http://traumadissociation.com/osdd
but they didn’t define
psychogenic confusion- Dissociative fugue, formerly fugue state or psychogenic fugue, is a dissociative disorder and a rare psychiatric disorder characterized by reversible amnesia for personal identity, including the memories, personality, and other identifying characteristics of individuality.
and
twilight state- a temporary disturbance of consciousness, attention, and also of cognitive functions. Therefore, it's characterized by strong mental confusion, a depletion of sensation, spatial and temporal disorientation, amnesia, and involuntary and impulsive movements.
It’s nice to have a term now for things I’ve experienced. I didn’t know there was one lol, but those are two issues I’ve dealt with before and, struggle to explain to people
Gay tears
but can tears truly have a sexual preference, or a sexual identify? they are tears after all, without sentience
i will over analyse all of you
Thoughts on trauma (tw: CSA)
okay so, I had a loss of sense of identity and then a sudden recall of traumatic memory when I was 20.
My therapist explained that it makes sense why the recall happened when I was 20- it wasn’t set off or triggered it was a result of finally feeling in a safe environment to do so. I had left home and left living with my grandmother to live in a dorm on my own, at a university.
I also later found out this is a normal way for trauma to present itself in individuals, and loss of touch with oneself in terms of identity is a listed and studied symptom of many different types of disorders but is usually a result of trauma.
So I understood okay this strange symptom I’m having is an actual thing.
But then, I never thought to ask why.
why did that happen.
When I tried discussing the matter with my therapist, I insisted that whoever I was before was gone and I no longer had touch with or memory of, or the sense that I even was that person. It was dead and gone forever to me, inaccessible. And she argued against me like, no, it’s not gone forever we just have to go back and find her. The notion creeped me out and also overwhelmed me. I also thought it was impossible so, I actually stopped seeing that therapist.
Was I subconsciously avoiding something by doing that? Possibly. I just felt like we hit a brick wall and I wasn’t getting better or really connecting with the therapy at all so.
I thought I was done with therapy but my parents suggested I continue, and after working me over for months to continue “getting help” I agreed to go. Despite having been through three hospitalizations and two therapists, and two psychiatrists. I felt like I was “fine” but my parents disagreed that I was not, as I wasn’t “living up to my potential” and seemed to be just sort of “getting by” and appeared depressed to them.
I also stepped back from going back to school and I think they saw this as concerning, as I wasn’t making much effort to move forward with my life. I explained that I felt stuck, but didn’t know why or how to get out of it- and I also felt conflicted in identity and thus found it difficult to be able to make important and big decisions about my life involving commitment. I didn’t feel “whole” is the exact words I described to my new therapist when going over our goals to what we wanted to achiebe out of therapy.
I thought this sense of wholeness would allow me to be more confident and less indecisive about moving on with my life, as I was struggling to- mainly due to mental illness acting like a barricade to my own progress.
She wanted to jump into EMDR therapy, even though I’d done it once before with an “EMDR” specialist. I don’t think she was specialized in this but she was specialized in trauma, among other things. Which is the reason I agreed to see her. I thought someone might really understand and finally actually be able to offer some real help.
But, the EMDR did nothing for me, and though I touched on some trauma I think? I don’t remember exactly what I talked about with her specifically. I think I told her I wouldn’t remember and she was writing down my memories as I said them for this reason. I told her about the panic attacks as well and she just explained to me sort of how EMDR was supposed to help with that. Like how it actually works.
But it didn’t.... because I was generally confused about why I had panic attacks about these issues in the first place, and didn’t know what memories to go over, because I would forget about them.
She would have to remind me of whatever we discussed the week before and sometimes it would jog something and other times not at all. Like she’d explain a memory we were discussing and we weren’t able to move forward with it because it was now completely gone- for the time being.
And then I got a hint she was breaking privacy rules with my parents, discussing my therapy with them, though I didn’t give permission and, I couldn’t trust my privacy with her anymore so it spooked me off pretty bad, and I never went back to see her.
Thoughts on physiological illness
I think my issue is entirely dietary and I’m just making a mountain out of a molehill. Because I stopped hurting as much when I ate some oatmeal. I think when I take proper care of myself I’m really probably fine. And the reason it looked like an auto immune disorder on paper is because of stress (could of been physiological or psychological) and combined with an eating disorder.
Thoughts on malingering, histrionic pd, BPD, narcissistic PD, regarding DID, dissociative disorders, dissociative symptoms, and trauma and identity.
So one of my psychiatrists suggested possible DID. He was sincere about it and sat down with my mom and myself to talk about it with her a tiny bit, but it was brief. According to him I dissociated during the session and also displayed multiple accents- is the reasoning, when I asked why he made that suggestion. I asked my mom though not him directly, because he retired directly after seeing me- I was literally his last consultation, and all his other patients had already been transferred off.
I was frustrated to be left hanging with this confusing thing over my head, My immediate reaction was to tell my mom, “well he’s obviously wrong he’s a quack I don’t have did- I’ve seen DID up close I didn’t look anything like that.” (Referring to my mental hospital stays).
But nonetheless I did lots of research trying to understand it.
and though I’m still confused about brief moments of dissociation I’ve had, I am learning it’s normal for this to happen with trauma and it doesn’t signify DID it just signifies possible trauma.
I know I have blacked out trauma, and I know of trauma I have memory of and then also have memory of blacking out during, in an effort of purposeful dissociation from reality in order to no longer feel The pain or anxiety of the situatjon.
I know I have seen some triggered brief moments of dissociation, and of course lots of panic attacks.
And though I do resonate with OSDD because of my identity struggles, I don’t know if I fully qualify for an actual OSDD diagnosis.
To my recollection, I’ve only had dissociative episodes enough to count on both hands, it’s not that significant. The rest of the time, I think I am just struggling to function despite an internal battle in my head, from trauma and depression etc. and loss of sense of self or identity.
Ive been doing research on all of this stuff for a while now and this is just the conclusion I’m coming to.
And though maybe I do have functional parts with slightly, clashing profiles, it’s so subtle in my daily life it hardly matters and I can pass as an integrated person if I want to appear that way- even if I do not feel totally solid that I actually am.
indont know why, or where this divide began, though I’ve tried tracing it back, and I’ve tried memory recall and, cataloguing analyzing myself my thoughts my moods my dreams my patterns.
I can’t seem to find any clarity on that. Where it began, or why that issue exists for me. I’ve come to one possible theory that it had to do with a meeting of needs in early childhood and it being essential for survival, and another potentiality being that the division was simply created out of having a stressful divide between my home environment and my outside life for pretty much as long as I could remember.
The only thing new I really learned was I unsurfaced some brief childhood memories that have unknown connections, which I’ve tried to make sense of rationally but once again just theory, and a nurse practitioner tried to diagnose me with cyclothymia and ADD. Which I chose to ignore as of late and agreed I would look much further into that with differing professional opinions and lengthy, detailed processing to really determine if that was an accurate assumption.
At one point the jossling of childhood memories had me confused and, in an attempt to make sense of it I said it was possible- I was theorizing here, that I was kidnapped and someone was just trying to cover it up. But later after more memories unsurfaced I realized, that it was more likely, it was a custody battle of sorts- or- even more likely, a court ruled desperation of me from the home, due to Criminal investigations opened into my father when I was a young child.
The only childhood trauma necessarily that I remember- like I have lots of memories that are just normal, well- nothing terrible is happening in them. But, yeah the two that I can remember occurred to me in dreams, that were traumatic. And one involved sexual assault from an older high school age student I believe- when I was toddler age. And then a memory of being neglected left to shit myself for days in a high chair uncared for. I have confirmed the latter one to be true on account of my mother. The CSA I can’t confirm
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6/18/2020 9:10:35 AM
Now that I think about it, I remember even at an early age I felt as if I was just “acting” in my regular life, and that’s why- like I *knew* at the time, that I would have no trouble in acting, as it felt very natural for me to do.
The fact I felt that way is odd, looking back on it, I guess. But, what it was the result of, I don’t know.
And when I left for Europe, I’m not sure totally but, I think I was trying to like, cure my depression or whatever and like, find myself and shit better.
As I’m always trying to do.
I continued to do, a lot of things, in an effort to end my depression, but, none of it was sufficient I guess.
But the reason I’m touching on that is, because I think I mistook, losing touch with myself- as a symptom of the depression, or blamed it on that- rather than, being able to face the fact I had trauma- which I was mentally dissociated from very much so. In terms of memory and acknowledgement of abuse- childhood, in adulthood, and domestic and sexual violence of my partner.
But yeah, all in all, I’m kind of on this constant journey of like, trying to find a concrete sense of self- and I don’t know what that’s even about, or why that’s happening but- that is just a result of trauma, and not necessarily an indication of OSDD / DID.
Like I said, I have seen dissociative symptoms, quite a lot of them, but so do many people with PTSD, which I believe now, I’ve had since the age of 10 as far as I can remember- that’s when it initially began showing. Unfortunately I was exposed to more trauma after that, and I didn’t know how to healthily deal with that so, it just sort of, became a mess from there for me psychologically.
As far as Blanc goes, I believe that was a coping mechanism and an avenue of self expression as well, as, a safe space I opened up for myself in order to heal from certain things or deal with certain things, in a way I felt comfortable doing. For xyz reasons.
It gets complicated but, yeah. I really struggle to find myself and, I felt like through that, I sort of could. Is what I was hoping anyway.
But instead it just made me realize all of my conflicting roles and the way I function in life, I don’t fully understand it like I said and, I don’t know to what degree it’s normal but, it made me realize a need for wholeness but, yeah I don’t know how to do that.
Because as far as I can remember I’ve never been any other way.
And I think it’s out of a desire to be myself but at the same time, on the outside there are other needs to be met that are higher than that need to be myself (at times) and thats where it comes into play like, a desire to be accepted by my parents for example, makes me different. And ya know, I guess that’s what happens when you grow up in a home that is not accepting but, it created identity conflict for me I guess.
I spent a very large portion of my childhood trying to appease and Appel to, and satisfy my parents. In order to have sanctity and, emotional needs met, and peace. And, it never was important for me to be my own self and form autonomy or opinions, instead by the time I was a teenager, I felt like I had been hammered into a mold I didn’t fit, and I was frustrated with that I guess. It was, stressful. It resulted in my harm, and my rejection, if I wasn’t that, person, that, standard, perfect, whatever.
And yeah the lack of like, time spent developing a personal sense of self left me feeling incomplete later in life when it was time to have one, and i was like, “i just do what I’m told” and had door Matt syndrome and control me syndrome surrounding myself with people who abused me or walked all over me and used me. And I had to figure out for myself what I really deserved because, I was naive to that kind of awareness at this time.
I had to manually develop a sense of innate value in myself and sense of self worth, capability, and convince myself, of what i did and didn’t deserve- because all of that at one time was very unclear to me.
At this point I’m just rambling because, I have no idea, ..... why I have identity conflict but, this is just, me rambling my thoughts on it. I dunno, I don’t really understand it
*scratches head* why u like this? Lol
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6/18/2020 9:40:26 AM
I also recently found out I was having symptoms of dissociation as a young child under the age of 10.
I don’t remember a whole lot from that time but when I was reading about symptoms they stood out to me and I’m like I used to get that all the time when I was a kid and didn’t know what it was
It was the sensation of my body getting larger or smaller than it was and the sensation everything was going slower than it really was