Depersonalization

[zaidrenteria]

Hello everyone,

This is the very first time I write on a board like this one. I have suffered from anxiety since my early teens but got really bad in the past 5 years so I unfortunately started drinking. I hit bottom because I was just trying to avoid everything with another problem. I finally searched for help back in September and I have been on Sertraline since then. I am now on 100 because just before the quarantine started I started having problems with the program I was with. There are no psychiatrists in my city so it had to be telehealth but they kept switching me to new doctors so my case would start all over again. Really bad service so I just stopped going thinking I had refills while I found something else and then all this happened. I had a relapse on my drinking but it was just enough for me to remember my life is worth fighting for so I now know I am not an alcoholic because I did not enjoy it nor wanted to continue. Anyways, the main reason of posting this is to share my experiences with symptoms and see if anyone else feels these because even my doctors never acknowledged them. When I have severe anxiety episodes I start feeling like the "me" wants to leave the body. I sweat but feeling super cold. I start losing sensation on my extremities and if I look at myself at the mirror it's like looking at someone else and several times I reach the point that I cannot control my body and collapse with hyperventilation and blurry vision. I have never lost consciousness though and during those episodes I really hope I would so that I would stop feeling like that. My health is pristine outside of that which is what makes it unbearable because I cannot put a name to it other than anxiety. I have had problems in employment because of that and they do not seem to take it seriously but thankfully I am good enough at what I do that I can continue doing it.

Thanks for listening and I look forward to listening to your comments.

[junglebook]

Ive had similar experience with anxiety. I would look in the mirror and feel disconnected from the image I saw back. This would send my body into panic and I would think I was losing a sense of myself. This would somtimes turn into a panic attack. Strange feeling but a heightened nervous system can do this. Wish you well. Dr Claire Weeks book Self Help for your Nerves is brilliant. It can be bought on Amazon for about £8.

[zaidrenteria in reply to junglebook]

Thank you. I will check it out

[xJuvenile]

thank you for sharing. I love how you wrote My life is worth fighting for! I felt that! Thank you, my life is also and I got a lot ahead of me. On the symptoms, I had my first panic attack at 14 then o got over it until college. I was on mes about 1 year and stopped and I was great until this lock down. I may have expience a lot of anxiety issues like Low Sugar, feeling like about to faint, sweaty ands and feet, panic attacks, social phobia like standing in line waiting or being in places where there is a lot of people.

Insomnia and what I’m experimenting now is that during the day I’m good until night falls and it sucks because I can’t sleep and I got so much better when I left my meds and all this pandemic and covid19 self isolation has taken it over again like it was nothing.

[zaidrenteria in reply to xJuvenile]

Yeah. It is a life struggle I had the first panic attack that I now recognize as one back when I was 8. Obviously, we did not have the knowledge to give it a name. I also have panic attacks when in line at places. Many times I have had to just leave the cart there and run out. I have left the airport twice just before boarding. Insomnia is also a problems for me because I get tachycardic when I am tired and that triggers anxiety.

It is nice to feel understood. Feeling isolated makes things worse. We have good things ahead of us. I wish you well