[Diego]

Hi everyone! I've been wandering if dp/dr is just a consequence of OCD or it is something else. What I mean is, always when I feel better my mind intentionally reminds me of my dr/dp so I'm back to the staring point and have to start the recovery journey again. And what I noticed from this experience is that anxiety isn't the "core" of dp/dr, if it was the core, so a simple benzo would solve it. So the really bridge to dp/dr for me is this ocd thoughts, I just wanted know your options about it. Be strong 🤞

 

[hotsack]

yes having severe ocd along with dpdr. the longing for the state of normal becomes the compulsion

 

[Trith]

Hi everyone! I've been wandering if dp/dr is just a consequence of OCD or it is something else. What I mean is, always when I feel better my mind intentionally reminds me of my dr/dp so I'm back to the staring point and have to start the recovery journey again. And what I noticed from this experience is that anxiety isn't the "core" of dp/dr, if it was the core, so a simple benzo would solve it. So the really bridge to dp/dr for me is this ocd thoughts, I just wanted know your options about it. Be strong 🤞

I feel something like that too. For me it's like OCD is about conflicts with myself. But if my DR decreases I feel more like just one person and suddenly the idea of a conflict with myself becomes more absurd. If I feel difficult emotions (like stress, but not only), I can be in conflict with my emotions, or try to protect myself from them. But if I am more integrated sometimes, they are just my emotions, and they regulate themselves more naturally, just because it's me. I have some problems with addictive behaviors too, and it feels very much like this too. And when I am more integrated there is no conflict between different behaviors, there is just me, naturally choosing the behavior that will give me more wellbeing, because why would I do anything else.
Lately, I have found that when I was in conflict with myself, it was often because I needed something from myself, like acknowledgement of who I am, of what I feel, self love,... (and it's most probably just one aspect of my problem) But the voice that tells me what I need is very very weak sometimes. And the negative emotions or discomfort in my life are much louder, so much so that I quickly can't hear my own needs anymore taking more distance might be my only way out.
In my case I don't think it is only about stress, but now I feel it's more about how I deal with anything negative in my life, and how I deal with myself, and also what space I allow myself to take in life. But it is still quite confusing.

I'm thinking that, because lately I have had lower DR, and a lot of my improvement happened when I allowed myself to say what I think to people, and valued what came from me. Like I feel more legitimate. I have been diagnosed with some autism and ADHD recently, and it makes me feel more legitimate with my problems. If I am not adapted to others, it's not necessarily because I will have to work forever to fix something in me, I am allowed to be how I am. So this solves some inner conflict and I feel my inner voice is not just bs.
When I feel stress, I can also feel that "I should not listen to myself because it always makes things worse", or something like that. When I have addictive problems, I can feel that "I should not listen to my needs, because they always cause problems, a good life is a life where I am in control and manage to distance my needs". And when I have mental obsessions (OCD like maybe), I usually fight with myself to try to gain some control over something, because I have learned to not trust what is naturally there. And perhaps rightfully so, because if my natural way is to not listen to my own needs (which is made harder by autism, I have heard), then my natural way naturally turns my life into crap, and more control is the only way.

 

[NoDevils]

Depersonalization and obsessive thinking are closely related but they're not the same thing. They're also closely related with anxiety, which is also not the same thing. I think a depersonalized person with less obsessive thinking and anxiety is less likely to care that they're depersonalized. Much suffering in depersonalization comes from thinking I'm not supposed to be this way.

 

[Trith]

Depersonalization and obsessive thinking are closely related but they're not the same thing. They're also closely related with anxiety, which is also not the same thing. I think a depersonalized person with less obsessive thinking and anxiety is less likely to care that they're depersonalized. Much suffering in depersonalization comes from thinking I'm not supposed to be this way.

I was thinking about something similar. I am under the impression that a lot of problems around DPDR are about over-using rationality to fix every problem. This was certainly my strategy even before I had DPDR. It's like these obsessions confuse my subjective experience with rational objective truth, as if they could work together. But they are really not the same thing and don't go on the same plane. For example, existential questions try to find rational definitive answers to things that are just part of our subjective experience, and it's trying to put predictable concepts on things that constantly escape rationality. Very often when we try to make them really work together, they enter in conflict. Solipsism, for example, seems to me like an attempt at finding an agreement between the two, and saying that maybe objective truth is absolutely aligned with my subjective experience and they are the same thing, "there is objectively only my experience and nothing else".
But they can't work together, because they are not even in the same reality. An actual experience and a theory are really not the same thing. But strangely enough that's kind of what DPDR feels to me, it feels like my actual experience is experienced on the same level as just a thought, it's as real as a thought.
I have talked about narcissism before, and interestingly, in psychoanalysis, the definition of narcissism is like the newborn, in it's first development stage, which doesn't understand the presence of people around him. Only his own experience exists and the satisfaction of its needs. It's not that he is hungry, for him it is just that there is hunger. At some point there is what they call the "narcissistic wound", where (I'm not sure about all this definition - don't quote me) they realize that others exist too and they don't share the same needs as them. To my understanding, narcissist wounds, even for an adult, are kind of the same thing as traumas (but don't quote me on this), and it has to do with the realization that we are not as powerful as we thought, or the realization of our true limits. So the baby realizes that their needs are not necessarily met, and they start to define who they are, and separate themselves from the rest of the world. So there is something about this that deals with the mix between subjective experience and objective truth and how we separate the two.
At an adult age, what we generally call a narcissist, is someone who thinks they are always right, and others are just there to serve them. It's like they confuse their own opinions and needs for an objective truth that others should naturally accept, because they have a wrong construction of themselves. Changes in how they view the world and how they separate objective truth and subjectivity might directly question their sense of self and how they built it in early childhood, and it can feel like dying. One experience I had about 6 years ago, that I think felt like a panic attack, came from suddenly realizing that I had built a castle of rationality and theories and it could not hold anymore and was collapsing. I had found many explanations to kind of mix and tape together my subjective experience with safe, rational and solid objective truth, and suddenly I acknowledged that it didn't work (because it can't work), and it all collapsed, and I really felt almost like I was dying. Changing who we are at the core can be a terrible experience, in my opinion. And I can't just tape a wound that is inherent to how my self is built right now.

By the way, I realize that my father's death when I was 15 might have affected me more than I previously thought. My sick relationship with my narcissistic mother might not have helped me build a good sense of self, and this is 98% of what I had to talk about in therapy for years, but my father's death might have been something I was not built to accept. Even before his death, I remember that before ten, I had regular problems sleeping in the evening, because of an existential fear of death. I thought that even if it will come in a long time, it is so impossible to wrap my head around it, and so impossible to accept. I feel it's like I had constructed a maladapted self for whom death is not something that fits in the story. And at my father's death, I think I got this impossibility that was just too hard to adjust too. It feels like I need to change my sense of self to adjust to the fact that death is a part of our reality. It is so fundamental to me that I feel like I won't go beyond that without a huge panic attack. Or maybe the answer is something totally different. A friend of mine used to have panic attacks with fear of immediate death, and it all stopped when she just dared to talk about it to her boyfriend. So it felt like fear of death but deep inside it might have something different, so I don't know. But it feels like this is a big thing for me. And I would like to change. The most horrible thing would be that I find a rational explanation to fix this wound without changing my core self. It would be like extending my stay in my mind prison.

 

[NoDevils]

I was thinking about something similar. I am under the impression that a lot of problems around DPDR are about over-using rationality to fix every problem. This was certainly my strategy even before I had DPDR. It's like these obsessions confuse my subjective experience with rational objective truth, as if they could work together. But they are really not the same thing and don't go on the same plane. For example, existential questions try to find rational definitive answers to things that are just part of our subjective experience, and it's trying to put predictable concepts on things that constantly escape rationality. Very often when we try to make them really work together, they enter in conflict. Solipsism, for example, seems to me like an attempt at finding an agreement between the two, and saying that maybe objective truth is absolutely aligned with my subjective experience and they are the same thing, "there is objectively only my experience and nothing else".
But they can't work together, because they are not even in the same reality. An actual experience and a theory are really not the same thing. But strangely enough that's kind of what DPDR feels to me, it feels like my actual experience is experienced on the same level as just a thought, it's as real as a thought.
I have talked about narcissism before, and interestingly, in psychoanalysis, the definition of narcissism is like the newborn, in it's first development stage, which doesn't understand the presence of people around him. Only his own experience exists and the satisfaction of its needs. It's not that he is hungry, for him it is just that there is hunger. At some point there is what they call the "narcissistic wound", where (I'm not sure about all this definition - don't quote me) they realize that others exist too and they don't share the same needs as them. To my understanding, narcissist wounds, even for an adult, are kind of the same thing as traumas (but don't quote me on this), and it has to do with the realization that we are not as powerful as we thought, or the realization of our true limits. So the baby realizes that their needs are not necessarily met, and they start to define who they are, and separate themselves from the rest of the world. So there is something about this that deals with the mix between subjective experience and objective truth and how we separate the two.
At an adult age, what we generally call a narcissist, is someone who thinks they are always right, and others are just there to serve them. It's like they confuse their own opinions and needs for an objective truth that others should naturally accept, because they have a wrong construction of themselves. Changes in how they view the world and how they separate objective truth and subjectivity might directly question their sense of self and how they built it in early childhood, and it can feel like dying. One experience I had about 6 years ago, that I think felt like a panic attack, came from suddenly realizing that I had built a castle of rationality and theories and it could not hold anymore and was collapsing. I had found many explanations to kind of mix and tape together my subjective experience with safe, rational and solid objective truth, and suddenly I acknowledged that it didn't work (because it can't work), and it all collapsed, and I really felt almost like I was dying. Changing who we are at the core can be a terrible experience, in my opinion. And I can't just tape a wound that is inherent to how my self is built right now.

By the way, I realize that my father's death when I was 15 might have affected me more than I previously thought. My sick relationship with my narcissistic mother might not have helped me build a good sense of self, and this is 98% of what I had to talk about in therapy for years, but my father's death might have been something I was not built to accept. Even before his death, I remember that before ten, I had regular problems sleeping in the evening, because of an existential fear of death. I thought that even if it will come in a long time, it is so impossible to wrap my head around it, and so impossible to accept. I feel it's like I had constructed a maladapted self for whom death is not something that fits in the story. And at my father's death, I think I got this impossibility that was just too hard to adjust too. It feels like I need to change my sense of self to adjust to the fact that death is a part of our reality. It is so fundamental to me that I feel like I won't go beyond that without a huge panic attack. Or maybe the answer is something totally different. A friend of mine used to have panic attacks with fear of immediate death, and it all stopped when she just dared to talk about it to her boyfriend. So it felt like fear of death but deep inside it might have something different, so I don't know. But it feels like this is a big thing for me. And I would like to change. The most horrible thing would be that I find a rational explanation to fix this wound without changing my core self. It would be like extending my stay in my mind prison.

I take psychoanalytic perspectives to be more philosophical than scientific but I like how they relate to narcissism. Narcissism has become catchall for describing pathologically selfish human behavior and I'm not sure if psychoanalysis is the historical basis for this or what. In related news, people around the world have started taking shelter in shallow understandings of politics and committing crimes or dissolving relationships over political matters. Most Americans are guilty of this by now, the taking shelter and dissolving relationships part. Crime is on the rise too, not to exaggerate or create undue panic.

I'd like to know more about your experience where your understanding of the universe fell apart and you panicked. Was that related to your fear of death? When I had a psychiatric breakdown my sense of self was temporarily shattered. It didn't feel like I had thoughts in response to other people's speech, but I was somehow able to answer them and my voice felt alien. You can imagine a self-portrait of a schizophrenic who draws a loudspeaker where his mouth should be. I've always had philosophical rumination and for the most part it hasn't been panic inducing. I've had the typical anxiety, fear of fear cycling over and over. For a short while I thought I was going to have a heart attack or collapse. Unmanageable fear of death is another common manifestation of anxiety, and high enough anxiety for long enough a duration can be fatal. I had a similar freakout about death when I was a child but that particular manifestation of anxiety resolved itself quickly.

That's interesting you're trying to formulate a theory about depersonalization that relates to narcissism and psychoanalysis. Is this uncharted territory? I'm not well read but I don't remember Freud having much to say about depersonalization. Depersonalization as you know is very neglected and difficult to treat apart from calming people and telling them to accept it.

I agree with the link between solipsism and narcissism. I made a friend at a mental hospital who was very egotistical and dysfunctional, and one day he told me I didn't necessarily exist. I don't believe he owed me anything but he was becoming more of a far right lunatic and directionless shut in every day. Everything he said was predictable with trends of various 4chan boards and so he seemed like he was losing what humanity he had.

I think everyone rationalizes fear of death by saying they're prepared to stop existing or meet what comes after. Some people do psychedelics and their fear of death lessens. You know, people are afraid of death for different reasons and relate to it in different ways. Why are you so afraid of death, what do you want to do about it, and what constitutes a "mind prison"? Maybe anxiety and feelings of obligation are the prison.

Some depersonalization clinics claim people with chronic depersonalization have higher instances of emotional mistreatment in childhood, even higher than the general population. Upbringings that are emotionally chaotic and result in poor emotional regulation skills are also correlated with dramatic cluster personality disorders. I think depersonalization syndrome and personality disorder are fairly distinct but I see similarities in being unable to regulate oneself. My mother was also negligent especially on an emotional level. I rate her ability to tend to her emotional needs a 2/10 so of course her ability to attend to others' needs especially her own child is going to be rather poor. I've been able to regulate myself on a rational level but how do we regulate ourselves on an emotional one? We're social and emotional creatures, so don't we need other people to support us emotionally?

When I felt close to another person I felt depersonalized but I also didn't care and was much calmer. There's such a premium on emotional intimacy now, and the more alienating and not cohesive society becomes the premium will go up. Having someone who cares about you in this world on an emotional level is like having an olympic medal or breaking the rules in some way.

 

[dpdrhaver184]

No, it's not. I hate this idea that "You only have DP/DR because you keep thinking about it and obsessing over it, and if you stopped that, it would go away". I know your post was genuine but all the ideas adjacent to it I've read are like this.

Firstly, expecting people with such a severe mental illness to just "stop thinking out of it" is ludicrously stupid. Like, "People with depression should just stop being sad" kind of stupid. Of course lots of people obsess over their DP/DR! That doesn't mean they have OCD, it feels very important so you pay attention to it. That's just human behavior.

Secondly, the idea that anxiety actively causes the DP/DR can be disproven by just thinking about it. For the first few weeks of my DP/DR, I barely knew something was wrong. For the first few months, I didn't know that thing was DP/DR. How could I have been focusing on something I didn't even know was there/didn't know what it was?

Also, I think you're being very rough on yourself to assume that if you think about DP/DR then you're "back to the staring point and have to start the recovery journey again". I don't think that's accurate to how it works.

 

[Psyborg]

nope

 

[leminaseri]

For the first few months, I didn't know that thing was DP/DR. How could I have been focusing on something I didn't even know was there/didn't know what it was?

this is such wrong? you dont have to know the name of something to obsess about. you can also obsess about a girl/boy youve seen anywhere but maybe you dont know her/his name. what a fuckstupid claim man i read this everywhere and it should show the low average iq of mankind

 

[leminaseri]

No, it's not. I hate this idea that "You only have DP/DR because you keep thinking about it and obsessing over it, and if you stopped that, it would go away". I know your post was genuine but all the ideas adjacent to it I've read are like this.

Firstly, expecting people with such a severe mental illness to just "stop thinking out of it" is ludicrously stupid. Like, "People with depression should just stop being sad" kind of stupid. Of course lots of people obsess over their DP/DR! That doesn't mean they have OCD, it feels very important so you pay attention to it. That's just human behavior.

Secondly, the idea that anxiety actively causes the DP/DR can be disproven by just thinking about it. For the first few weeks of my DP/DR, I barely knew something was wrong. For the first few months, I didn't know that thing was DP/DR. How could I have been focusing on something I didn't even know was there/didn't know what it was?

Also, I think you're being very rough on yourself to assume that if you think about DP/DR then you're "back to the staring point and have to start the recovery journey again". I don't think that's accurate to how it works.

and no. even if you dont think about something, you can still be obsessed about it. the idea of this is to ACCEPT that youre ill and then let that go. just like wheelchair bounded people who can climb mountains. they also dont give a shit about their chair.

 

[snorri]

Depersonalization and obsessive thinking are closely related but they're not the same thing. They're also closely related with anxiety, which is also not the same thing. I think a depersonalized person with less obsessive thinking and anxiety is less likely to care that they're depersonalized. Much suffering in depersonalization comes from thinking I'm not supposed to be this way.

We also regularly think and evaluate our DPDR state. This echoes some earlier sentiments. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is one thing recommended to treat DPDR.

 

[Trith]

this is such wrong? you dont have to know the name of something to obsess about. you can also obsess about a girl/boy youve seen anywhere but maybe you dont know her/his name. what a fuckstupid claim man i read this everywhere and it should show the low average iq of mankind

I don't think he means just knowing the name of it, it's just that if DPDR is only caused by obsessing over DPDR, then if you don't have DPDR in the first place, logically you would never get it since you don't have any symptoms to obsess about. But we can imagine that there is something else that starts it, and then obsessing over DPDR perpetuates it. I don't know what is true and what isn't with this, but at least that's the logic. We could imagine that for some people stress starts it, and obsessions perpetuate it.

I don't have any answers about the actual causes, but my impression right now is that most of the time my obsessions are as much out of my control as my DPDR symptoms. But when I felt better last week, I also had more distance with respect to obsessions. I still had some but they became more secondary. And then they became worse and it went up and down. So my impression is that it all goes hand in hand, like obsessions are just like another symptom of DPDR. And obsessing about obsessions is as counterproductive for me as obsessing about the size of my hands or my reflection. When I feel better I feel that what is important is what I am (I think coolwhip shared something about this too) and how I relate to myself, that I am allowed to take space in life, just like anybody else.

 

[NoDevils]

I don't think he means just knowing the name of it, it's just that if DPDR is only caused by obsessing over DPDR, then if you don't have DPDR in the first place, logically you would never get it since you don't have any symptoms to obsess about. But we can imagine that there is something else that starts it, and then obsessing over DPDR perpetuates it. I don't know what is true and what isn't with this, but at least that's the logic. We could imagine that for some people stress starts it, and obsessions perpetuate it.

I don't have any answers about the actual causes, but my impression right now is that most of the time my obsessions are as much out of my control as my DPDR symptoms. But when I felt better last week, I also had more distance with respect to obsessions. I still had some but they became more secondary. And then they became worse and it went up and down. So my impression is that it all goes hand in hand, like obsessions are just like another symptom of DPDR. And obsessing about obsessions is as counterproductive for me as obsessing about the size of my hands or my reflection. When I feel better I feel that what is important is what I am (I think coolwhip shared something about this too) and how I relate to myself, that I am allowed to take space in life, just like anybody else.

I think noticing and obsessing are different things. A lot of people say it feels like being drunk or high on marijuana so to think a person wouldn't notice that they'd have to be a perpetual drug user.

 

[Trith]

I take psychoanalytic perspectives to be more philosophical than scientific but I like how they relate to narcissism. Narcissism has become catchall for describing pathologically selfish human behavior and I'm not sure if psychoanalysis is the historical basis for this or what. In related news, people around the world have started taking shelter in shallow understandings of politics and committing crimes or dissolving relationships over political matters. Most Americans are guilty of this by now, the taking shelter and dissolving relationships part. Crime is on the rise too, not to exaggerate or create undue panic.

I'd like to know more about your experience where your understanding of the universe fell apart and you panicked. Was that related to your fear of death? When I had a psychiatric breakdown my sense of self was temporarily shattered. It didn't feel like I had thoughts in response to other people's speech, but I was somehow able to answer them and my voice felt alien. You can imagine a self-portrait of a schizophrenic who draws a loudspeaker where his mouth should be. I've always had philosophical rumination and for the most part it hasn't been panic inducing. I've had the typical anxiety, fear of fear cycling over and over. For a short while I thought I was going to have a heart attack or collapse. Unmanageable fear of death is another common manifestation of anxiety, and high enough anxiety for long enough a duration can be fatal. I had a similar freakout about death when I was a child but that particular manifestation of anxiety resolved itself quickly.

That's interesting you're trying to formulate a theory about depersonalization that relates to narcissism and psychoanalysis. Is this uncharted territory? I'm not well read but I don't remember Freud having much to say about depersonalization. Depersonalization as you know is very neglected and difficult to treat apart from calming people and telling them to accept it.

I agree with the link between solipsism and narcissism. I made a friend at a mental hospital who was very egotistical and dysfunctional, and one day he told me I didn't necessarily exist. I don't believe he owed me anything but he was becoming more of a far right lunatic and directionless shut in every day. Everything he said was predictable with trends of various 4chan boards and so he seemed like he was losing what humanity he had.

I think everyone rationalizes fear of death by saying they're prepared to stop existing or meet what comes after. Some people do psychedelics and their fear of death lessens. You know, people are afraid of death for different reasons and relate to it in different ways. Why are you so afraid of death, what do you want to do about it, and what constitutes a "mind prison"? Maybe anxiety and feelings of obligation are the prison.

Some depersonalization clinics claim people with chronic depersonalization have higher instances of emotional mistreatment in childhood, even higher than the general population. Upbringings that are emotionally chaotic and result in poor emotional regulation skills are also correlated with dramatic cluster personality disorders. I think depersonalization syndrome and personality disorder are fairly distinct but I see similarities in being unable to regulate oneself. My mother was also negligent especially on an emotional level. I rate her ability to tend to her emotional needs a 2/10 so of course her ability to attend to others' needs especially her own child is going to be rather poor. I've been able to regulate myself on a rational level but how do we regulate ourselves on an emotional one? We're social and emotional creatures, so don't we need other people to support us emotionally?

When I felt close to another person I felt depersonalized but I also didn't care and was much calmer. There's such a premium on emotional intimacy now, and the more alienating and not cohesive society becomes the premium will go up. Having someone who cares about you in this world on an emotional level is like having an olympic medal or breaking the rules in some way.

About that kind of panic attack, it happened when I was in a buddhist cultish organization. Like in almost every cult there were many valuable things though. We were very free to interpret the "teachings" as we wanted to, and I was satisfied with my psychological explanations of what their concepts were about and I was progressing with curiosity. At some point though, they slowly started to tell us that this or that interpretation was the right one, that some things had to be taken more literally. I had put a big trust in this organization and this felt dishonest manipulative and it was my first shock. It's a very long story. But I started to express my disapproval around me and I saw that almost all of my friends were very satisfied with the literal interpretations of "magic stuff" and that was my second shock. It's weird because it could be expected that in some sort of buddhist organization there would be people who really believe in reincarnation, but this did not hit my mind in all those years just because I was free to have my own interpretation until then and I thought others were thinking like me, we rarely spoke about these things with each other, because the teachings were not about the magic stuff most of the time, but more about things that could more clearly just be psychological stuff.
I had some discussions with them, that usually they initiated, and it was weird for most of them that I did not believe in these things, and I felt the pressure of the group, and thought "I didn't realize the nature of the situation the whole time". I think my obsessions increased, about how to defend my truth, at least for myself, and find more logical stuff. But I think it all collapsed because I was confusing my rationality with truth itself, I was facing paradoxes all the time. I didn't change my mind, it's just that I tried to go from 98% certainty to 100% and that last bit was impossible (obviously). It sounds like a small thing, but the mere fact that 100% is impossible was challenging my kind of unconscious view of reality at the time. It sounds stupid when I say it like that, but it was about a kind of tower I think I had been building for a long time, and didn't realize the nature of what I was doing.
Then, technically, it felt like a spiral of thought, I felt like I was kind of falling, having no more reference. I went to lay down and let my head spin, and it was over in some minutes. But in those few minutes, it kind of felt like my life was over.

And about fear of death, it's a good question. I think that when I was a kid I was mostly afraid of how much would happen in the world that I would miss. So I think it was based on knowledge too. On a deep level it was kind of the fear of not being able to know everything, and maybe knowledge can be seen as a way to connect with the world. Also the fear of the world going on without me is maybe a fear of abandonment (not a rational one obviously, because when you are dead you are not being abandoned, you are just dead). Now I feel much better with this. And I feel that, to some extent, the realization of death that I had when people I loved have died, actually helps me to enjoy life more moment by moment. I don't think about it all the time, but I would lie if I said I was comfortable with the idea in the times I think about it. Sometimes people think they are comfortable with it, but I think they just don't think seriously about it or they regard it as something that is far enough for them that it can stay in the realm of hypotheses. I can't imagine that most people are afraid to speak in public, but are completely comfortable with dying, saying goodbye to their friends and/or children and so on.

And the mind prison I am talking about is DPDR or lack of connection with the world. I think that this is caused by a badly constructed identity. It's like pieces of paper that have been glued together in a wrong way, and the only way to fix it is to rip the paper apart and then glue it again properly. That panic attack I was talking about felt like this, like ripping the paper. And I prefer a thousand times more having this kind of panic attack than just ease that kind of fear, if it means I will never change and have more of that connection. So far I don't believe fear causes my DPDR, but running away from my emotions does, because they are part of me. Sometimes if those emotions are too intense this is what happens, but generally my emotions don't seem to cause that for me now. But when I make big theories (a bit like now) and believe too much in them, then I go to theory world and I try to be safe from the unpredictable world of emotions, and this is when I get more DPDR I think. And it feels a bit like the sollipsism of the person you describe, although not as extreme.

 

[Trith]

That's interesting you're trying to formulate a theory about depersonalization that relates to narcissism and psychoanalysis. Is this uncharted territory? I'm not well read but I don't remember Freud having much to say about depersonalization. Depersonalization as you know is very neglected and difficult to treat apart from calming people and telling them to accept it.

I don't know if it is uncharted. I have also never heard anything from Freud about this, but once I tried to read a small book about DPDR and psychoanalysis, and it was very cryptic and not so interesting. And I am a bit allergic to psychoanalysis in general. I think there are some good things in it, but also a lot of pseudoscience and fallacies, at least the psychoanalysis we can find here in France. I'm afraid that reading too much about psychoanalysis is a good way to get lost rather than a good way to find answers.

And about emotional regulation, that is found in personality disorders, the link I observe in myself is that when emotions are too strong, I might tend to go to "f*ck it, I'm out of here" mode and distance myself from them. When I have a stronger self and less distance, my emotions are more linked to the actions and thoughts that preceded them. And when I record the painful emotion, I also record the actions and thoughts that led to it or that kept it alive, and I very naturally try to avoid these thoughts and behaviors, almost with no effort, when I see it I just do what makes sense. But if I feel split away from these emotions, I consciously know I shouldn't stay on youtube for 6h on a tuesday night, but the link isn't natural and stopping requires a huge effort. And it's the same with thoughts that make me feel like crap or that perpetuate bad emotions. So I was thinking that a weak sense of self (that is typical of narcissistic personality disorder, or borderline, or bipolar, that deal a lot with addictive behaviors) might prevent emotional regulation in this way, but that's just based on my personal experience in the past weeks.... not on anything I have read. One thing I have read, though, is that people who have addictions have a hard time identifying their own emotions. And it's hard to care for yourself if you don't even know what you need.

 

[NoDevils]

About that kind of panic attack, it happened when I was in a buddhist cultish organization. Like in almost every cult there were many valuable things though. We were very free to interpret the "teachings" as we wanted to, and I was satisfied with my psychological explanations of what their concepts were about and I was progressing with curiosity. At some point though, they slowly started to tell us that this or that interpretation was the right one, that some things had to be taken more literally. I had put a big trust in this organization and this felt dishonest manipulative and it was my first shock. It's a very long story. But I started to express my disapproval around me and I saw that almost all of my friends were very satisfied with the literal interpretations of "magic stuff" and that was my second shock. It's weird because it could be expected that in some sort of buddhist organization there would be people who really believe in reincarnation, but this did not hit my mind in all those years just because I was free to have my own interpretation until then and I thought others were thinking like me, we rarely spoke about these things with each other, because the teachings were not about the magic stuff most of the time, but more about things that could more clearly just be psychological stuff.
I had some discussions with them, that usually they initiated, and it was weird for most of them that I did not believe in these things, and I felt the pressure of the group, and thought "I didn't realize the nature of the situation the whole time". I think my obsessions increased, about how to defend my truth, at least for myself, and find more logical stuff. But I think it all collapsed because I was confusing my rationality with truth itself, I was facing paradoxes all the time. I didn't change my mind, it's just that I tried to go from 98% certainty to 100% and that last bit was impossible (obviously). It sounds like a small thing, but the mere fact that 100% is impossible was challenging my kind of unconscious view of reality at the time. It sounds stupid when I say it like that, but it was about a kind of tower I think I had been building for a long time, and didn't realize the nature of what I was doing.
Then, technically, it felt like a spiral of thought, I felt like I was kind of falling, having no more reference. I went to lay down and let my head spin, and it was over in some minutes. But in those few minutes, it kind of felt like my life was over.

And about fear of death, it's a good question. I think that when I was a kid I was mostly afraid of how much would happen in the world that I would miss. So I think it was based on knowledge too. On a deep level it was kind of the fear of not being able to know everything, and maybe knowledge can be seen as a way to connect with the world. Also the fear of the world going on without me is maybe a fear of abandonment (not a rational one obviously, because when you are dead you are not being abandoned, you are just dead). Now I feel much better with this. And I feel that, to some extent, the realization of death that I had when people I loved have died, actually helps me to enjoy life more moment by moment. I don't think about it all the time, but I would lie if I said I was comfortable with the idea in the times I think about it. Sometimes people think they are comfortable with it, but I think they just don't think seriously about it or they regard it as something that is far enough for them that it can stay in the realm of hypotheses. I can't imagine that most people are afraid to speak in public, but are completely comfortable with dying, saying goodbye to their friends and/or children and so on.

And the mind prison I am talking about is DPDR or lack of connection with the world. I think that this is caused by a badly constructed identity. It's like pieces of paper that have been glued together in a wrong way, and the only way to fix it is to rip the paper apart and then glue it again properly. That panic attack I was talking about felt like this, like ripping the paper. And I prefer a thousand times more having this kind of panic attack than just ease that kind of fear, if it means I will never change and have more of that connection. So far I don't believe fear causes my DPDR, but running away from my emotions does, because they are part of me. Sometimes if those emotions are too intense this is what happens, but generally my emotions don't seem to cause that for me now. But when I make big theories (a bit like now) and believe too much in them, then I go to theory world and I try to be safe from the unpredictable world of emotions, and this is when I get more DPDR I think. And it feels a bit like the sollipsism of the person you describe, although not as extreme.

One time I had a therapist earnestly ask me how I was feeling about life and all the trauma. I told him I'm hopeful about life in spite of its obstacles but I'm bordering on furious about the trauma. The fact other people are suffering worse trauma makes me even more angry. I felt like a real human again when this anger came over me. What you said about putting yourself back together as a total or partial cure is consistent with treatment for dissociative disorders.

About death, I think a lot of people avoid death because they have things they want to do but are otherwise comfortable not being able to know and do everything. Anxiety in relation to death makes sense because it's possible there could be some kind of afterlife. Any type of hell, reincarnation, or new universe is possible, and this ambiguity can be horrifying. Sometimes people will fear they're going to be stuck in a black void where nothing happens, which doesn't make sense but also isn't possible to disprove.

 

[hotsack]

when you have CHRONIC ocd with this you cannt STOP an obsession. the brain gets on stuck mode detecting errors in fantasy land. if you want hell its basically that

 

[dpdrhaver184]

and no. even if you dont think about something, you can still be obsessed about it. the idea of this is to ACCEPT that youre ill and then let that go. just like wheelchair bounded people who can climb mountains. they also dont give a shit about their chair.

Your first point about not knowing the name of something is valid, although I still think there's an irrational fear of calling something a symptom of DP/DR among people who try to ignore it/accept it. If something is part of DP/DR then call it part of DP/DR.

I don't understand what you mean by "even if you dont think about something, you can still be obsessed about it". Isn't obsessing defined by constantly thinking about something? I also don't know what that has to do with people who climb mountains in wheelchairs.