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My journey of acceptance continues, yet it is difficult to update certain sections of this site in a timely manner; much has happened since I first created it and it was last fully updated.
Also, knowledge in the fields of psychiatry, neurology, sociology and the like change so rapidly some statements/theories I have are already out of date, or are being challenged as I type this. I will try to update the site with occasional comments here. |
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December 11, 2006:
This is a taste of some purely aesthetic changes to the site. More to come; I'll try not to get too carried away with the succulents! I wanted to write about what is foremost on my mind at this time this year -- penguins; I have begun to despise them. I hate seeing repeated commercials for the film "Happy Feet." This started two years ago. My friend of some 30 years took her own life in December of 2004. It was a horrible situation overall and I feel she abandoned me. I'm angry with her. She loved penguins. Last year I had to contend with "March of the Penguins" for the Love of God. We'd probably now be planning a whole evening out around "Happy Feet." What has helped me (somewhat) handle her death is a group called "Survivors of Suicide". They are located everywhere. Give them a Google, and I'll get the link up here. No one wants to talk about suicide save those who are indeed the survivors, those left with the aftermath. Like mental illness, it is a very taboo subject, yet one needs to share the experience with others who understand. Here's that great link: Survivors of Suicide
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February 15, 2007:
There are many reasons I have changed DreamChild's appearance to this cactus/Western theme. The idea began when a number of people emailed me and said my original site was too gloomy; it seemed "too foreboding, too hopeless." Also, I had always loved David Hockney's photographic collage "Pearblossom Highway" (which I saw "in the flesh" at the new J. Paul Getty museum in Los Angeles.) Seeing a print, or an internet image never does a work of art any justice, but again here's "Pearblossom Highway". This amazing work immediately struck me as another excellent example of my experience of derealization and "scrambled input." But it is also just a marvelous alternative vision of the wonder of the West. (I just might have to put a photo of a Joshua Tree up here.) Ah, and my "dream house" is in Pacific Palisades, CA (yes, dream on) -- Will Rogers' house; he generously donated the property and land to California as a State Park. The house, though large, isn't ostentatious in the least and is decorated entirely in his favorite Western themes, including a real "stuffed calf" (taxidermed?) ready for roping. There are also stables there, and I love horses as I do all animals. There is a massive amount of land -- beautifully preserved -- and an amazing view of the Pacific Ocean. And all of this culminates in a memory I often revisit -- another wonderful time in my life; this reminds me there were such times of joy. I loved horseback riding as a young girl. One of the best vacations I took with my mother was to the White Stallion Dude Ranch in Tucson, Arizona perhaps at age 8 or so. Rides in the desert with a young girlfriend I met, at a cantor, at a gallop, filled me with intense joy. The crystal clear Arizona sky, intense deep blue ... I know that then I was 100% fully in reality. Rock solid, crystal clear reality. Real life. I planned to take a horse and run away when I was there. I wanted to live in the desert; how I don't know. But I formed a deep intense connection with nature at that time -- with the flora and fauna of the desert, and encountered a very homey "family oriented" group of people at the ranch. Finally, I recalled I always loved Seals & Crofts, and felt their lyric "Even the desert will bloom" was perfect for the hope I hold onto, each and every day, that I will return to the crystal clear reality I found that winter in the Arizona desert. Have a look at: Will Rogers' Ranch and California State Park. Make sure to look at pictures of the ranch house interior and the stables. There are old shots of Will, family and friends as well! |
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March 26, 2007:
Today is a bad day though I'm not especially DP/DR. The best I can describe it is I cannot focus, on anything, I am simply very "disconnected" from things. I have tried to continue my update on the meds and therapy section of the website, and the words begin to look like Greek. I feel tired, as if this were the end of a 16 hour workday, yet it is only 10:30 in the morning. I have a fear it is "only a matter of time" before the DP/DR "take over completely," they are dogging me today. So I do whatever I can to distract myself. On one hand this gives me a sense of urgency. I feel I have so many plans, things I want to complete. On the other, I feel little motivation to do anything. There is little that holds my interest. But I can't say this is depression. This is a time where I feel I have "shut down" for some reason -- none in particular -- and I wish there were a reason. This is the misery of this illness for me. It is unpredictable. I feel I can't depend on myself. So what do I do? I randomly choose something that needs to be done around the apartment. There is always some stack of papers that needs to be sorted. There is always a drawer that needs to be organized. I am thinking I could organize the cleansers under the sink. I have no desire to read. I have no desire to watch TV -- I am sick of TV these days anyway. I have no desire to listen to music. I don't want to walk outside, on a lovely day, as it makes me more disoriented. I don't want to go to the store, any store. I'm glad I have no plans to go out to meet anyone. There is something about writing this, this "keeping a journal" -- today for everyone to see -- that reminds me I am alive, still trying. The words on the screen prove I am alive. The words are "out there" in your world, even if I am stuck "in here" in mine. |
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June 16, 2007:
I'm very curious about this book coming out in the UK at the end of July. It is on the UK Amazon site and a few European Amazon sites, but not here in the US. I'd gather distribution in the US will depend on sales in Europe. It apparently focuses on CBT for the treatment of DP. It seems to me this makes a great deal of sense in early intervention when DP is associated with panic attacks and the like. I don't see how it could have any effect on chronic DP such as mine. I have no relief from the symptoms, hence I have no "normal" baseline of reality to return to and hence any positive reinforcement of feeling better or gaining control of episodic symptoms; my DP is not episodic. However, I do believe this could be an extremely helpful book for many people. Early intervention is critical in any illness and we are all unique. |
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Overcoming Depersonalization and Feelings of Unreality
Anthony S. David, 2007 Anthony S. David, FRCP, FRCPsych, MD is Professor of Cognitive Neuropsychiatry at the Institute of Psychiatry and the GKT School of Medicine, London |
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September 10, 2007:
There has been a breakthrough in understanding one form of perceptual distortion -- the out-of-body experience. I'm hoping this will lead to further understanding of DP and DR as to an extent I am perhaps experiencing a chronic version of this phenomenon. See the fascinating article below:
By Denise Gellene, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
In simple experiments carried out by teams in Switzerland and England, test subjects looking at video images of themselves projected through the goggles reacted as if their own bodies had been touched when their virtual selves were stroked or poked. Tricked by the illusion, participants reported feeling that their consciousness had drifted from their real bodies into their virtual ones. The research helps explain the odd sense of floating outside the body, which people sometimes experience after such traumatic events as car accidents. Out-of-body experiences have also been reported in cases in which a critical area of the brain is damaged, such as from stroke, epilepsy or cancer. The studies, published in the journal Science, 'call into question the axiom that everything you are is anchored in your body,' said Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, director of UC San Diego's Center for Brain and Cognition, who was not involved in the current research. Instead, Ramachandran said, 'what you regard as you is really a transient construct created by the brain from multiple sensory sources.' When visual, tactile or other inputs don't line up, he said, the boundaries of self-perception shift. In England, Dr. H. Henrik Ehrsson of University College London, asked 12 volunteers to wear virtual-reality goggles while they sat in an empty room. A camera behind each participant projected an image of their backs. Thus, the participants viewed their own backs from the perspective of someone sitting behind them. Ehrsson stroked each participant's chest with a stick, carefully keeping his arm and the stick out of the camera's view. At the same time, he moved his other arm in front of the camera then dropped it down as if moving to rub the subject's virtual chest. The subjects could see nothing happening to the images of themselves projected in the goggles. Yet, they could feel the stick on their own bodies. The result was a disorienting mismatch between the subject's tactile and visual senses. When touched, participants reported they had the experience of drifting outside their own bodies toward the direction of the camera and viewing themselves from behind. To test the illusion further, Ehrsson wielded a hammer, swinging it in front of the camera. Even though the participants felt nothing, they flinched and registered fear through sensors attached to their skin. In the Swiss experiment, Dr. Olaf Blanke of Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne asked seven subjects to wear virtual-reality goggles while standing in an empty room. A camera behind each person projected three-dimensional images in front of them. Thus, participants felt as if they were standing behind themselves. When their backs were stroked in sync with the virtual image, participants reported feeling that their consciousness had been transported to the virtual body in front of them. The experiment was repeated with a virtual image of a human dummy and a large rectangular object. Participants' sense of self floated into the dummy, but not into the object. Blanke and colleagues said future experiments would look at the effect of disturbing a broader range of sensory perceptions, such as a sense of body position and balance. The studies 'allow us to understand how consciousness works,' said Susana Martinez-Conde, a scientist at the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix, who had no connection to the latest research. 'It is what makes us who we are, what makes us human.' " denise.gellene@latimes.com |
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September 15, 2007:
A brief quotation for my friends B. and R. who are celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary this month. They give me hope for good things in this world, through their beautiful children (our future), through their work and acts of kindness and integrity. Congratulations!
- Don Galer -
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When you do, you apologize for showing truth." - Benjamin Disraeli - |
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© Sandy Gale, 2000-2008
The Pear Blossom Project 
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| April 17, 2008 |