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LSD acting on the serotonin receptors...

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OpenMedia1

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Mar 12, 2011
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So I've read online that LSD acts on the serotonin receptors, which we all know deals with mood. So my question is, does it effect you the same way, or similarly, as say...MDMA would? To an extent of course. Like what I'm trying to get at is if it makes you feel happy and have a general sense of well being, and peacefulness?

Its going to be my first time on syd soon, I just want to get an idea of what I'm in for (:

Oh and is it euphoric, in the sense of body high? or is it mainly visuals?
 
lsd competes with serotonin, mdma just releases it (among other things)

The effects are completely different.

that being said

It affects me in all the ways you described, :) but YMMV.
 
To put it simple, MDMA causes your brain to release serotonin, so it releases your own body's serotonin. On the other hand, LSD is an agonist of certain serotonin sub receptors meaning that it activates those receptors as if it were serotonin itself, basically your brain mistakes LSD for serotonin.

The psychedelic effects come from LSD activating a certain serotonin sub receptor named the 5HT2a receptor, which regulates the senses, thought, memory, learning, sleep, vasoconstriction and more. It binds to more serotonin sub receptors, but that is the most prominent one. LSD binds to the 5HT1a, 5HT2a, 5HT2c, 5HT5 and 5HT6 sub-receptor, all of these regulate slightly different parts of your brain and body but many are involved in mood, thought and vasoconstriction and dilation. LSD does more then just that, it is for example also a dopamine D2 agonist, which is probably responsible (I assume) for the stimulating and also euphoric effects LSD can have.

Either way, it has little to do with the way mdma works in the brain, LSD does not deplete your own body's serotonin so there's no crash and your own serotonin is just left intact doing what it always does in the amounts it always has. Most / all classic psychedelics (the tryptamines and phenethylamides) work through the 5HT2a receptor, although there is speculation that 5HT2c agonism (=activation of receptor) also mediates psychedelic effects.
 
I don't think you can adequately explain the effects of LSD in text. It's not the same as MDMA, no.

Understanding LSD's pharmacology would take several hours if not weeks of dedicated study; you're not going to get it in a few lines we say on a forum.

My suggestion would be to take some acid and call us in the morning; you'll probably have a much better idea of what you want to ask.
 
Well yes you can, its done right here:
http://psychedelic-information-theory.com/toc.php

It does take quite some background knowledge to understand it probably, but you can explain anyone about neurotransmittors, receptors, sub-receptors, what they regulate, what agonism and antagonism mean, how serotonin and glutamate release work, how it affects the brain, how the placement of the receptors makes the difference etc. If you're really interested and have a few weeks spare time and some basic knowledge of biology and chemistry its really quite possible to understand.

Its also possible to explain it in a slightly more simplified way; ofcourse not as accurate, but for some basic understanding that can be well enough. Basically you have the 5HT2a receptor, which is a subreceptor of serotonin. LSD activates this receptor, and upon activating it releases glutamate. Due to the placement of these receptor in the brain this causes a sort of over stimulation in those certain area's, of which the processing of visual information and other information of the senses. The link I sent explains it really quite well, if you're interested I do advise reading all of it.
 
OpenMedia1 said:
So I've read online that LSD acts on the serotonin receptors, which we all know deals with mood.
Click to expand...

It might have some effect on mood but you're not referring to the idea that "Lack of serotonin causes depression" are you? Ben Goldacre wrote a good article where he explains the serotonin myth of depression has no truth to it whatsoever. All those half-witted stories you hear "MDMA causes serotonin depletion so that's why you get depressed" have no basis in fact at all. In fact once you stop believing that theory MDMA doesn't make you depressed anymore.

Some of the latest treatments for depression are based around depleting the serotonin in your brain - they work just as well as the SSRI's.
 
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http://vimeo.com/16782003
Heres a video of David Nickolas at a confrence discussing some of the knowledge that has been discovered recently and some basic overveiws of past research on psychedelic substances and their effect on the brain. MAPS has number of great videos disscussing a varity of topics dealing with psychotropic drugs. Watching a video might be a bit better than reading some lines of txt for some of these questions about drugs
 
That's how it worked for me rickola. I used to get the blue tuesdays cos I'd read serotonin depletion meant you had to be depressed - so by the placebo effect I got depressed.

When I read it was all horseshit and depression had nothing to do with serotonin I wasn't expecting to get depressed and I didn't get depressed.

So sue me.
 
Yeah fair enough but what about the thousands of people that get depressed after MDMA that don't even know what serotonin is? xP
 
no depression for me either, but anyone that says you don't get a hangover from too much M is deluding themselves. last time I did a couple points of really bomb stuff, I felt like part of my brain had been scooped out the next day
 
it might not be due to serotonin depletion though, there might be more pharmacological nuances owing to the "crash" than we, or at least i, am aware of. who knows though? what's certain is that i get horrible crashes from MDMA and always did before hearing anything about why.
 
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