[lemontea]

Whole day was relatively OK, I was doing other things, not thinking about my dp/dr...I had all the usual symptoms and everything, but was able not to think about them...But something, I don't know what, didn't feel right, like if somethings gonna happen...

Now's evening...I'm having a dinner, everything's still OK, I have only one small problem, a headache...Nothing that bad, but it kinda surprises me, as there is no apparent reason for it...And, all of sudden, it strikes me, the whole dp/dr thing and I feel most unreal for a long, long time..I'm different person every second..AAargh..this is not the first time it strikes me this way, but it's very bad and I hate that and it scares me so much!!! I feel so insane, damn...And still continues now...

But the funny thing is, I don't have the headache now, and I'm pretty sure, that after this attack fades away, I won't have the strange feeling I had whole day. I'm pretty sure these things, the strange feeling, headache and now the attack, are somehow connected - like if the whole day was a preparation for this attack now...Or that dp/dr was "blocked" in my brain and now it found its way out...Well, this may be interesting thing, but I'm not able to think about it right now (I don't even believe it's me who's writing this), just want to feel better...

 

[Guest]

I know what you're talking about because I've gone through the same experiences. But, just so you know, reading your words as someone not familliar with DR would --that is, just listening to the way you express what you're trying to express-- you come across as totally coherent and together. In fact, articulate and perceptive. Your "voice" (to use an expression from fiction) is constant. I guess my point is, while you may feel like you're changing from moment to moment, your writing is proof that you're not.

 

[lemontea]

Thanks for reply, WhereHaveIGone.

When this happens (or in the situations in which it's possible that it will happen, like going from one room to another), I always try to focus on just one thing, doesn't matter what, may be only melody of some song or something, to prove myself it's still me and I guess it helps...But it's surreal experience anyway.

 

[Guest]

Keeping in mind that the sense of not remaining consistent from one given time to another is a *Feeling* and not an actual reality. That is, like when you have vertigo, it seems like the room is spinning around when it's not. With this in mind, have you ever tried the counter-intuitive response of just letting it go and not *trying* to preserve consistency? And just let it rip? I know what that fear of insanity is --like you're going to come undone and that will really be the end of it. But everything I read about dp/dr is that these are not accurate interpretations of the real situation. They're feelings. Just as an experiment, have you tried "not trying"? Definately not an easy thing to do, but, intellectually, there wouldn't seem to be any real danger in that, would there? I'm taken by the idea of being in some Alice in Wonderland universe that has different physical laws, and you keep trying to make tea on the stove but it won't get hot, so at some point you try putting the pot in the refrigerator. Hey.... whatever... (I think I'm being kind of presumptive and familliar here, but I'm just trying to come up with something that might help.)

 

[lemontea]

I think that being able to do this is an important step...Now, it's something I can think about when I don't feel that bad, but seems almost impossible when my dp/dr attacks me in such a hard way. Well, I don't know..I think that I really should experiment with my mind rather than just doing the usual things which help me only to, eh, let's say, "survive" my dp, but don't make the whole thing better actually.

 

[Guest]

You want things to be normal --there is nothing wrong with that! That's the goal of everyone at this forum, I'd think. To get things (sense of reality, sense of self) back the way they once were. You're trying to make it happen as best you can. I did the same. I didn't have your particular problem of self (although I was close enough to it to feel I know what it is). I felt I was "thrown off the train of life" by my DR. All my friends from high school went on as I was supposed to --marraige, career, homes, adult attitudes-- while I "matured" to living in the back of a van and reading books on psychiatry to try to figure out what was wrong with me. On top of the DR, I had major shame because of this. In a way, to this day, I've never grown up, but now I kind of like it! I mean, how many 54 year olds get sucked into the music of Nickelback? Guys younger than me never got beyond David Bowie. I guess what I'm saying is, things didn't go at all the way I wanted or expected them to, but I think (not sure, but think) it's turning to my advantage (it's a lot more than just music). And all that time I was in the fog of DR, I was trying to GET BACK my former life that I had lost. I was trying to GET BACK reality. Now, looking back, I wonder (don't know, just wonder) if that was holding me back. Maybe I should have not tried so hard to hold on. Maybe I should have floated with it. I don't know HOW I would have done that, but then that never even occured to me.
Keep up the good fight in whatever way you can, John. Resisting or floating or whatever else.

 

[Martinelv]

Two words that might help here:

Stop analysing.

 

[lemontea]

Thanks for support WhereHaveIGone...I really appreciate it.

Martinelv, well, you are certainly right. Apart from posting here, though, I don't analyse my dp/dr...I think.

 

[Guest]

Martinelv,

I'm sorry you see it that way.