• MDMA &
    Empathogenic
    Drugs

    Welcome Guest!
  • MDMA Moderators:

MDMA Recovery (Stories & Support - 5)

Status
Not open for further replies.
socrilus said:
It technically started after drinking 2 weeks after using MDMA. I thought I had recuperated from the initial insult completely as I felt fine a few days after the MDMA but this essentially reactivated all the *same* symptoms. I did not have HPPD ever. Visual snow+tinnitus resulted during my SSRI trial which like I said before was likely way too early (I can't remember exactly but I started it between 1-2 months after this began) given that my serotonin system was probably sensitive as hell back then.

Buspar is something id consider but given its a 5-HT1A agonist I'm concerned what effect it would have on visual snow or tinnitus.
Click to expand...
Sounds similar to me....I mostly recovered after the initial incident then kept retriggering symptoms once by smoking weed...Then again a week later by fapping and taking that dumb curcumin.
 
It's supposed to not be addicting (nothing like benzos) but I see a lot of people complaining about various side effects, and not just physical ones but lots of mental ones, but it's hard to say if that's just the vocal minority or what I guess.

Medicine is all about risk vs. benefit but I can't seem to get a read on that med's risk to benefit ratio
 
Cotcha Yankinov said:
It's supposed to not be addicting (nothing like benzos) but I see a lot of people complaining about various side effects, and not just physical ones but lots of mental ones, but it's hard to say if that's just the vocal minority or what I guess.

Medicine is all about risk vs. benefit but I can't seem to get a read on that med's risk to benefit ratio
Click to expand...
true, true. Buspar does seem somewhat "activating" from what I've read about it. For me anyway it feels like I have a "hot brain"....Between the tinnitus, hyperacusis, face tingling....So anything activating seems like a bad idea.

I've been reading a decent amount about clonodine since a poster a few months back posted that his neurologist has dealt a lot with MDMA "damaged" patients, and he had luck prescribing clonodine...Where some people even saw improvement after a few weeks. Not sure this poster ever took the med though.

https://www.researchgate.net/public..._in_Adult_Male_Rats_Comparison_with_Clonidine

Looks like it's active in the frontal cortex, which maybe why it's effective? Not sure what I'm reading, but it talks about 5-HT, and I've also read about it helping HPA Axis dysfunction....Which is shunja's thing.
 
Cotcha Yankinov said:
It's supposed to not be addicting (nothing like benzos) but I see a lot of people complaining about various side effects, and not just physical ones but lots of mental ones, but it's hard to say if that's just the vocal minority or what I guess.

Medicine is all about risk vs. benefit but I can't seem to get a read on that med's risk to benefit ratio
Click to expand...

Hmm. Ive browsed around and did see mention of physical sides like nausea. But a lot of people seemed to say it either does nothing or somehow randomly helps. Mostly the former.

Whats weird is I saw that it decreased some people's libido but increased other peoples.

What interests me about it the 5-HT1A action and whether that can help the HPA axis. But I don't want to risk worse tinnitus or visual snow or mental stuff.

Also in terms of non medicine options what about tdCS?
http://www.diytdcs.com/tag/depression/

Is it too risky and under-researched right now? Thats what worries me about that one

It seems like that study mentioned isotretinoin. Which is strange since that is the acne medicine ive heard some people get crazy sides from it even worse than this LTC. I only see the abstract but why are they comparing it to Clonidine exactly? Arent they used for different things?
 
Last edited:
Yeah supposedly GI tract side effects are common with 5-HT1A agonists and this makes full agonists at 5-HT1A intolerable, which means the available 5-HT1A agonists are only "partial" agonists, meaning they don't activate the receptor to the same degree/in the same way that serotonin does.

But from the reviews, some people are reporting severe mental side effects, a day of sheer panic type stuff. Some of that may have been due to people not properly tapering their benzos but I think some people were experiencing significant mental side effects from buspirone.

@Adubbs - Clonidine does have a lot of various effects and people tend to like it for sleep, but I'm not sure how well it would work as an anti-depressant long term. Its essentially the opposite of Mirtazapine, which is an actual anti-depressant (at higher doses anyways). But for an LTC, who knows. I probably would've taken more of it if I could have put up with the lightheadedness.


@Socrilus I'm not too keen on electrical stimulation of the scalp but a study has shown that magnetic stimulation of a particular brain area can help with depersonalization. I would be curious if electrical stimulation shows a similar result. I think those treatments need more investigation, but they could be promising. Supposedly the initial investigations into electrical stimulation haven't shown any benefit to cognition in normal people, but that doesn't mean that it may not be beneficial to some people with mental illness.

ECT on the other hand has long been used to success in MDD, but there are side effects.

RE: isotretinoin, there have long been mental side effects associated with some of the acne treatments but I'm not sure if the causes are clear, isotretinoin does have effects on cell survival though.
 
Decided to chime in after a while.

Finally made some progress.

What's really working for me:
- Cardio/brisk walk at least 30 min a day. I'm really lucky to have a friend that invites me to exercise every day.
- Socializing; forcing the brain to come up with a subject to talk about with the buddies. Read stuff in the internet, work out your brain as much as possible.
- A supplement that seems to be working for me is Ashwaganda. Alledgedly it repairs damaged axons. Do some research.
- Prayer and (try to) meditate. God exists and he loves you, pray for him to heal you during your sleep. Never lose your faith, never.
- Keep a positive attitude, don't think about brain damage and shit, it will slow down progress.

I dare say I improved maybe 40%, but I would rate it 60% if the tinnitus were gone. It's really frustrating. Interestingly enough, the eye floaters improved a bit!!! Cotcha/someone here ever had the tinnitus healed after a while recovering?

Oh and guys, avoid cigarrettes at all costs... It affects the production of the all holy BDNF that we all need to regrow our precious brain cells.

Light and godspeed.
 
I've spoken to two people who have had their tinnitus go away after mdma abuse.
 
My tinnitus is still present and in full force, basically the same for my floaters and face tingling. Almost 8 months in, and I'll be 31 next week....:).....never would have thought I'd be like this....oh well. Gosh I need to exercise more though.

good words about prayer Thiago, I've been trying to get back to my faith as well, my father swears by his faith and how it carried him through very tough times.
 
Cotcha Yankinov said:
Yeah supposedly GI tract side effects are common with 5-HT1A agonists and this makes full agonists at 5-HT1A intolerable, which means the available 5-HT1A agonists are only "partial" agonists, meaning they don't activate the receptor to the same degree/in the same way that serotonin does.

But from the reviews, some people are reporting severe mental side effects, a day of sheer panic type stuff. Some of that may have been due to people not properly tapering their benzos but I think some people were experiencing significant mental side effects from buspirone.

@Adubbs - Clonidine does have a lot of various effects and people tend to like it for sleep, but I'm not sure how well it would work as an anti-depressant long term. Its essentially the opposite of Mirtazapine, which is an actual anti-depressant (at higher doses anyways). But for an LTC, who knows. I probably would've taken more of it if I could have put up with the lightheadedness.


@Socrilus I'm not too keen on electrical stimulation of the scalp but a study has shown that magnetic stimulation of a particular brain area can help with depersonalization. I would be curious if electrical stimulation shows a similar result. I think those treatments need more investigation, but they could be promising. Supposedly the initial investigations into electrical stimulation haven't shown any benefit to cognition in normal people, but that doesn't mean that it may not be beneficial to some people with mental illness.

ECT on the other hand has long been used to success in MDD, but there are side effects.

RE: isotretinoin, there have long been mental side effects associated with some of the acne treatments but I'm not sure if the causes are clear, isotretinoin does have effects on cell survival though.
Click to expand...

Honestly it seems like the causes for any drug (prescription or not) triggered mental issue are highly unclear and the medical establishment currently has no way to deal with it due to lack of knowledge about what happens. And then doctors blame "stress" for no reason when it has nothing to do with "stress" in the typical sense of the word.

I will never be taking meds like isotretinoin in my life. And I will avoid pretty much everything with even a 0.1% chance of depression after the LTC is over.
 
socrilus said:
Honestly it seems like the causes for any drug (prescription or not) triggered mental issue are highly unclear and the medical establishment currently has no way to deal with it due to lack of knowledge about what happens.
Click to expand...

We not only have a relatively poor understanding of the side effects, but we also have a relatively poor understanding of how the drugs are used to success in the first place. We have some correlative data, like SSRIs reverse hippocampus atrophy, which is associated with increased BDNF signaling and most antidepressant therapies work via BDNF and so on and so forth, but why any of that causes one state of consciousness versus another is beyond us.

In other words, we have a relatively poor understanding of what pattern of neural activity gives rise to different states of consciousness.
 
Anyway to relieve my anxiety? I had a panic attack in the gym and have been on edge for a day and a half. No meds please, going completely natural.
Good news is the static is less prominate and CVEs are down like 80%, I can actually close my eyes now!!! It's bliss. The cells in my eyes are dying down. After images are annoying the same but it's only been 6 months plenty of time to improve. Akintopisa still by far the most annoying thing in the world!!! Anyone with anything positive to say about that!
 
I would personally keep hitting the gym (cardio especially) but try to stay mindful and not think too much. There is also going to be a balance between pushing yourself too much physically, if that played a role in the panic attack, and pushing yourself too little and not getting enough benefits.
 
Hi guys, I am about to finish my 8th month and I am looking for some hope. I have been 'locked' in the same state since November with very little improvement. I dont think there has been any. I am really struggling to find motivation to keep going. Benzos either make me a bit better or very ill. I have spent the last month in bed because of fatigue. My house is a mess. I dont really dress or wash myself properly anymore. I feel as if I'm losing my grip. My symptoms are tinnitus, grainy vision, starburts, anxiety, dp/dr, extreme fatigue. I am not going through severe panic anymore which I guess is good but I am still very much disabled and struggling. Anyone out there that has recovered after 8 months or so can chime in? I am almost tempted to try zoloft but I feel like I am risking a worsening of symptoms as I can tell my body is ultra sensitive to anything. Hope you guys are all doing well and improving. God bless you all.
 
fnono33 said:
Hi guys, I am about to finish my 8th month and I am looking for some hope. I have been 'locked' in the same state since November with very little improvement. I dont think there has been any. I am really struggling to find motivation to keep going. Benzos either make me a bit better or very ill. I have spent the last month in bed because of fatigue. My house is a mess. I dont really dress or wash myself properly anymore. I feel as if I'm losing my grip. My symptoms are tinnitus, grainy vision, starburts, anxiety, dp/dr, extreme fatigue. I am not going through severe panic anymore which I guess is good but I am still very much disabled and struggling. Anyone out there that has recovered after 8 months or so can chime in? I am almost tempted to try zoloft but I feel like I am risking a worsening of symptoms as I can tell my body is ultra sensitive to anything. Hope you guys are all doing well and improving. God bless you all.
Click to expand...

Man hang in there you gonna get better. It took me 10 months to see any noticeable improvements, it's very important that you exercise every day and socialize, pray god for help because it helped me a lot too. Do never give up, people in this forum usually go back to normal after 3 or 4 years, but I believe life gets more tolerable as time passes by.
 
Exercise is incredibly important, especially with fatigue and/or insomnia.

I certainly wouldn't harbor an intense fear of SSRIs - something like Lexapro could be helpful. Always something to talk to a doctor about.

The benefits are usually not instantaneous though, Amml may be an outlier in that regard. But who knows.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top