dissociation is fucking wild
it’s just a part of your brain
checking out as a way to cope
because everything around you
just hurts too much
and of course
when i was 10, 12 years old
i had no idea that dissociating was a thing
i only knew that for months at a time
who i was a person
didn’t exist
i didn’t feel real
the only thing that i felt
was a deep hollowness
that went down past my guts
and into the very marrow
of my bones
so cold
fear and lack of sleep
because i killed myself in my dreams
and it felt so real
the only time i felt real
is when i made myself bleed
and so i did
again and again
and the vivid memory
of my therapist watching me go
through a box of bandaids
to cover the red mess
of my left arm
as i told her that i heard voices
in my head that weren’t mine
and saw things that
weren’t really there
and she told me i was
so nonchalant about it
and i laughed
because of course i was
how else was i supposed to be
-
Author:
Boaz Priestly (Pseudonym) (
Offline) - Published: October 6th, 2018 01:19
- Comment from author about the poem: Now that I am older, and way more well versed in psychiatric "jargon" than I was at 12 years old, I know that my dissociation was a product of the environment I was living in. And, honestly, just knowing that there was a word for how I didn't feel "real" is still one of the most comforting things. I still definitely do experience episodes of dissociation from time to time, but it's so rare now, that I am not living with my mother. Coincidentally, once she kicked me out for the second, and last, time, both my auditory and visual hallucinations went away. That's pretty damn telling, isn't it? Now, I was almost diagnosed with BPD, as well as two different forms of schizoid personality disorders, but almost every mental health professional hesitates to diagnose a minor with something that serious, so I just got the good old fashioned depression, anxiety, and some PTSD to throw into the mix. I don't know how to feel about this poem. I don't dislike it, but it's not something I would ever read at a slam, either, unless I was really drunk. There's no satisfying way for me to talk about my experience with dissociation, and auditory and visual hallucinations, and no satisfying way for me to end this poem before it becomes a fucking novel. Story of my life, huh. (Also, the line about my nonchalance is very true. I've been told by multiple therapists that I am almost too calm when talking about wanting to end my life and hurt myself. But, that's how I coped. I joked about things, and distanced myself from them as much as possible. It's how I survived through all but the last two years of my being a teenager, when I finally stopped being actively suicidal. I'm still that way when I talk about my past trauma, because, poor coping mechanism be damned, it's what I know).
- Category: Reflection
- Views: 18
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