# describe dp/dr



## spectator162 (Dec 26, 2017)

How to best describe dp/dr to someone who doesnt have it in a few sentences? Its easy to explain it to someone who has it. But saying, nothing feels real, feeling not connected with things, everything looks 2 dimensional, feeling like im in a movie is difficult to understand for someone who doesnt have it I think? Can someone explain it better? Or like with an example


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## 106473 (Feb 7, 2017)

Because DP is such a wide range of symptoms, you can list them in an overwhelming list. Or just keep it simple and understand that if this person is just someone you see once in a while, over time they might get it but it's not as important as you think. It helps my family kinda get it but friends, apart from I have anxiety, non of it really helps, i've gone into details with people and it's over their head or they don't get how these things could be etc.

The way i describe the detached thing is simple. I say:

"have you ever driven a really long distance or been on a train for say an hour and zone out to the point that when you arrive, you don't remember any of the journey" as especially from my understanding that's kinda a bit like DP (one symptom of). Everyone has experienced that, or nearly everyone.

The other way is when people are really hungover and feel 'distant', many people feel mild DP hungover.. nothing like DP but that kinda feeling a bit out of it.

DR is easier described simply as the world looks flat and fake, for me sometimes cartoon like, but i don't get DR that regularly anymore, that's about all you can really say.

My main advice would be unless it's your family or something, sticking to anxiety and realising the details they will never really understand. It's a hard one but easier than the effort i went to with a few friends to understand it. Numb is the easiest one to understand, just void of all emotion, just tell them imagine listening to music and it just sounds like noise.


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## Sharon22 (Jan 10, 2018)

For me, I feel like I have no idea who I am and I have no memories of who I was. I feel like there is smoke between me & reality, my surroundings are stange & my perception of everything has changed.


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## katiej (Jan 21, 2012)

Like I was placed on mars and told this was my life and have memories of being there before but have a strong feeling I dont belong and like I would be living a lie to act along with living on mars. But have no where else to go so feel trapped.


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## austin101 (Mar 2, 2018)

katie you got dp again? Its like every year you still keep getting it lol. Is it less intense now?



katiej said:


> Like I was placed on mars and told this was my life and have memories of being there before but have a strong feeling I dont belong and like I would be living a lie to act along with living on mars. But have no where else to go so feel trapped.


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## CoffeeGirl9 (Oct 4, 2009)

Nothing feels right. I don’t feel my body doing the things it’s doing. I am not experiencing anything whether it be sitting on the couch watching tv or showering, etc. somehow I function enough to keep a job and talk as needed. But it doesn’t feel like me. Like at all. I feel soulless. No one looking through my eyes. Not in control. Hollow.


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## katiej (Jan 21, 2012)

austin. I was dp free for two years completely forgot about it and this site. anytime something traumatic in my life happens I seem to get it. Ur still on this forum? have you had it the whole time then ye


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## Sharon22 (Jan 10, 2018)

Depersonalization is hard to explain because there are such a wide range of symptoms and everyone suffer such individual symptoms. Explaining mine are a feeling of disattactment, poor memory/memories feel fake, strange, estranged, physical and mentally numbness, autopilot sensation like it's not me controlling my body, disconnected to my body, headaches/head pressure, time perception has changed. Its horrible and hard, had it a year now.


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## Animgirl (Mar 23, 2018)

I've tried, with varying degrees of success, to explain DP to loved ones. You hear stories of people having out-of-body experiences (I think most people without DP can still imagine how bizarre the sensation must be), but for me, there is no out-of-body; my consciousness is detached, but I am trapped within my body, forced to experience the world through a filter. It often feels like playing a video game where I'm piloting a mech, but with serious lag; my conscious self is able to think quickly, but my body feels bulky and unresponsive, and physical sensations seem distant and trivial (they may as well be blips on the heads-up-display)... That's not to say I don't feel things, obviously, but often the sensations feel delayed and muted, like data transfer over a slow connection. Also, there are so many tasks that just get automated, without any necessary pilot intervention, which means I often don't form any memories of those tasks or their processes... The whole sensation might be something I could get used to if it weren't for the sudden reassociations that remind me what it actually feels like to be in the present as a single entity-- no lag, no flesh-prison... Just me... Cohesive, but utterly incapable of remembering how to do all the things that just happen automatically when I'm piloting my mech... I guess the best way I have to describe that part of it (I'm not 100% this is relatable, but it's the only analog I can think of) is like when you're clapping to a beat or doing something else that requires you to maintain a rhythm, and you suddenly become very conscious of your movements or the sound you're making or even the timing of the beat itself. Something draws your focus to the details, to the process of how the rhythm is being maintained or to the nature of the rhythm itself, and immediately, as soon as you focus on the present and on what you're actually doing, you lose the rhythm, and there's no real way of getting back in the groove... It's just gone, like a perfectly cozy spot you had under the blankets that disappeared when you sat up, and lying back down and trying to get back into that same position never works.
Add to that the bizarre time-sense fluctuations that happen between states and what you're left with is just a constant, oppressive feeling of being out-of-sync...
The other explanation I give is it's like when you've been roller skating, and you take your skates off, and for a moment you feel much shorter... Except you know, having that feeling all the time...


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## austin101 (Mar 2, 2018)

its yasin dont know if u remmeber me or not. dunno why i have austins name. Nah its been gone for me i just come back for pms. And nice nice glad uve forgotten about this shitty disorder more than it has come up. Hopefully u get better again m'lady



katiej said:


> austin. I was dp free for two years completely forgot about it and this site. anytime something traumatic in my life happens I seem to get it. Ur still on this forum? have you had it the whole time then ye


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## forestx5 (Aug 29, 2008)

DP - altered perception of self. 
DR - altered perception of environment.


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## luluinthefog (May 25, 2017)

DR for me is just a weed high that never ends


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