Topic: cigi and others who know about depersonalization
lpkayak
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 5230
posted
what is it? is it a lyme symptom? if it is i haven't heard of it-but i am very interested because a close relative has been dx with depression and some sort of social disorder-of course i have thought for years she had lyme-but her whole family is ignorent or in denial that its lyme. any info about this would be appreciated.
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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hopeful123
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 3244
posted
Hi, This is from a link when i googled. It can be related to drugs or illness.
Depersonalization is the third most common psychologicical experience, after feelings of anxiety and feelings of depression, and often occurs after a person experiences life threatening danger, such as an accident, assault, or serious illness or injury. Depersonalization disorder has not been studied widely, and its cause and occurrence in the population are unknown.
try not to worry. just find out stuff about it. okay?
best, hopeful123
-------------------- some days you're the bug, some days you're the windshield Posts: 1160 | From NY | Registered: Oct 2002
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Ann-OH
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
Member # 2020
When your world seems strange and you've lost your sense of self, you'll be hard pressed finding a name for your affliction. But there is one "Depersonalization Disorder", and it's nothing new.
It may happen when you first wake up, or while flying on an airplane or driving in your car.
Suddenly, inexplicably, something changes. Common objects and familiar situations seem strange, foreign. Like you've just arrived on the planet, but don't know from where. It may pass quickly, or it may linger.
You close your eyes and turn inward, but the very thoughts running through your head seem different. The act of thinking itself, the stream of invisible words running through the hollow chamber of your mind, seems strange and unreal.
It's as if you have no self, no ego, no remnant of that inner strength which quietly and automatically enabled you to deal with the world around you, and the world inside you. It may settle over time, into a feeling of "nothingness", as if you were without emotions, dead.
Or the fear of it may blossom into a full-blown panic attack. But when it hits for the first time, you're convinced that you're going insane, and wait in a cold sweat to see when and if you finally do go over the edge.
What you don't know at the moment is that this troubling experience is distinctly human, experienced briefly at some time or another by as much as 70 percent of the population.
In its chronic form, popular culture once saw it as part of a nervous breakdown. Some have called it "Alice in Wonderland" disease. Jean Paul Sartre called it "the filth" , William James dubbed it "the sick soul". It's been linked philosophically to existentialism, even Buddhism.
Yet to its victims, it's anything but an enlightened state of mind. Welcome to the world of Depersonalization Disorder.[end quote]
posted
i've had this since i was little. I always called it feeling numb or like I was watching myself in a movie.
Years later I now know it was from a tramatic experience I had when I was little which had been blocked out for years..
It is better today but not gone and I live with the feeling daily. I remeber in the begingin when it started it would come a little at a time..bu tafeter a while it was there all the time. I was terrified when I was little and it sarted. I even saw a therapist but of course she missed the diagnosis.
sorry you are having this.. daniella
-------------------- ~Things may happen in my life time to change who I am but I refuse to let them reduce me...~ Posts: 968 | From private | Registered: Jan 2005
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lpkayak
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 5230
posted
thank you. is there treatment?
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
what is called 'depersonalization' as relates to lyme disease is not imo the same as is seen in psychogenic cases. in neurolyme, it is far more intense and this is due to invasion of the CNS causing the syndrome...a feeling of disorientation, of detachment of your mind from your body, a disturbance of reality perception. it is very disconcerting and can lead quickly to suicide. the patient may describe the experience as being "like watching a movie", of feeling like the world seems "artificial", or feeling like a "bad trip" and this is often accompanied by panic {if the patient retains insight} and memory disturbance. similar symptoms can be seen in other neuropsychiatric diseases such as neurosyphilis, adult-onset leukodystrophies, brucella infection, wilson's disease, and various metabolic disorders.
anyone complaining of such a constellation of symptoms, especially if they are panicky over the situation or state that they feel as if the feelings are overwhelming and outside of their control {ie appear hypochondriachal} should be immediately evaluated for these CNS conditions and if the doctor will not consider neuroborreliosis and another cause is not found get an LLMD immediately.
people have killed themselves over not being able to get help for this.
Posts: 523 | From Stillwater,OK,USA | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Depersonalization is THE symptom that pushed me to find out what was wrong with me, after years of diverse ailments.
I had the constant feeling that I was living a dream, that my life wasn't real, that I was just a spectator. I though that anything could happen (death, accident) and it wouldn't really happen, so I didn't care about what I did, what I said, how I drove... That's the weirdest feeling.
I seriously though that I was losing it. I could deal with the pneumonia, the arthritis, the heart problems, bells palsy, but the prospect of becoming mad (that's what I thought at the time) got me really scared.
After a few months on abx, it stopped. After 1 year of treatment, it seldom happens. I don't need any other proof that it's Lyme related.
Posts: 159 | From CT, USA | Registered: Jan 2005
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lpkayak
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 5230
posted
wow-i wrote about my niece-but what you all are describing is something i was experiencing for the last month or so before my surgery on 1/6. i had written it off as stress-cuz i was having a cancer scare and having to sell my house and move and all during the holidays when i was in a wheelchair with a pelvis fractured in two places...i figured it was normal to be anxious and depressed considring what i was going thru---and so far have refused the zoloft that is being pushed on me by the docs(not the llmd). i allso had severe dizziness-but not typical vertigo-annd there is a post on here that describes my dizziiness exactly and says it is related to inflammaion of ceertain cervical vertebrae leadign to pressure on a cranial nerve(forget the #-never could remember that )....soooooo...i have been thru a lot this fall but by rambling on here in different places a lot is falling into place...i think the bug is having a good time and growing big time deep with in and it might be time for me to again go on heavy duty abx and put a stop to this party inside my bod.
i don't see my llmd til 2/28...but i think i will try to contact him and make a plan.
as for mey niece...i'm gonna start a new thread about that...thanks for your replies
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
anyone who experienced what I experienced...and I know this is totally subjective...would likely freak out. I left something off too...it was all accompanied by an overwhelming sense of doom, like I had no future. I literally could not look forward to anything, even though I tried to force myself. I suppose this could be called a "severe depressive" symptom...yet the entire time I was not sad...but I WAS panicky and anxious over how I felt...which was made much worse by the total inability of a whole string of physicians to diagnose and treat the condition.
Posts: 523 | From Stillwater,OK,USA | Registered: Sep 2004
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