I Am Not Myself: What is Depersonalization and How to Live With It

Some people feel detached from their "self," and the world around them seems unreal, as if their life is happening to someone else. This condition is called depersonalization; it is poorly understood and difficult to diagnose. It is known that it can be triggered by experienced trauma or severe stress, but there are very few specialists in Russia who work with this disorder and know how to treat it. In a book by American psychiatrist Daphne Simeon and Australian journalist Jeffrey Abugel, who has lived with depersonalization for many years, published for the first time in Russian, clinical signs, the history of research, theories of pathogenesis, and methods of therapy for depersonalization disorder are described in detail. The authors' work is based on knowledge accumulated by the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and the UK’s Institute of Psychiatry at Cambridge University, and it will be of interest to mental health specialists and people with depersonalization who are trying to understand what is happening to them and find a way to recovery.