No. The defining feature of this experience is that you know things feel unreal — that intact insight is exactly what separates it from psychosis. It is frightening and it is not dangerous.

Why do breathing exercises sometimes make it worse?

Because attending closely to internal sensations is the direction the symptom lives in. Use external grounding and movement during an episode, and save slow breathing practice for when you are not in one.

How long does it last?

Most episodes last minutes to hours. Longer-lasting detachment, especially after trauma or heavy cannabis use, needs professional help — and it does respond to treatment, which is worth knowing early.

Is it caused by cannabis?

It can be triggered by it, and by other substances, sometimes persisting well after use stops. If that is the sequence for you, say so to the clinician you see — it changes the plan.

Derealisation: when the world goes flat and far away

The world looks like a photograph of itself. Your hands are yours but not quite. Sound arrives a beat late. You can hold a conversation while feeling entirely absent from it, and the fear that this is permanent is worse than the state itself.

Do this now

Come back through the senses, not the breath

3 minutes

Do not watch your breath or your body — that is the direction that made this worse.
Hold something with texture. Name out loud what it feels like: cold, ribbed, heavy.
Name five things you can see, and say the colour of each one out loud.
Four sounds. Three textures. Let one long exhale happen between each, unmeasured and unhurried.
Stand up, walk ten steps, press your feet down deliberately. Movement returns the body faster than stillness does.

Run it with a timer

What it is, in plain terms

Derealisation and depersonalisation are dissociative experiences: the world feels unreal, or you feel detached from yourself. They are extremely common — brief episodes occur in a large minority of the general population — and they are strongly associated with panic, anxiety, exhaustion, and severe sleep deprivation. They are not psychosis. During them you know that things feel unreal, and that preserved insight is precisely what distinguishes the two.

The hyperventilation contribution

Low carbon dioxide from over-breathing reduces cerebral blood flow and is a well-documented trigger for feelings of unreality — voluntary hyperventilation reproduces the symptom reliably in a laboratory. That is good news practically: some part of this is a gas and a breathing pattern, and both are changeable.

Why fighting it extends it

Checking whether you feel real yet is an inward attention task, and inward attention is where the symptom lives. The state fades when attention is occupied by the outside world and the body is moving. That is why grounding beats breath-watching here, and why this is the one page on the site that tells you not to focus on the breath.

What changes it, over a week

When it appears
Grounding and movement first. Long exhales, but do not count them and do not monitor them.
Every day
Twenty minutes of walking outside, mouth closed. Rhythmic movement plus nasal breathing does more for this than sitting practice.
Sleep
Protect it ruthlessly. Sleep deprivation is one of the most reliable ways to produce this state in anyone.
This week
Book with a clinician, particularly if this follows trauma, cannabis use, or has lasted more than a few weeks. It responds to treatment and it is not something to wait out alone.

When this is not a breathing pattern

See a clinician — promptly, and before assuming any of this applies to you — if any of these describe you:

Hearing or seeing things others do not, or believing things others find impossible — that needs urgent assessment and is a different category
Detachment that began after a head injury, a seizure, or a new medication
Episodes with lost time, or finding yourself somewhere with no memory of getting there
A history of trauma or abuse with these symptoms — this needs a trauma-informed clinician, not a breathing app
Any thoughts of harming yourself — contact your doctor or a crisis line today

This page is education, not medical advice, and no part of it is a diagnosis. Full disclaimer.

Questions people ask

Am I losing my mind?: No. The defining feature of this experience is that you know things feel unreal — that intact insight is exactly what separates it from psychosis. It is frightening and it is not dangerous.
Why do breathing exercises sometimes make it worse?: Because attending closely to internal sensations is the direction the symptom lives in. Use external grounding and movement during an episode, and save slow breathing practice for when you are not in one.
How long does it last?: Most episodes last minutes to hours. Longer-lasting detachment, especially after trauma or heavy cannabis use, needs professional help — and it does respond to treatment, which is worth knowing early.
Is it caused by cannabis?: It can be triggered by it, and by other substances, sometimes persisting well after use stops. If that is the sequence for you, say so to the clinician you see — it changes the plan.

What this page is built on

— Hunter et al., 2004, Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology — the prevalence of depersonalisation and derealisation
— Terhune et al., and the wider hyperventilation literature — voluntary hyperventilation reliably inducing feelings of unreality
— Michal et al., 2016, Journal of Psychosomatic Research — depersonalisation in anxiety disorders and its clinical course

Named by author and year. The DOIs live in the journal.

Put a number on it

Most of what is on this page tracks one measurement: the Control Pause. It takes sixty seconds, needs no account, and it is the thing that tells you whether any of this is working.