🕯️ IFS and Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder

For some, life begins to feel like a dream they can’t wake from.The mirror shows a face that feels foreign. Hands, body, voice — unreal, distant, disconnected. Or the world itself blurs into something hollow, flat, like watching through glass.

Others call it Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder.

IFS sees something else: protectors who step outside the body or detach from reality to shield exiles carrying pain too overwhelming to endure directly.

🕯️ The Traditional View of Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder

In the DSM, Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder (DPDR) is classified as a dissociative disorder. It is defined by:

Depersonalization: Experiences of feeling detached from one’s own thoughts, body, or sense of self — as if observing from the outside.

Derealization: Experiences of feeling detached from the world — as if surroundings are unreal, dreamlike, or distorted.

Intact reality testing: Knowing logically that the experience is not true, even while it feels overwhelming.

Symptoms often include:

• Emotional numbness

• Distorted sense of time

• Feeling like life is robotic or dreamlike

• Panic, depression, or despair over feeling disconnected

  
  

From this lens, DPDR is explained as:

• A dissociative response to trauma or extreme stress

• A disruption in the brain’s perception and integration systems

• A defense mechanism gone “too far”

  
  

Treatment often focuses on:

• Grounding skills and mindfulness

• Therapy (trauma-informed, CBT, psychodynamic, or somatic approaches)

• Medication for co-occurring depression or anxiety

• Stress and lifestyle management

These supports can help.But they rarely ask:

"Which parts of me are pulling me out of reality — and what are they trying to protect?

🕯️ How IFS Sees Depersonalization/Derealization

Internal Family Systems doesn’t see disconnection as failure. It sees it as strategy.

From an IFS lens:

• A protector may step outside the body to prevent the system from drowning in panic, pain, or abuse.

• A detaching part may flatten emotions, convinced feeling nothing is safer than feeling too much.

• A distancing part may blur the world, believing unreality is the only shield against terror or despair.

  
  

And beneath them — exiles. Children who were present for horrors they could not process. Parts who carry terror, grief, or rage that once felt life-threatening. Parts who learned: “Better to leave than to live through this.”

Depersonalization and derealization, through IFS eyes, are not malfunctions.They are the most devoted acts of protection a system can offer.

🕯️ IFS Doesn’t Force You Back — It Builds Relationship

Many approaches try to pull people immediately back into the present. IFS moves slower.

It asks:

“Can we thank the part who pulls you out?” “What is it afraid would happen if you stayed fully here?” “Would it be okay to sit near it — not to erase it, but to listen?”

The goal is not to rip away disconnection. It is to build enough trust and safety that the protectors no longer need to keep reality at a distance.

🕯️ The Power of Staying

Depersonalization and derealization often feel terrifying, even unbearable. But IFS reframes them: they are not punishments. They are protections.

When the part is met with compassion — not fear, not rejection — something begins to shift. It learns that it no longer has to carry the job alone.

Presence with these protectors is what begins to bring presence back to the body and the world.

🕯️ Yes, Use Grounding and Supports — And Still Talk to Your Parts

Grounding skills, therapy, medication, and safe relationships can all help restore connection.And alongside them, IFS invites curiosity:

“Which part of me makes the world feel unreal?” “Which part steps outside my body?” “What are they afraid would happen if I stayed?”

Because in IFS, disconnection is not meaningless. It is protection with a history.

🕯️ What Liberation Looks Like in IFS

IFS does not see depersonalization or derealization as evidence of brokenness. It does not see those who live with it as detached forever.

IFS sees protectors who left reality to shield unbearable pain. It honors their devotion. And it helps them rest when they realize there is finally enough safety to return.

Liberation looks like being able to turn inward and say:

“I see you, distancing one. I see you, numbing one. I honor your sacrifice. You don’t have to carry this job by yourself anymore.”

Healing is not forcing yourself to feel “real.” It is befriending the protectors who stepped away — until presence feels safe enough to return.

🕯️ Disclaimer & Support

This article is for reflection and education, not a substitute for professional care.If you are struggling with dissociation, panic, or overwhelming disconnection, please reach out to a trusted professional or a crisis line right now. You do not have to carry this alone.

Crisis Support Hotlines:

• U.S.: 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline — Call or text 988, or chat via 988lifeline.org

• Canada: Talk Suicide Canada — 1-833-456-4566 or talksuicide.ca

• UK: Samaritans — Call 116 123 or visit samaritans.org

• Australia: Lifeline — Call 13 11 14 or visit lifeline.org.au

• International: findahelpline.com

  
  

IFS does not see dissociation as brokenness. It sees protectors carrying unbearable burdens of pain. And it knows: you are not alone.