(Cannabis; Poss. Synthetic) HORRIFIC Experience: "Lights Are On, Nobody is Home"
Hi guys,
I need your opinions/advice (my apologies for the length of the following post). The following narration details a terrifying incident that recently occurred to me after inhaling the smoke of a substance I was 'told' was Marijuana, and which also left me hospitalized for a night after I suffered a full-blown psychotic breakdown. For the record, and I don't mean to sound like I'm on a high horse by saying this; although I have no problem with drugs, I personally don't like using them and have an instinctive aversion to them, with the inclusion of plant-based entheogens and psychoactives. I am prescribed Clonazepam due to Generalized Anxiety Disorder, which I take on occasion when the current of anxiety is too strong, although it's usually a last resort.
I consider myself an intuitive individual, and there were several warning indicators I sensed that I inadvertently ignored, the first of which being that the unburned 'plant' smelled like artificial pine potpourri spray. I had not smoked Marijuana in many years, and when I had, I distinctly remember it having a fruity, almost lemon-like aroma with a faint hint of black pepper to it. I realize that different strains have different smells to them, but what I was smelling just seemed... artificial, not the least bit herbal, etc. Strike one. Secondly, the texture was almost cloth-like. I actually remember pulling out a red strand of what appeared to be a fibrous wire, NOT a pistil from one of the nuggets, and not the red/orange, hairy, vein-like hairs that are intertwined within the nuggets either, this piece of 'wire' was separate from the nugget and there were no more of the like. Again, seemed artificial. Strike two. Regardless, I packed the pipe, took the hit/inhaled and waited. I remember thinking that for something so often touted as being natural and "from The Gods/Universe," etc., it felt like I had just inhaled the noxious fumes of bleach or some other toxic, vaporous chemical as both my throat and lungs felt like they were on fire. Strike three.
After exhaling, I initially heard a sizzling sound (think 'frying eggs') in my head followed by having difficulty breathing, and I had the sensation of feeling very heavy. My tongue and mouth in general became unusually dry. I don't know if this was a hallucination, but there appeared to be smoke coming out of my mouth. I thought that some of the smoke had been lodged and trapped somewhere in my body (perhaps in my intestines or [worse] cranium) and had to be forcibly expelled, like when water gets lodged into your ear(s) at the pool or beach and you have to tilt your head and bang it or stomp the floor with your foot to drain the water out, so I tried to induce vomiting. Nothing. At this point, I was in a full-fledged panic attack.
What happened afterward (and throughout the rest of my my 'reaction') cannot be accurately conveyed in language. In a general sense, I experienced an extreme... EXTREME alteration in my conscious awareness (think depersonalization times ten). It was as if my awareness had short-circuited and gone haywire. More specifically, I would describe it sort of like this: when I'm not anxious (mentally in the future) or depressed (mentally in the past), it feels as though my consciousness is integrated in the present, here-and-now moment and interacts with said moment spontaneously, naturally and reactively; when I enter a familiar setting or come into contact with people I've had contact with in the past for example, the memory and feelings that are associated to those places or people pop-up automatically and 'color' my surroundings, so to speak. However, what I felt during my 'reaction' was something akin to my conscious awareness becoming violently unglued, or unhinged from reality, traveling somewhere else and getting stuck there! The thought of being stuck there forever fueled the panic I think.
One of the hallmark symptoms of panic disorder is the fear of losing control. That's exactly what I felt happened to me. I lost all control: I had no control of my movement, my thoughts; I didn't know who I was, where I was, what I was, etc. I looked at a doorknob and was literally dumbfounded at what it was and what it was used for. I was pacing in circles as everything just came apart. It felt as though reality and all things associated to it were escaping me, and I remember trying to yell out and remember the name of certain objects in my immediate surroundings because I noticed this helped me remain a bit grounded in this reality, but every attempt at trying to hold on to the memory of an object -- so as to try grounding myself back -- was failing. I was unable to create and store new memory.
A relative of mine noticed that I had been circling the car in the driveway for about twenty minutes and talking to myself, although it felt like one minute to me. He managed to bring me into the house and immediately became concerned, which is when he dialed 911 and the paramedics came. They sat me down, and for a good half-an-hour tried to figure out what the heck was happening. They took my vitals, attached electrodes all over my chest and stomach and performed an ECG, pricked my finger (still hurts today) for a blood-glucose reading -- the whole works. All the while, I was in a catatonic stupor; completely disoriented, confused, and convulsing to an extent that my relative(s) thought I was having an epileptic seizure. I had a fixed, glazed look, although I was not focusing on anything, was unresponsive to everyone/everything, had dilated pupils, was tearing from my nose and eyes, was shaking like crazy, had bloodshot eyes, etc. I was in a semi-conscious state wherein I was entirely unresponsive to commands, but somehow reacted to pain and was aware of what was being said. I remember one of the paramedics said that "the lights are on, but nobody is home." I was also unable to move or speak. It was a living nightmare that I couldn't wake up from -- the absolute scariest experience in my entire life.
Later on in the ER (at around 5-6 AM), they performed a series of tests, including a CAT scan of my head. Thankfully, everything was normal. I did confess to what I had done, as it was obviously in my best interests. The oddest thing is that the ER doctor mentioned that the drug test showed that there was NOTHING in my system, and that whatever I had "smoked" was likely not what I thought it was (Marijuana). I'll never know now because I immediately flushed everything after being discharged from the hospital. The diagnosis was "Altered Mental Status (AMS)/Confusion."
We sometimes hear or read about people who get killed by ways in which they don't know what hit them, as in the case with someone who dies from from a stray bullet or from getting struck by a car. I thought I was one of those people, I thought I had a fatal accident that night and that it was my time to go. Infact, I remember that there was a feeling of absolute surety that I had died and had "crossed over" to somewhere else during the experience. After doing some research, I am unsure whether I experienced what some refer to as an 'ego death,' or whether I simply had the absolute worst panic attack in my life... or both. What do you think? Also, what substances do you know cause these reactions, and what does synthetic Marijuana like Spice or K2 look and feel like physically, because what I had smoked looked identical to bud, so I don't understand how it had not shown up in the hospital toxicology test. Can Cannabis have really caused this, perhaps at very high doses in inexperienced users? Any additional thoughts or advice would be appreciated.
Thank You
Hi guys,
I need your opinions/advice (my apologies for the length of the following post). The following narration details a terrifying incident that recently occurred to me after inhaling the smoke of a substance I was 'told' was Marijuana, and which also left me hospitalized for a night after I suffered a full-blown psychotic breakdown. For the record, and I don't mean to sound like I'm on a high horse by saying this; although I have no problem with drugs, I personally don't like using them and have an instinctive aversion to them, with the inclusion of plant-based entheogens and psychoactives. I am prescribed Clonazepam due to Generalized Anxiety Disorder, which I take on occasion when the current of anxiety is too strong, although it's usually a last resort.
I consider myself an intuitive individual, and there were several warning indicators I sensed that I inadvertently ignored, the first of which being that the unburned 'plant' smelled like artificial pine potpourri spray. I had not smoked Marijuana in many years, and when I had, I distinctly remember it having a fruity, almost lemon-like aroma with a faint hint of black pepper to it. I realize that different strains have different smells to them, but what I was smelling just seemed... artificial, not the least bit herbal, etc. Strike one. Secondly, the texture was almost cloth-like. I actually remember pulling out a red strand of what appeared to be a fibrous wire, NOT a pistil from one of the nuggets, and not the red/orange, hairy, vein-like hairs that are intertwined within the nuggets either, this piece of 'wire' was separate from the nugget and there were no more of the like. Again, seemed artificial. Strike two. Regardless, I packed the pipe, took the hit/inhaled and waited. I remember thinking that for something so often touted as being natural and "from The Gods/Universe," etc., it felt like I had just inhaled the noxious fumes of bleach or some other toxic, vaporous chemical as both my throat and lungs felt like they were on fire. Strike three.
After exhaling, I initially heard a sizzling sound (think 'frying eggs') in my head followed by having difficulty breathing, and I had the sensation of feeling very heavy. My tongue and mouth in general became unusually dry. I don't know if this was a hallucination, but there appeared to be smoke coming out of my mouth. I thought that some of the smoke had been lodged and trapped somewhere in my body (perhaps in my intestines or [worse] cranium) and had to be forcibly expelled, like when water gets lodged into your ear(s) at the pool or beach and you have to tilt your head and bang it or stomp the floor with your foot to drain the water out, so I tried to induce vomiting. Nothing. At this point, I was in a full-fledged panic attack.
What happened afterward (and throughout the rest of my my 'reaction') cannot be accurately conveyed in language. In a general sense, I experienced an extreme... EXTREME alteration in my conscious awareness (think depersonalization times ten). It was as if my awareness had short-circuited and gone haywire. More specifically, I would describe it sort of like this: when I'm not anxious (mentally in the future) or depressed (mentally in the past), it feels as though my consciousness is integrated in the present, here-and-now moment and interacts with said moment spontaneously, naturally and reactively; when I enter a familiar setting or come into contact with people I've had contact with in the past for example, the memory and feelings that are associated to those places or people pop-up automatically and 'color' my surroundings, so to speak. However, what I felt during my 'reaction' was something akin to my conscious awareness becoming violently unglued, or unhinged from reality, traveling somewhere else and getting stuck there! The thought of being stuck there forever fueled the panic I think.
One of the hallmark symptoms of panic disorder is the fear of losing control. That's exactly what I felt happened to me. I lost all control: I had no control of my movement, my thoughts; I didn't know who I was, where I was, what I was, etc. I looked at a doorknob and was literally dumbfounded at what it was and what it was used for. I was pacing in circles as everything just came apart. It felt as though reality and all things associated to it were escaping me, and I remember trying to yell out and remember the name of certain objects in my immediate surroundings because I noticed this helped me remain a bit grounded in this reality, but every attempt at trying to hold on to the memory of an object -- so as to try grounding myself back -- was failing. I was unable to create and store new memory.
A relative of mine noticed that I had been circling the car in the driveway for about twenty minutes and talking to myself, although it felt like one minute to me. He managed to bring me into the house and immediately became concerned, which is when he dialed 911 and the paramedics came. They sat me down, and for a good half-an-hour tried to figure out what the heck was happening. They took my vitals, attached electrodes all over my chest and stomach and performed an ECG, pricked my finger (still hurts today) for a blood-glucose reading -- the whole works. All the while, I was in a catatonic stupor; completely disoriented, confused, and convulsing to an extent that my relative(s) thought I was having an epileptic seizure. I had a fixed, glazed look, although I was not focusing on anything, was unresponsive to everyone/everything, had dilated pupils, was tearing from my nose and eyes, was shaking like crazy, had bloodshot eyes, etc. I was in a semi-conscious state wherein I was entirely unresponsive to commands, but somehow reacted to pain and was aware of what was being said. I remember one of the paramedics said that "the lights are on, but nobody is home." I was also unable to move or speak. It was a living nightmare that I couldn't wake up from -- the absolute scariest experience in my entire life.
Later on in the ER (at around 5-6 AM), they performed a series of tests, including a CAT scan of my head. Thankfully, everything was normal. I did confess to what I had done, as it was obviously in my best interests. The oddest thing is that the ER doctor mentioned that the drug test showed that there was NOTHING in my system, and that whatever I had "smoked" was likely not what I thought it was (Marijuana). I'll never know now because I immediately flushed everything after being discharged from the hospital. The diagnosis was "Altered Mental Status (AMS)/Confusion."
We sometimes hear or read about people who get killed by ways in which they don't know what hit them, as in the case with someone who dies from from a stray bullet or from getting struck by a car. I thought I was one of those people, I thought I had a fatal accident that night and that it was my time to go. Infact, I remember that there was a feeling of absolute surety that I had died and had "crossed over" to somewhere else during the experience. After doing some research, I am unsure whether I experienced what some refer to as an 'ego death,' or whether I simply had the absolute worst panic attack in my life... or both. What do you think? Also, what substances do you know cause these reactions, and what does synthetic Marijuana like Spice or K2 look and feel like physically, because what I had smoked looked identical to bud, so I don't understand how it had not shown up in the hospital toxicology test. Can Cannabis have really caused this, perhaps at very high doses in inexperienced users? Any additional thoughts or advice would be appreciated.
Thank You
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