depersonilization.... Describe yours

[First Bad Comedown]

Derealization

Derealization.

The sense that the outside world isn't real.
Reality itself has been compromised.

Have you ever driven by the house you grew up in or a restaurant that holds special meaning?
Even the gas station you always went to when you lived at your old apartment...
Drive by there again and it isn't the same.

It doesn't spark any memories.
Sure, you can force yourself to remember details, but nothing volunteers itself.
And the details you recall hold no emotional significance.
You just don't care that you are looking at the place you met your girlfriend for the first time.
And that old bike trail you used to ride on, who cares...
Maybe its not the right trail anyways. What did that tree look like?
Damn landmarks are escaping you.

These are core features of memory.
And they add to the vibrancy of life.
They lend meaning to your memories, literally defining who you are.
When these familiar places are alien - then all of the outside world is questioned.

How do you know if everything around is real?

Perfect example:
I used to be afraid of heights.
All my life, since I was a little kid, standing at a ledge was sincerely nerve-wracking.
In part because I always felt like I could just jump.

My derealization was so severe that I stood 3 stories up and stared over a ledge.
I looked at the ground, waiting for that familiar tension to creep in.
Wishing it would.

No, even this familiar feeling would be denied.
I could climb higher and peer longer, but my endocrine system offered me nothing but melancholy.
I remember reading about some kids that actually jumped.
From buildings.
Because of Dp/Dr, caused by MDMA.

I understood why they did this.
Maybe on the way down, the fear would actually return.
Maybe for just a fleeting moment, they felt human again.
The suffering is so extreme that feeling 'normal' event for a fleeting moment before death, this can be worth it.
At least you would die as yourself in a real world.

Hmm.

Maybe a less grim aspect.
People weren't right to look at.
Their faces didn't make sense.
It's like the advanced software that we have to analyze and memorize a human face has been damaged.
I can force myself to see aspects of their face.
I can tell you what color the eyes and hair are, but even doing this might require major concentration.
And don't ask me to step back and see the face as a whole.
No, better to look down.

Eye contact is very surreal.
I just don't know what to do with faces.
Moving mouths....so confusing, irritating.
Flapping bags of skin....

Early on, people were almost two dimensional.
I mean this - card board cutouts!
Can you imagine looking at people and seeing no depth or thickness, only their height and width.

That's right.
Derealization means that when you talk to other people, you see card-board cutouts with faces you can't understand.
You don't want to look at them because it hurts your mind.

Yes, this card-board phenomena has been described in the medical literature by MDMA users seeing psychiatrists.

Can you imagine how easy it would be to look at a lifeless meaningless figure that you know is a human, and feel nothing?
I suddenly understood why all the school shootings seemed to involve SSRIs.
With such an empty grey view of other people, watching them die - causing them to die really wouldn't feel like what one expects.
Murder would actually be surreal.

Yes, I am saying that extreme violence comes easy to a person with a compromised serotonin transmission.
The endocrine response to everything is altered, so the brain doesn't push back. Maybe the sight is even amusing.

Maybe psychopaths dissociate like this.
Derealization is a dissociative disorder...
Nothing around you feels or looks real.

 

[First Bad Comedown]

Hppd

Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder.
Ongoing sensory information that shares similarity with the drug experience, usually visual.

HPPD was with me every morning I woke up.
It was the first reminder that I was still brain damaged.
Even before I go to the mirror to experience depersonalization, or the shower, or outside to experience derealization...
HPPD was there to greet me and shout - "You are fucked up good."

To start, everything looked less colorful.
Colors could still be discerned, but they were not vibrant.
Like someone had turned down the color saturation on an old tv.
Textures were also too blended in.
The freckles on my wife's face disappeared into her skin.

Also, there was a depth perception problem.
I first thought that the whole world seemed like it was a little distant.
I'm not saying far away, I mean it was like a few inches further away than it should be.

No, I figured it out - my eyes weren't in the right position.
It was as if my eyeballs were set in the back of my skull, literally four inches further away from everything I see.
Yes, that was more accurate.

That's right, a slightly distant greyish world. Hard to focus on details....
What else.

That's it!
I was looking at a projection.
The whole world was nothing but a movie being projected onto a screen in front of me.
And this screen was behind a sheet of glass.

This is the best description of HPPD I can muster.
And I found a very similar description in the literature as well.

Is this really like the drug experience?
I don't think so.
I remember MDMA causing the world to be bright and vibrant.
Although there was an artificial 'plastic' nature to things (including people).
Maybe this HPPD is a perversion of the colorful plastic world into a gray pale flat one.


HPPD is too often called Dp/Dr.
These are unique conditions, but they do overlap.
Dp/Dr is about emotional detachment from the sense of self and the world around you. Dissociation.
HPPD is actually something in your vision that can be separated from your emotional state.

The only significant overlap I see is the card-board cut out phenomena.
I believe that HPPD played a role in how other people look, and this leads to dissociation emotionally.
Had the HPPD not been present, perhaps the Derealization would not have been so profound.
Its like a chicken and the egg.

HPPD does not rise to the extent of true hallucination.
You won't see people that aren't there.

It just happens that this persistent visual disturbance is likely to be brought on by drugs that disturb vision during their use.
The visual cortex is rich with serotonin receptors, and it falls victim to neurotoxicity more easily than other areas of the brain.
I still believe that slight visual symptoms will linger longer than any other for cases of MDMA 'brain damage'.
When depression is long behind you, and everything in life is real and important, you still might not focus on fine details the same way.
Even after three years, I find reading text to be a little more challenging than before.

My father-in-law still struggles to read text on a screen, twenty years after his last LSD use.
His daughter (my wife's sis) now follows in his footsteps.
She is partially color blind from LSD.

Here is the important part for those of you worried.
They do not care.
And neither do I.

Lingering visual changes, if they can even be called HPPD, do NOT exert emotional distress forever.
I could live the rest of my life with my current vision and feel nothing more than annoyance on occasion.
I feel like my eyes are more like an old man's.
That is all.

Vision is only troubling when its really fucked up, early on.

 

[Robv5]

Can this be caused by alcohol?
When I first got drunk I drank a stupid amount and for around 2 weeks had similar symptoms,
No it was not a hangover,
Like if I was asked to find tea in a cupboard everything inside looked blank and plain, and I thought I had a brain tumor, that sounds daft but i was scared and when people just laugh at you when your looking for help , doesn't help :/

 

[pmz]

FBC. Dude. All I asked was how your feeling these days. Not another poetic explanation on what derealizization is. You get really annoying on these threads sometimes. Just answer a simple question without a text book long essay behind it. (Constructive critasim)

 

[herenow14]

Yes I've thought a lot about the overlap of my visual disturbances and my emotional/perceptive disturbances. It's difficult for me to imagine one without the other. They feel extremely tied together for me, except for the after images and light sensitivity which is more just a nuisance. I can definitely relate to the odd sensation of looking at myself in the mirror as well as hearing my own voice in conversation. It becomes very difficult for me to carry out a conversation because I feel like I am constantly hearing and criticizing my own words as I say them.

Dont worry herenow I can say it does get better. At least the cognitive part for me has improved 10 fold. Its been 6.5 months for me. About 6 months out took to really feel a difference. Not 100% id say 75-80% improvement by now.

How are ur emotional side of things? Do u struggle with say feeling "joy" or "inspired" about life? I think its called anhedonia.

I appreciate the reassurance. I can't wait to start feeling some healing. My emotionality is actually fairly unaffected. I still do get satisfaction out of the things that brought my joy before this. Music, literature, cooking, exercise, yoga. These things still bring my happiness, and I feel very fortunate for this. My biggest emotional problems are the constant anxiety, fear, and frustration that result from my inability to socialize, my perceived changes in cognitive abilities, and the sense that my entire perception is totally screwed up.

BLers who suffer from these issues, did you notice this damage after a single big dose? Or did this stuff sort of build up onto you after extended use?

For me, it was after a single night. Over the course of my junior year in college, I took ecstasy 11 times, all without little ramification, except for the 11th time which brought on a long bout of head pressure. Almost two years later, I gave MDMA another chance and took a single cap of around 90mg. The last four months of hell have all resulted from that night. It was a very moderate dose. I could tell by the roll itself that I'd only taken a small amount. But I believe that even though my head pressure head gone away, two years later, I was still sensitive to the effects of MDMA and hence I must now battle a second long comedown with entirely different and significantly scarier symptoms.

 

[First Bad Comedown]

Um, hey PMZ.
How you doing buddy?

I know its your thread and all.
But I was trying to answer your first question, about defining Dp.
I didn't even see your post to me between writing my three posts.

I wasn't trying to ignore you, rather I wanted to continue my thread.
Honestly, I find writing like this to be more challenging and less interesting.
That means this is a practice in critical thinking for me, and I'm glad to be capable still.
Besides, I think it is important to give a poetic and accurate description of the trifecta of horror that is Dp/Dr/HPPD.

How am I doing?

Much better.
Much.

I have odd physical ailments that come and go, like chest pain, body twitches, tight neck.
Sometimes these cause anxiety.
Last year I thought I was having TIAs multiple times, and I'm pretty sure I'm right.
I dropped my cholesterol big time by eating vegan for two months.
And I started taking baby aspirin every day.
But the symptoms still kept me from exercising - every time my heart rate went up I just wouldn't feel right.

Just a few days ago I started going to the gym again.
But I have a lot of weight to put back on and its going to take me a while.

Aside from symptoms of TIAs and chest pain, which started last April and stopped in August, I have no complaints.
Sure, there is the continuous cognitive loss that is well documented in former MDMA users.
Most of the time I find it more difficult to learn new things than it should be.
But not impossible.

And I get the distinct feeling that I will re-learn some of these cognitive abilities very slowly over the next decade of my life.

But there is no Dp or Dr anymore.
My body is quite real.
I feel pain and fear as much as I need to.
And sometimes pleasure too!

Other people occupy three dimensional space.
Their faces are easy to understand and seeing a person suffering evokes a unique and healthy brain function - empathy.
This took so long to relearn, but there it is.

My night vision when driving is the most obvious remnant of HPPD.
Some nights are worse than others - I just can't describe how my long distance vision feels dim and weak.

Standing at a precipice is scary again.
But not as much as I'd hope for.
Heights used to make me sweat with anticipation, now I can just look down and be still.
But if a car swerves out in front of me on the road, it sure as hell startles me!
That startle response seemed long gone at one point, but its back and healthy now.

I hope these descriptions help.
The worst of my Dp/Dr was in the first 6-9 months.
After 1 year, definitely 1.5, it really got better.
Only to be replaced with a new set of issues, mostly cognitive.
Around year 2.5 I had a major freakout and after felt like a stroke would kill me!
Ever since I've been taking it easy emotionally, not getting upset or sweating the small stuff.
Or even some big stuff.

Right now I'm hopeful that the 4th year of recovery will show me the end of the tunnel.
I've heard other BL members describe a 7 year process.
For some of us, this journey doesn't stop.
But I suppose that has its merits. The brain is constantly re-wiring itself.
Way beyond the scope of current research studies...

 

[derok]

i actually have this tight neck, i thought it was related with my nightclenching, but now the nightclenching is not so bad but the neck muscles are in pain almost every morning, however this is better than the pain of the past, im even changed my "bad side" first was the left , this last months are the right, anyway the i can manage better with this new muscular pain.

 

[pmz]

Um, hey PMZ.
How you doing buddy?

I know its your thread and all.
But I was trying to answer your first question, about defining Dp.
I didn't even see your post to me between writing my three posts.

I wasn't trying to ignore you, rather I wanted to continue my thread.
Honestly, I find writing like this to be more challenging and less interesting.
That means this is a practice in critical thinking for me, and I'm glad to be capable still.
Besides, I think it is important to give a poetic and accurate description of the trifecta of horror that is Dp/Dr/HPPD.

How am I doing?

Much better.
Much.

I have odd physical ailments that come and go, like chest pain, body twitches, tight neck.
Sometimes these cause anxiety.
Last year I thought I was having TIAs multiple times, and I'm pretty sure I'm right.
I dropped my cholesterol big time by eating vegan for two months.
And I started taking baby aspirin every day.
But the symptoms still kept me from exercising - every time my heart rate went up I just wouldn't feel right.

Just a few days ago I started going to the gym again.
But I have a lot of weight to put back on and its going to take me a while.

Aside from symptoms of TIAs and chest pain, which started last April and stopped in August, I have no complaints.
Sure, there is the continuous cognitive loss that is well documented in former MDMA users.
Most of the time I find it more difficult to learn new things than it should be.
But not impossible.

And I get the distinct feeling that I will re-learn some of these cognitive abilities very slowly over the next decade of my life.

But there is no Dp or Dr anymore.
My body is quite real.
I feel pain and fear as much as I need to.
And sometimes pleasure too!

Other people occupy three dimensional space.
Their faces are easy to understand and seeing a person suffering evokes a unique and healthy brain function - empathy.
This took so long to relearn, but there it is.

My night vision when driving is the most obvious remnant of HPPD.
Some nights are worse than others - I just can't describe how my long distance vision feels dim and weak.

Standing at a precipice is scary again.
But not as much as I'd hope for.
Heights used to make me sweat with anticipation, now I can just look down and be still.
But if a car swerves out in front of me on the road, it sure as hell startles me!
That startle response seemed long gone at one point, but its back and healthy now.

I hope these descriptions help.
The worst of my Dp/Dr was in the first 6-9 months.
After 1 year, definitely 1.5, it really got better.
Only to be replaced with a new set of issues, mostly cognitive.
Around year 2.5 I had a major freakout and after felt like a stroke would kill me!
Ever since I've been taking it easy emotionally, not getting upset or sweating the small stuff.
Or even some big stuff.

Right now I'm hopeful that the 4th year of recovery will show me the end of the tunnel.
I've heard other BL members describe a 7 year process.
For some of us, this journey doesn't stop.
But I suppose that has its merits. The brain is constantly re-wiring itself.
Way beyond the scope of current research studies...

Sorry dude. I was in a frustrated mood. Just wanted an easy answer to read. But yeah its pretty helpful.

That's good to hear its getting better

My biggest struggle is that lack of connection of life. I want music to inspire me again. I lack that feeling. How does music sound to you? Flat? Or can u experience the sounds like normal? I can enjoy it actually. But it doesn't energize me like I'm used to

 

[herenow14]

I suppose my biggest question is whether mdma induced dp/dr differs from other types of dp/dr eg post traumatic stress induced, anxiety induced, marijuana induced etc. if dp/dr is merely a defense mechanism of the brain as opposed to some manifestation of "damage", then is it possible to cure dp/dr by way of mindfulness, exercise, and many of the other methods discussed in recovery. I visit the dp self help forum in addition to blue light and often find their stories and descriptions of symptoms as similar to my own as the posts I read in ecstasy discussion. How much power do we have over this ailment? Whether I'm in the drivers seat or not in this's recovery process, time will obviously play a big part. Nevertheless it would be comforting to believe that what I'm experiencing is a psychological response rather than brain damage.

 

[pmz]

I suppose my biggest question is whether mdma induced dp/dr differs from other types of dp/dr eg post traumatic stress induced, anxiety induced, marijuana induced etc. if dp/dr is merely a defense mechanism of the brain as opposed to some manifestation of "damage", then is it possible to cure dp/dr by way of mindfulness, exercise, and many of the other methods discussed in recovery. I visit the dp self help forum in addition to blue light and often find their stories and descriptions of symptoms as similar to my own as the posts I read in ecstasy discussion. How much power do we have over this ailment? Whether I'm in the drivers seat or not in this's recovery process, time will obviously play a big part. Nevertheless it would be comforting to believe that what I'm experiencing is a psychological response rather than brain damage.

I wonder the same thing a lot too. Who knows.

 

[lovepsychadelics]

2 years until fully recovered from around 18 months of heavy MDMA and amphetamine abuse. Never want to go there again and this is 11 years since regaining my mental faculties to the greater extent. If you want to do the whole DP thingy I'd suggest ketamine or MXE. These substances at low doses actually seem to repair the old noggin to some extent. Also if you are RESPONSIBLE with your use of K/MXE you don't get the days of feeling like half a human unlike MDMA abuse or sometimes even just MDMA use. Excessive use of MXE has been shown to cause neuro-toxicity for days after use being ceased so tread with caution and try and avoid stupid high dose kitty flips, these almost always cause serotonin toxicity. I never really experienced DP as some who have posted here have experienced more severe memory issues, decreased social function, depression, "Remember when this was Tom-Toms syndrome" about almost every social event even non electronic music etc.

There were times however (usually after 2-3 beers for some weird reason) I'd do random shit with all lights on but no one home. Just weird shit like wandering through bush land with a vague plan of getting "home" despite "home" being over 30 minutes away by car. Never been able to handle Etoh very well since and Etoh and mushrooms resulted in some really fucked up state of DP (this was a one off around 1 year after ceasing MDMA use). Like watching yourself in the third person. I'd done shrooms loads before my MDMA abuse and even in combination with MDMA/Etoh but this one off experience with 1/2 cup of shroom juice some 12 months after ceasing MDMA was something I'd rather forget.

 

[Dawglaw]

The funny thing about DR is that when I was in a nasty 8 month spell, it was the most traumatizing feeling I had ever experienced. Now that I am so far removed, I barely remember what it was like.

Just imagine that you feel like a prisoner stuck inside your mind watching a movie through your eyes. Nothing seems or feels real. Every thing you do seems to be a automatic response to your surroundings. Very much like running on auto pilot.

If you don't know how to deal with it, it can be devastating. What a fucking trip. Test your drugs!

 

[pmz]

The funny thing about DR is that when I w as in a nasty 8 month spell, it was the most traumatizing feeling I had ever experienced. Now that I am so far removed, I barely remember what it was like.

Just imagine that you feel like a prisoner stuck inside your mind watching a movie through your eyes. Nothing seems or feels real. Every thing you do seems to be a automatic response to your surroundings. Very much like running on auto pilot.

If you don't know how to deal with it, it can be devastating. What a fucking trip. Test your drugs!

Traumatizing to say the least. How did it effect u emotionally. Did u have that numb not able to "feel" how you know you should part?

 

[First Bad Comedown]

Hey PMZ,

I thought about it and remembered just how goddamned frustrated I used to be in your shoes.
I understand completely.

Music was also a point of frustration for me.
I used to be obsessed with certain songs or melodies.
I was no star, but I enjoyed music enough to sing in choir for seven years.
Music truly captured me as a child.

It wasn't until the brain damage that this changed.
I would have days where I would break through the dullness, like after work outs.
And the music would flow through my veins!
But it would recede again, and I was very frustrated with the change.

The endocrine system is definitely critical to the enjoyment of music.
And this is where the greatest brain dysfunction lies.

When I took lithium, otc, I would get extreme euphoria from music.
We are talking tears in my eyes good.
But this normally was during the onset of the drug, not throughout its duration.
The first two days would cause this.

And I shouldn't forget to mention melatonin.
This is an odd supplement to try for those with serotonin rewiring.
It never used to do much to me at all, but now it is a potent sleep aid.
And it causes a HUGE increase in energy the next day - jittery endurance that includes enjoying music.
Why would melatonin be so powerful?

Other than cortisol, it is the only known substance known to upregulate serotonin receptors.
I can't believe the effect it has on me!
But as with everything, it is temporary.

The first few days though are intense and music is awesome.
It turns on some of the dopamine pathways that are mediated by serotonin, imo.

Music is slowly coming back to its former glory for me, even without the supps or exercise.
Lately I've been enjoying this master pianist. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0U73NRSIkw
Genius.

 

[pmz]

Interesting. I'm glade I have hope for the beauty of music to enter my life again. Thanks

 

[First Bad Comedown]

As far as other types of Dp/Dr go, it is fascinating to think about the underlying similarities.
I will say that MDMA induced Dp/Dr/HPPD seems to carry a few unique characteristics.
The 'card-board' effect and the 'movie screen' effect are commonly reported enough to appear in the medical literature.
This are more HPPD symptoms, not Dp.

I believe that stress induced Dp can also be considered brain damage, perhaps with serotonin dysfunction at its core.
We know that severe repeated stress causes changes to cortical SERT over time.
This would explain the similarities.

MDMA is accomplishing chemically what the brain would normally only experience during times of extreme stress.

 

[Braindead1217]

Does anyone else feel like they are constantly relapsing? I've been finding that I've "forgotten" how to act normally in public, or it could be that I never really knew how to act in public and I'm just more self conscious of it now, but it seems like I can feel myself getting better throughout the day and ill think to myself by the end of the night "damn, maybe I really can get through all this, maybe there is hope" and then ill wake up in the morning feeling like I've lost all progress I had gained throughout the day. Also I seem to just have spurts of derealization, today I went and visited my mother whom I had not seen in months, and I started to get really upset because I realized I couldn't even hold a conversation with my
own mother and right after that I started to feel kind of euphoric. It was weird, but if anyone else has some kind of experience with this some feedback would be greatly appreciated

 

[Spadez87]

From 2004 to 2008 I'd to about 10 ecstasy pills a week. there wasn't much pure MDMA (nobody even called it that it was just E) in Toronto then so who knows what else's was in it. That was about 6 years ago, while I have used tons of other drugs I have not used E since.

I'm still fucked from it's use I think. I have mad anxiety, paranoia and just am not the same person I was. I enjoy nothing and explode at everything. They say I have borderline personality disorder more then likely mad 1000 times worse from drugs/my DOC ecstasy.
In short I hope yours clears better then mine. I know I'll never be the same again.

 

[Dawglaw]

I 100% attribute CBT, mindfulness, positivity and working through negative issues in my life for my DP/DR going away.

It is not caused by brain damage from drugs rather it is a reaction to extreme stress.

If you are suffering and can't do it alone, go get CBT and really work on mindfulness.

DP/DR feeds on anxiety. It also causes a lot of anxiety. You have to work hard to break the cycle.

 

[pmz]

I 100% attribute CBT, mindfulness, positivity and working through negative issues in my life for my DP/DR going away.

It is not caused by brain damage from drugs rather it is a reaction to extreme stress.

If you are suffering and can't do it alone, go get CBT and really work on mindfulness.

DP/DR feeds on anxiety. It also causes a lot of anxiety. You have to work hard to break the cycle.

So do you not think the dp we have is from a physical brain trauma from drugs? The lack of focus and ability think clearly, the memory aspect and everything else? Is all from just anxiety, Initially caused by drugs yet worsted through the inability to deal with the anxiety and there for evolving into dp?

Not challenging you btw. Just questioning.