Depersonalization Disorder?

I’m in a long-distance relationship (45 minutes away, very few ways of getting to see her) with an amazing girl who has depersonalization disorder. She tells me she has no traumas that may have caused it and she’s had it for as long as she can remember. She also has anxiety and is on medication for it. While she doesn’t have as many panic attacks, she’s always sleepy and it doesn’t help her depersonalization. She’s also experiencing a lot of pressure from school, other friends, going to college, and extracurricular activities.

She tells me that she feels like nothing is real, and she told me recently she is having suicidal thoughts. She says she won’t go through with it because of me and her other friends, but I can’t convince her to talk to a therapist. It’s gotten to the point where she doesn’t like talking to me on IMs or the phone because “she feels like I’m not there.” If I could, I would see her every day, but because of distance/scheduling conflicts, we’re lucky to see each other once every two weeks. This last month has been especially horrible, and it’s so far been 5 weeks since I’ve seen her in person.

I love her very much, but it feels like she’s distancing herself from me, even though she says I’m one of the things that keeps her going. I have no idea what I can do to help her. I feel so helpless.

Hi Akio. Thanks for your post, it’s a pleasure to have you with us. Tell me a little bit about what you know about your girlfriend’s condition: how was she diagnosed? what medication does she take? who is supervising her treatment?

I ask because I think it’s very important that she get some long-term talk therapy, in addition to the medication she’s taking.

It’s lovely and wonderful that you want to be with her and support her, but I worry that that might put a huge burden on you. What do you think?

Actually, it’s Aki. My name was suppsed to be Aki of the Dead (horror movie pun), but I digress.

I don’t know how exactly she was diagnosed; I think after years of it she just demanded that she see a professional. She’s on the generic form of Prozac, and her mom supervises her treatement, though she says her mom doesn’t 100% understand what’s wrong.

I’ve been asking her about her appointments with neurologists and psychiatrists, but she doesn’t tell me ANYTHING. Not if they said anything encouraging or discouraging, not even if they happened.

Yes, I think it’s a big burden on me. And the fact that I worry so much about her ends up getting me nervous when she won’t talk to me for a while. I’m with her because I love her, but I don’t even know if the girl I love is still there. I keep wanting to save her and fix everything, but the fact that she only seems to be getting worse gets me so frustrated.

Hi Aki. Thank you for sharing that, that really helps. I hear you saying that you really want to help her and that is very good and very loving. Unfortunately, it’s really tough for any of us to “save” anyone else; people have to want to be helped, they have to want to be saved. It’s almost impossible to help someone with a problem they don’t think they have.

So let’s talk about what you can do….

You can share with her how you feel. You can talk to her about what you’d like to know (i.e., how her doctor’s appointments went) and what you’d like her to do differently. You can ask for certain changes and tell her how much these changes will mean to you.

So when you think about this, what do you wish you could ask her?

Thanks again for sharing…and for the correction on your name, sorry about that! :)