subjective effects of 5-HT2 down regulation?

[<SpaceHead>]

I assume that 5-HT2 down regulation causes these sets of receptors to become less sensitive to serotonin, requiring more to achieve the same effect in the brain. Please correct me if this is wrong.

For about six or seven years I have used psychedelics weekly or more, tripping hundreds of times. I assume it's a sort of self treatment / medicating for some sort of depression, and does work well when I keep other drugs like dissociatives and pot under control and take the consideration to not mess up my sleep schedule with the psychedelics.

But last fall I took a 3 month break from all drugs, which was a very sudden and drastic change for me. At first I had high hopes for the sober state of mind, and it started out ok but each week it became harder and harder. The symptoms I had were like the opposite of psychedelics, feeling extremely isolated, not being able to see the novelty and beauty in the world and being stuck in the same one dimensional repetitive and depressing thought patterns.

So it may just be that I'm just depressed, but I wonder what impact the constant psychedelic use had on my experience. Training my brain to expect a strong serotonergic stimulation every few days for years and then suddenly stopping. Have any other habitual trippers experienced this effect?

 

[Pheebz]

Well if it really is a down-regulation of receptors, which is debatable, as those receptors return back to normal within a few days or so. Now it could really be that you miss the magic or novelty that the psychedelic experience provided, which could also be it, but if that's the case then your the only one that could really know.

Now while it is true that the 5-HT2a receptor interacts with dopamine, and there are some psychedelics that agonize the dopamine receptors (LSD comes to mind), that effect is way less pronounced than, say, classic stimulants, such as meth of adderall, so I highly doubt any down-regulation would persist for 3 months. I would bet it's mostly psychological but then again I'm not in your shoes to say for certain