IDK what to title this

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I'm thinking about the fact that I'm an Actual Real Person and it's for some reason freaking me out. That probably makes no sense to anyone else, but I have identity issues and dissociate so much that I rarely, if ever, am able to process that fact. Everything feels unreal 90% of the time and has since I was 11-12 (probably since before that, but beyond 10-11 my memories get fuzzier and fuzzier), and my personality and interests are basically just an amalgamation of traits that my identity-less ass has stolen from people since I was a little kid, so realizing that I'm my own person that should have their own interests and s**t and should be allowed to just exist as themselves is always super f*****g weird. I kind of hate it NGL. I don't like acknowledging the fact I have no solid identity or sense of self.

Even my interest in Zelda that has been the only facet of my identity that has been solid for 20 years I technically stole from my older brother because I started playing the games just because he did and I wanted him to interact with me more. I have not gained anything, interests or traits, in my entire 22 years of life that is just Me because I was treated like s**t for being Me since I was a toddler and it's so f****d up.

I'm kind of drunk so maybe I'll ask for this to be deleted later, but this is way too long to post anywhere else and I just need to vent about it. lmao

You ARE an actual person.

It’s obvious you’re not a bot.

I can relate to the disassociating thing. I was at a point where I freaked out when I looked in a mirror because it didn’t feel like me. It was like seeing some stranger with dead eyes.

Anyway, I found time and therapy to be helpful although not a perfect solution.

Zelda is one of my big special interests, too. We both have something to look forward to in the near future.

WELL, yeah, of course. It's really hard to explain. Dissociation is really weird and it can legit make you feel like you and your surroundings are not real, so I guess I'm grappling with having a moment of clarity that yes, despite the fact everything feels fake and has for YEARS, that I'm real and that my thoughts and feelings are also real and valid. That sounds so benign, but when you live in an unreal-feeling daydream-esque world for most of your life it's kind of really f*****g freaky to process.

I never register that the person in the mirror is really "me". I remember being able to do that as a toddler, but at some point in my early childhood my brain completely f*****g forewent that. I don't get how that can be a helpful trauma response and I hate that my brain did that.

It's not you in a sense.
Up until relatively recently, no human being would have been able to see their reflection other than in the water, with distortion or with less clarity, more like a shadow that's been coloured in. You "cast" a shadow or you "make" a shadow, we don't say that the shadow is "me". We tend not to say "I'm making my own reflection in the mirror", we say "that's me!" but in reality we're standing there making the reflection happen by getting ourselves in the way of the mirror. You're doing that until you decide to walk away, then the reflection disappears and the real you continues to be.

There's that story of Narcissus who is always happy. One day he sees his reflection in the water for the first time and falls in love with himself and from that day on, he is never happy again.