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MDMA Recovery (Stories & Support - 4)

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Dont listen to the pussys saying "you are scared for life". I made it through and i have good news for those who suffered same symptoms as me:

- Anxiety GONE
- depression GONE
-intrusive thoughts/obsessive thoghts GONE
- sleep problems GONE
- dizzyness/fucked up balance GONE
- small panic attacks (never fullblown, weed gave that shit) GONE


I started getting these symptoms after my last dose it was shitty pipe pills that fucked me and ive done mdma/pills 8-9 timesin my life always leaving atleast 2-3 months between every use. Sometimes 1 month BUT NOTHING LESS. I felt so fucked up and hopeless that i ended up here with you guys while some of my friends do it weekly and never been happier. Its unfair but it proves we are mentally and physically not suited for drugs. Ive lifted weights every DAMN day since this shit and eat a healthy clean bodybuilding diet through all this with lots of vitamines, cardio (soccer 3-4 times a week) and LOTS of healthy fats. I dont attribute my speedy recovery for the foods but the excersice. It gets the blood flowing to the brain and keeps you more calm. My doctor told me panics, anxiety and depression got nothing to so with the food tou eat. Its just a chemical imbalance in he brain and basically im back to baseline now. For those in the same place as me (lifting, atleast got a social life and TRULY believes in them self) Dont listen to the ones saying you will never recover. I laugh at the time i felt anxious and this hopeless despair and feeling of dread. Just imagine the ones trying to crush your hope how they look like. 99% they are fat neckbeards with 0 social life and are doomed. Just do YOU and start doing something to improve and i swear you will be fine! Why the fuck are old users never coming back and reporting?? BECAUSE THEY AVE MOVED ON, they are never coming back here cus they have rceovered!

Btw i just cant speak for the ones with hppd and and the ones who abused the shit out of molly. Ive only done it 8-9 times WITHOUT benzos/ssri. The thought of relying on medicine scared me. Like i just came to the point i have to use NERVE medicines to go through life, thats fucked up (for me) and really felt like a loss. So yeah 4-5 months and im symptom free everything is good i look good (made some quality gainz through lifting) and im excited everyday!! Believe me dont think about the time you WILL recover.
 
8BitTrip said:
I mean, what can I do about it anyway. Either my brain will recover or it won't.
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I would avoid this attitude - its important to give credit to the effect that conscious direction of our attention can have on our brain.

I think the primary reason that some people are experiencing a very slow return to relative normality is rumination/un-mindfulness.

Imagine we have two groups of LTC sufferers - a neuroscientist tells one group that they have fried their brain and that they'll never heal, and that they've made a horrible mistake and they should regret it everyday for the rest of their lives. Imagine the neuroscientist tells the other group that the adverse effects are due to neuroplastic changes that will reverse over a couple of years or less, and that things like mindfulness can really help, while rumination can prolong return to normality. It should be painfully obvious which group will fare better.

I think one issue is that people are not understanding/practicing/applying mindfulness very well. I'm not saying that mindfulness will instantly cure all your symptoms, especially HPPD, but I will certainly make the case that ruminating all the time can really prolong mental illness that you would normally be recovering from slowly but surely. The issue is that mindfulness is actually very difficult and takes a lot of practice. But if it were easy, I think its potential to induce real change when practiced long term wouldn't be as strong.

Anyways, I'm hearing a lot of talk about returning to "normal". I personally wouldn't want to return to normal because I personally probably would've ended up dying a young death. This doesn't apply to everybody, but does everybody here really want to return to their former drug abusing selves? Do we not wish for genuine change, to view this as a learning experience?

How you frame an illness, be it mental or physical, can be very important. For example, pain in a body builder working out compared to pain in a patient with bone cancer. Even if the sensation is exactly the same (bear with me), the result of feeling that same sensation will be vastly different in the body builder who is associating the burning with growth as opposed to the bone cancer patient that is associating that sensation with cancer.

Try to just stay in the present moment and feel raw sensation - try not to have real thoughts (speaking aloud in your head) about the sensations, just feel your hands for examples, whatever you feel, good or bad, feel the fuzziness and pins and needles. Stay in the present moment.
 
@Cotcha

I guess you're right. My statement was meant more as a kind of letting go/giving in to the sensations rather than giving up. Although as you detected it was laced with an unhealthy bit of cynicism and resignation.

I am often guilty of not being able to take my own advice as a fellow advocate of mindfulness.

I fully appreciate the power of mindfulness when applied properly. To be honest I'm trying to frame it as a sort of 'reckoning' for myself. I have been stripped bare and I can see all of my impurities, in addition to all of the unhealthy habits of which I had previously given no second thought. Now I'm using it as an opportunity to repent and cleanse myself of my old immature, recklessly drug taking self - to mirror what you said.

Thanks for the reminder to stay present though. Sometimes I just need a nudge in the right direction.

That being said, after careful consideration I am starting Sertraline 50mg daily for a month as I believe it could help with my emotional flatness and anhedonia. I will post results at a later date. If this doesn't work then it really does look like I'm going to have to hone my mindfulness technique for the long haul.
 
@cotcha

The thing is though a lot of us hardly qualify as drug abusers especially when some people only used once or a few times. I would like to return to my previous state of normal or better like Mikek said. Nothing wrong with better but id like to not be worse. My expectations have been said to be too high by that same psychologist and that just pissed me off so I am not going there again.

Also I can easily cut off rumination in a few seconds but I find that it doesn't do anything to the way I feel. And then I get frustrated and ruminate over how cutting off the rumination didn't alleviate my symptoms. I have also experienced that when symptoms are better, rumination is also better. But its difficult to address rumination without some symptomatic relief or momentum to seeing progress.
 
@8bit

I hope my writings didn't seem judgmental or harsh, and I personally approve of trying SSRIs - approaching the problem from more than one angle simultaneously is always a good idea.

Letting go and giving into the sensations would be wonderful - I think the issue is that the benefits of doing so are not realized immediately, and then we (un-mindfully) start saying to ourselves "this isn't working, when will I be normal" and so forth.

I realize that not everyone's pre-LTC normal was abusing drugs and making bad decisions of that genre, but there may be benefits outside of a change in behavior, pehaps change in attitude and the ability to stay in the present moment and appreciate whatever we can about our present moment.
 
@Cotcha

Not at all. I'm just as lost in this mess as everyone else and need a firm setting straight every now and again. Fair enough...I am skeptical about the potential repercussions however I know that this SSRI has shown good results for a number of BL users; Mikek11 and Amml, to name a few.

Mindfulness is counter-intuitive. It doesn't rid the immediate symptoms, at least right away. Although what it does do, is produce a 'flavour of purification', as Young might say, in that the more aware of the moment you are, the less one suffers and the more mindful awareness one cultivates. Shinzen Young is worth checking out on youtube for anyone looking for a more Westernized approach to mindfulness.

@socrilus

I relate to what you're saying. Sometimes when I'm mindful I become disturbed by the sensations arising, or frustrated that I'm not getting better. I believe the appropriate technique here is to reapply mindfulness to those reactions over and over again.

Though it's is a quite delicate practice as far as I can tell. Therefore it needs serious dedication and effort for effect.
 
socrilus said:
@cotcha
The thing is though a lot of us hardly qualify as drug abusers especially when some people only used once or a few times. I would like to return to my previous state of normal or better like Mikek said. Nothing wrong with better but id like to not be worse. My expectations have been said to be too high by that same psychologist and that just pissed me off so I am not going there again.
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There are certainly people who took the drug as a one off, and also there are people in Nambo's situation who was heavily talked into taking the drug, but I'm sure that we can all make improvements to our former self. The main improvement that I think we can make is in attentiveness to the present moment, but an empathy towards others with mental illness or illness otherwise will surely follow, if it hasn't arrived already, from these experiences.


socrilus said:
Also I can easily cut off rumination in a few seconds but I find that it doesn't do anything to the way I feel. And then I get frustrated and ruminate over how cutting off the rumination didn't alleviate my symptoms. I have also experienced that when symptoms are better, rumination is also better. But its difficult to address rumination without some symptomatic relief or momentum to seeing progress.
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The issue is that the full benefits of staying in the present moment with mindfulness aren't realized immediately, and this seems to be the case with many scenarios. Consider the scenario of recovering from chronic deconditioning and muscle atrophy after being in a coma. We would not expect a change in our muscles after doing 3 reps of an exercise.

Another issue is that the degree to which we stay in the present moment, the manner to which we pay attention to our sensory experience, essentially just how mindful we are and in what manner we are mindful, is going to vary a lot.

So for example we may be able to shut off our thoughts for 3 seconds, but can we do that for many hours straight (having absolutely zero thoughts) for months while paying exquisite attention to your sensory experience from head to toe, while paying attention to your breathing - noticing the minute that you breathe in, and noticing the moment that you start to breathe out? When mindfulness is viewed from that perspective, we are incredibly green novices.

As far the rumination being better when symptoms are better, there is certainly a bi-directional cycle here and managing (sorry to use that word) the cycle by whatever means we can will give us the best quality of life.

For example, a lot of people have given good advice about getting back out into nature. I think one reason why advice like that is really good is because you're putting yourself in an environment that is conducive to mindfulness. But you can apply mindfulness itself anywhere you are, 24/7. Actually managing to do that 24/7 for months is a different story, but there will still be a correlation between how much you manage to stay mindful in whatever manner and how much benefit you receive. Some mindfulness is certainly better than none.
 
8BitTrip said:
@socrilus
I relate to what you're saying. Sometimes when I'm mindful I become disturbed by the sensations arising, or frustrated that I'm not getting better. I believe the appropriate technique here is to reapply mindfulness to those reactions over and over again.
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Unfortunately that is exactly the correct technique - when being disturbed and irritated by un-mindfulness creeping in while doing mindfulness, I wouldn't immediately say to yourself "mindfulness isn't working", but rather I would say "I will get better at mindfulness with practice".

That applies moreso to the acute, concentrated session aspect of mindfulness, the real trick is being able to apply mindfulness 24/7. But that often only comes after practicing in concentrated sessions.
 
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Maybe im misunderstanding the whole mindfulness thing but sometimes I feel like it makes me hyperaware of things. Some mindfulness videos talk about how a lot of people are on "autopilot" but I almost feel like for me distraction and being on autopilot (which is supposedly what we are to avoid) helps more.

I guess what I mean to say is there are a lot of people who say when heading home from work or whatever aren't necessarily being mindful. Their thoughts may not be in the "now" but it doesn't cause suffering by itself.

Maybe it just doesn't work for me though and distraction is just as valid a method. To an extent, I feel like a lot of articles say distraction is only a temporary thing and dont run away from problems etc. BUT I also think that they are referring more to those with longstanding issues rather than LTC. Distraction is also a technique supported by standard CBT.
 
There are certainly acute benefits to being distracted. You may tend not to have as much thoughts of unpleasant memories and regrets for example. You may get a temporary mood lift from the neural activity pattern (whatever it may be). But I don't know if un-mindfulness is going to have much benefit on a long enough time line. It could contribute to a chronically developed imbalance in neural networks that predisposes one to mental illness like anxiety and depression. The specific network in question is known as the Default Mode Network (DMN), and it is hyperactive in various mental illness. It is the network that kicks in when somebody is "task negative", or on autopilot commuting home and such. It is probably playing a big role in anxiety and depression, and could conceivably contribute to depersonalization and other issues.

Mindfulness, if done with some level of proficiency, can still offer lessened daily recall of unpleasant memories and regrets, but with an accompanying neural state that is going to manifest in very different neural changes long term. Mindfulness is associated with a decrease in the strength of the DMN, and an accompanying improvement in symptoms in diseases like depression. But there are other cognitive benefits as well that you won't see with being on autopilot all the time, such as (random) better reading skills in ADHD and dyslexia patients.

"BUT I also think that they are referring more to those with longstanding issues rather than LTC. Distraction is also a technique supported by standard CBT"

I think its probably the case that people with LTCs have had biology that has been brewing for some time, and maybe only now has it reached critical mass. Some people with LTCs have reported always being of the over-analytical type for example (As we sit here and analyze the shit out of our LTCs)

An analogy here would be that the LTC is a fire, and the different contributing factors (including genetic factors) are the fuel. Some gasoline may instantly flare the fire and then it will die down, while wood may not flare it immediately but it will take longer to die down. I think some people have been accumulating wood for quite a while in the form of their thought patterns and then the LTC lit the flame. Now the thought patterns that never appeared to cause issues before are still adding wood to the fire, but there isn't a strong enough temporal link between when you stop adding wood and when the flames die down for people to be really motivated to practice mindfulness out the ying-yang.

As for distraction and other coping techniques used in CBT, I think these are certainly tools that people with anxiety/depression/painful memories should have in their toolbelts to avoid encountering negative thoughts and such, and they are certainly better than nothing, but mindfulness might be able to shift the biology such that there are less spontaneous thoughts that you would have to distract yourself against in the first place. The benefits of distraction probably end pretty soon the moment after you're not distracted any more. There might be some situations where distraction is not viable as well, and staying in the present moment will have more benefits (I wouldn't want to be off in la-la land on a first date for example, or while trying to sleep). See for example the benefits of mindfulness on cognition.

But my main point is the effect that chronic practice of mindfulness will have on the brain is going to be very different than the chronic effect of distracting oneself, if you simplify mindfulness down to a decrease in the activity of the DMN, and simplify being lost in thought to an increase in activity of the DMN, they are really on opposite ends of the spectrum specifically in regards to the DMN, although I'm sure they differ in many other nuanced ways.

Hope this was helpful. Remember that CBT is all about changing maladaptive thinking that has been thought to have been occurring chronically, which finally leads to a change in mood and behavior. Whatever is maladaptive is going to be different from person to person, and it will all be relative. For example, distraction will be less maladaptive than thinking to oneself "I will never be happy" or constantly recalling a traumatic memory, but mindfulness is probably the least maladaptive of all. Especially in regards to gaps between when you are distracting yourself, where un-mindful thoughts are likely to sneak in.
 
Hello Everyone,

I just want to chime in. I have'nt been on this site for quite a while. This site used to be my lifeline. I was here literally 24/7. looking for cures and finding hope in the stories of people that have recovered. Now Im sure you all know that people recover. I was one of those who thought i would never get better. My recovery took roughly 4-5 years. Its hard to determine when full recovery happened because im sure as you all can tell its like chopping a tree and waiting for it to grow back again. which is actually a great analogy that I will come back to later.

Let me tell you quickly about my story. Early 2009 i was introduced to raving. I went hard on it! after my first night i took 2 pills the next day i took 2 more. this happened religiously almost every other week we would go to an event and roll, averaging 3-8 pills a night. some are back to back saturday and sunday. Fucking retarded I know. This was at the dying of the PLUR renaissance. rolling was magical. The environment was magical. New years eve on 2010 i decided i cant do it anymore. I was fucked. That was the beginning of a very long fucking journey.

I had it all. HPPD, DP/DR, Anhedonia, panic attacks, anxiety, deppression, and worst of all my mind was shit. I could not comprehend shit and reading became impossible. I couldnt have a conversation with anyone because my brain couldnt process wtf was going on. 1st year was hell. I was highly suicidal, i thought i fucked myself up for good and i kept telling myself "ok, im giving myself 3 weeks, 4 weeks , 2 months to get better." Slowly but surely the symptoms started to slowly fade. I think the panic attacks lasted for 6-8 months. Fucking shit. Tunnel vission year 1, HPPD year 1/2, Dp/Dr about year 3. I remember when it was only anhedonia/apathy was left. it was still a hard battle but i knew it was gonna go away.

Heres the thing. The synapses in your prefrontal cortex that does alot of the higher functions shriveled up due to the oxidation after rolling. You are in constant fight or flight mode (adrenaline fatigue). Those branches have been chopped and those branches are essential for a healthy brain function. looking back i wouldve done things differently i wouldve recovered faster. Am i the same person as from before the LTC. sadly no but as froo froo as it sounds LTC is actually something im really grateful that happened to me. It gave me massive understanding about the brain and a deeper understanding of depression.

Heres the cure. Ever heard the term the synapse that fires together wires together? Thats what you have to do. Your brain will heal, what you have to do is guide it to best direction. if you constantly worry, your brain is going to wire that way. Meditate, i wish i did this earlier. Mindfulness meditation will help you regain control of your thoughts. I had no control of my brain when this whole thing was happening and that was the one thing that really drove me insane. Work out, i worked out daily. Every fucking day! release endorphines and induces BDNF (neuroplasticity). omega 3's. multivitamins. healthy diet. Nothing else. The brain will heal guys. you can speed it up a little bit but make sure you guide it to who you want to be. If you constantly worry then those worry wires are gonna get stronger. Keep the endgame in mind and the middle part will work itself out.

Im sorry ya'll going though this, but keep on keeping on and one day you'll look back at this as a blessing as well.

feel free to email me if you need help [email protected]. this community has helped me tremendously and i prolly wont alive if i didnt find bluelight.
 
That is a great recovery story my friend. Thank you for describing the details !

And yeh you are right. Neurons that fire together wire together....and if you don't use it, you will lose it. =P

Good luck for your future :)
 
The tinnitus is pretty annoying -___- even more annoying than visual snow to me. With visual snow I can be like ok whatever hey I can still see everything fine and its not a huge hindrance at all. I feel like ive gotten used to it but it flares up when im more stressed. Even then its not a huge deal.

But tinnitus....its annoying bc I had also acclimated well to this such that I only noticed at night but somehow randomly a few days ago its been an obsession :(. I worry if I will at least get back to my baseline where I had habituated. Thats my main worry. Other than that id say im doing alright right now.

But the good thing is a lot of people (even tjose who didnt do drugs) have tinnitus and end up adjusting to it. I was certainly one of em until recently like a week ago.

Im still frustrated about it becoming 'aware' again but I know previously my strategy was mask it out, get on with my day, then soon enough id forget about it even without something to mask it.

Cotcha--any advice for this? Other than that im mentally feeling better but I don't want to let that tinnitus bullshit drag me down. I have anxiety about not thinking about the tinnitus lol. And the more I try to force it out the more its bothering me....
 
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Thank you very much for your post Yar0nin. I very much appreciate that you've posted your recovery! Nice to here you are better!!
Regarding tinnitus, I don't actually mind it really, it sucks but I find it the least of my problems at the moment. Visual snow however, now that really pisses me off to the point of breakdown. It makes everything so dark and grim. Used to love dim lighted rooms as well. Anyone here reported a decrease in VS? I swear I've made a little progress, I remember it was so bad, the room looked awful when dark, there was no black it was just grey. Now it's defiantly black with hints of grey
 
HPPDOFF said:
Thank you very much for your post Yar0nin. I very much appreciate that you've posted your recovery! Nice to here you are better!!
Regarding tinnitus, I don't actually mind it really, it sucks but I find it the least of my problems at the moment. Visual snow however, now that really pisses me off to the point of breakdown. It makes everything so dark and grim. Used to love dim lighted rooms as well. Anyone here reported a decrease in VS? I swear I've made a little progress, I remember it was so bad, the room looked awful when dark, there was no black it was just grey. Now it's defiantly black with hints of grey
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Thats interesting lol I find VS easier to deal with. But then again my VS is just the static aspect and the blue field phenomenon is enhanced. Both of those things I don't mind too much. Dark rooms the VS is the worst cause theres so much noise but ive accepted it. It doesn't interfere with my life.
 
socrilus said:
Cotcha--any advice for this? Other than that im mentally feeling better but I don't want to let that tinnitus bullshit drag me down. I have anxiety about not thinking about the tinnitus lol. And the more I try to force it out the more its bothering me....
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Heh, don't think of a purple elephant.

Personally the tinnitus for me was pretty bothersome as I was obsessed with music and was very audio oriented, but what I've mainly noticed is that it gets louder if I listen for it while it gets quieter if I focus on other sensory genres, for example if I focus on letting my gaze relax into the back of my eyelids while paying attention to my hands and breathing.

As a caveat, I had had some tinnitus from noise induced hearing loss from before and I got it acutely regularly from loud music, jaw clenching on amphetamine/sleep deprivation, and then I also went on to work at a lumberyard with loud saws so its not like I only had experience with tinnitus from the LTC. That may have helped me a bit. That's probably analogous to an experienced psychedelic user getting HPPD vs. a drug naïve person getting HPPD.
 
Hey aDUBBS,

I never had tinnutis luckily

I did have Visual snow/hppd. That was a bitch. It was actually one of the first symptoms to go away. I would say 6-9 months till it was completely gone. Amidst all the bullshit I just realized that it wasnt there anymore.

Again just want to let you all know. Everything goes back to baseline.
 
Anyone out there had tinnitus go away? I have it too. Not my worst symptoms and it's lower than it was. But, still annoying.
 
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