I don’t know what to do or where to start to find help for this

[northernboy]

I’ve dissociated for as long as I can remember. It’s always usually in the form of emotional detachment or physical discombobulation. I have autism (aspergers) so it’s something that i’ve seen as a symptom. I also have sexual assault trauma and physical and verbal abuse in my past. Usually, it’s not that bad. I can handle it or move on from it. But i don’t know what’s changed in the past 4-5 months. Almost EVERY DAY I emotionally dissociate and feel unreal or that everything is fake. I’ve been having bad blackout dissociation, where I will think i’ll go to sleep but the next morning i’ll wake up with new self harm wounds or my eyebrows are shaved and I have no idea why I did it nor do I remember doing it. Then, last night, i was at work, going through the motions. I felt myself start dissociating, I could feel myself stop caring about the job or anything happening around me. I KNEW that i needed to do my job and tried to bring myself to care but i just COULDNT. And then the next thing I remember is my manager asking me to get something from the walk in. Then she was picking me up off the floor. She said I had been gone for five minutes. She showed me the video of me walking into the freezer and just lying down. It was so surreal to see that, because I have no memory of doing it or why I did it. This is not the first time I’ve dissociated at work, but it’s the worst, and now it’s raising questions of my emotional stability and competence. I need help. I just don’t know what to do.

 

[DharmaGirl]

Therapy would be the best thing for this. I have also spent most of my life dissociated. Now I am living, for the most part in the present. You can be helped, go to the Psychology Today website and click on find a therapist. Or you can ask your doctor for a referral. My heart goes out to you.

 

[Sideways]

Definitely get this checked out bu a doctor. Sudden massive changes in symptoms like this? Warrant medical investigation. Even when they aren’t resulting in SH.

There are a lot of threads here that talk about grounding exercises. They take practice to work - practice when you’re doing ok, so that you have the skills there when things go wrong.

You may also find some short term relief from practicing mindfulness. This is anskill set that you could target particularly with a T who is well-trained in mindfulness (since online mindfulness ‘self help’ is increasingly bogus).

Getting this checked out? May help with some of the anxiety about the issue, and that anxiety is potentially making the symptoms worse.

 

[Reflections]

If you need something right away, try a breathing technique (slow inhale counting to 5, slow exhale counting to 7). You can also use a grounding technique (name 5 things you see, 4 things you feel, 3 things you hear, 2 things you smell, 1 thing you taste). Mindfulness is also very helpful. Doing healthy things that helped relax, soothe, or calm you down can help too. That could be as simple as watching a funny video or going for a walk in the park.

Losing feelings or time is a scary thing. Our minds will do that when we're totally overwhelmed and dissociation is our go-to coping method. It's our brains giving us a break. It may have been manageable or helpful in the past but if we don't have better methods to cope, our brains will check out even if it's not safe or in our best interest. I recommend finding a therapist who deals with trauma and has some training/education in dissociation disorders. From the research I've done, therapies that treat trauma help dissociation disorders and dissociation disorders are very treatable. CBT, DBT, EMDR, Somatics, Mindfulness are ones that get recommended. Some medications can trigger dissociation, so check on that.

 

[Arty-Pelican]

@northernboy , Yes you need some professional help, But its easter weekend, so maybe you could do some art therapy grounding execises. Just some colouring in a colouring book can help, Or a big piece of paper and some crayon or pencils, stand up to do this. start drawing a figure eight as big as you can, keep going over and over the figure eight. the rocking motion will calm and sooth, after a bit, try and think of the smells and sounds you hear, the colour of the crayon, focus on your breathing, in through the nose, extended exhale through the mouth. Hope this helps

 

[EveHarrington]

I hope you can find a therapist. To me it sounds like your dissociation is on the level of having a dissociative disorder, and when your dissociation is that bad, interfering with your daily functioning, it’s important to have a professional who can help guide you through managing your symptoms.

Hugs.

 

[Sweetleaf]

I have aspergers, too, and dissociation that is related to that. It happens if I think about stuff too hard. I drop out of the world, no longer aware of my outside environment, I start doing these really f*cking weird finger movements and uneven shallow breathing, and visualize things incredibly strongly, it's like hypervisualization mode or something, and I just visualize and think through whatever it was I was thinking about, and I think about it really hard and really fast. It's hard to describe. It's like thought overload mode. It can be over just about anything. Happy, sad, funny, any thought at all, that I am thinking about too hard, usually with strong emotion, and when thought about in the right way.

It is completely involuntary. I have no control over entering it. I don't even know that I'm doing it, until it's over, and I snap out of it.

Over time, I have learned to make it so I don't do it in public. Keeping my hands busy, or holding something, or like keeping one in a pocket or something, prevents it from happening. It's no longer a problem for me, in general life. It still happens from time to time, but I have gotten very good at keeping myself from doing it, by habitually always doing something with my hands. Not allowing the hand movement to happen = no dissociation. Lmao. I wish I could do that with my PTSD dissociation.

I -think- that is the only type of autism-related dissociation I experience, aside from just regular old being-off-in-my-own-world type of dissociation. They're both very different from PTSD related dissociative symptoms that I have. They're also usually not distressing, unless of course they happen when I'm thinking too hard about my trauma. Then, it's kind of both types. If that happens with the finger-movement thing (It's so f*cking weird and embarrassing :( ) then when I snap out of it, usually my head is really hot, and I start breathing really fast and kinda panicking sometimes, and it's just bad. Not good to have those two happen together, trauma related thoughts/memories and autistic dissociation. Bad combo.

Luckily it's not very often that that happens.

Almost EVERY DAY I emotionally dissociate and feel unreal or that everything is fake.

I have this happen a lot, but for me I am sure it's only PTSD related. It happens when I start to panic too much, or when I'm being subjected to too much stress, pressure, or a stressor, or when I'm sleep deprived (which is also kinda panic inducing for me)

You should talk to a professional about all of this. A lot of people with PTSD have those things happen. I've seen them posting about it here, and I have my own experiences, so I really wouldn't be surprised if whatever it is, is trauma related for you, rather than autism related. Autism can have dissociative symptoms too though, so you could be getting some from that, and some from everything else.

Do you have a therapist or a pdoc?