[SillyPutty]

Does anybody else get these thoughts and feelings with their DP/DP,
that humans are weird and complex, it scares me to think about my insides and all our body parts and how they work, to imagine my brain and stuff inside, anybody else think like this sometimes?

 

[Da'Burgh]

Yes, I do this all the damn time! I'm always thinking about how my brain functions and stuff like that. That's my most common thought. I know that it's disturbing, but just distract yourself and don't let your mind wander.

 

[mcsiegs]

I do this a lot! I thought it was only me...Growing up, I sometimes obsessed over my heart and lungs, and brain inside my head.

It's all part of the disorder, unfortunately.

Normal symptom, unfortunately. Try and distract yourself. I know it's hard, though!

 

[Guest]

I think of stuff similar to this sometimes. Throughout uni, I learned how to think of the brain from a reductionist perspective, how thoughts, emotions and sensations can be seen as just energy and chemical reactions. It may be distressing for some to think about humanity in this way, but there is a calming side to it as well. I am reading a book right now that discusses psychological experiences as they relate to quantum physics (I know it sounds hardcore but it really isn't) and it teaches you to try and understand/experience symptoms of disorders, such as fear and anxiety, as energy, because, when it all boils down to it, that is all that it is.....energy. When I think about it like that, I tend to feel more relaxed about it.

 

[Guest]

I get this very often as well. Out of all the crazy feelings DP/DR give, I think this is the worse. Sometimes I'll just focus on how my eyes can see, or how can I think, or how I can walk and move about. It's kinda like marvelling about the greatest engineered machine ever made. It gets scary when I start thinking about my brain or my heart however. If you've ever watched CSI you'll get what I mean. You know how sometimes they zoom in on a particular part of the dead-person's body (eg. he had a heart attack) so they show the heart beating and the electricity in there, and then they show it stopping. I see my heart beating like that sometimes. I'll have an image in my head of it beating, the heart itself, this bloob of flesh going poopoom poopoom. Very scary. Whenever that happens I usually just try to move the image away. Or I'll see my brain, I'll "feel" my brain in my scull. I'll think, how am I thinking, these little connections sparking in my head, the neurones and stuff. Weird. I hate when it happens. But it's pretty easy to get rid of that feeling, just think of something else. It's existentialism gone haywire. When you know that, it's easier to control.

NB

 

[Ben]

SillyPutty -

Yes, I do this a lot. The thing to ask yourself, though, is why does it make you anxious? To me, it makes me anxious because of all the things that could go wrong - or suddenly stop working (for example, I sometimes get myself all buggered up worrying that I might somehow "think" my heart to stop one day).

The reality is that, I imagine, it's quite hard (if not impossible - probably) to do this, that is, to think yourself dead. BUT - what this illuminates is some of the stuff I've posted about earlier: that it's really the anxiety you have about your frailty and the world about you that makes reality all the more scarey. There is nothing more real to us than our bodies - for if those quit - *pop*. Do you see my point?

 

[SillyPutty]

Thanks for all the repleys. Let me clarify a little.

It's not just the major organs and stiff like that, although that is a major part, but just our entire makeup. For example, I'll start thinking about our nose and the composition of our face and our arms and legs and bones,
basically everything and all of sudden it will seem foreign like an alien
and I get this feeling to sometimes when I look at other animals, gorillas (recent trip to the zoo) especially freak me out about how much they look like us!!

HELP, can anyone relate?? Please respond.

 

[sming]

The thing to ask yourself, though, is why does it make you anxious?

that it's really the anxiety you have about your frailty and the world about you that makes reality all the more scarey

Ben, this is something I often ask myself and the conclusion I come to. Just what on Earth is it about, say, strip lighting, that is threatening? Whilst I accept it causes me to feel DR and very, very anxious, why? What possible actual threat is it to me? None. None whatsoever. Unfortunately that does not stop me from feeling dreadful.

Now your heart (or similarly important organ) stopping (to get back to the thread at hand) is more threat-worthy but for some reason that does not bother me in the slightest. I am able to say, without a sniff of anxiety that if it stops, it stops. I am dead. Same is true if you get run over. Or get a terminal illness. Or caught in a house fire. Do people on this board worry about those more-likely scenarios? No. Strange eh?

I suspect that DP/DR is often a deap-seated fear of dying. That we cannot just "trust" that we'll be OK, even in the most innocuous/safe environs. And I also suspect that this almost primal fear is often a result of a deeply traumatic event that affected us at a very base level. Which is why, after years of REBT and CBT without meds I've gone back onto meds - I cannot see thinking therapy alone working for me.

Cheers,
pete

 

[falling_free]

haha yeh i do this all the time, Ill often visualise or get kind of a wirmeframe view of my body in my mind, also always a lot fo the time visualising dna and blood cells pumping through my body, which can cause physical tension and anxiety.

I don't really know what got me thinking this way though at first, possibly from a drug induced high using my mind or something, and then kind of getting stuck in a visual space of sorts in the mind, as well as experiences and memorys that stay with me I guess.

 

[Ben]

Sming,

I probably, with this post, made myself sound too much of a "suck it up and deal with it" kind of person, no? If I did, then I apologize as that wasn't my intent at all. It's my belief that we have a very strong chemical, neurological, biological or whatever'igical tendency towards anxiety, depersonalization, et al. It is something that is as much a part of us as someone with Diabetes having insulin problems. They can't get over it by thinking, just like we can't. However...

Each one of us is different -and it's very likely that the results of our differing issues give the same effects - namely, DP/DR. In my case, I see the biological predisposition as something that makes the situation right for DP, and then my mental actions as that which continues the cyclical, recursive nature of the disorder. I believe it's important to kind of combat the problem from both sides (I take Paxil, for example).

I have a lot of respect for CBT and REBT and what it has done for my life, but, it's not going to have the same effects on everyone, obviously. I believe it has prevented me from heading down the "rabbit hole" of destructive DP thoughts many times; I feel a twinge of discomfort from DP as opposed to outright fear more often than naught anymore. The rational thinking has a tendency to throw a rod in the spokes, so to speak. It's still there, though.....

 

[sming]

I probably, with this post, made myself sound too much of a "suck it up and deal with it" kind of person, no? If I did, then I apologize as that wasn't my intent at all.

No, not at all I don't think.

I also agree that we're all different and I see quite a lot of "why do I get X when others don't?" type threads which, whilst of interest to the concerned parties, are hardly surprising.

CBT and REBT have helped me too no end. Where I was a complete basket case before, I am only a basket case 60% of the time now :wink: Sadly I still frequently get days where I'm just crapping myself and none of my techniques or insight help very much. Gah.

 

[agentcooper]

the conclusion I come to. Just what on Earth is it about, say, strip lighting, that is threatening? Whilst I accept it causes me to feel DR and very, very anxious, why? What possible actual threat is it to me? None. None whatsoever. Unfortunately that does not stop me from feeling dreadful.

Now your heart (or similarly important organ) stopping (to get back to the thread at hand) is more threat-worthy but for some reason that does not bother me in the slightest. I am able to say, without a sniff of anxiety that if it stops, it stops. I am dead. Same is true if you get run over. Or get a terminal illness. Or caught in a house fire. Do people on this board worry about those more-likely scenarios? No. Strange eh?

Cheers,
pete

hey pete, just out of curiosity, do you have the whole sha-bang (meaning dp AND dr) or do you mainly just have dr? 'cause i have dr but hardly any dp and strip lighting scares the pants off me, as well, whereas an organ stopping doesn't scare me at all. i think the reason fluorescent lights scare us drers, has something to do with our visual processing.

sorry, i know that doesn't have too much to do with the post but i always find it interesting when someone has the same symptoms as me.

 

[sming]

hey pete, just out of curiosity, do you have the whole sha-bang (meaning dp AND dr) or do you mainly just have dr?

I don't really know. I know I have had a lot of DR/DP symptoms for 10 years or so but I've only just learned about DP/DR so it's all rather new to me. I've just been told all this time that I had "depression" and so it's been good to find out about DR/DP.

'cause i have dr but hardly any dp and strip lighting scares the pants off me, as well, whereas an organ stopping doesn't scare me at all. i think the reason fluorescent lights scare us drers, has something to do with our visual processing.

Right. Have you found any useful techniques for reducing the anxiety caused by said lights? I've yet to hear of anything effective.

sorry, i know that doesn't have too much to do with the post but i always find it interesting when someone has the same symptoms as me.

NP, I was taking this thread off-piste anyhow. I just want to learn as much as possible about this condition and more importantly, how to handle it.

 

[Guest]

Sometimes I feel like a part of my computer, really, I feel that inorganic. A lot of times I worry that my lungs arent working right or I have a heart problem, and I think thats becaue I feel so "empty". I had a funny thing happen at the docotrs, they kept trying to take my blood, and missing the vein. After the third attempt, I laughed and said "I always wondered if there was any in there and you confirmed that I don not exist". The nurse didnt see the humor, but thats how bad it gets sometimes, I dont even feel alive. I feel way too complicated to be alive, even though all living things are complicated. Oh the internalizing.... no wonder I am socially phobic, before I can say hi to someone, I have ot read their DNA and get a spit sample :shock:

 

[falling_free]

Sometimes I feel like a part of my computer, really,

Yeh I feel like a fucking computer sometimes, like a emotionless robot.

 

[Guest]

---double post removed--

 

[Guest]

have you guys ever in the middle of taking a bite out of your food thought 'what is food? why am i eating? this is such a strange concept'

 

[SillyPutty]

Definatley, and when ever I think that and I'm eating meat I really get freaked out even though I am not a vegetarian.