Psychiatrists, therapists and doctors in hospitals don't want to talk about dissociation one bit!
I just figured out 10 yrs ago that I dissociated in my teens/20's/30's after doing some research (and I'm 60 now and still have residual effects from dissociating). I had NO clue what was happening to me between the ages of 13 and 50. I was absolutely fine before 13: had lots of friends, was happy, joked around a lot. Then I started getting real anxious around girls at 13 and started to feel extremely strange: I didn't feel ANYTHING around my family or friends anymore - I didn't find my friends enjoyable or funny and became very detached from myself and couldn't feel myself and I couldn't talk because I was so detached. I didn't talk for most of my life. I found out that I had all 4 stages of dissociation including dissociative amnesia and derealization (It's very hard to explain but as a teen I didn't feel real and everything around me seemed unreal - when I looked in the mirror I didn't feel real at all.)
So I've been telling all of this to inpatient and outpatient doctors and therapists (who have all been COMPLETELY incompetent) the last 10 yrs and NONE of them will talk or ask about it (and I've been hospitalized maybe 20 times the last 10 yrs). I get the feeling none of them understand dissociation at all.I told all of this to a resident at Johns Hopkins (who I thought I had a good connection with) and she didn't say one thing after I explained all of it. I also saw one of the top psychiatrists at Johns Hopkins 3 yrs ago and told him that severe mood disorder and dissociation as a teen "damaged my personality and took away all the qualities that I had before 13" and he said "Damaged your personality?" and then was completely dumbfounded and didn't say another word.
I've seen 5-6 therapists the last 1.5 yrs and they were ALL dreadful and incompetent. The last 2 therapists I saw didn't say a word to me every visit. Then one finally spoke and said "I'm not sure if I understand you or not" so I never went back to him! I saw another therapist who wouldn't stop talking - I had panic attacks in her office every visit and I tried to explain my life and she wouldn't let me talk! So I stopped seeing her!
I told my present psychiatrist all about my dissociation (and that I was told at Hopkins that I have Asbergers) and he didn't say much. And he's the best doctor I've seen in 35 years! He is young and bright and cares about me and says he wants to help me (I've been extremely sick since he started me on prozac 8 mths ago - all of my 5-6 symptoms are extremely severe including giving me insomnia. He stopped prozac 6 mths ago and nothing has changed at all!). My mood has been absolute torture since I started prozac for some reason and I tried to kill myself 6 mths ago - I had to do something because every second was torture so I tried to hang myself and it didn't work! And I will not go back to any hospital - all they've done the past 35 yrs is abuse me and ignore me because I can't do anything and I have PTSD from the hospitals. I've been to every psych hospital between Philly and Baltimore the last 35 yrs.
I have no idea how to solve my feeling of not being able to identify with myself. I still don't feel anything around people and I can't connect with anyone I talk to.