BluLait
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Feb 26, 2012
- Messages
- 544
I posted this on the cannabis discussion forum, but since it might be related more to emotional or psychological issues.
First of all, a little about myself.
I'm a regular weed smoker (basically i've been smoking almost everyday at least a joint - however, lately, money problems have gotten this number down to about 2-4 times a week on average.
Everything was nice and easy until about after what happened 3-4 months ago while I was at school. I had some speed-like research chemical (something like mephedrone or MDPV, but god knows what it was) sold as bath salts.
I had class from 4-6 PM. Got to school at 3:20 or so and decided to snort a line. The stuff was brown coloured and smelled kind of like dog food. It had a numbing effect on my nose.
At around 3:45 I began to feel the first effects creeping up on me. A kind of anxiety coupled with a very mild euphoria and a fast heart rate (but nothing uncommon) til' around 4:20 when i decided to do about half the previous amount sublingually.
I was a bit tweaked out at this point anyway since I was so focused on a IM conversation I had with someone - barely knew the guy and we were talking about going to an event and who would bring what drugs etc.
All this until around 4:40 when I started noticing my heart rate shoot up and I got anxious. It didn't stop in the next 5 minutes - something which further increased my anxiety.
I was starting to have a panic attack thinking that I might have ingested some crap which would give me a heart attack and then I immediately left the room during class. I was spinning around in circles in the hallway, feeling my pulse. I panicked since my hands got a bit numb.. like many small needles were going through my fingers. I went in search of a pharmacy. I was thinking a million miles per second and was walking so fast. My mouth and tongue had never been this dry my entire life. I couldn't even talk without sounding retarded because my tongue would stick to my mouth and I couldn't move it properly.
I finally got to a pharmacy, I told the women there I really needed help because I thought I was in trouble. I told them i drank 3 coffees and a red bull and that my heart was out of control.
They sent me to this GP's office which was right next to the parmacy (in the same building). I cut in line in front of everybody who was waiting for their turn inside the office. I walked inside while she was consulting another pacient and started talking all panicked - I told her the same story about the coffee and the red bulls. She took my pulse, it was around 160 or 180 (very high anyway) and she told me to sit down and relax because I was very scared and this only got my pulse higher.
She gave me 50 mg of metroprolol tartrate (a beta blocker) and said that she had to call the ambulance because this could be something like a heart disease or whatever (since you don't get that high pulse from coffee alone usually). I started calming down and after about 10 minutes the paramedics got there. They took my pulse rate again, it was down to 120-130 (not because of the beta-blocker, but because I could finally relax knowing that I wouldn't die). They told me they didn't need to take me to the hospital if I didn't want to but that they recomended I'd go to get myself checked out just in case there's a problem.
I agreed and went with them. When I got to the hospital on a strecher, everybody was looking at me (I was still pretty stimulated mentally at that point since I started making jokes with the paramedics). Doctors saw me and asked me what I took, I told them 3 coffees and a redbull. They asked me if I'm sure that's everything I took - I said yes. They asked me a third time: "No drugs, are you sure?" I denied the accusation, they still weren't convinced but there was nothing left to ask.
Long story short, they checked me out - and I had some heart palpitations and PVC and other crap so they told me to get one of those 24h EKG things. I did after a few weeks, they even took an ultrasound scan of my heart. They told me I was perfectly healthy and that there was no reason to worry.
After that, smoking weed has almost never been the same.
The majority of time I smoke and I'm not in a comfortable situation - like a friends house, or a nice party or home alone and relaxed - after about 10 minutes from smoking the joint (during which my heart rate is normally around 110-120) I usually start getting what I think are panic attacks and my body starts feeling weak, my heart SHOOTS UP to around 160-170 BPM and beats very hard. I find it if I lie down it decreases to about 150-140 or so and stays there for about 15 minutes after which it settles at 120 for about 20-25 minutes and then it starts going down 110-100-90 and finally back to normal.
Usually if I can calm myself, my heart stays at around 130-140 bpm and I still feel a little anxiety but that's it.
Today I had probably the worst thing happen. I was out with 2 of my friends and we smoked a joint 20 minutes before they left to catch a bus. I started feeling uneasy right after smoking. I agreed to accompany them to the bus stop, leaving the house and going to the bus station with them only made everything worse because I was starting to have a bad trip. My heart was pounding at around 150-160 BPM the whole time. I got thirsty so I decided to go to a shop and buy some water while they were waiting for the bus. I had to go through an underground passage so I went down some stairs. I was getting more panicky because I was thinking that if I somehow got sick or whatever I would be in a public place and I wouldn't be able to deal with it (if I'm at home and relaxing it's usually better). After getting the water, I went back, I had to go down and up the stairs again, during my ascent I felt very very tired (also because I was in the middle of a full-blown panick attack) walking up those stairs, and by the time I got up my heart was probably at 180 BPM or something. I could feel it in my throat. My friends seemed fine, they were a bit stoned but they were making jokes etc. The bus came, they left. This is where it gets worse. I went back to my car (had to go through the underground passage again). After going up those stairs again, I was really feeling uneasy and my body was so tense and frightened. I felt my pulse and my heart was palpitating I think, or doing an extra beat, I don't know but it kinda felt like it stopped for a milisecond after which it beat a lot harder (it was like a machinegun hard to keep track of every beat). I got to my car and started saying to myself that "it's ok, it's just the fear, there was nothing in the weed, my friends were fine so I should be fine too" - stuff like that. I calmed down a bit, took my pulse - it was about 160. I chilled for 5 minutes and took my pulse again, it dropped to 140-150 and after about 10-15 minutes it was around 110-120 (so about how it normally is when you smoke weed). After that the trip was great, I stopped at a friends house and we chilled and laughed and I was generally in that good-mood that weed gives you every time
Does this sort of panick attack/thing ever happen to you after you smoke weed and are in a stressfull situation or having a bad trip or scared/paranoid?
Does your heart rate go up that high/does it palpitate?
I really am scared. I don't know if the weed was laced. It looked regular, was sticky-icky, had a nice weed smell/taste, I got stoned just as usual - only thing wrong with the experience was the panick attack and my heart rate - which I couldn't control.
Even when I'm in a nice, safe environment and having a nice trip, my heart rate is still about 120-130-140 until to about 30 minutes after smoking and still freaks me out.
I want to add that I have had these episodes in the past, but they were very infrequent and not as severe. I also noticed that if I smoke more than 1 joint/bowls during the course of the day, the second bowl/bong/joint does not increase my anxiety at all and doesn't affect my heart much either. So this is only after the first smoke of the day. Also, if I go on a weekend-long binge, I usually only get these feeling on friday after smoking the first time, and once I get used to it, it's all ok.
Do you have any suggestions for me on how to stop this?
Could the 2 incidents be related (the one with the stimulant and my ever-increasing panick attacks?)
First of all, a little about myself.
I'm a regular weed smoker (basically i've been smoking almost everyday at least a joint - however, lately, money problems have gotten this number down to about 2-4 times a week on average.
Everything was nice and easy until about after what happened 3-4 months ago while I was at school. I had some speed-like research chemical (something like mephedrone or MDPV, but god knows what it was) sold as bath salts.
I had class from 4-6 PM. Got to school at 3:20 or so and decided to snort a line. The stuff was brown coloured and smelled kind of like dog food. It had a numbing effect on my nose.
At around 3:45 I began to feel the first effects creeping up on me. A kind of anxiety coupled with a very mild euphoria and a fast heart rate (but nothing uncommon) til' around 4:20 when i decided to do about half the previous amount sublingually.
I was a bit tweaked out at this point anyway since I was so focused on a IM conversation I had with someone - barely knew the guy and we were talking about going to an event and who would bring what drugs etc.
All this until around 4:40 when I started noticing my heart rate shoot up and I got anxious. It didn't stop in the next 5 minutes - something which further increased my anxiety.
I was starting to have a panic attack thinking that I might have ingested some crap which would give me a heart attack and then I immediately left the room during class. I was spinning around in circles in the hallway, feeling my pulse. I panicked since my hands got a bit numb.. like many small needles were going through my fingers. I went in search of a pharmacy. I was thinking a million miles per second and was walking so fast. My mouth and tongue had never been this dry my entire life. I couldn't even talk without sounding retarded because my tongue would stick to my mouth and I couldn't move it properly.
I finally got to a pharmacy, I told the women there I really needed help because I thought I was in trouble. I told them i drank 3 coffees and a red bull and that my heart was out of control.
They sent me to this GP's office which was right next to the parmacy (in the same building). I cut in line in front of everybody who was waiting for their turn inside the office. I walked inside while she was consulting another pacient and started talking all panicked - I told her the same story about the coffee and the red bulls. She took my pulse, it was around 160 or 180 (very high anyway) and she told me to sit down and relax because I was very scared and this only got my pulse higher.
She gave me 50 mg of metroprolol tartrate (a beta blocker) and said that she had to call the ambulance because this could be something like a heart disease or whatever (since you don't get that high pulse from coffee alone usually). I started calming down and after about 10 minutes the paramedics got there. They took my pulse rate again, it was down to 120-130 (not because of the beta-blocker, but because I could finally relax knowing that I wouldn't die). They told me they didn't need to take me to the hospital if I didn't want to but that they recomended I'd go to get myself checked out just in case there's a problem.
I agreed and went with them. When I got to the hospital on a strecher, everybody was looking at me (I was still pretty stimulated mentally at that point since I started making jokes with the paramedics). Doctors saw me and asked me what I took, I told them 3 coffees and a redbull. They asked me if I'm sure that's everything I took - I said yes. They asked me a third time: "No drugs, are you sure?" I denied the accusation, they still weren't convinced but there was nothing left to ask.
Long story short, they checked me out - and I had some heart palpitations and PVC and other crap so they told me to get one of those 24h EKG things. I did after a few weeks, they even took an ultrasound scan of my heart. They told me I was perfectly healthy and that there was no reason to worry.
After that, smoking weed has almost never been the same.
The majority of time I smoke and I'm not in a comfortable situation - like a friends house, or a nice party or home alone and relaxed - after about 10 minutes from smoking the joint (during which my heart rate is normally around 110-120) I usually start getting what I think are panic attacks and my body starts feeling weak, my heart SHOOTS UP to around 160-170 BPM and beats very hard. I find it if I lie down it decreases to about 150-140 or so and stays there for about 15 minutes after which it settles at 120 for about 20-25 minutes and then it starts going down 110-100-90 and finally back to normal.
Usually if I can calm myself, my heart stays at around 130-140 bpm and I still feel a little anxiety but that's it.
Today I had probably the worst thing happen. I was out with 2 of my friends and we smoked a joint 20 minutes before they left to catch a bus. I started feeling uneasy right after smoking. I agreed to accompany them to the bus stop, leaving the house and going to the bus station with them only made everything worse because I was starting to have a bad trip. My heart was pounding at around 150-160 BPM the whole time. I got thirsty so I decided to go to a shop and buy some water while they were waiting for the bus. I had to go through an underground passage so I went down some stairs. I was getting more panicky because I was thinking that if I somehow got sick or whatever I would be in a public place and I wouldn't be able to deal with it (if I'm at home and relaxing it's usually better). After getting the water, I went back, I had to go down and up the stairs again, during my ascent I felt very very tired (also because I was in the middle of a full-blown panick attack) walking up those stairs, and by the time I got up my heart was probably at 180 BPM or something. I could feel it in my throat. My friends seemed fine, they were a bit stoned but they were making jokes etc. The bus came, they left. This is where it gets worse. I went back to my car (had to go through the underground passage again). After going up those stairs again, I was really feeling uneasy and my body was so tense and frightened. I felt my pulse and my heart was palpitating I think, or doing an extra beat, I don't know but it kinda felt like it stopped for a milisecond after which it beat a lot harder (it was like a machinegun hard to keep track of every beat). I got to my car and started saying to myself that "it's ok, it's just the fear, there was nothing in the weed, my friends were fine so I should be fine too" - stuff like that. I calmed down a bit, took my pulse - it was about 160. I chilled for 5 minutes and took my pulse again, it dropped to 140-150 and after about 10-15 minutes it was around 110-120 (so about how it normally is when you smoke weed). After that the trip was great, I stopped at a friends house and we chilled and laughed and I was generally in that good-mood that weed gives you every time
Does this sort of panick attack/thing ever happen to you after you smoke weed and are in a stressfull situation or having a bad trip or scared/paranoid?
Does your heart rate go up that high/does it palpitate?
I really am scared. I don't know if the weed was laced. It looked regular, was sticky-icky, had a nice weed smell/taste, I got stoned just as usual - only thing wrong with the experience was the panick attack and my heart rate - which I couldn't control.
Even when I'm in a nice, safe environment and having a nice trip, my heart rate is still about 120-130-140 until to about 30 minutes after smoking and still freaks me out.
I want to add that I have had these episodes in the past, but they were very infrequent and not as severe. I also noticed that if I smoke more than 1 joint/bowls during the course of the day, the second bowl/bong/joint does not increase my anxiety at all and doesn't affect my heart much either. So this is only after the first smoke of the day. Also, if I go on a weekend-long binge, I usually only get these feeling on friday after smoking the first time, and once I get used to it, it's all ok.
Do you have any suggestions for me on how to stop this?
Could the 2 incidents be related (the one with the stimulant and my ever-increasing panick attacks?)
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