It’s a strange sensation, not to feel like yourself. To feel like it’s not you, but rather something alien and numb living out your life in your body. To feel cut off from what’s going on around you, from the day-to-day details of mundane existence. To walk through a shadowy reality, the shades and nuances of emotion rendered indistinguishable under a weighty, stifling blanket of lethargy and adrenaline interwoven.
This is the harsh reality of life after trauma, the rough experience of many forms of mental struggle. As I work through a depressing mix of trauma and grief, there have been far too many days when I’ve felt as if it wasn’t fully “me” going about my daily life, certainly not a version I recognized. A version that’s more like a faint reflection of who I’ve been in healthier, less traumatic times, and barely a fraction of who I want to be.
There are times when I manage to feel relatively present in the forms and motions of everyday life. Then there are periods when the memories of heartache seem stronger than ever, and that shadowy, muted reflection kicks in and sets things on autopilot.
As I’ve learned more about how the brain reacts to trauma, I have come to recognize this feeling as dissociation—a mental disconnection from reality. It is made up of two terrifying twins: depersonalization, in which I feel detached from myself, and derealization, in which I feel detached from the world around me. This disconnection makes it nearly impossible to be engaged and present in the moment, to care about the minutiae of daily living. I theoretically know what it is, and I’m grateful to have vocabulary that describes my experience. This awareness, however, doesn’t make this state of being any less strange or running through the exercises of functioning any more engaging.
In those moments when I don’t feel like myself, returning to a more grounded place—one where I can feel closer to who I was created to be—requires external encouragement. I need to hear from and connect with God, the One who created me. Sometimes His voice is more like a quiet whisper, guiding me in the right direction. Other times, it comes in the form of words and the presence of people placed in my life. Sometimes it involves opening myself up to enjoy the gifts placed in my life, like petting the soft fur of my cuddly cat, listening to my favorite song, savoring my favorite meal, taking in beautiful scenery on a nature walk, or getting caught up in the adventure of a new book.
This doesn’t stop all of the “bad” days from occurring, but it does result in far more “good” days, and a more whole and centered version of myself that I can bring into every area of my life. Someone I can look at in the mirror and recognize.
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