You're going to need professional help for this one. Amateur advice like "sleep with a light on" is all stuff you're already doing or stuff that won't fix anything

>>16987253
see a therapist, you sound majorly fucked up and probably wont be able to fix it on your own. there's no shame in seeking help.

Yeah I agree with you about the professional help but I'm rather scared to for some reason. I think it's because I've always just kind of lived with if my whole life. It honestly didn't hit me until kind of recently that not everyone expirences it. I know there's probably not anyone on here that can give me actual advice but if someone has similar expirences that'd be great so I don't feel so alone in my situation

Sorry to say but a small niche board on 4chan probably won't let you find anyone who can relate to something so rare, hence the professional help. You'll want to speak to someone who is aware of the condition and who has probably dealt with others who have had the same feelings as you. They'll also be able to give you advice on ways to cope.

By the way, your art is badass.

>>16987253
>>16987267
Just go see a professional for 1 session, stay for the full session and see if you like it. If not, then mabye change your approach - try another one with a different plan.

Yeah I know but I also live in a small shitty bogan drug town so there's not a lot of access to that kind of help here. I've asked my mother many times about seeking help but she kind of brushes it off. I complete agree with seeking medical help but it just seems like I'll have to wait until I have proper access to the help I need. Thanks for the replies though guys

Also thank you very much for the compliment on my art, means a lot :)

>>16987285
Well.... if you live in australia, if you get reviewed by a doctor and get diagnosed as clincally depressed, you can go see a psychologist for a couple of sessions a year for free.... mabye this is the same in your country? Check it out.

>>16987285
Look at your own art to ground yourself, prove to you that things are real and that you have created something lasting and tangible.
Sometimes the bleakness of everything will hit you hard, but they come in waves.
You need to hold onto something so you don't get swept away.

>>16987291
Thank you I hadn't even considered getting a referral from my usual doctor so I'll look into that

>>16987293
That's similar to something I do currently. Usually I can stop it happening when I feel it coming on by quickly turning all the lights on, looking at myself intently in the bathroom mirror/ talking out loud to myself and, when it's really bad, pinching and grabbing myself to help regain the feeling in my skin. I definitely find that going and talking to people to offset it helps a lot. I'll call or Skype my friends to help ground me. I feel crazy just typing this which is part of the reason I hadnt searched for help until now because I didn't want to feel alone and isolated. But now I realise it's better to just accept it and seek helps. And thank you what you said was phrased beautifully by the way

>>16987304
Don't feel crazy.
I feel the exact same way. Sometimes I'm hit with the feeling of..I don't know how to describe it. The understanding that everything that I experience could be surreal.
After all..emotions are just chemical reactions in the brain. It all relates back to the how's and why's of our existence. When I was younger.. Around your age, I would endlessly wonder of possibilities. But there is never an answer. But there is also no reason to be fearful. Just know that the things you feel, happiness, sadness, apprehension, embarrassment. They are all fleeting, fleeting moments that you have to embrace. Because if you live questioning why you are here, rather than enjoying your time here, you will always be miserable.
If you live in fear of the unknown, you will never allow yourself to truly live..

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>>16987253
I experience something similar daily,it's like being really immersed in a movie but all the while you're aware it's not real.

Therapist says it's a defense mechanism so I'm not affected as deeply by anything that could hurt emotionally but it also takes away from the good moments.
From talking with her doesn't seem like there's much you can do to stop it only accept and make the best of it

>>16987253
I'm currently struggling with the same thing op, it's a form of anxiety and is related to depersonalization disorder. Basically nothing feels real.

This started for me two years ago and it was drug induced, I smoked too strong of weed and ended up having a really bad experience, and ever since then reality hasn't seemed real. I would question my own thoughts, movements, exsistance, and was in danger of having panic attacks very often. But over time I've learned to deal with it by looking up articles online about people with similar experiences and it made me feel not so alone. I've tried to find hobbies and focus on life more to distract myself from the detached thoughts. The feeling is always constantly looming over me but it's become more mild and tolerable.It's a mental thing and it's because there's chemicals in our head not doing what they're suppose to do.

i haven't seen a therapist because I don't have the money for it, but I would highly suggest it. They could maybe help with your patterns of thinking and find the root cause of your condition

>>16987968
Yeah I figured that there's probably not a lot I can do other than deal with it. I guess I really just want to know where it comes from, because it's been such a big part of my life for the vast majority so it'd almost feel not right to have it not occur.

>>16988077
Yeah the people I've talked to about it who've expirenced something similar explain it happened to them due to some kind of side effect of drug taking. I've definitely used hobbies like art, music and going out in the night as ways to distract myself. And yeah it seems the general thinking is that I should seek therapy, even if it's just to have someone who's educated to talk to on the topic. Thanks

>>16987267
Hi

I often have this experience you've described. You probably experienced some trauma as a kid (like seeing your parents fight). When you're little, you're less able to deal with things and something that could be brushed off/processed as an adult can really hurt you when you're a kid. Because your parents are mentally ill, you probably were taught a lot of their behaviors, and their screwed-up beliefs became your own. Beliefs become thoughts, which become feelings. In therapy, they can do a thing called Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) that helps you challenge those incorrect, skewed beliefs and therefore become happier.

About the dissociation. The article you read is not correct. Most people who dissociate started when they were a kid. It's a way for your brain to kinda 'shut down' partially (when you do it, it's like being half asleep) in order to protect you from the negative experiences. After they stop, the dissociation continues. Some people do it all the time; I used to. A good way to deal with it that's helped me is to, when I notice it's happening, start running my hands across something. And make a very hard effort to stay 'in the room' and keep my attention only on my immediate surroundings rather than in my head. You can do this by counting the blue, red, green objects in your room, using your hands to feel all the textures in the room, breathing thru your nose and focusing your attention only on your breath. Vipassana or "noticing" meditations will make the feeling to away almost immediately. Google them and use a guided youtube one.

It is kinda scary for me sometimes, like being entirely alone in the universe. I am having an especially hard time because my partner moved out; we broke up mutually. It's very quiet in my house. Doing dishes helps. Feeling the water on my skin, the soap. Breathing the soapy smelling air in. Let me know if you have any questions for me, I'd be happy to answer.

>>16989511
Thank you a lot for your suggestions I'll try those next time. They sound like a better option than what I do currently which is scratch or bruise myself to remind myself I'm a person with feelings and I even exist. Grounding myself in some way like you said is the only real way for me to get out of that state. And wow thanks for telling me it often begins as a kid I've never heard that before and it made me feel a lot better about it. I know myself that when I'm not around family and friends constantly it gets a hundred times worse so you must be going through a real rough patch right now with your break up. I'm sorry to hear about that but it'll get better man :)

>>16989511
Also for a question, did you expirence trauma or abuse as a child? Because I don't know if I did or didn't as I don't remember any direct abuse, more or less just others in my family fighting. I think I've blocked a lot of my childhood out because I've talked to my older brother about it (he's 9 years older) and he remembers a lot worse stuff than I do. So when did your disassociation begin?

>>16989733
Thank you (: We're all going to make it

>>16989750
Yeah, I was abused by my parents. They had every intention of hurting me; they did it for fun. Sometimes they'd hit/choke me, but a lot of it was verbal, and I actually didn't realize what was happening until I was about 19. What I thought were just arguments were actually interactions sadistically designed to make me feel anger, fear, and guilt. When you grow up being treated that way it becomes normal, so it took some perspective & age for me to see it. As a kid, this kind of abuse is a lot harder to deal with than just being beaten. When someone hits you, you can say to yourself "wow what an asshole, screw that person" but when they emotionally abuse you, it can get internalized & you say to yourself "this must be my fault because I am bad".

>>16989750
whoops i hit send too soon. it started when I was five. my mother would make me sit down and listen to her say awful things to me. she'd say "youre worthless, youre no good, why can't you just be normal" looking back, it was very strange. she'd just sit there, not angry, not upset, just neutral, and say these things to me. Over and over like brainwashing almost. and shed tell me i had to look her in the eye while she said these things. nothing happened that made her do this ( i didnt forget to clean my room or anything) it was just fun for her to make me upset. it made me really sad, especially having to look her right in the eye, and so I figured out that it was easier to just zone out. i could kinda 'shut off' and dissociate, and it made it not hurt.

>>16987968
>>16988077
>>16987253

Do you ever suddenly look in the mirror, or at your hands, and then get the feeling that you're looking at a total stranger? That you don't recognize your face? I have some recent issues with this, and you three describe sounds a bit like what I feel, but on a bigger scale. It started happening to me a few months ago and I have no idea why.

>>16989947
Yes difinietly especially when it's quiet and I look at my reflection from the corner of my eye. It's like I don't recognise myself for some reason. As a teenage girl I obviously spend a lot of time looking in mirrors haha. It can often be jarring when I have an imperfection or something like that on my face. It must be scary that's it's happened out of nowhere for you. I find that being stimulated in someway whether it be by sound or television or other people can really help to ground yourself.

>>16987253

Dissociation, depersonalization, and derealization

The triad of the dissociative mind. Austin reporting. I suffer from all this. I've been in the grips of a very severe heroin addiction for a few years, so it wasn't until I sought treatment for that when I started to make sense of what was going on.

It's normal for this to manifest in childhood. It's not common to be aware of it as a child. It's not commonly an intentional response to a situation, and will often manifest during a period of high stress, intense emotion, or anxiety.

How to deal with it? Stop fighting it. It's not necessarily a negative response. It's a survival mechanism. In the absence of the proper tools to deal with the emotions being felt, dissociation helps the user cope with what they are feeling by disconnecting that sub-routine from the active consciousness.

When you feel it, use it, remember it, hold onto it, and think. When I came to terms with it, when I accepted that my brain was disconnected from itself in an abnormal way, only then was I able to use it for a positive outcome.

If you feel it most when you're alone, it probably relates to an anxiety you feel about yourself. Thinking that something is wrong with you, feeling uneasy, or that things are too quiet relate to a subconscious insecurity you are feeling that you're unable to confront. If you have a good spiritual base, it'll be easy for me to teach you how to work your way out of it, but if not, the process will be much longer.

That's not to say your efforts would be fruitless with no spiritual basis, it's simply easier with access to that additional component of your mind.

My mind splits most often due to hyperarousal or a sufficent level of stimuli. By being mindful of it, I can be aware of the physical reality surrounding me, my separate conscious mental processes, and my subconscious processes. The grounding in spirituality is a way to connect the subconscious with the conscious.

>>16989994
Yeah, it only tends to happen to me when I'm getting ready for work or if I'm at home and my husband hasn't said anything for a bit. When I'm social, or doing something that requires a great deal of thought, I'm okay. When I go to the bathroom, I won't recognize myself, and it'll really hit me then. Sometimes I'll just look around the house and not recognize where I am, who I am, or what I'm doing. This afternoon, when I looked into the car mirror on lunch, I scared the shit out of myself. Only lasts a few seconds, but it's really strange. Started a few months ago. I've had gran mal/tonic clonic seizures since I was 8, but it's completely controlled by medication. Didn't have a normal childhood though.

Really, I'm just worried that this is something potentially dangerous.

Does this sound like what you have, OP? It's something you should probably talk to a professional about. I've seen it listed as a symptom of several personality disorders. I feel that way mildly sometimes. I think because I'm very introverted, since I don't interact a whole lot with other people it's easy to feel like I'm not real. Sometimes I get the weird feeling that my consciousness is separate from body, like it's controlling my body from far away.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_%28psychology%29

>>16989944
That's so horrible. I'm so sorry you've been treated like that no one deserves that dude. my mother is verbally hurtful but not to that extent. More or less just snide comments about my physical features from a young age. One time (during one of her worst stages of her manic depression) I was about 7 or so and we were about to cross a busy road. she whispered in my ear "I could kill us both right now" and walked into the road without looking, cars nearly hitting us. Shes now quite less manic and she says she genuinely doesn't remember 90% of the things she did. It's scary how fragile the human mind is honestly.

So basically you are having an out of body experience? You should look up this term and it might help.

>>16990007

>>16990007

Austin reporting. The idea is, to take inventory of everything you are aware of in that moment. Touching things, changing lighting, etc. will provide a temporary relief bringing you back in line with your mind's physical sensations, but ultimately cannot be relied upon because it doesn't address the core issues, but more importantly it doesn't gain you anything.

I do agree with the suggestion to see a therapist. Sometimes they can help. It's no guarantee, though, because dissociative disorders are very poorly understood. Often treatment is with anti-psychotics whose main mechanism of action in dissociation is through a handicap to short-term memory.

To become more aware or mindful simply takes a conscious effort. You've already identified what it feels like. You've identified a situation where it happens. Try to identify it whenever it happens, and you should notice it manifest a lot. Make peace with it, because the harder you fight it the worse it will get. Find ways to use it to your advantage, and don't let it disconnect you from your emotions.

You probably don't realize it's happening in normal situations. When I'm in an ordinary situation, I separately experience my physical reality in full intensity and have racing thoughts on several wavelengths separate from my conscious and subconscious thoughts. It used to hinder me with anxiety, but now I can use it as a tool and it has made me very good at multi-tasking and making quick judgments.

It's all about how you use it, or how you let it use you.

>>16990010
I've lived with it my whole life and I don't really see it as being dangerous, more or less just scary and an inconvenience. As long as you don't get lost in being scared by it, you can live aside it pretty normally. As many other people on here have suggested, if it becomes progresses it may help to see a professional. Best of luck to you though

>>16990097
>>16990097
Thank you that's a really interesting way of think about it. Instead of avoiding or fight it constantly I should just embrace and control it. It's a really good concept in theory, but when I'm in the moment I'd rather die than expirence the feeling. Getting to the point where I'm not scared of it would be amazing, but I think it still affects me too badly to try that yet. The funny thing is that it's gotten worse with age. When I was little and it would happen I would cry and scream "it's not real!" or "I don't know you!" and my parents would be very confused and thought I was just having night terrors so they never looked into it further than that.