When Dissociation Feels Like Dying with Your Eyes Open

And the one-page tool I used to come back into my body when nothing else worked

You don’t forget the first time you dissociate and know it.

For me, it wasn’t some soft fade. It was like the lights cut off behind my eyes but the show kept running. I could still move, still speak — barely. But I wasn’t in there. I was watching myself from somewhere behind glass.

I remember standing in the kitchen, after getting off a phone call that should’ve just been stressful. Instead, it cracked something wide open. My body was in the room. I wasn’t. It felt like drowning without the water.

And I remember thinking: “If I don’t ground myself now, I’m going to do something I can’t undo.”

Not because I wanted to hurt myself. Because I didn’t know how to exist in that moment without completely unraveling.

I made this tool for that version of me. And maybe for the version of you that knows exactly what I’m talking about.

---

The Tool: 5-4-3-2-1 Anchor

This is a one-page survival tool.
Not a concept. Not a coping strategy. A lifeline.

It walks you through five sensory steps when you're dissociating, spiraling, or shutting down — using your body, not your thoughts, to anchor you back to the now.

Because when your brain is offline?
You don’t need inspiration.
You need instructions.

---

I’ve used this in a parked car, in a bathroom stall, in the middle of a flashback. It doesn’t “fix” anything. But it keeps you in the fight.

It’s free. Always will be.
No email. No pitch. Just here when you need it.

Print it. Screenshot it. Save it before you need it.
We don’t heal by thinking harder.
We heal by surviving the worst moments differently than we did before.

—Cody Taymore
Kill The Silence