Feeling distant from reality

Quest for Lucidity
1

Hey, everyone.

Ok, to begin with, sorry if there is any post like this, I just have no idea how to put it into a search (which words to use.)

Anyway, the first time I tried to have a LD intentionally (a few days ago) I tried WILD. Maybe not the best choice, I don’t know.
What I found out a day later was that that night I had a fever, probably very high.

So, I was in my bed and began to see HI very easily (“this is easy!” I thought :tongue: ). Then one of them became really real. Very simple stuff, a yellow shape with lines. It scared the bejesus out of me! After I calmed down I just tried to go to sleep normally.

About 4AM I woke up almost jumping out of bed. It felt like I had gotten an electric shock or something. Felt dragged out of a dream or something (I couldn’t remember any dream). My hands were super sensitive, and anything I touched had a different feeling…

After I got up, and through the next day I felt kind of detached from reality, almost wondering if I existed and WHAT was reality… bizarre. I can’t explain the feeling better than that… It’s like trying to describe a color that doesn’t exist…

Then when I found out I had a fever I calmed down a lot, blaming it on the fever, since I guess high fevers can make you see or imagine things… (and have sensitive touch)

So, I was wondering (just to be 110% sure) if it really was the fever.
Has anyone ever experienced this or anything like this?
Let’s just say it’s an undescribable feeling that can REALLY freak you out, so it would be nice to know if it is WILD related, for example, if anyone can tell.

By the way, I’m better now :smile: , back to reality.

Terrible night to try a WILD, huh?

Thanks, in advance!

2

(Not a doctor, I just play one on the internet! My advice should not be taken as a replacement for real doctor types, no matter how convincing I may seem. I could be wrong.)

High fevers can cause hallucinations, and changes in perception. Disassociation from reality is a psychological effect but can have hormonal roots, if you are having trouble discerning what is real or not or continue to have problem 1-2 weeks after the fever passes I would see a doctor or a psychologist in case something happened.

Just so you know, I would be willing to bet money it’s because of the fever.

Your waking up suddenly, I’m not sure. I’ve had things where I am awake but close to sleep and suddenly jump up hyper ventilating (Like someone gave me a shot of adrenaline) but it passes.

Hope this helps, and I say again, don’t worry about it. It’s probably the fever.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociati … chology%29

EDIT:

And more importantly, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derealization Which is mainly what I was talking about.

/me is half asleep x-x

3

I’m in agreement with S_F, it sounds very much like fever symptoms.

As for the sudden and intense waking, it could be fever related, simply a reaction to the disorientating effects of waking quickly from fever dreams, or it could have been that your body twitched .

Also, it is not unusual for people suffering fever dreams to talk in their sleep, so you might simply have woken yourself up that way, and once the initial shock of hearing the noise you forgot what it was that woke you up.

But I don’t think that the feeling is related to WILD

4

Great. It’s what I thought. Just wanted to be sure… I wasn’t very familiar with WILD, which can be… interesting. :grin: and since I never had a fever like that before… actually, at the time, when I woke up, I didn’t even think of checking my temperature, because about 98% of the times I have fever I have it with coughing, runny nose, etc.

thanks for the replys, now I can LD in peace :smile:

but what about SP? and the Old Hag!?
just kidding…

EDIT:
and thanks for that last link, Slinking_ferret. I think that’s EXACTLY it. never heard of it before… actually, I’ve had it once before (and MUCH worse) so, once again, wikipedia answers all my questions! :smile:

5

Relax, dreams can be a pain in the ass when your sick. I had a cold when I was on vacation during Octobre. I wasn’t attempting to LD during this time at all, even though it probably would have been easier. I kept going to sleep this one day and during the entire day this stupid annoying dream kept waking me up, simply making my rest a living hell.

This was no nightmare, it was instead just annoying. Believe me, I kept trying to make it go away but it just insisted. I doubt my dream will make sense, it didn’t make much sense to me. I will explain it though. May I also add that I thought that this was real too, and that these things were really flying around my head bothering me.

It began pretty much like this, a bunch of (germs?) were on pirate ships flying around my head over and over again where I was sleeping. This mixed with my stuffy nose, sore throat, and tired body was way too much to handle. As I woke up, I still half way thought it was real and wouldn’t return again, but as I drifted to sleep again, they annoyed me some more. Damnit, they just kept at it! I don’t know why they were aggitating me but they were literally making my rest very hard to enjoy, or at least get some decent rest.

The point of this story is, being sick doesn’t mix well at all with dreaming. Your body is already sick and disoriented from the start, now to mix your creativity with being sick, it can be hell of hallucinations! =( I wouldn’t worry about it much bro, just chill. I think lucid dreaming could help when your sick, but I wouldn’t recommend it to the inexperienced.

That won’t stop most people though. Hell, I would continue trying to LD while sick lol. You sleep most of the time when sick, so why not get some extra training time in? If I was trying to LD when I was sick in Octobre, I would have no doubt had an LD seeing as how I had the very same dream over and over.

Good luck my friend!

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true! lol that would be a good time to practise.
It is probably easier to LD sick. When I woke up in the morning after the fever, I stayed there with my eyes closed and saw incredible HI. If I weren’t freaked out at the time I would definitely have tried to “dive” into the images… lol

Thanks. :smile:

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Lol, I can imagine how HI would freak you out while sick. No problem, enjoyed your post. :content:

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It has happened to me. Not because of a fever, but because of a drug. I felt EXACTLY how you are explaining it though, and I thought the feeling would never subside, but it did in a few days. The drug I took was a dissociative, so I agree with the first reply (sorry I didn’t read after that). That night I had two out of bodies and they were scary ones. I woke up suddenly in my own sweat (although I was freezing and it was a hot day) a few times. I got that electric like feeling too, making me thing I might have overdosed and had a seizure or something. The following day I was very out of it, and the next few days everything was quite surreal. It was a terrible experience, but I’d like you to know that I feel completely healthy now and I don’t believe there was any lasting damage on my mental health.

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I would disagree, as when the body is sick, it would be best to give it extra rest, so it can heal better, not to overwork your subconscious. Especially at (high) fevers.
If you would strain your mind and body, trying to LD at fevers, it could make it worse (I’m no professional here xP )

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matttias, realize also that in using the “WILD” method you are breaking through into another plane of reality. In this plane you use your subconscious to think and perceive, in the waking plane you use your conscious mind. Except for high level yogis, hardcore schizophrenics and psychotics, those who have been meditating or fasting for days or taking psychedelics, and those “realized beings” like Christ and Blake and Buddha who are born that way, all people’s conscious minds are attached to the ego. Taking the ego through to an astral realm can cause extreme terror. Most schizophrenics started out as having access to higher realms of consciousness, and hyperspatial dimensions, but they do not know where they are going and bring their ego with them and then they really do go crazy. No more enlightenment, only insanity. Another way they move from experiencing other planes to being genuinely crazy is to be put in a mental hospital. Anyone who’s been to a real psych ward knows those places are designed to make you crazy and keep you crazy.
But taking your ego with you to the dream world can be scary. When you begin to be frightened doing WILD, remind yourself that the feelings are temporary and will pass, nothing is being damaged, it is all either illusion or energies from the astral realm affecting you. Remind yourself that no matter how far you go out you will come back.

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Thanks for all your replies :smile:
I feel 100% normal now. It’s been over a week and I’ve been trying to LD, so I’m getting used to WILD and other stuff. I’m not “afraid” anymore, of my own mind and what it can do. I know all the weird stuff from WILD and the dream reality are just illusions or whatever.

onestick: I actually had had this experience once before, and it was also because of a drug. It was a lot worse though (worst experience of my life…), but I was awake all the time. I slept almost normally after that. But part of the feeling was exactly that: you think you’ll stay that way forever, like you’re going crazy or something. Thanks for your post, though. It’s good not to feel like the only one who went through this. :wink: I also feel completely healthy now, and not at all interested in drugs (not that I ever was, actually…). Dreaming is much better and healthier! lol

Fate: Yes, I agree completely. I was just kind of joking… :tongue: If you feel like you need to sleep more than usual, it probably means you need rest, body and mind.

DayLight: Exactly. The first time I tried to WILD (after the fever) it was weird, but I could handle it. Now I think it’s actually fun. lol As I said above, it’s like I feel now that I can “trust” my mind. I don’t feel afraid I can get lost in my head or whatever… SP is less frightening too.

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Way to inspire others to pursue WILD, DayLight. lol That just creeped me out to no end while reading it, brought chills down my spine.

Well then, I am glad to here it Matt! Back to LD’ing aye?

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Sincerest apologies if I did creep anyone out with that.
If I had read that I would have found it quite enticing rather than creepy, I didn’t realize it might be perceived that way.

And by the way, I dig your title under your screen name; “Lucidity in 2008!” :content:

14

I wasn’t creeped out, lol. But if I had read your post WHILE I was feeling those weird things (I think derealization is the name of what I had…) then, yes, I would have probably freaked out! :tongue: I would think I was schizophrenic or something! But, ok, ok… that’s in the past now.

And, yes, I’m “back” at “LDing” now. :content:
I say “back” because I actually started after the fever…
And I say “LDing” because, well, I’m more like “trying to LD” lol

15

Fever dreams are really strange, and they even happen when awake. The simplest and most common for me, is just a feeling that everythings is frighteningly far away, such as the walls and ceilings, even though they look the same distance away. I think your feeling was probably related to this. A mild hallucination that affects perspective. In past fevers, I’ve spent days tunneling like a mole whenever my eyes were closed, and been attacked by billions of tiny skeletons (like warhammer models) when awake. I also had a tormenting drug related dream, that felt quite similar to a fever dream. I had taken Name of drug removed and when I went to sleep, all night I was moving through endless hazy doorways, one after another, like being trapped between two mirrors. I regret taking that drug. I think I’m am slightly traumatised from that night. (I recommend to anyone to forget drugs. They do mess people up, no matter how much they deny it.) Everything felt unreal the day after that.
Finally, the first time I had a LD, wake induced, I woke up immediately from the dream, when I felt I was losing control of it (it started getting silly), and when I awoke the world felt different. I suppose it was the feeling of having been in a box , not knowing there was anything other than the box, and then suddenly discovering that there is a world outside. It felt very odd. It was a while before I regained any sense of immediate purpose.
I reckon it was most likely a perceptual hallucination from the fever that was behind your derealisation.

This is a little off topic, the topic is related to the feeling of dreaming during a fever not dreams under the influence of drugs

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i havnt ever had a dream like that but somtimes like when im about to go into WBTB i get this shocked feeling and lately i feel distent too like somhow forgoten and i feel like thier could be somthing else its hard for me to explain

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Omg… thanks for the link Slinking_Ferret. Reading about Derealization on wikipedia really helped me. I’ve been having those symptoms for about over a year O.o. It feels good to know that I’m not crazy or anything. I never had any words to explain what I was feeling, now I know what it is. Thank you alot, you have no idea how much that helped.

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Exactly, Magicpotion! When I read that I felt a lot better too! I think being able to give it a name helps me. I also couldn’t explain very well what it was and also thought I might be going crazy. It’s the worst feeling ever!

But you’ve had it for over a year? that doesn’t sound cool at all… =/ you should maybe look for professional help? I mean, just in case, you know. :smile:

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It’s gotten worse and worse over the last year, at first it was this feeling of just doing everything automatically in some moments, especially at work. I thought it all made sense since I have to react quick at work most of the times and being aware in stressful moments isnt all to easy. But I already heard about ppl that become these sort of working robots so I thought it was ok. Since then it just got worse and worse. I had vacation 3 weeks ago and on the last day of vacation my friend said to me, that we dont even have to worry about work because the next two weeks will be over in a snap. I can’t even recall what I did those two weeks. I go to work and I dont worry when I get off any more. It just doesn’t seem to matter. Because the next day is already there. I am very confused at the moment and everything is so blurry in a way and I kinda miss the way I saw the world in my childhood which I have very good memory of. 3 hours playtime seemed like forever back in those days. But what am I saying, I’m only 20… but I try not to get depressed about it and I’m trying awareness techniques now and then to help me just see that I’m not crazy every once and a while. To not know what youre feeling is a pretty bad one. Oh and professional help isn’t possible for me. I’m in my apprenticeship and can barely afford food, bustickets my appartement and all the other crap. Man ppl if youre reading this and you still live at home, you dont have any Idea how many ppl want money from you once you’re on youre own. But then again I wouldnt be the first to warn ya ^^. Thanks again Slinking_Ferret. And its nice to know that I’m not the only one mattiasdavis.

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Thanks for the info guys, I really have felt like distand from reality a few times after I have had an LD :smile: