Before my DP/DR hit me full force 24/7 in 8th grade, around age 13... I keep getting grades and ages mixed up, I had about a year of dizzy spells, feeling like the floor was moving up and down, feeling I was "tilted over", couldn't "walk straight", etc.
These feelings passed. Strange, it was as though when the DP/DR "took over" the dizziness went away.
In one of the old DSMs, and it could have been the DSM-III, dizziness like this was mentioned as a symptom or prodromal symptom of DP/DR. Or I swear I read this somewhere.
It doesn't say this in the DSM-IV. My guess is they consider it more related to anxiety.
But I remember my father dragging me around to doctors and finally the eye doctor as I had bad eyes to begin with. I overheard the eye doctor -- Dr. Gomer Evans -- I will never forget that man (knew him since I was 2 and 1/2, LOL) -- he said in a low voice to my father "It's a phase, an hysterical thing."
Even though I was a kid I could have decked him.
The dizziness was the beginning of chronic DP/DR for me. This is my case only and it was before I was on any medications, etc. I was 12 years old.
If one believes (as I do) that DP/DR are perceptual distortions that are the result of :?: :?: not going right in some brain pathway, it makes sense that some other pathway isn't working correctly. Nothing in the brain occurs in a vacuum.
I wish I had an old DSM, I'm almost certain that "dizziness" was mentioned as an accompanying symptom to "Depersonalization Disorder." It seems these days that DP DISORDER is rare, and that DP/DR comes WITH other mental illnesses particularly anxiety disorders which are probably the source of the "off balance business" -- man I HATED that.
30 years later I'm still DP/DR, but no dizziness or any of that other stuff.
Best,
D 8)
These feelings passed. Strange, it was as though when the DP/DR "took over" the dizziness went away.
In one of the old DSMs, and it could have been the DSM-III, dizziness like this was mentioned as a symptom or prodromal symptom of DP/DR. Or I swear I read this somewhere.
It doesn't say this in the DSM-IV. My guess is they consider it more related to anxiety.
But I remember my father dragging me around to doctors and finally the eye doctor as I had bad eyes to begin with. I overheard the eye doctor -- Dr. Gomer Evans -- I will never forget that man (knew him since I was 2 and 1/2, LOL) -- he said in a low voice to my father "It's a phase, an hysterical thing."
Even though I was a kid I could have decked him.
The dizziness was the beginning of chronic DP/DR for me. This is my case only and it was before I was on any medications, etc. I was 12 years old.
If one believes (as I do) that DP/DR are perceptual distortions that are the result of :?: :?: not going right in some brain pathway, it makes sense that some other pathway isn't working correctly. Nothing in the brain occurs in a vacuum.
I wish I had an old DSM, I'm almost certain that "dizziness" was mentioned as an accompanying symptom to "Depersonalization Disorder." It seems these days that DP DISORDER is rare, and that DP/DR comes WITH other mental illnesses particularly anxiety disorders which are probably the source of the "off balance business" -- man I HATED that.
30 years later I'm still DP/DR, but no dizziness or any of that other stuff.
Best,
D 8)
