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lsd = schizophrenia

I was diagnosed with a schizoaffective break and spent a week recooperating in a hospital and about 5 more months staying at home with my parents kind of relaxing and getting mentally back on track a few years ago.

Based on my experience with schizoaffective disorder I can't say I can compare the illness to a specific class of drugs really. There are some aspects I experienced and actions I did that very much remind me of the way my brain thinks on lsd and other psychedelics. I was (and to a lesser extent perhaps still do) making very illogical, irrelevant connections between things and people. Things that I only realize later do not make sense. My visual field was not all distorted and covered in fractals so the delusions seemed convincgly natural in the moment very much like psychedelics to me. Also with schizoaffective I guess you tend to have drastic mood swings which is not necessarily uncommon with psychedelics.

One of my coping methods in uncomfortable situations where I didnt have to talk was deperzonilization like which occurs on disassociatives. I often took a detached '3rd person' view of the situation which made me feel secure.

The last aspect of the illness i can relate meglomania, paranoia, and persecution is most commonly associated with stimulant psychosis but I often experienced it on ketamine. So I definitely think my perceptions more closely resemble the drastic cognitive shifts of psychedelics/disassociatives more so than stimulants.

I can't say I've really had many effects of a stimulant binge in the 2-3 months I was pretty disconnected from reality. But I've only done a stimulant binge a few times, certainly not lasting past 48 hours. One symptom I've had pretty very little of was visual hallucinations. I remember possibly 2-3 incidents where afterwards I realized my visuals were distorted.

I was using drugs at this time as well so they could definitely have exacerbates my mental well being. I think psychedelics do fairly represent many of the perceptions of schizoaffective disorder. I saw someone mentioned MDMA as possibly useful and I absouletly think it could be useful medicine. I don't think its a cure but it did provide me with a very positive, confident outlook and I've been able to accomplish some things since then.

I can certainly separate an LSD experience from the illness but I think that suggestive thought LSD can produce along with some of delusions of the illness can be a double whammy and produce more intense delusions, to clarify I think its the lasting impact of the LSD moreso than on the trip. It seems if I have a mind that may reintegrate or something back into 'reality' more slowly than a 'normal' person may.
 
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Guerillabedlam, Thanks for sharing your experience, though what I do find a little odd is how LSD affected you, considering it was the complete opposite for me when my schizophrenia was really bad. LSD tended to bring me back to some form of reality much quicker.
 
I didnt use LSD for awhile after my schizoaffective break, I did take LSD in the 2 month time span leading up to the break though. I don't know why you would find it odd when its been well known that LSD can exacerbate mental illness. Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd and Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys are two examples who had underlying illness that led to persisting psychotic symptoms with the use of LSD.
 
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Although certainly a risk to take the chance, LSD and other psyche have also been shown to actually help with a range of mental health issues for some. But they can exacerbate the symptoms greatly for others too sometimes. I certainly feel they help me and my mental state has always been greatly improved by fairly regular psychedelic use. Not sure I'd be too keen on dosing if I was in an acute state of distress during one of "my episodes" though - could go either way. Once the storm has settled and I'm putting the pieces back together I find psyches to be very useful - also for keeping me in a more healthy mental state in general when not acutely ill.

Suspect it varies hugely from person to person and condition to condition - not really something anyone can say definitely is (or defnitely isn't) going to make things better or worse for anybody's mental health, ime, imo, etc, xtc, std, otc.
 
Big)Sky said:
So if excessive Dopamine in the brain is linked to schizophrenia/psychosis, would taking a dopamine releasing substance like MDMA, reduce the symptoms of schizophrenia?
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I don't see how; releasing more dopamine when one is already being saturated in it wouldn't help.
 
there ARE some drugs directly correlated with schizophrenia. PCP for example... but LSD can only bring out latent schizophrenia in a person... they already had a problem. but even then, it takes a pretty hefty dose to do that....

temporary psychosis is pretty similar to schizophrenia, but temporary.
LSD causes PTSD for people who take way too much and freak out.
it also causes nervous breakdowns.
but not schizophrenia, ever.
 
i think you can contrast the biochemistry of a schizophrenic and a "tripper" because they both are theorized to have imbalances. i think that's accepted knowledge. on the other hand, if you compare these two individuals to a sane person, a label is one of the few widely accepted characteristics that distinguishes psychotic from not psychotic.

psychology and the structure of language is used to categorize behavior, but someone who is psychotic in one part of the world, may behave more rationally, productively, and have a more appropriate affect than someone living in a completely different environment. to put it more succinctly, i believe mental illness is relative.
 
What if we are the schizo"s and those who maintain "actual reality" are actually transformed back to bein sane? Was Einstein not called insane? what about Tesla?
 
commander-blue said:
there ARE some drugs directly correlated with schizophrenia. PCP for example... but LSD can only bring out latent schizophrenia in a person... they already had a problem. but even then, it takes a pretty hefty dose to do that....

temporary psychosis is pretty similar to schizophrenia, but temporary.
LSD causes PTSD for people who take way too much and freak out.
it also causes nervous breakdowns.
but not schizophrenia, ever.
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I don't think PCP is directly correlated with PCP at all. PCP is a perfectly pleasant trip. Certainly nothing schizophrenic about it.

And ANYTHING can bring out latent schiophrenia in people. If LSD and cannabis vanished from the face of the earth tomorrow the rate of people developing schizophrenia would be exactly the same as it's always been. You can always create "links" between things but whether there's anything there or not is another matter. Sure, a guy developed schizophrenia after taking LSD, but was it the LSD or the fact that he failed his exams a few months before he took LSD? Pinpointing one exact thing is fraught with complications. LSD is a good bogeyman and it's easy to blame.
 
At one point in my life, I was using too many stims, maybe up to 4-5 pills a day?

I was psychotic for a few phases through my use...
From my own experiences

Psychedelics are absolutley nothing like being schizophrenic/psychotic...
The best way I can describe mushrooms (My favor over lsd) would be a realization of the past present and how the future in your life will lead (not far into, but how your present and past actions effect it)... I believe this is also the reason for bad trips happening, people not really noticing how memories which were not so focused on before become brought out into the present, along with 100 other things... can be a bit staggering but its all about managing onesself...

A few strong mushroom trips + meditation and analyzing things really sets my mind back on track every few times a year... it is sort of a ritual i enjoy

As for being psychotic, it is not fun, it is not inciteful and the only things that I remember are massive panic attacks, mass anxiety, and pretty much losing the respect of most everybody I knew... Many have looked past it and I'm grateful for the friends I have/made/kept who trust me and know me...

Here, I'll try to write down a train of thought right here, imagine going through this gibberish shit for weeks at a time...I HATE SPEED:
_____________________________
hows about spending nights having conversations with yourself, maybe getting 1-2 hours of sleep, hearing noises, screaming, crying, sounds from the speakers, thinking everything that happens is connected to some grand scheme of some sort, playing your video games and the game commentator is saying things that shouldn't be so coorelated with the conversation you are having with yourself in your head and it is totally freaking you out becaus the same thing also happens while your listening to music, just scannign through your playlist or going through completly random websites/forums/IM's and it blowing your mind how everything is totally interconnected but at the same time you realize you've been up for days, using way to much speed than you should be even after people you know who use it as well are telling you to stop or at the least slow it down and get some rest and holy shit why are the neighbours crying and screaming again in my head....blahblahblahblahblahblah

repeat repeat...

this is not anything like psychedelics... infact psychedelics have given me some of the scariest as well as some of the most peaceful and happiest states of mind ever, but one thing they've never been is confusing or frustrating...

P.S Stims + Mushrooms is a NONONONONONONO

imagine that up there ^ multiplied by 1000(though less talking, more conversations) and having wacky ass visuals and hallucinations... I was up for 3 days, tripping the fuck out and seeing strange floating gas orbs(which I put my hand through and was the strangest thing i'd seen, sort of like seeing through a ripply moving glass window but it was gaseous and...fucking weird) and ghost/spirits or something... I thought it was aliens.. those were the worst/scariest/weirdest 3 days of my life (Beyond Datura overdosing)



P.P.S I wrote this long post because I wanted to show i guess from first hand experience the differences with psychotic states and the state which psychedelics can put you in...

They can say many things about the similarities about them from seeing people which are high... but not all people are the same, and if the scientists are taking random people who've never taken any drugs before in their lives and dosing them with LSD/Psilocybin, obviously they are going to have ridiculous and varying results... (I imagine a scientist trying to fill out a questionaire as the volunteer is laughing his ass off at seemingly random or strange shit...)

where as schizophrenics or psychotics would probably not differentiate anything real/not because they are suffering from a physical mental illness which will impair them... be it temporary(Psychosis) or permanently(Schizo)
 
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A bad trip can often take the form of schizophrenia. For instance paranoid delusions or other psychotic episodes. Also, if machine elves communicate with you, then that's schizophrenic. Auditory hallucinations are also a trait of schizophrenia. The depersonalization and derealization on LSD are not exactly schizophrenic, but are a symptom of the schizotypal personality disorder. "Magical thinking" which some psychonauts might develop is also identified as a schizotypal trait by psychiatrists.

So there's definitely lots of schizo* in psychedelics. Though suffering from schizophrenia can most probably be a lot worse than a temporary psychotic bad trip.

Some users might also develop hallucinogen induced psychotic disorders with delusions and hallucinations, without being schizophrenic.
 
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No, a bad trip has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with schizophrenia.
 
Cybion said:
I would like to bring a little something to this thread that, from what I saw, nobody has: Schizophrenia.

I was diagnosed as a Paranoid Schizophrenic when I was 12 and it got clearly worse from there. By 14 I was on anti-psychotics and was told by my doctors that if I ever stopped taking them I would not be able to function and would be hospitalized, I very much believed them considering what it was like during a Schizophrenic episode. Though now I see just how wrong they were, considering I no longer take medications and function very well in society (thanks to psychedelics, in my opinion)

My Schizophrenia causes auditory and visual hallucinations. I hear and see things that do not exist, sometimes I can logically deduce what is real and what is not (if I'm in a building I'm obviously not going to hear an ice cream truck close to me). However, if there is no obvious signs that what I am seeing or hearing is not real, I have no way of telling what is real and what is not.

I've taken LSD many many times (after development of Schizophrenia) and I can say it does not compare to Schizophrenia in any way, shape, or form. Think of Schizophrenia as more of a deliriant, such as Diphenhydramine, as opposed to a typical psychedelic, like LSD.

So to sum up, when LSD makes me see a friend who I name trouble bubble, or puts me on the side of the road in nothing but my underwear with a toilet brush and a trashcan claiming I'm sweeping the kitchen (true stories); I will gladly come back and take back the things I've just said.

Hope I've made clear some things, and brought something that people will deem as useful to this conversation.

Cybion
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Although I have no schizophrenia, I have friends who are extremely bad. I wouldn't like to risk giving them psychedelics, besides one of them is in some specialist psych ward and another kept at home by a wheelchair-bound opiate addicted mother.

I find it interesting and also heartening to hear that psychedelics haven't caused you any harm in regards to this, possibly helped even.

I've suffered psychosis before like others here in this thread and on BL, drug-induced. Nothing to do with LSD or any other psychedelic. Amphetamine abuse. Again, surprise surprise.

I doubt I'll EVER suffer this reaction with any amount of psych usage, as it seems pretty clear that I don't have a latent disorder of any sort.

I don't want to sound patronising in any way, but I've seen how downright fucking nasty schizophrenia can be for people and anyone here who suffers from it or anything similar, and still functions, well you have my admiration.

<3<3<3
 
basically what PROZ just said...

Psychosis is only a temporary "Insane" state of mind, which passes, possibly over months but damaging your brain from overdosing on stims/rc's/MDMA can possibly cause permanent damage... I can say though that MDx drugs are iffy.. I've taken 1G of MDA over the span of 4 hours before... starting small then dropping the rest...
I was gurned the whole time-not realizing it

Psychedelics don't melt your brain like a long bender on speed will

DPH I hear while is dangerous, is far less damaging than Datura...(Too unpredictable)
either way Deliriants=places where people should just not go to...especially at extremley high doses
 
Umm yeah well I did 20 hits of 160ug acid over the course of a few weeks, taking 1/4 to 1/2 a tab a day for weeks at a time, developing insomnia and convincing myself that sleep was unnecessary. The combo of acid and sleep deprivation caused enough psychosis that I decided to try to ascend by comboing three hits of acid and tons of RC's including m1, 4-ho-met, 2c-t-2, and various rare stuff that isn't even on erowid in an attempt to leave this reality and hand my body over to a walk-in. I ended up in a mental hospital for a short while until I was able to recover with antipsychs and sleeping pills.

So my point being that it is not at all unreasonable to link LSD and psychosis / schizophrenia. I also know others who have had similar issues with LSD as well. LSD is tons and tons of fun, but be careful, make sure you have someone sober who can ground you and don't take LSD too frequently ... give yourself a chance to get to baseline and integrate the experiences.
 
All the tripped out crazy ideas and images could definatly drive anyone insane.
Some people just cant understand reality anymore after coming down off some big doses. The prolonged frightning effects can stick in ones mind or whatever grand delusion they have created for themselves.
 
Tunnelfission said:
LSD can bring to the surface any mental instability that one may have dormant.

but I think it goes without saying that were all a little unstable, what is the universe anyways?
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I dont understand why most people attribute schizophrenics as being born that way. Most often they let their minds go awry and dont know how to bring it back.
 
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