# Hello - I am new - a bit of a long post....



## smooshkin (Dec 17, 2005)

Hi there. I am from the UK. I hope everyone is ok. I am pleased to find a site that is centered around this whole DP/DR thing. Yes I thought I had gone insane. I thought I was schizophrenic. I went to my Doctors to help me when I first started having problems. My stomach was churning, I had terrible toilet problems, my breathing was fast and heavy, my heart was racing. I figured it was probably stress - I have a very busy job and I had some family issues too. My boyfriend suggested I go to see my GP and get a mild tranq to calm me down. The Dr suggested I was suffering from anxiety and depression so dosed me up on valium and zoloft. The next couple of weeks were physically uncomfortable. I lost about a stone in weight, had no motivation to get out of bed. For the first time in my working life I got signed off from work for 2 weeks. After this time the physical symptoms wore off, although I was still suffering from the globus hystericus thing which made things quite difficult. Then out of the blue I began to over analyse things. I questioned why I was here, why I spoke English, which was quite hard when talking to people as I paid more attention to reasons why they were saying things - not what they were saying, I thought about why we eat food, why breathe. I questioned myself so much about this I found I wouldnt eat in fear that my throat would close up and I would choke on my food. I lay in bed at night worrying about the breathing thing and I was scared that if I thought about it too much, I would stop breathing. My head was going crazy. It wouldnt stop. I managed to find answers to my questions....I am English because I am...then I suddenly thought..Where did these thoughts in the first place come from...THATS WHEN I THOUGHT ID GONE INSANE. I was getting icy cold headrushes, I couldnt sleep, my head was hurting so much. My brain was just on overdrive. Then the DP/DR set in. I couldnt look at myself in the mirror. I didnt know who I was. It was all so strange and alien to me. At the time I had no idea this was DP/DR so i set about finding out myself. I turns out...im not the only one and its all symptoms of depression and anxiety. Which was a relief I must say. But despite knowing this the DP/DR wont leave me alone. I still feel unreal even typing this. The physical symptoms have come back. Although I dont actually get panic attacks and hyperventilate, i do find it hard to breathe sometimes and my heart does race, usually when i am in bed. I fear that the DP/DR feelings may never go and I will be left with this feeling forever. I went back to my GP who increased my dose of Zoloft and confirmed to me that I wasnt losing my mind. But still there is that whole 2 head business. Miss Rational is telling you that you are ok, it'll pass, its just the anxiety! and Miss Irrational is shouting back saying..''YOURE NUTS'' and more often than not, at least for most of the day Miss Irrational reminds you of the DP/DR feelings and you go back to square one again. Its a horrible feeling, its frightnening and scary and all things bad. I feel ive lost myself. I cant be bothered with Christmas, I cant even be bothered to do the housework - and thats a stress just thinking about what needs doing...the washing up, the hoovering...etc. Well thats me. I will look forward to your replies. It is so nice to know when someone responds personally that they have the same problems it saves the worry. Thanks so much for taking your time to read this. xxsmooshkinxx


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## Guest (Dec 17, 2005)

I can relate to much of what you've said. You get a completely different view of things and whatever once seemed important becomes unsatisfying and alien.
It's surprising how many of us get the existential angst. It had a postive outcome for me: it allowed me to observe, question and understand things on many different levels and I developed new abilities.
But the terror is stultifying and I've had that too.
Hopefully you'll find lots of anwers here, Cheers, BG


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