Dissociation?

Does anyone else here have an issue with dissociation, especially depersonalization/derealization?

I have had this issue even before going on psych meds and also when I took meds that made my feelings completely numb.

Lately, it's been happening to me again, more and more. Especially when I'm running. It is like I just gets lost in my head and my body keeps running on without any thought from me. Then, my app will announce a time or mileage, and I will realize I've been lost up there for over 2 miles. Sometimes, it's a bit like watching a movie, but more, it's just like my body does one thing, my mind another.

This morning, I ran for a long time. When got back home, I realized I had spent at least half of my run completely dissociated.

I can always come back into my body from the dissociation if I choose to, though I guess lately I want to less & less?

Why now? What causes it? Is it part of bipolar? Does it just happen or have a trigger? Is it psychosis? There was one time I was psychotic and dissociated, but at that time I was confused as to if what was happening around me was reality or not. I just couldn't tell if what was happening was real. But these experiences lately, I have no confusion as to if what is going on around me is real or not?

I'll bring it up with the T tomorrow and the pdoc next week.

Does anyone else have this? It's scary it seems to be happening more & more. What if there is a time I don't choose to come back to reality? Can that happen?

Is there a way to treat this or not really?

I know what dissociation is and due to my traumatic background, I do experience it.

As I read your post, I cannot help but think you are describing something more like "highway hypnosis," which is something we all tend to experience as we drive down the road. We go on auto-pilot and do not always remember every mile we have driven.

Are you familiar with "highway hypnosis?"

Is this akin to what you are experiencing?

Even if you are dissociating, it's not very likely you will remain dissociated forever.

Yes, please do run your experiences by your pdoc and your T.


WC

I get runner's high on the elliptical and sometimes on my bike, and during yoga I sometimes think practice was cut short when it was the full length time because I've gotten so focused into what I'm doing that everything else fades away, even time. Instructors have come and gotten me off the machines because I've lost everything in what I'm doing and almost missed class

Cool! I learned a new term - "Highway Hypnosis". Thanks, Wild Coyote!

Really, mild dissociation is common regardless of whether or not a person has a mental illness, but as for more significant dissociative symptoms, I guess it's possible it may be more common in people with mood or emotional struggles. I think it often boils down to stress or other psychiatric struggles.

I wrote a blog post about my experiences with depersonalization and derealization, along with grounding techniques I've used to overcome them. Those experiences were ones I only had seriously for about a five year period. I really do believe I've overcome them. If you're interested in that post, let me know. I'm hesitant to provide links to my blog unless they are asked for.

Thanks. I'm glad this is likely something where I will not end up just stuck in my head. I've never heard it termed "highway hypnosis", but I've experienced that, so has H. Such as we will be going someplace on the weekend, but H is on auto-pilot and starts driving his route to work.

Running and exercising it happens a lot. I think I purposely dissociated a lot do all that exercise when my ED was bad; I am talking upward of 4, 5 hours a day exercising and not eating enough just so I could get through the pain & exhaustion.

Sometimes I think about something in particular and sometimes not. I had a lot of trauma and did it from an early age, so I suppose it is something of a coping mechanism too. And one of the ones I learned earliest to use.

Now, the time I had it with psychosis and could not tell what was real and what was not, that was scary. I repeatedly kept saying I didn't know if I was really saying what I was saying or not and if what I was seeing was real (it was, I just couldn't distinguish it from a false reality). I am not sure what brought that episode on, but I hope never to go through something like that again.

That sounds awful.
(((((HUGS)))))
bizi

I would like to hear more about depersonalization and derealization. First time I have heard either of those terms and I'm not sure what to think. I agree with Wild Coyote in that a mild dissociation from active thoughts is a form of "highway hypnosis" and may be why a person might go running in the first place(assuming they are in a safe place to let their thoughts wonder a bit). I'm not sure that is a concern needed to be discussed with a doctor but I am sure any doctor would welcome the topic.
As always, before I go running, I am well fed and not in an anxious or anemic state (the same rules apply to driving). Yoga keeps my mind more active than running, possibly because the muscles I am working on are less developed. Bird Dancer, please do share your thoughts on the other two topics

Probably, I should ask, when you are dissociating, Blueberrybook, do you remember what is keeping your thoughts? Is there a problem your subconscious might be trying to solve on its own or is your mind simply entertaining itself? I would be rather scared if I was loosing my thoughts and not remembering what I was thinking about. In that case, I would definitely seek a mental health professional or family member or close friend. More likely, it is probably no big deal.

AB, since you asked for it, my experiences can be found at Depersonalization and derealization – Grounding techniques I’ve found effective – Bird Flight

Usually, I remember all or most of my thoughts when I dissociate though not the time I had psychosis with it. I mostly think while dissociating, but sometimes I just exist and am there but not really and thinking of nothing. May write more later; I have to get my daughter from school. Early noon dismissal today.

Unfortunately I do this more than I care to admit, but the worst is that I don't remember what my thoughts were that took me away from the task at hand.

Yes what WC said.

Saw my T today but no recollection of getting there and home.

It’s very calming.

I would think you would enjoy it since you report everything is a struggle for you daily.

Mostly I do enjoy it, especially while running, but it's dangerous too. Sometimes, I'm so stuck up there in my head, thinking or just existing I'm not doing very basic things one needs to do while jogging in the neighborhood, like watching for traffic. I have had a lot of car horns blared at me lately.

I thought that much running was problematic for u w the ED.
Regarding dissociation when I am extreme stressed I have what I call confusion. I have hidden it for years. “Darn, I really should have gotten more sleep last night”. Whatever, I had a million excuses when I was working. I worked in jobs where I could hide it.
When it’s really bad I can’t add numbers together and I have a masters degree, in Lib Science tho. Like Blueberrybook, I used to read voraciously, but now I have to use books on tape. It’s stress.
BirdDancer and everybody, is this dissociation? I’m going to look on Wikipedia.

Yes, that much running is not good for me. Probably should not exercise at all, maybe walk around the block or something. Pdoc wants me to gain weight.

Between the dissociation and racing thoughts, I had to stop working. I have an M.S., and I couldn't calculate or remember numbers for dilutions to run gels or remember to label what I ran in each lane of a gel. Worse, it was PCR gel, which is so much easier to work with than SDS-PAGE (mostly large gels) & silver staining them. SDS-PAGE runs vertically; the gels are super thin and tear much easier, and silver staining has so many steps, it's easy to tear the gel. So I could do the French press and SDS-PAGE in grad school to get my M.S., but I couldn't even do PCR for a job.

I'm having trouble with concentrating, reading, watch a TV show or movie, even playing easy games on my tablet like solitaire. I'm on Adderall now; it helps some, but not completely. I just go up in my head, get lost up there, sometimes thinking and sometimes not. It's crazy.

I get issues with depersonalization/derealization. I'll feel like I'm in a dream and can't wake up, on the outside looking in, or like I'm floating above my body. I get these when I'm having relatively bad anxiety or mood issues.

I get the highway hyponosis stuff, and I've experienced a disconnect while running too. I don't consider these quite the same thing, as these I get when I'm not having issues with mood and anxiety.

Talk about weird dissociation. Has anyone been hypnotized before? My mom made me try it while I was in college for the ED. Really weird. The hypnotist cannot make you say or do anything you ordinarily would object to, I remembered it all (for some reason! I thought a person just forgot what happened under hypnosis.). But I remember the hypnotist telling me to raise my right arm and thinking I had no objection to that, so I did it. It seemed like an OK idea. Same with the left arm.

I didn’t have much of a breakthrough during the session, except a rembrance of a carpet color from long ago that was part of the sexual abuse incident. Hypnotist told my mom she thought I had been sexually abused, but that is the case of over half of those with EDs. Strangely, I did start to recover after that, but if it was hypnosis, time, just fed up with feeling like crap, looking 50 when I was 20, who knows? I recovered enough over the summer to graduate with my B.S. by December. (I had to withdraw from the spring semester, when I should have graduated.). Still was nice to get the year 2000 class ring. I liked the idea of graduating at the start of the new millennium.