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MDMA Recovery (Stories & Support - 4)

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fnono33 said:
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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I had tinnitus before my LTC due to moderate hearing loss in my right ear. It honestly goes away when you learn to ignore it. I only hear it when I'm actively thinking about it, otherwise I don't notice it. Just learn to accept it and in time you will no longer notice it.
 
PillsAndKills said:
I had tinnitus before my LTC due to moderate hearing loss in my right ear. It honestly goes away when you learn to ignore it. I only hear it when I'm actively thinking about it, otherwise I don't notice it. Just learn to accept it and in time you will no longer notice it.
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Agreed--ive had the tinnitus for a while now in the LTC but I was ignoring it for the most part.

Then due to some stress I developed the OCD obsession with it and I can't stop myself from obsessing and checking for it. Its been a whole week with this debilitating obsession when I would otherwise feel ok (no depression, etc) if I didn't have the obsession. So that in itself makes me extremely pissed that I un-habituated to it literally in the span of a day or two from stress when I became hyperaware and its taking way longer to re habituate. Theres the typical rumination about having gotten my obsession about it in the first place. And ive been trying to "not think" about it and refocus my attention with CBT+mindfulness but that makes me keep thinking about it.

Idk how to get rid of my obsession really quickly. Of course it will probably resolve eventually but I get so anxious about when it will resolve. Its bad enough such that in fact when I notice im *not* obsessing about it I start obsessing about it. And the issue is it feels completely out of my control it just automatically happens. I really don't feel I have control over my mind when its doing this and I want my control back.
 
During ww1 they used to just put patients to sleep for weeks at a time to cure ptsd. I wonder if that would work for us.
 
I completely empathise with you obsessing over it. I was obsessing over every symptom I was getting for the first few months and my mind would race to all sorts of conclusions. Thats anxiety for you.

My advice would be to focus on treating your anxiety and understanding that you are fine. Then you will be able to learn to ignore tinnitus and/or any other symptoms you are getting. Thats what worked for me, it feels easy saying it now because I remember when I was in that obsessive thinking pattern and it fucking sucks. But it will improve in time I guarantee you that.
 
fnono33 said:
During ww1 they used to just put patients to sleep for weeks at a time to cure ptsd. I wonder if that would work for us.
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I don't thint that putting people into artificial sleep for weeks (which causes heavy distribution of neurotransmitter systems) is a good idea. Remember that Insulin coma therapy and lobotomy were also famous "curing" methods even into the 60s.
Nowadays medical marijuana is common in the US for war veterans with PTSD, maybe someone here tried mild weed with low THC content for their symptoms?
The most people here say that they make bad experiences with weed, but I think medical marijuana may be another thing than regular weed.
I think at least it may could help coping the psychological symptoms? Anyone with experiences?
 
I have constant tinnitus which is obviously worse when trying to go to sleep in a quiet room. I've found pink noise really helps. Search pink noise on youtube and there's a 10hr loop of it. I play this through my phone and leave it running all night on a low volume on the bedside table. It cancels out the crazy high frequencies of tinnitus which drive you insane.
 
PillsAndKills said:
I completely empathise with you obsessing over it. I was obsessing over every symptom I was getting for the first few months and my mind would race to all sorts of conclusions. Thats anxiety for you.

My advice would be to focus on treating your anxiety and understanding that you are fine. Then you will be able to learn to ignore tinnitus and/or any other symptoms you are getting. Thats what worked for me, it feels easy saying it now because I remember when I was in that obsessive thinking pattern and it fucking sucks. But it will improve in time I guarantee you that.
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I mean I was ignoring them fine before so I'm not sure what happened and if the actual noise increased or whether my anxiety decided that it was time to latch onto this.

Anyways the Klonopin seems to help with the tinnitus but I don't know if this is because it reduces my anxiety or whether its because its reducing the noise directly or both.

And if Klonopin helps this is that a good sign that when my anxiety dissapates that ill get the same effect?

I'm hoping that its louder because of anxiety and not louder because it actually got worse for some reason cause at least the anxiety part of it is treatable but I don't want to rely on a benzo.

But im so scared of other stuff cause I don't want to make this or anything else like sex drive worse
 
fnono33 said:
During ww1 they used to just put patients to sleep for weeks at a time to cure ptsd. I wonder if that would work for us.
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I wouldn't be surprised if this helps with HPPD, but I think weeks would be a bit too much. There are residual effects to general anesthesia that can last a couple days in multi-hour surgeries (this is especially noted to last weeks to months in the elderly), and the brain might rebound to some degree. But I think a 2-3 days of anesthesia would be interesting to try to let the brain reset.

The effect could be similar to taking a mood stabilizer like a sodium channel antagonist (lamotrigine caused a rapid remittance of HPPD in a patient for example).
 
@cotcha: Does the serotonin metabolism in the brain really turn to normal after 2-3 years? Because I realized when I take 5-HTP for a few days now my remained symptoms disappear fully, that's why I'm curious how long it takes until the serotonin metabolism normalizes.
 
5-HTP affects more than just serotonin. I think it also has an impact on cortisol and dopamine levels. 5-HT 1A is one of the intersection points between serotonin and cortisol I think.

Also @cotcha

If you do poorly on SSRIs or 5-HTP is that due to the impact on dopamine or cortisol levels? Like if 5-HTP leads to a bad reaction could that be due to it lowering dopamine?
 
I think there are a lot of success stories but unfortunately we just tend to hear from people still in the recovery phase. People do drop in every now and then to tell us how they're getting on and those stories are indeed encouraging but I think most people just move on.

@Amml: When you say serotonin metabolism, do you mean uptake by serotonin transporters? Serotonin transporter levels can take some time to return to normal in ex-MDMA users but abstinence is really important in that regard. Metabolism by MAO and IDO I'm not too sure about. But the answers as to why 5-HTP helped you don't necessarily have anything to do with an issue with 5-HT metabolism, it could be giving you a similar effect as an SSRI. I personally think 5-HTP could be passing into the brain appreciably.

@socrilus: When you first administer SSRIs to animals the firing rate of the serotonin neurons in cortex actually drops at first because of homeostatic inhibitory processes mediated by autoreceptors like 5-HT1A, this is going to have a far reaching effect on the network of the brain and I don't know if I would tunnel-vision on a particular neurotransmitter or hormone. Its probably more important to consider how the different neurons/brain structures are communicating with each other, for example consider modulation of neural oscillations by serotonin transporter alterations -> serotonin receptor alterations.

5-HT1A modulates neural oscillations such as theta frequency connectivity between an area called the mPFC and the amygdala. Theta connectivity between the mPFC and amygdala is altered in scenarios with a possible relevance to some MDMA adverse effects sufferers. The scenarios are serotonin transporter knockout mice and neuroimaging studies in humans with a short allele of a serotonin transporter gene called 5-HTTLPR. Mind you the short allele is associated with increased adverse effects after acute tryptophan depletion and MDMA abuse, and increased risk of developing depression after stress.

Having a short allele at 5-HTTLPR is associated with a lower level of expression of the serotonin transporter. There is thought to be a desensitization of serotonin receptors when this decreased serotonin clearance (due to hypo-expression of the serotonin transporter because of having a short allele) happens during a developmental stage. But the thing is that 5-HT1A is expressed presynaptically as an inhibitory autoreceptor that shuts off neurons, and postsynaptically as a heteroceptor.

It is thought with SSRIs that it takes some time for the 5-HT1A autoreceptors to desensitize while the 5-HT1A heteroceptors sensitize and upregulate with chronic SSRI use. So in other words, the acute reaction to SSRIs could be very different than the chronic reaction, and this could be modulated further by individual factors, such as where you are in terms of recovering normal SERT/receptor expression after MDMA use, whatever your SERT expression was in the first place (due to variation at 5-HTTLPR), and what is going on with your serotonin system (ie dorsal raphe nucleus) and your mPFC/amygdala. Serotonin is modulating these theta rhythms through receptors like 5-HT1A, but its not incredibly clear cut.
 
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Hey. I am/was an LTC-sufferer from Sweden. I have been silently reading (guess I'm not the only one) this thread since July. That's when I had a weekend of too much MDMA, amphetamines, weed and alcohol at a festivale.

It was my fourth time taking Molly and this time I decided to go hard, like some of my friends. My dosage the previous times have been around 110 mg - 150 mg but this time I did 200 mg + 100 mg an hour later.

It was too much for my body/brain to handle. I couldn't stand up, couldn't talk properly, my body temperature was really high, throwing up etc. On top of that I didn't drink any water. Don't ask me why but while peaking on Molly I smoked an entire joint which made me have a full blown psychedelic trip. The festivale site were transformed to a beach, to a war zone. And my friends were transformed to clowns and other crazy shit. I also had auditory hallucinations as I heard hundreds of people/voices singing Yellow Submarine by the Beatles. I think it safe to say I took too much MDMA.

The next day I was shaken by the experience but tried not to give it too much attention. And beeing the stereotypical youngster I followed the lead of my friends. The entire next day we did dextroamphetamine and alcohol (still having trouble processing how neurotoxic this must have been considering I had done too much Molly the night before). The last day of the festivale I drank lots of alcohol and smoked weed.

Coming home from the festivale I wasn't feeling to bad. Despite too much drugs and lack water, food and sleep. The next day though, that's then hell broke loose.

I had enormously anxiety, depressed like I had lost all my friends, derealisation, depersonalizemation, massive brain fog. In the following weeks I would develop some visual disturbances as well. I got after images, a visual field full of transparent dots and halos around objects. I have always been an anxious person and I have had panic attacks all my life so I could moderately handle these symptoms, but the DR/DP/Brain fog was to intense for me to handle.

The following three months I was suicidal. I had seen plenty of doctors but they were all telling me I was physically fine. I went from having loads of friends to hardly see anyone of them anymore.

I asked my doctor for benzodiazepines but since it's basically impossible getting it here in Sweden I was declined. Since I felt clinically suicidal I felt I had no choice but asking my former
dealer for some klonazepamt. This was seriously my life saver and made it possible for me to have a social life again.

That's when I noticed some small reliefs of my symptoms. I ordered some fish oil, magnesium, zinc and vitamins B, C, D. I also started eating five meals a day and doing some cardio. Little by little, symptoms started to get smaller and smaller.

By the fourth month my derealization and brain fog were basically gone. I also switched from klonazepam to diazepam.

Fast forwarding another two months. The depersonalization is almost gone, the anxiety is at the level as it was before this ordeal starting. I haven't taken a benzo for three weeks and my friends all say I'm more talkative and happier than ever. I'm still feeling tired pretty much all the time but I don't see this as a symptom of LTC. I just see it as a symptom of tiredness. I also have some bad after images left but I don't pay any attention to them anymore.

I have been feeling like this for the last three weeks so I'm not sure I dare to say it's a success story yet, but it's at least a positive story.

I think a long term comedown is when the drugs mess with your stress hormones. How long it will take to heal is probably completely individual.

One think I would like to add is the concept and the idealizing of the former self, as a lot of you measure your health by saying "I'm feeling like 60% of my former self". I can only speak for my self but pre this LTC I was a lazy, anxious, insecure and sometimes rude person and my mood and behavior wasn't constant, if you know what I mean. I am not 100% percent like my former self now but I'm happy and in the end that's all that matters. This ordeal has made me more thankful for my friends and family. As I said, I'm not 100% like
my former self. I am a happier and a better person now.

Just hoping the next three weeks will be as good as the last for me now. And I'm absolutely sure you'll be fine as well.

And oh, sorry if my English is poor.

Best of wishes!
 
Edit: I wouldn't say benzodiazepines pshycially helped me. They just made me endure the time it took for my brain to "heal". They secondarily helped me as I could spend precious time with my friends.
 
THC and other cannabinoids are known as antioxidative and neuroprotective, I think that saved you from more damage.
 
Silentface said:
Interesting. How about smoking weed during an LTC?
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The most people here made bad experiences with smoking weed during LTC, you need to try on your own when you feel somehow stable. But I think that smoking weed regulary is definetly not good for recovery.
It could only be helpful in the acute intoxication because it workes as antioxidant and therefore could scavenge free radical formation and also has an antipyretic effect.
 
Did you not suffer any benzo w/d symptoms though? Were you just lucky?

Cause I always thought the benzo w/d syndrome stuff is pretty similar to an LTC.
 
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