ed (Sep 27, 2007)

I'm sure that CBT wouldn't necessarily work for every case of dp.

In my case dp had developed in particular circumstances, and anxiety - developing later into agoraphobia - seems to have been behind it.


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