Renly
Sponsor
Mostly, I experience emotional numbness - I am still a bit unclear on whether this is a form of dissociation - but this weekend I had 2 dissociative episodes (derealization) lasting about an hour each. Both episodes started after I was having a minor panic attack (both panic attacks I could not identify the reason for - they just sprung up on me). During the episodes, everything was so strange, time slowed down, I couldn't feel my body - I almost felt like I was high on drugs (although no drugs). I kept thinking to myself that maybe I am dead or I maybe I had entered into "the twilight zone." I was initially a little panicked when the episodes started, but then once I settled into them, I kind of enjoyed the experience. It was weird. One of the episodes simply faded away, but the other one, as time went on, I ended up feeling very dysregulated and began doing breathing exercises - then I had to tell my SO to pull the car over and I threw up on the side of the road (I am not sick)...after that everything went back to normal.
I had some pretty significant dissociation during my trauma (mostly depersonalization) which I was mostly unaware of until I started revisiting my trauma in therapy. These derealization episodes made me realize that its not the first time this has happened to me, although because I have memory issues surrounding my trauma its hard to put my finger on past episodes - it is more of a feeling or an awareness that I've been there before, just lacking specifics.
My question is: has EMDR (or therapy in general) increased dissociative episodes for others between sessions? Especially for those who do not dissociate regularly? I do not generally experience dissociation (unless you count the emotional numbness) so this is new to me. I feel like maybe my brain is opening up to me the reality of the traumas I've been hiding from myself and I am becoming more easily triggered? Anyone have any thoughts on my experience? What is it like for you??
I had some pretty significant dissociation during my trauma (mostly depersonalization) which I was mostly unaware of until I started revisiting my trauma in therapy. These derealization episodes made me realize that its not the first time this has happened to me, although because I have memory issues surrounding my trauma its hard to put my finger on past episodes - it is more of a feeling or an awareness that I've been there before, just lacking specifics.
My question is: has EMDR (or therapy in general) increased dissociative episodes for others between sessions? Especially for those who do not dissociate regularly? I do not generally experience dissociation (unless you count the emotional numbness) so this is new to me. I feel like maybe my brain is opening up to me the reality of the traumas I've been hiding from myself and I am becoming more easily triggered? Anyone have any thoughts on my experience? What is it like for you??