What is wrong with me?

[serena.]

Something is happening to me lately, something that I am growing increasingly unable to control. The first aspect is that I am extremely alienated from the world. I feel disconnected, detached and depersonalized. I am growing increasingly hateful of everyone around me, everyone I know: friends, family, strangers - I look down at all of them and feel this horrible sense of superiority.

I can no longer operate properly on social events, because I feel depersonalized. I feel more like a camera, a spectator of my own life and I view every event, every conversation in a third-person manner, in a disgusted manner. I watch myself say things, but it doesn't feel like I am saying it. Sometimes I can get past this, but it's getting worse and worse.

Then, these two add together to cause something which I really need to stop. I am increasingly finding myself emotionally hurting people. Almost everything I do now in social events, with friends and family, is just some sort of cog that works towards hurting the person I am conversing with. It's as if the sentences I am saying are building blocks, and I am preparing them to hurt the person. I could hurt the person in the next sentence, or I could wait weeks. I manage to suppress it most of the time, but I get an amazing satisfaction, as if I've taken some sort of amazing drug, and I find myself asking: "This makes me happy, this is one of the few things that makes me happy - why not?"

As well as all this, these all add towards my identity crisis. This is mostly increased by my depersonalization. I find myself discovering that I don't truly have my own personality, and if I do, it's completely disappeared within the fakery I have created for myself. Because I lack any true identity, I take film/book characters, adapt into their physical looks and then become them. I take my favourite aspects of their personality, and work it into my own. I've done this since I can remember, but it's very severe now, and as I say, it's at the point in which I've done it so much, I am not me, I am a combination of several fictional characters.

I care for no one but one person in this world, and because we no longer talk, all this is escalating to a massive level that I cannot keep control of for much longer. I keep getting dizzy spells. Death is becoming one of my main thoughts: suicide, homicide, the death of everyone on this planet, apocalyptic thoughts (which have plagued me for a while). I have outbursts of anger now, I recently smashed my door to my bedroom to smitherines with a metal pole because I couldn't find some money. I find no enjoyment in anything whatsoever, not a single thing I want to do. The days just go on and on. I wake up early, and go to bed early, it used to be the opposite on both accounts. What is wrong with me? Is this serious?

 

[hitsugaya]

Hi Patrick, I'm glad you have reached out with your story. It sounds like this is a pretty deep and pretty multifaceted issue. I would recommend you speak with a counselor or psychiatrist. It sounds like a difficult time in your life and you may just need a little help to get through this rough spot - there's no shame in getting help. One way you could do this is by speaking with your primary care doctor - they can set you up with someone to speak with.

I would caution you, though, that if you are feeling like you may hurt yourself or another, (as you mentioned homicide/suicide), you should go to the emergency room, as that way you can get some help right away. Given what you wrote, you may still want to consider going to the ER even if you are not having suicidal/homicidal thoughts anymore.

Best of luck to you, and please do get this looked into right away, either the ER today or an appointment with your doctor tomorrow. It is important, and yes, could be very serious.

 

[Carls [Mexico Won]]

If I go to the emergency room, what on earth would I say?! I didn't know, for emergencies, they would take in someone with a mental issue. I thought that was solely for physical emergencies.

I've asked my doctor to refer me to a psychiatrist, but I somehow was under the impression he didn't believe my situation to be too serious, however I didn't exactly tell him everything (naturally, I was fearful he would assume me crazy and ring up the local nuthouse) so I refrained from revealing the detailed analysis I have posted here. Perhaps I should return to my doctor with this page printed off, I feel if I don't sort this out it will escalate and that's the last thing I want. At least, right now, there is a small part of me still grasping for normalcy, still hoping this will go away, but it feels as if that is getting smaller every day...

 

[Brittany J.]

I'm sorry your doctor has not taken you seriously regarding your concerns. You may want to look at a different doctor (there are often many internal medicine/family medicine doctors to choose from). The ER is not just for physical emergencies but it is also for mental emergencies. ERs are linked with inpatient psych units which have many people on staff 24/7 to get people past that bad 'hump' so they can get you counseling and possibly medication to get you back to feeling at least semi-normal.

When you go to the ER you just tell them you basically say what you've said here - you've been having thoughts of harming yourself or another, and you are concerned about the safety of those around you. They take that situation very seriously. They will have a doctor talk to you, and then will likely have you admitted for a 3 day stay in order to give you a proper diagnosis, and a safe haven environment where they can try to get you stable before referring you to outpatient care.

I work in a hospital, so I know that this type of thing happens all the time. They are not there to judge you, but are there to try to get you the help it sounds like you need. It sounds like you may need to think about going there.