Kratom and metal health.

[Lipark]

Hello everyone.

I have been a reader of threads at Blue Light for around a year and a half now, but this is the first time I have chosen to post anything. I feel like I need some sound advice.

Basically, I feel like I've been on the verge of a mental breakdown for around two months now. It started when I began to have episodes of completely sleepless nights again (I've been a sufferer of insomnia for half my life) and my mental health has steadily spiraled downwards since. I feel it is necessary to point out that I am predisposed towards depressive tendencies. I have never been diagnosed, but there has always been an undercurrent of troubled thoughts that you would expect from an over-thinker and poor sleeper. Substance abuse may have been a precursor to this, yet paradoxically, I have been inclined to self-medicate with narcotics to ease restless nights and form that comfortable bubble of reassurance to fill the hole that I carry around. Opiates have been may main drug of choice with this, along with hypnotics such as diazepam - though not as much as the former.

I was first introduced to opiates after I had a minor operation, and as I lived around people who had a steady supply, I gradually became dependent on codeine over the following years. Sometimes I have hit terrible lows, where due to availability I had managed to throw myself down into a deepening spiral of dependence. Although, on the most part, my abuse has been light and I class myself as a light, functioning opiate addict.

As many people who have had addictions that have spanned years, I wanted to break free from my pain-killer taking cycle. I searched on the internet for a safer alternative and thus, found kratom. I suppose it's obvious to say that eating kratom just replaced the act swallowing pills, and that is where I am finding myself now; a kratom addict. I have been taking it everyday since around the end of April 2015, and my daily intake is between 3-7 grams, so I wouldn't class myself as a heavy user.

Things were fine for me mentally up until just a few months ago. I had a steady job, was writing a book about my previous travels which I was getting towards the end of, and was happily saving money to leave the country again. Yet things just seemed to slip dramatically after that first sleepless night. I found myself becoming extremely anxious and depressed. Sometimes all I could do was hold my head in my hands for hours after I woke up. My thoughts have become really inattentive. My confidence had been shattered. I ended up losing my job after I had to call in sick to work from sleep deprivation, which hasn't helped the situation at all. I feel like I need a structure to be able to motivate myself. Thankfully I am starting a new job on Monday. Although these feeling have just carried on, which I am surprised at. I expected it to just be a bad patch. I haven't been able to write any of my book since these feelings started. Sitting down and consolidating my thoughts is just too difficult at the moment. Even thinking about people reading it frightens the life out of me. My plans to leave the country again have been put to a standstill, as the thought of it frightens me still. This is very unusual for me. My relationship has also become strained. I find that I have become distant, sometimes snappy, angry or overly emotional. These feelings scare me. As I said before, I classed myself as a functioning opiate addict, who was relatively stable, emotionally. Yet now, even though the abuse hasn't peaked or become out of control of the norm, I do not class myself as functioning emotionally. I feel like I am losing a grip on myself and reality.

I am seriously considering that kratom might be the cause for this abrupt slip in my mental health. Everything in my life was going relatively fine before. There wasn't any change there which would have merited this decline, so I am now thinking that the cause my be my mind 'collapsing' from the constant input of this psychoactive. Yet from searches on this forum and the like, I can only mainly find people posting about the positive effects of kratom on peoples mental health. I fear that I am experiencing the opposite.

Is there anybody that has had anything that is a similar experience to this?

Thanks.

 

[HeadHigh]

How long have you been using kratom at the mentioned dosages?

And i have used kratom for over a year now and the only time that i had mental problems due to kratom was because i was having an internal struggle with the fact that i was addicted to something, and now that i have tapered and broken that addiction, i have come back to baseline. So im sorry that i cannot answer your question, but i would advise taking some personal meditative time to really intensively think about how you feel about your mental health, your drug use, and maybe even things like youre new job. You may be able to find some seemingly hidden answers that way.
And if you would like, you could post some thoughts or findings you have back on here and we can give you feedback. Hope you figure things out soon!

 

[blueheaven]

I would just like to add something here. I have some posts on here from 2011 when I kicked opiates and again from 2013 when I kicked opiates and now I'm back on here 'cause guess what? I guess I need a LOT of practice.

TLDR version; before you decide it's kratom's fault, go to a doctor. Don't rule out anxiety and please also consider a blood test. I blamed kratom when it turned out I had a horrible Vit D deficiency (it's possible that kratom contributed to it, and also possible that kratom had nothing to do with it at all, considering how long I abused morphine prior to ever taking kratom). It was severe enough to screw with my thyroid levels; my hair was falling out, I slept 12 or 14 or 36 hours in a go, I had gained 30 pounds that I could not drop even though I never ate, and I was ready to die. My life imploded. I couldn't work because I lived in a fog when I wasn't having a panic attack. My brain just did not WORK. It all went to shit right *after* I quit opiates.

Anyway, longer version; one of the reasons I kept going back to my DOC was what I called acute never-ending PAWS. The sun just never came out again. I would wait months. If I used kratom I could force myself to go outside, work, stuff like that, but i often spent the whole weekend in bed and usually slept about 12 hours at a stretch. Eventually, in 2013, I unscientifically decided it was the kratom due to my personal observations - it seemed like the fog I lived in was worse the day after kratom. There's a thread on here somewhere with me giving up in despair on kratom and wondering if I was doomed to live with PAWS or active addiction forever.

Fast forward a bit - after I quit the kratom and still couldn't ever get out of bed. I did some more research and found one single journal article abstract about a teenage girl with hypersomnia who turned out how to have very low Vitamin D levels. They treated her with massive "catchup doses" of D3 and the hypersomnia resolved itself. I went to the doctor and explained the hypersomnia, that anti depressants never did anything, that I lived in a fog all the time, that I was essentially just treading water and waiting to die, and could they see if there was something physical. Turns out you are supposed to have a minimum of 30-something PPM of D in your blood to be at the low end of normal. I had 3. Single digit. Three.

I did some more research later once the fog lifted a bit - which took a couple of months of massive doses of Vit D - and Vit D deficiency can cause or exacerbate all kinds of problems, including joint and back pain, depression, and lots of other stuff I always self medicated for. They are now advising that the currently published dosage advice could be way too low for a whole lot of people, esp. in the winter. *The Vit D deficiency messed with my thyroid levels,* which is NO joke. I was a sick puppy.

I have become convinced (though I cannot prove it and could be dead wrong) that long term opiate abuse can lead to or at least contribute to Vit D deficiency. Lots of other variables in there of course - I worked indoors, only jogged in the evenings so no direct sunlight, always wore sunscreen once I turned 40, junkies don't always have the best diets and exercise regimens anyway, etc etc. So this is NOT a diagnosis and ultimately is nothing more than anecdotal. I had other problems besides Vit D deficiency. But it was the Vit D deficiency that almost killed me, because I thought my brain would never get better and I had nothing at all to live for anymore.

Right now I am using kratom, yet again, to help me kick opiates, yet again, and I have been careful ever since 2013 to take my Vit D regularly. My life has honestly gotten a lot worse after briefly getting a good bit better - I am about to declare bankruptcy, I am watching ten years of grad school go down the drain for nothing, and I've been unemployed for months - and I can't really say my mental health is all that great. But that post-kratom fog I used to get? No sign of it. The inability to think? No more than what you'd expect when kicking opiates. Episodes of freaking the hell out? I think that comes with the whole being unemployed, getting sued, and having to kick opiates in the middle of it - the kratom so far is only helping. Matter of fact, it's the only thing helping. the only reason I haven't walked in front of a train is that my kid still lives with me and isn't capable of feeding herself w/ a part time job. The only reason I get out of bed is kratom. Yes, I'm a kratom apologist. Yes, I'm aware not everybody is wired the same. Yes, I'm aware that some folks have had bad experiences and it could be dangerous for some people and ymmv. But don't rule out other stuff if things have suddenly gone off the rails.

Then again, your opiate abuse may simply have masked symptoms of an anxiety disorder or something like that, and you may be seeing what is actually an underlying, pre-existing, or gradually-developing condition.

Moral of the story: it might be the kratom, but odds are fair it isn't. If you have insurance, consider a doc, describe symptoms, and ask for a simple blood test. It probably saved my life in 2013. I haven't made much of it since then, but I do want to help spread the word about how easy it is for vitamin deficiency to sneak up on folks and how serious the symptoms can be in some cases.

In any case, I hope things clear up for you and I wish you the very best luck.

 

[deadendgame]

Yeah. I don't feel anything from the kratom either. What I do feel is nausea and vomiting. I don't know what it is, I don't think kratom works