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Ketamine Withdrawals...?

R

Rastahund

Bluelighter
Joined
Apr 19, 2011
Messages
59
Hi everyone.
I know it sounds a little far-fetched... but every time I try to quit ketamine, I get some very unpleasant side effects that make it really hard to continue to go through with it. I was wondering if anyone else has ever experienced such a thing?
I've been an every day ketamine user for about 1.5 years (before it was every day, I would use it quite often for the last 6 years before this) . My dosage ranges from 1 to 4 grams a day (I know, I know. That's why I'm trying to quit) and every time I do attempt to quit, I feel perfectly fine until about the 3rd night that I haven't had it hits. It starts with really intense goosebumps and feeling really cold and dangerously hot at the same time. My boyfriend says that I sweat so much throughout the whole night that he thought I had peed the bed.
I also get this really intense flank soreness. It bothers me so much that leaning on my back when sitting down is very uncomfortable. It hurts in my back on both sides, both sides of my flank and all the way into my lower abdominal region. Urine output becomes a lot less... but I think that may be due to the massive amount of sweating. I also start to get really shakey after even more days pass. I know for a 100% fact I'm doing straight Ketamine HCL because I get it from the veterinary vials and dry it out myself.

Does this happen to anyone else?
 
I've honestly never heard of withdrawal symptoms like this with ketamine but I wouldn't be surprised at that level of usage.
However it honestly just sounds to me like you're experiencing a pretty bad anxiety response after quitting, perhaps exacerbated by a pre-existing anxiety disorder that you were medicating with ketamine.
A few times I've quit smoking weed after a year of daily usage I get similar symptoms, minus the back pain, which I would recommend seeing a doctor for as it could be indicative of kidney damage; heavy chronic ketamine usage can be quite damaging to the renal system.
I'm honestly surprised that you haven't gotten k pains so painful that you had no choice but to quit.
 
Oh man have I gotten k cramps. For some reason, it never really stopped me though because they would eventually subside (or I would find ways to ease them enough to make them go away- tea and a hot bath, wheat grass and ginger shots, really fizzy kombucha, flooding my stomach with water and frequent small bumps of k... all those things worked pretty damn well) after struggling in immense pain and vomiting for a little bit. It's strange to me that it never got me to stop because I've been quite literally terrified of throwing up since I was a kid. Lol. I guess it never really helped because I have a friend who would experience the same problems as me because he's just as heavy of a user... so we would just suffer together then get over it.

You may be right about the anxiety thing... I definitely have noticed some mental problems ever since I quit that I could maybe attribute to anxiety. I guess I just thought it might have been some kind of withdrawals because of the massive amount of sweating that happens at night. I wake up so dehydrated, I don't even have to pee and that's going to bed after drinking a full normal sized bottle of water.
 
It's definitely a form of mental withdrawal, I doubt your anxiety would be so constant and severe otherwise, and it should likely subside in a week or so but until then it could be pretty uncomfortable.
Do you currently exercise at all? It can do wonders for mitigating anxiety.

When I have had similar withdrawal symptoms I would just use Xanax or diazepam to help get through the first week and quit after that but I can't in good conscience recommend the same to everyone, I tend to have fairly good control over my habits but benzos can be horribly addictive especially to someone who already has a previous addiction.
Further, trading a ketamine addiction with a benzo addiction is a million times worse, night sweats are the least of your worries during benzo withdrawal.
 
I know a friend that abuses 3meopcp heavily and he gets withdrawals when stopping. severe physical anxiety, jitters, etc
 
I don't exercise much but I do start going to the sauna and the gym every time I do try to quit. I'm a lot more serious about quitting this time because my mental cravings are so low that there's no point in drawing myself back into addiction. I plan to go to the gym with my friend today.
Xanax is helpful and I use it sometimes. If it gets too uncomfortable, I will... but I tend to stay away from Xanax because of how out of it I get- it makes my friends angry at me.
I could imagine that for sure on 3-MEO-PCP...
 
Rastahund said:
Xanax is helpful and I use it sometimes. If it gets too uncomfortable, I will... but I tend to stay away from Xanax because of how out of it I get- it makes my friends angry at me.
Click to expand...
...sounds as though you're eating too many Xannies to me...

I don't use nearly as heavily as you do, but I, too, will sweat the sheets through the first two nights after a Ketamine run.
3-MEO-PCP was terrible to come off of though. I'd get RLS and this cold metallic feeling in my stomach as well as off the chart anxiety...I won't do it any more for those reasons.

Oh, by your "flanks" do you mean thighs or buttocks?
Sensitivity in the thighs can be referred pain from a bladder infection or a UTI.
 
I get the same thing, Ive been doing ket IM between 5-10 vials a day of 50mg/mill ketamine HCL (2.5/5 grams per day). Im getting back pain, jitters, dhiarrer, anxiety, sweating etc. I'm not wanting to replace it with other pharmacy drugs but tapentadol and xanax seem to soothe it a bit. I'm already thinking of getting more and it's only been 1 day, I got these withdrawal effects only after doing it everyday for 2 months, I can't imagine what years would be like, please share if you have been successful in stopping and how you did it etc.
 
So I agree that effects mediated through the emotional system need to be suspected first. I mean, we don't turn to ketamine cuz we're so chipper to begin with, right? And the mind-body connection, i.e. emotional state affecting the immune system, is as hard a science as any. That said, here's an alternative speculation.

Dissociatives downregulate the immune system. If one uses consistently to the point of moving about its point of homeostasis, an immune system kicking back into gear could conceivably become as if an attack upon your organism, producing a cytokine storm as if by flu.

Again, just speculation, as physical dependence on dissociatives isn't exactly heard of. But if pressed to form a hypothesis, that's what I would posit.
 
I would get a longer lasting disso, like 3-meo-pce and use it to taper down.

I would also get extra care taking topical magnesium chroride and plenty of regular sea salt and potassium (fruit and veggies) as to me it sounds like yo have your minerals wreked too. Probably you have no b12 as well, so add it or take meats

And finally, take huge amounts of green tea. It should be mandatory for any disso user. In your case, extra mandatory.

I would minimize or taper down xanax too in favor of racetams. Fasoracetam upregules GABA, so double good for you.

The gym is a great idea too. Go for it. You will get out of your addiction in no time. Just take action and attack it for all fronts
 
Ive never done ket daily for more than a week or so.
So cant really say much about physical withdrawal.

Usually i do a few grams once a month or so.
Sometimes more often though, bit what i usually notice a emotional urge to dose after ive been clean for a few weeks.

So i can def understand the mental compulsion that a ketamine addiction brings.
Its such a strong drug that can make you forget alot of the issues of life.

Maybe an idea is to use some kind of crutch the first few days or weeks to make it easier to stay away from ket.
Although switching addictions isnt really a long term solution.
But for health reasons my opinion is that getting off daily ket is probably your priority atm.

Of course diet,exersize is vital but some supplements like nac, cbd cant hurt.
 
I went through a time of intense dissociative (deschloroketamine) abuse and with time there were indeed some alarming discontinuation symptoms, mostly scattered mind, low energy, anxiety, feelings of physical unrest but also acoustic hallucinations. Doing another dose brought relief but was short-acting, eventually I got to dose every 1-2 hours (despite the 4-6+h half life of DCK) to avoid being thrown into withdrawal. I think it is due to your NMDA receptors getting upregulated which does some pretty toxic things to your biochemistry and the antidote of choice would probably be a benzodiazepine. Most symptoms recovered pretty quick but some were lasting, mostly forgetfulness, low energy and those damn acoustic hallucinations (don't know, they might have been due to sleep deprivation).
 
plumbus-nine said:
the antidote of choice would probably be a benzodiazepine
Click to expand...
Would probably agree but you have to be equally if not more careful with benzos because benzo withdrawl is absolutely terrible and can be deadly as well.

Maybe have some for that 3rd night and see if it gets you through. I would recommend not taking it multiple days in a row or even on a weekly basis. Just from personal experience.

Would also advise not getting a benzo off the street as well, especially if you're in the US, because there's lots of fake xanax that actually contain fentanyl.
 
Anecdotal story that may not help: back in 2014 when I was kicking a massive etizolam habit and couldn't stand because of how badly I was shaking, the nurses kept asking me if I had a ketamine habit, and didn't believe a benzo habit could cause withdrawals that bad. Fun crew.
 
K is addicting as f***, for me at least. Once I pop there's no stopping.

When I use K, it's usually only for a few days at a time, once every few months maybe, and I'll go through about a gram a day at my worst.

Using 3.5g in a few days leaves me with a funk, depression, and general malaise that lasts at least a week. I believe ketamine has some metabolites that linger in the body for up to two weeks.

The thing with K is, it activates sooo many parts of the body that are rewarding. Amines increasing all over the place, from GABA to dopamine to serotonin to activation of the opioid system. No shit it's good for depression.

I have yet to meet someone who has felt permanent benefits from any sort of K treatment. There always is a need to readminister, 3-4 months seems to be the maximum time for benefits of K infusions.

Anyway K is fun and all, but I try to stay the heck away from it these days because the days afterwards are so F'ing bad. Worse than MDMA, even. Goddamn it's fun though. But c'mon Shulgin himself said fuck this shit, dissociative have no place in psychedelic medicine.


Bottom line, don't listen to the tards who say K isn't addicting, these are the same guys that will tell you THC has no withdrawals lol

Peace


PS here's a knowledge bomb for all you guys - get some potent St. John's Wort (Gaia herbs is good) and your liver will clear ketamine and its metabolites much, much faster. Same trick works for benzodiazepines actually. It's kind of the opposite effect of drinking grapefruit juice. SJW is an enzyme inducer, and trust me this trick works. Only do it if you want the stuff out of your body as fast as possible though. If you take SJW and keep using you will need double the dose or more. Nicotine would also work, but I wouldn't recommend that for obvious reasons like death
 
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