eli5 what is disassociating? Tried looking online but I don’t understand.
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A lot of responses here are going by the clinical definition. Dissociation is a spectrum. Majority of people perceive it to be the intense personality shift of D.I.D, the feeling like you’re in a dream/living third person, or like you’re juuuust out of phase with yourself, so you’re on extreme autopilot.
I won’t get into how the DSM-V is under-serving us here since it doesn’t talk about complex/early childhood PTSD or the emotional dysregulation that comes with ADHD.
Dissociation can be as simple as doom scrolling, time blindness due to intense focus on a game or hobby, the “blah”, numb feeling at the end of the day where you’re not really present or paying attention to what’s going on around you. Intellectualizing, compartmentalizing, etc.
It’s a response to stress, which is often due to external stimulation and not knowing how to and/or feel safe to identify and feel your emotions. We go through the day dismissing and minimizing are emotions and that feedback goes somewhere, which is back into our central nervous system.
Nearly all of us don’t know how to exist in emotions we don’t want to feel (“negative” emotions”) safely, and we feel those daily. We’ve often had to adapt to not having the space, modeling, or language to express our emotions because our family of origin and cultures shame us for having them. So our mind finds ways to protect us from the stress and constant feedback loop without direct release because we learned that we are bad if we express emotions that aren’t socially acceptable to express.
A real ELI5: Your brain and central nervous system learned years ago that it’s not safe to feel distressing emotions due to fear of rejection, disconnection, and loneliness. Now all stress and trauma follow the same path to varying intensities. From avoiding existing in your body quietly without distraction to full on creating an altered state of consciousness.
A really real ELI5: Your brain learned first person view is too intense, so it tries to make you play in third person to reduce feeling overwhelmed.
…true ELI5: Your brain would rather exist outside of you than in if you make it feel like a it’s in a bear hug by the human torch.
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