Mental Health Recovery from a drug induced psychosis / question about HPPD

[darklord777]

Hi guys,

Before the negativity towards this post , please bare with me as this is my first time posting on this website and if I'm doing things wrong then please let me know. :D

My story is a very long one but I am going to summarise it to the best I can possibly do. On the 22nd June, 2016 I woke up completely and utterly detached from the world, with very intense derealization. I had a heavy head and felt like I was still in a dream, except I was not. What followed was a week or two of unreal anxiety, panic attacks and thinking I was in a coma and awaiting to wake up, thinking that any day I would be awoken in a hospital bed. Not only this but the certainty that I was becoming schizophrenic, sitting on the internet all day googling symptoms and relating them to myself, eventually resulting in extremely depressive thoughts as I thought I was essentially doom. Fast forward to this day and I am coming right very slowly, regaining my attachment to the world and realising that this is the real world and so forth. I have been assessed by the Crisis team over here and have been told that I went through a drug induced psychosis. (cannabis)

A little bit about me :

-Male, 19 years old
-Cannabis smoker of 3 years, mostly everyday. (Quit on the 24th of June when I started having those feelings, have been completely drug and alcohol free since)
-Always suffered from anxiety and been very much a perfectionist, if things aren't in order then I would spiral out of control in a way and getting very worked up

Now this is where my question comes in, and it may seem extremely idiotic but my anxiety and constant need for assurance is what is fuelling it. About 3 and a half months ago a bunch of friends and I took some LSD, a little bit more then what was anticipated, and I ended up having the most traumatic experience of my life. In my trip I thought that died on my friends floor , prior to this I was stuck in a loop type thing where I thought everything was repeating itself and that all the people around me were playing some sort of sick joke on me. I kept saying "make it stop, stop f***ing with me" etc etc and then would proceed to wandering off and sitting in my room and losing my shit, thinking I was essentially stuck in a trip for the rest of my life ( i heard that this is common in a bad trip) . I eventually woke up and was very disorientated for half an hour or so as the effects started to wear off. I was drunk when I did the LSD and have never really been someone interested in this drug at all, almost having a fear of it, but since my friends were doing it and I wasn't thinking straight I thought why not.

Stupid me has been reading articles again and again, and I found out about the dreaded HPPD, and that some people undergo quite bad derealization / depersonalization before the effects start to set in. When my derealization gets really bad, I start to think that everyone is playing some joke on me because I feel so detached and unreal , and it reminds me exactly of the way I felt when I was having that bad trip. Last it happened was few days and for some reason the feelings are very slightly still there, but I know how idiotic they are so I can somewhat shake them.

So to the crux of this post, am I going through the onset of a life of HPPD after one single trip?? Seeing as these feelings of everyone playing a joke on me come and go and feel like that time when i had a bad trip (it has happened about 3-4 times since I woke up that one day) , or should I just listen to my psychiatrist who has seen this all before and take his word when he says I have gone through a drug induced psychosis and that part of that is derealisation and paranoia. P.s I am not having any hallucinations per se but if I stare at something for long enough or if I glimpse at it slightly it has a somewhat wavey affect (a very very light one, this is probably my anxiety and vision playing tricks on me because it is extremely subtle).

To anyone who even finds the time to read this and shed some light, I will be forever thankful, and I am not just saying that. Im in a horrible time of need right now and a helping hand would be absolutely amazing. Once again I apologise for the long post but I hope there are few of you out there that can bear with me. 8(8(

Much Love

Darklord777

 

[whatamI]

from my experience with psychosis, the anxiety was a big part which i think schizophrenia is mistaken for. In my non-medical opinion, a benzodiazepine might help more than an antipsychotic

 

[AlphaMethylPhenyl]

Benzos tend to lose their effect after about a month of daily use. They also don't work very much, if at all, against the level of anxiety that would warrant an antipsychotic. In the beginning they're great, then for most people they just prevent withdrawal, which is horrible for most people.

 

[Mysterie]

to me it seems that you are susceptible (under the surface) to bipolar/schizoaffective etc, and that lsd is definitely enough to trigger psychosis in someone like that, and daily cannabis use is going to also make it difficult to find a healthy balance in life.

i think you are right on in terms of not smoking weed any more and definitely lsd is really well known to get people to lose touch with reality when they are sensitive to it already.

don't worry about the mild hppd, it could help to try to ground and centre yourself when you notice yourself worrying a lot about it, and i'm sure it will reduce in time as well as other symptoms that have come to surface as a result of the psychosis (increase anxiety/hopelessness etc)

what was instrumental for me was to talk to a counsellor who understood where i was coming from and i could talk to and just getting things off my chest and putting things in a wider perspective was therapeutic for me. of course everyone will say exercise, get outside, try to find a good balance between work and play, eating whole foods, learning better coping mechanisms such as CBT/DBT/mindfulness.

things do get better with time. are you undergoing some kind of therapy/counselling?
addressing your mental health instead of ignoring and self-medicating is a positive direction to turn towards in my experience.