Dissociation?

Hi All,

So I have been struggling with OCD for years which became mostly the obsessional form in that I performed all sorts of rituals and checks in my mind so that things felt "right." I had a really bad situation happen about three months ago in which I feel like I have lost my sense of self or who I thought I was. I have been seeing a psychologist and we still have a lot of discovering to do, but in this time I have questioned whether or not I have been experiencing some form of dissociation as well. I have this constant sense of "watching" my thoughts as well as my as my actions and behaviors. I also feel like I am battling this presence 24/7 sometimes I can't help but engage with it, other times I try to just keep it there and accept it for what it is but it never seems to go away. Now, I don't feel like I am watching myself from the outside, but rather from the inside almost like I have two brains. I also know that this is all me and not some outside voice, but this presence itself keeps telling me negative things and I believe it because I know this is all coming from me. I also seem to have these thoughts that bring memories of myself to confirm the negative feelings and ideas about myself. I still feel like me, but this negative persona feels like it has taken away my ability to experience life as I use to and to think as I did. Sometimes I don't know if I am just making this all up. In fact, I think my obsession with this is what has imprinted it into my psyche. Any insights or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

We cant tell you whether you have a dissociative disorder or not but we can tell you what jumps out in your post....

here in New York, which is in the USA being able to "watch" thoughts is not a dissociative symptom.. here its considered a psychotic symptom, I have had it happen and for me it came about for two reasons....using over the counter vitamins and supplements that I was not prescribed and in doses that my doctor did not prescribe.... I was also having memory problems like not knowing who I was where I was and many other things......

a body is made up of many vitamins, minerals, nutrients and chemicals that work together. you throw off that carefully balanced list of chemicals, nutrients, vitamins and minerals and all kinds of things can happen including things like psychotic episodes of things like auditory and visual hallucinations.

I went back in your posts and see that you are using 5HTP. here in New York doctors are warning against using this over the counter supplement because of things like heightened anxiety/ hallucinations/ psychotic thoughts/abnormal behavior changes.....

my suggestion let your psychiatrist know you are using this and discuss whether it is causing your problems you posted here and whether you need the type of chemicals in this supplemental drug and work with your psychiatrist to find the right dosage.

the other reason this symptom happened to me was because I was in a room where someone was smoking a joint. my body couldnt handle even the second hand smoke and caused me to have psychotic symptoms.

Welcome! I dissociate and have at least one alter in. I am still figuring myself out! The best peice of advice I can give you is to keep talking with your therapist. Journaling has helped me. Everyone has individual experiences when it comes to to dissociation. Some is actually normal. Only a yherapist can tell you if what you are experiencing is abnormal. It depends on the type and length of it. And other stuff too.

I can tell you what mine is like. When i dissociate i go indto this tunnel. But i haven't figured out where i end up. It is a quiet place and very white. I usually dissociate anywhere from seconds to minutes. There are several things tha trigger me and sometimes i don't know why i dissociate. Sometimes i don't know that i have until i found out i already had conversation A with person Q yedterday but I do not remember it no matter how hard i try.

So thats a bit about me. Hope it helped.
when you watch your thoughts do uou see them in words? And the persona is you.. so it sounds like your voice? And when you watch yourself doing things are you on the inside of your body? Just wanting to understand more! And welcome! Btw!

Thanks for your response and sharing your experience. The previous poster stated that it may be related to herbal supplements that I am taking, but I highly doubt that. This all came on weeks prior to me taking anything and I felt and still do to some degree that this is an offshoot of my OCD I'm just not sure as anxiety disorders can bring on dissociation. In fact, the supplements have calmed me down significantly in times of panic. When I read about dissociation most of what I understand from people's experiences is that it usually seems to be a lot more dramatic and somewhat different from what I experience. For me, I am aware that all of this is me and it doesn't seem like a separate entity within me, more like I am fighting myself. It can get confusing sometimes and feel like it is separate, but I know that it is me. I am always inside my body, it never feels like I'm watching myself from the outside, but rather I am making mental notes of myself from the inside so as if thoughts don't freely flow, but more like I am in control of my mind 24/7. My psychologist said this may create a minor feeling of depersonalization which leads me to believe that if I do experience depersonalization is an effect of my thinking all the time rather than the cause of it. I'm confused. That's why I'm wondering if anyone with a dissociation condition has experienced this too

Thanks for your response. I doubt that what I am experiencing is any form of psychosis. This has come on weeks prior to me taking any form of supplement and the supplement itself has not seemed to exacerbate any symptoms in fact it has lessened the severity of the anxiety at times. My psychologist also told me that I was not displaying any form of psychosis whatsoever as he saw I was very concerned with my thought process. I agree with you that I should adjust my dosages and take them responsibly which I have been doing for weeks now.

Oh like you are SO focused on your thoughts thry don't feel like yours anymore? Even though you know they are?

I have not and do not experience that
and when i do dissociate I do go away! I have also had that thing where i feel as though I'm observing myself ftom outside my body ect.

I would say having anxiety and OCD myself wbat really belped was learning CBT. What your going through may be a different type of depersonalisation as your T says. It could also be analytic OCD thoughts... hmmm interesting. You may want to post this on the anxiety and OCD areas too. I was reading through those the other day and saw SOME of the people disspciate when they have panic attacks. Keep posting here too of course! and if you ever want to tslk privatly you can PM me.

Thanks a lot. Yeah I guess you could put it that way that I am so focused on my thoughts and my mind that it doesn't feel like me anymore sort of lol. Almost like my mind is mirroring itself. I am fairly confident it is connected to my OCD because this all came about from me not doing a compulsion. It's so hard to articulate sometimes. I have posted what I am experiencing a few weeks ago in the OCD forum and I received some helpful replies, but I was not too confident that people fully understood what I was trying to explain. As I have dealt with OCD type thoughts for years, this is something I have never experienced until now and I have used strategies that have worked in the past, but they don't seem to work now.

yes anxiety can cause a person to feel / have dissociation symptoms...

maybe it will help you if you know more about the term ...dissociation....

picture yourself on a race track... each mile, quarter mile, eighth mile... represents a dissociation symptom....

the starting point is whats called normal dissociation...this is the ability to daydream, space out, high levels of concentration, numbing of emotions/feelings/ feelings of detachment/ unconnectedness....and other completely normal types of dissociation every person is born with..

then as you walk or run around this race track you hit different check points..these check points are the different dissociative disorders.

in between these check points are symptoms that lead up to those disorders.

these symptoms that lead up to the disorders are variations of whats normal...

kind of like a race track is made up of different grades of dirt, hills, straight aways, curves...

what makes these symptoms abnormal is different for everyone...

everyone is different.. they have their own stress levels, their own body make up, their own experiences, their own tolerance levels for things like stress, anxiety, depression. medications, physical challenges, mental challenges....environmental issues.... a whole bunch of things go into how a person reacts to their life, people in their lives, their location, culture...all kinds of stuff.

because of all this diversity with in a human being and their lives, anything and everything can cause them to go from their normal state of mind to a dissociative state of mind that is not their normal way of being.

for some people its work issues that causes them to dissociate
for others its a celebration
for this person over here its their medicaton
for that person over there its their OCD
for that guy its breaking up with his girl/guy
for this guy its the death of his child
this student is preoccupied with a class
thatt student is bored with their class
this driver is so concentrated on their cell phone that they miss their destination
that driver gets so focused on their thoiughts that they are not paying attention to where they are driving....

my point is dissociation is one of those things that is a normal human response to everything and anything..

the result is anything and everything can cause a person to dissociate..

the only person that can say whether ...your....dissociation symptoms are coming from your OCD/anxiety issues is you and your treatment providers..

how you figure that out is by taking into consideration things like what your dissociative triggers are, what your dissociative reactions are, what your life issues are, what your medications are, what your job is like and other personal to you situations and events are.. you look at what is your normal reactions to everything are vs what your abnormal reactions are and much more....

most people that I know discover whether they are dissociating and what its from and how to fix the problem by talking with their treatment providers. a rare few can pin point where things went a bit off, why they reacted that way and how to fix that problem...

for some its a change in meds, for others its a change in jobs, for others its having someone to talk to, for some its learning grounding, for others its learning/doing edmr, dbt and other anxiety/behavior changing things..

for me right now its work issues, pregnancy, depression, bipolar disorder and other things that cause me to have dissociation symptoms and my treatment providers and I fix the problem based on my dissociative triggers..lightened my work load, changed/dropped some meds until after the baby is born, getting enough sleep and dietary changes...

again only you and your treatment providers can say why this is recently happening to you.

Hmmm maybe time to learn some new tools? When my usual tools aren't working I also ask myself and pepple close to me how well my meds are still working. And make sure i am still at a good baseline. And your welcome! I've had OCD and anxiety since i was a kid. SMe with dissociation.