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Depersonalization
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Depersonalization is the experience that one is detached from their own body and experiences. This phenomenon is often described as the feeling that one is looking at themselves from the outside. Depersonalization is the third most common symptom, behind anxiety and depression, which is experienced by those who have experienced a traumatic event such as an accident, injury, assault, or serious illness. In cases where depersonalization is experienced after such an event, the episode will typically last only a short time.
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Depersonalization is a mental state in which a person feels detached or disconnected from his or her personal identity or self. This may include the sense that one is "outside" oneself, or is observing one's own actions, thoughts or body.
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Depersonalization and Derealization involve similar consciousness states, although psychiatric literature discusses them as two different symptoms. The major distinction is that the first is a distorted awareness of self, while the second is a distorted perception of the physical environment. Often patients experience both, simultaneously or alternately. These states of mind are accompanied by an obsessive need to self-monitor, to observe the self moment by moment. The sufferers describe an inability to experience their own lives while stuck in chronic self-observation (... feeling that identity is disappearing, or has already vanished).
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Depersonalization and other behavioral and physiological indices were monitored before and after the administration of high- and low-potency marijuana cigarettes and a placebo cigarette in 35 physically and mentally healthy normal volunteers. The cigarettes were administered under double-blind conditions during three visits to the laboratory separated by a minimum of 1 week. Marijuana smoking, but not placebo smoking, was associated with significant depersonalization that was maximal 30 min after smoking the high-potency cigarettes. Other behavioral changes induced by marijuana included disintegration of time sense, sensation of "high," increased state anxiety, tension, anger, and confusion. Respiration, pulse rate, and systolic blood pressure ... increased after marijuana smoking. Multiple regression identified temporal disintegration as the most significant predictor of depersonalization.
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Depersonalization