Weird Identity Shifting

[Upside Down Eagle]

Hey all,

I was wondering if some of you can recognize this symptom I've been becoming more aware of lately. When I talk to specific people, or think of specific people, or remember them, they seem to "shift" into me (or I shift into them), meaning my own identity vanishes and I start to feel like I "am them".

It happened to me the most last winter, where I had some sort of malign memory of my father as a controlling and authoritarian shadow hovering over my life. He seemed to take over my mind to the point where "I" was diminished to barely being there at all and being bossed around by my own brain who had "become" him.

It always happens with people who are close to me or have been (family), or with some people who resemble bad qualities of my abusers (authoritarianism, control issues). I take on their way of talking and their way of feeling, which is really weird, and it creeps me out. Sometimes it takes quite a struggle to "find" my own identity again and shake theirs off.

Radise

 

[spookedlife]

I'm glad you're aware at least that it's important for you to 'find' your own identity again...as many who experience this...symptom, though I hesitate to call it that...do not even recognize it as unhealthy. This sounds very much like an experience common to those who have been diagnosed with Borderline personality disorder...which itself is now recognized as arising from abuse during early childhood. I'm not a mental health professional of any kind, but that would be my guess.

In my opinion, this is likely an evolved trait which enables those who are regularly in dangerous situations to increase the likelihood that they survive...as they are more sensitive to the motives and intentions of any potential attacker.
I wouldn't think there should be any reason to let it disturb you overmuch, as long as you're aware of it, and that it's not a good thing to "lose yourself" in another.

 

[Amalia]

Every day i am learning new things on this site. I have exactly the same thing, to the point that peoplehave commented on it - almost like an exceptionally evolved sens of empathy? Especially when it comes to painful experiences on the part of others - even if i don`t them at all i can almost feel what they are feeling and it is like they are `me`.
i could be wrong though.

 

[Upside Down Eagle]

@spookedlife thanks, I do have borderline personality disorder, so it was a good guess haha.
Anyway although it may not seem like a bad feat, I experience it very much as a bad feat because I will take over the "evil personality" of somebody else who want to hurt me. Consequently I hate myself for taking them "in" into my brain, I really don't want to invite them in... I'd rather they stay ten lightyears away from me.

Finding out who I am has always been a struggle for me, I think I "lost myself" as a kid.

@Amalia I've thought of it like empathy too. But for me it's not a good kind of empathy, as empathy usually comes from who you are... a genuine feeling of knowing how the other person feels, as yourself...