Bipolar Disorder Support Group

Yeah these happen to me sometimes. When it happens to me it is almost like there is a heavy invisible cloth on top of me. I think about going to get a drink or maybe reach for the remote a few feet away but the thought of moving is just exhausting so instead you just sit and stare and just... be.

I am not totally sure what causes it. Sometimes, for me, it comes when i'm dehydrated and very low. I'll just... not be able to get up. Other times the only correlation i can make is to my depression. My thoughts just seem to weigh me down more and more.

If i can realize i'm in this state i try and force myself to move, or force myself to feel something. Like... i'll say wow its cold in here, and repeat it over and over in my head. Run a dialogue that isn't the negativity or the blank emptiness. Sometimes that can jumpstart me enough to move.

Try getting up and doing something when you are low, if you start to get lower feeling don't just sit or do something sedentary, perhaps that can perk you up enough to not enter that trance state. I'm not doctor though, you should definitely consult your doctor first, they might know exactly why this is occuring for you.

I use to do that all the time and wondered why now I'd give anything to get back to that since I've been hypo maniaced for a while and my brain is rushing 200 mph. Zoning out would be a Godsend at this point. Sometimes the human brain can only handle so much and it is then that we must zone out at least that's how it is for me.

I do it too. I call it shutting my brain off. Growing up I did it voluntarily when I was yelled at or abused but now it happens without me trying to and I can't do it if I try... So backwards... It sucks...

Yeah,I do the same thing when I'm in a bad place...the house gets so quiet ,it's eerie...like I'm the only person in the world.

I zone out all of the time . . . I think because I am so easy overstimulated . . . television, someone talking, phone ringing, ceiling fan running . . . it is just too much.

oh god yes. i call them pauses. i can be walking sitting anything and just stop and i cannot move. mike calls me, shakes me but im so far away its almost like an echo. when i come out of it im confused. my pdoc at first they were petite sezuires and increased my lamictal and they stopped for almost a year. theyre slowly coming back but not as bad.

i can tell myself ok valerie move move and im stuck. its horrid.

I was diagnosed with complex partial seizures. I used to zone out in class and would come to with the teacher clapping at my face. I'd get in trouble all the time for day dreaming.

When I got tested and diagnosed with it, I was told not many doctors believe that the condition even exists because there are so few places to test for it. I'm not sure at this point if those numbers have gone up or not.

I still halfway zone out like that, but it seems I'm aware of what's going on now, rather than just totally gone before. I seem to be a bit in that state right now, but it doesn't bother me that much.

I zone out a lot but I have always put it down to epilepsy, never thought of it as a bipolar thing before now

Yes, I become that way, at times. The Pdoc said I was catatonic. It's weird, isn't it?! I can't move at all!!! Or think, even!
The only thing I can think to tell you is to stay well hydrated all the time. At least that way, you won't become dehydrated during the periods it hits you!
Hugs and good luck!

i do it unconsciously when i am having a difficult time dealing with something. in fact yesterday when we were up at the outlaws kidlet finally said "mom, mom are you in there?" i just shut down at times for my own protection.