Can MDMA or other empathogenic drugs cause spinal cord/brain damage?

[isaaccain]

I made a very detailed post about this that took about an hour and a half, then accidentally deleted it, so I’m just going to go through this quickly.

Basically, I’m coming out of a fairly heavy session where I took 9 pills in 3 days. They were all the same type of pill from the same guy, although I bought 5 of them a different day, so they could have been a different batch, although I don’t think that’s very likely. These pills felt quite similar to MDMA, but they only lasted about an hour. This isn’t because of tolerance because a mate who’s only taken a pill once tried one and was only on it for 2 hours, and they’re meant to be 250mg.

I didn’t test these pills, but being 15 it’s hard to get reagents, and the pills where I live are generally quite high quality. I’ve only come across one pill that didn’t turn out to be MDMA on pill report, and that was before they blew up.

The reason I think there might be something wrong with my spine/nerves is because I keep getting a weird tingling feeling in my inner chest/shoulder area. Honestly, it feels quite nice, but sometimes it scares me. It gets quite intense and I jump, then it goes away. It usually happens when I’m not doing anything, like lying in bed or watching TV.

I know that there are amphetamines out there that are likely to cause brain damage (PMA/PMMA??), and being that I took 9 of these pills I think it’s quite likely that if these were one of those drugs that I would have neurological damage.

I’ll list some of the effects to try and see if anyone can help me to figure it out:

•The pills were green punisher skulls. They weren’t the blue ones on a triangle background, like actual skull-shaped pills.
•They dissolved a tiny bit of my nose when I sniffed one and made it go a bit numb and red where it had been damaged
•They made me hallucinate in a way that wasn’t very similar to psychotic hallucinations, although it did have some spiders. The first night wasn’t too bad, the second was a lot worse
•They made my stomach hurt quite a bit in the comedown, like a burning as well as occasional sharp pains in my middle abdomen
•The second night I took 3 about an hour apart and felt barely anything, but despite that my pulse increased quite a bit
•They made me sweat more than any other pill I’ve ever taken
•The first night I took them they had an after glow of a few hours
•Being that they lasted half as long as for my friend who has no tolerance, it is probably a drug I have a tolerance to. I’m assuming all amphetamines have a cross-tolerance, so I would have a tolerance to any of them (which doesn’t narrow it down much), as well as a small methylphenidate tolerance (but I really don’t think it was methylphenidate)
•The night I took them where I barely felt anything, I got to bed by about 1 AM. To be fair, I’d been up all the night before, but it’s unusual for me to get to bed that early on pills/speed
•The hallucinstions the second night were like a mix of pdychosis and acid, and for the first time ever I felt a physical sensation, like a spider crawling on me

I think that’d be everything. If all of that was completely unnecessary and MDMA can cause brain spinal damage on its own then tell me, because it’s just something I should probably know. I’m making a doctors appointment about my kidneys soon anyway and I was wondering if anyone thinks I should tell him about the tingling. Thank you for your help xx

Update: The weird feeling subsided after I got some sleep, although I do feel like I have some damage to serotonin or 5 HTP receptors or some shit since I'm showing all the usual symptoms, apathy and confusion especially, but I would say that it's reversible as long as I take a break very soon

 

[Specified]

So let's enjoy, let the X destroy, your spinal cord so it's not a straight line no more'

 

[dxnm]

First of all, we can't tell you whether you've caused damage because this drug is certainly not what you were told it is.

In my experience:

The standard length of a roll is usually 3-4 hours and that's on a low dose (~100mg).
MDMA is very mildly hallucinogenic, and that's with higher doses (tracers and/or halos around lights)
I've done my fair share of MDMA and I never felt as if spiders were crawling on me.
The fact that you took 750mg in one night makes me highly suspicious that it's not MDMA, you'd be rolling extremely hard- but you wouldn't feel like spiders were crawling on you.
Taking MDMA 3 nights in a row could cause long term damage to your 5-HT receptors, minimum 1-3 months before rolling again is typical.

These pills sound very sketchy, I would not recommend that you consume them again if you don't know what's in it.

Judging by the effects you stated though, it does sound like a serotonergic drug, but definitely not MDMA. It may or may not be neurotoxic.

 

[isaaccain]

So let's enjoy, let the X destroy, your spinal cord so it's not a straight line no more'

That’s exactly why I asked haha

 

[Cotcha Yankinov]

So being as young as you are, I've got a bit of news for ya - peripheral nerves can get pinched, compressed and irritated, its a fun part of getting older and it can be exacerbated by many things (like amphetamines, sleep deprivation, repetitive motions that alter the tissues surrounding the nerves, stress). In my opinion, I think in some people amphetamine use could lead to a bit of a build up of scar tissue that increases vulnerability to nerve compression. So there's one explanation.

Pins and needles certainly don't have to be a spinal cord issue, or anything particularly dramatic happening with the peripheral nerves. It can simply be that certain postures lead to compression of a nerve and then the pins and needles or whatever sensations arise.

I would do some working out and try to fix your posture if you have postural issues, be it hunched shoulders or forward head posture. You can try stretching your pec minor as well. There is a bundle of nerves (brachial plexus) that can be pinched there are it runs through the chest/shoulder. I've actually had surgery to relieve compression of that nerve bundle. If the sensation is in the region of the subclavius muscle, that would be good to note too. This is essentially the muscle that covers the brachial plexus.

But yeah, what you may be experiencing could simply be something equivalent to carpal tunnel syndrome but elsewhere on the body. If it doesn't go away, continues to concern you or gets worse then remember there is nothing wrong with seeing a neurologist (nerve doctor) about it. Its very possible that the MDMA/ecstasy bit could be largely unhelpful to mention though, it can kind of throw doctors off the right trail (they can begin thinking "this person is a head case").

Try to notice during what postures do the sensations arise - if its often when you're laying down and your shoulder blades are being pushed forward (from laying on your back) this would be good to notice in terms of postural nerve compression.

Best of luck, any questions are welcome
CY

 

[Tranced]

•They made me hallucinate in a way that wasn’t very similar to psychotic hallucinations, although it did have some spiders. The first night wasn’t too bad, the second was a lot worse

I think it's likely that the hallucinations here are related to the psychotic break that you experienced and posted about the other week. Wasn't the gist of that experience spider hallucinations? They are a very common psychotic hallucination. Possibly a combination of hallucinating off MDMA + psychotic hallucinations.

 

[isaaccain]

So being as young as you are, I've got a bit of news for ya - peripheral nerves can get pinched, compressed and irritated, its a fun part of getting older and it can be exacerbated by many things (like amphetamines, sleep deprivation, repetitive motions that alter the tissues surrounding the nerves, stress). In my opinion, I think in some people amphetamine use could lead to a bit of a build up of scar tissue that increases vulnerability to nerve compression. So there's one explanation.

Pins and needles certainly don't have to be a spinal cord issue, or anything particularly dramatic happening with the peripheral nerves. It can simply be that certain postures lead to compression of a nerve and then the pins and needles or whatever sensations arise.

I would do some working out and try to fix your posture if you have postural issues, be it hunched shoulders or forward head posture. You can try stretching your pec minor as well. There is a bundle of nerves (brachial plexus) that can be pinched there are it runs through the chest/shoulder. I've actually had surgery to relieve compression of that nerve bundle. If the sensation is in the region of the subclavius muscle, that would be good to note too. This is essentially the muscle that covers the brachial plexus.

But yeah, what you may be experiencing could simply be something equivalent to carpal tunnel syndrome but elsewhere on the body. If it doesn't go away, continues to concern you or gets worse then remember there is nothing wrong with seeing a neurologist (nerve doctor) about it. Its very possible that the MDMA/ecstasy bit could be largely unhelpful to mention though, it can kind of throw doctors off the right trail (they can begin thinking "this person is a head case").

Try to notice during what postures do the sensations arise - if its often when you're laying down and your shoulder blades are being pushed forward (from laying on your back) this would be good to notice in terms of postural nerve compression.

Best of luck, any questions are welcome
CY

These pins and needles and numbness in my toe is constant, it doesn't just come and go. The weird feeling in my chest was definitely sleep deprivation. It moved to the inside of my head and I was honetly really scared, and considered going to hospital. The feeling can only really best be described as extremely similar to that of an orgasm, but with an extra tickly feeling in there somewhere. If it was still bothering me I would have went to the hospital, but it went away after I went to bed.

 

[isaaccain]

I think it's likely that the hallucinations here are related to the psychotic break that you experienced and posted about the other week. Wasn't the gist of that experience spider hallucinations? They are a very common psychotic hallucination. Possibly a combination of hallucinating off MDMA + psychotic hallucinations.

Yeah them hallucinations were definitely just MDMA. I've come to expect now that I will at some point be attacked by a swarm of insects during a comedown

 

[Glubrahnum]

First of all, we can't tell you whether you've caused damage because this drug is certainly not what you were told it is.

I think so, too.
Did you notice in the mirror whether your pupils were dilated ?
100mg of MDMA should dilate your pupils like this in 1h.