Chelsea

When I first visited this website and I read the stories I cried.  I have been suffering from DP for 3 years now and it’s nice to know that there are other people out there like me.

To start my story, I used to be a real big fan of weed.(not anymore!)  I started smoking weed when I was 15 and continued until I was 16.  One night while at my friends house I smoked some weed and only a few minutes later I felt weird.  I had never experienced this before and didn’t think It was a big deal until I started to panic.  I suddenly felt like I was dying.  I couldn’t keep a thought in my head for more than a few minutes.  I began to cry and asked my friends to take me to the hospital.  They thought it was funny and brushed me off.  The symptoms continued through the night and I finally fell asleep because I was so tired of trying to concentrate.  When I woke up the next day I got out of bed and immediately knew that something was terribly wrong.  I felt as if I would fall asleep and wake up over and over.  I thought that if I went to sleep again it would go away so I slept for most of the day praying this would go away.  When I woke up and nothing had changed I began to panic!  I was hysterical and I finally told my mom.  She thought that it would go away soon and told me to just calm down. 

Well I would like to call that the biggest understatement of the next 3 years of my life!  I can honestly say that I haven’t felt the same since that day.  The symptoms continued to get worse and I would stay in my room for weeks at a time.  I barely continued on to the next grade because I was afraid to go to school.  Although the symptoms were constant they would get worse at school when I was around people and I was embarrassed to have an attack at school.  I finally made it through high school and just graduated a few months ago.  I have seen doctor after doctor and no one has fully diagnosed me with anything but I know that I have ruined my life.  I have been on 4 different medications and none have really seemed to help me completely.  Some day’s I am fine and I have no symptoms while other days I can barely talk because I don’t sound like myself.  Just recently I have been seeing a really good psychologist and he has helped me a lot.  Although none of the drugs have really worked for me yet I’m not going to give up yet.  We just recently started to work with antipsychotic instead of antidepressants and I hope these can help me.  I have had so many different types of DP experiences that I think they will change and progress throughout my life.  Some have stayed with me while others have left.  Just recently I have developed a new one. (great…) I have been questioning the existence of others around me.  The reason I bring this up, is so if others are reading this and they are experiencing the same thing, they can know they aren’t alone.  I attend college now and am living on my own (with a roommate) and while at school I thought I had imagined someone say hi to me passing me on the stairs.  Everything in my mind is telling me that It didn’t happened and I still question it… I hope that someone out there can relate to my story and I can help them in some way.  I think that all we have is hope….

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