Some problems after using cannabis/mdma, maybe someone who can help me?

[memolo]

Hello everyone,
Thanks for reading!
When i was around 15/16 years old i started smoking weed. I was young and (a little) naive, but of course at that age i wanted to try things out. When is smoked weed i became tense and self absorbedinstead of relaxed. My body felt tense but it calmed my mind. After some time i quit because i felt a little strange in my head and also a little tense in my body when i wasn't using anything.
A year later i took for the first time mdma (the quality was good and the amount was balanced, a friend of mine took exactly the same), i got exactly the same feeling when i was using weed. Self absorbed and feeling tense, not happy or joyous. I was deep in my own thougths and a little in my own world. When i woke up i was still tensed and self absorbed and a little panicky because it wasn't stopped. After a few resting days i still felt strange, my symptoms:
-Sweaty palms (a little bit)
-More self absorbed
-Tense in my body
-Ligth headed
I thougth it would stop but it didn't. Exactly a year later after i took my first mdma i took another one, everyone around me was using it and i was so curious how it felt to be in such a state of excitement that i used it agian. Very dumb. The cycle repeated and it became worse. Symptoms
- A completely tensed body
- Overheated body=> sometimes itchy
- Hands are normally very warm but when it's cold they become very cold (more then normal)
- Excessive sweating =>my whole body
- Fuzzy head - Beep in my head => i hear my head is working hard
- Muscle strain
- Visual snow
- Shaky hands and body
First it was worse: i couldn't retain information and racing thougths.
I was so self absorbed and my complete body was tensed that i didn't ask for help. After a year i finally seeked help and went into therapy (cognitive behaviour therapy). It didn't help a lot and after that i tried a few other things but not with big returns.
My question is does anyone else recognize my problems, especially the overheated body part and the excessive sweating (something you don't hear often). I have also uncousciously some worrying thougts when im sleeping (no nigthmares or dreams, but worries) that i cant stop...
If anyone recognize something in my story or you know people in this field with a lot of experience who can help me let me know!
Thanks and sorry for my bad english!

 

[memolo]

To make it clear: i still have these problems after 3 year. I know a few people have some of these issues, but not for such a long period. Especially that i'm excessive sweating the whole day (and have a overheated body) and the uncousciously worries in my dreams.

 

[MD96]

To make it clear: i still have these problems after 3 year. I know a few people have some of these issues, but not for such a long period. Especially that i'm excessive sweating the whole day (and have a overheated body) and the uncousciously worries in my dreams.

Hey man, are you still using or have you used any substances in the past 3 years?

 

[memolo]

Hi! I completely quit using drugs. Only alcohol sometimes. But since a year i also quit alochol. I eat well and meditate, i excersise on a moderate level but it's because when excersise my body gets overheated and itchy.

 

[MD96]

Hi! I completely quit using drugs. Only alcohol sometimes. But since a year i also quit alochol. I eat well and meditate, i excersise on a moderate level but it's because when excersise my body gets overheated and itchy.

How do you know your body is overheating.

 

[Theko]

Hi memolo
I'm sure you will already know quite a lot of things about anxiety since you did CBT.
But there might be a few things that they didn't mention, like there are different types.


*Separation Anxiety
*General Anxiety
*Social Anxiety
*Health Anxiety


What you're talking about in your post is Health Anxiety. I think CBT is an effective therapy, but sometimes it isn't specific to the type that a person has, so people may find sometimes that it wasn't as effective as they had hoped. If you know exactly which one you are struggling with, I think that can make it easier for the person to understand their condition.


I think one of the most important factors about health anxiety is for the person to stop thinking in terms of trying to make the symptoms go away.
Because if you try to stop a symptom like floaters in your vision or visual snow, or sounds in the head, that will draw your attention to it, so you will actually notice it more.
So if you have a thought like I wish this sound in my head would go away, that won't make it go away, it will keep causing you to notice a sound in your head.
Also with health anxiety people will keep checking their body to see if the symptoms are still there, that causes the symptoms to be noticeable.
So it keeps going round in a cycle.


The key is instead of focusing on trying to change or stop the physical symptoms, the aim is to change your thoughts about them.


Hopefully this will make some kind of sense to you...


Imagine if you moved house, and the house was very close to a busy main road.
At first it might concern and worry you that you now live so close to a main road because of the noise,
so your mind would then focus on the cars and you would hear the noise and notice it all the time.
But after awhile you would probably become less concerned about it, and you would just accept in your mind that you live close to a busy main road.
Then what would happen is you would stop noticing the noise of the cars all the time, even though nothing has changed except your thoughts about it.

It might be a good idea to contact the CBT people again, and ask if they can send you some information about health anxiety in the post.
Perhaps you could also arrange an appointment to specifically talk 1 to 1 with a CBT therapist about health anxiety as well.