depersonalization

Robot

~ KJ ~ 6 Comments

I am constantly on high-alert. I am (painfully) aware of things that other people don’t notice, or don’t think twice about: sounds, people, cars, everything. I know that is related to my PTSD.

In some ways, it benefits me. I had someone following me in the dark a couple of weeks ago and I noticed right away and took action.

In other ways, I can do without the hypervigilance. It’s tiring. I am constantly questioning every little noise and every movement. It makes it impossible to focus.

You would think that, with being so aware of my environment at all times, I would be aware of what is going on within me. If I know the outside, I should know the inside, too. It seems like common sense. It seems like it should be that way. But it’s not for me.

Yesterday, I was putting labels up at work. I started noticing splotches of reddish-orange. I thought it was just marker or something, so I tried to rub it off, but that just seemed to spread it more. Then I noticed my hand, which had the same color splotches on it. Then I noticed my finger, entirely covered in it. It took me a minute to realize that it wasn’t marker on the labels. It was me.

I was bleeding. Profusely. I didn’t even notice I had cut my finger. How, I don’t know. I didn’t feel a thing. No pain. Nothing.

I could understand if this was a one time thing. I could rationalize it by saying that I was just too tired. But this wasn’t the first time something like this has happened. Years ago, I leaned over a burner while it was on and burned my abdomen. I didn’t feel anything. The only thing I noticed was the smell of my burning shirt. I’ve injured myself countless times and not felt any pain.

Why can I notice everything going on outside me, but I can’t notice anything going on inside me? I notice the blood on the paper, but not the cut on my finger. I notice the smell of burning fabric, but not the burns on my skin. It doesn’t make sense.

It scares me. How can I know when something is wrong if I can’t feel anything?

It frustrates me. People ask me how something feels and I just don’t know. Isn’t it hot in here? Well, I guess it is hot since you asked. But I have no idea. What does this pillow feel like? I don’t know, but since I can see that it’s silky, I’ll take a guess and say that it’s soft. I use context clues so I can seem normal. The truth is I really have no fucking clue how anything feels to my body half the time.

It worries me. You could cut the head off of my body and I feel like I’d still function the same. I don’t feel connected at all. There is no mind-body connection here.

I feel like a robot. Robots can’t feel, and neither can I.

I’m just a passenger

~ KJ ~ 6 Comments

I have spent a good portion of the last few weeks as a passenger in my own life. I’m not in control. I’m not in the driver’s seat. I can see everything that’s going on, but I have no control over it. I’m just an observer. I’m just a passenger.

This happens a lot more than I care to admit. Yesterday, I realized I was (literally and figuratively) out of my own control. I found myself involved in a situation in which the ways I was acting and speaking were not my own. I knew it was me, and I could see and hear everything that was going on, but my responses were not me. As everything was going on, I felt like I was sitting next to myself. I would say something, and then I would ask myself where the hell that just came from. I would never say this. I would never do this. I don’t want this. Yet there I was, saying it, doing it, and apparently wanting it.

It concerned me, because this situation is something I very much don’t want to be involved in. I told myself, maybe I’m just crazy.  I don’t even know what’s going on. I don’t even know how to explain it to someone else because I don’t even understand it.

I wanted to bring it up to my therapist, but it felt so awkward and uncomfortable. Oddly enough, I had a therapy assignment from our session earlier in the week – the stages of therapy. I looked over the sheets and crossed out the things I didn’t have issues with, and circled the things that I felt I needed help with. Next to relationships, I wrote “making questionable decisions”. I was hoping my therapist would read it and ask about it so I didn’t have to bring it up myself.

And she did. So I explained what happened yesterday. I told her how I felt disconnected, but not entirely disconnected because I still had full awareness of what was going on, but I just didn’t have control. And I thought she was going to think I was crazy and not making any sense, but she didn’t. She understood what was going on, and suspected what I had suspected as well – another part coming through, a part with completely opposite wants. Great.

I sort of have been hiding some things from my therapist, not just about relationships, but with other things as well. Not purposely, I just didn’t feel like they were important. But most of the things I had been pushing away seemed to come up with that assignment today. One of the things I crossed out was ‘drugs’. She asked about it. I said I haven’t used in a while, and that I even threw away all of my pills last month. Then she asked why. I don’t really know why, I just know it happened during one of my regular crises.

Then she asked if I remembered doing it. No. I hadn’t remembered doing it. I only knew because I went to throw away my trash weeks ago and noticed a bunch of pills fall out from my bin and into the trash bag. I don’t remember doing it, or why I did it. But clearly I did it.

And as we went on, I realized there was a lot of occasions that I don’t remember. I’ve just been telling myself it’s because I’ve been so tired lately, that’s why I can’t remember shit. But it’s more than that. And that worries me. I know I’ve been under a lot of stress, especially in the last month. But it’s concerning because I am in the midst of making some pretty considerable life decisions, and I don’t know if it’s 100% me making those decisions.

I have been in a dissociative denial.