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What causes skin crawaling sensation?

drug_FUCKED

drug_FUCKED

Bluelighter
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Aug 7, 2009
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Gumdrop house on lollipop lane
Wondering what causes that skin crawling bugs under the skin feeling in drug withdrawal. Because I have heard people get it from cocaine, meth, heroin and i have experience with it from benzo withdrawal.
 
I think adrenergic/noradenrergic activity has a lot to do with it. There is a sympathomimetic storm on withdrawal of benzos, opiates, GHB etc. and that feeling is comon to them all.
Alpha2 adrenoreceptor antagonists cause it too for me(alpha2 is the autoreceptor)

Adrenergic and cholinergic innervation of the tiny muscles that move one's hairs might have something to do with it on a peripheral level also.
 
[Offtopic] Does anyone know how this relates to tingley prickley feelings, like taking gaba, 5htp(especially in my arms and hands).
I have noticed this in my cheeks alot with chocolate, Salvia d, psychedelicl and penibut(possibly only with a gaba suppliment) Complete burning prickley overload but w/ no anxiety of this occouring. maybe niacin?

Ps I love this feeling
 
It's called parasthesia and can be caused by numerous things/conditions. It it is because of drug withdrawal, anxiety seems the most plausible cause. This would support the noradrenergic explanation given earlier, although as far as I know it has nothing to do with innervation of smooth muscles, but with (temporary) dysfunction of sensory neurons.

It is related to the feeling in your foot/leg/arm if you lay on it for too long; it is also related to formication (commonly known as coke bugs). But now I might sound like I'm just showing off instead of contributing anything of value LOL, so I'll give it a rest and go get myself some dinner. :)
 
reactions from experimenting with drugs, the fine print that comes along with drugs. lol.
 
i had a REALLY bad "bugs" tweak for a long time.

i believe part of the reasons for the sensation wrt meth use anyway are:
1. Very dry skin
2. increase in body temperature
3. hyper peripheral sensitivity

i think most of the time i thought a bug was on me, it was probably me over-feeling an individual sweat gland excreting sweat onto my super dry skin.

since at first there's no apparent cause for the itch, and because sleep dep really inhibits fine focus, and the stimulant's obsessive-compulsive reinforcement the mind rationalizes the sensation the only way it knows how.

then god forbid, once we ever do see the slightest insect in our vicinity the mind says "ah ha! proof!" and a belief is formed.

it took awhile after quitting using before my sanity was restored.
 
The medical terminology for this is 'formication', and can occur with toxic psychosis from stimulant abuse, benzo withdrawal, etc.

Formication from toxic psychosis/withdrawal is typically accompanied with Ekborns (delusional parasitosis), particularly in the case of benzo/GABAergic withdrawal. I know this first hand; when I was in diazepam withdrawal, I was convinced I had some sort of parasite, etc. The tricky thing is, parasites are very common in humans, for example the tiny demodex follicularum mite can be found in most adults, and virtually all aged patients. Benzodiazepine withdrawal, simply put, acts as a "magnifying glass" and makes these things "stand out", and combined with the anxiety, you know have pseudo-delusional parasitosis, in which yes, there is a parasite (mites, lice, bed-bugs etc), but the reaction to these common pests are more noticeable and worrysome than they would be without the toxic psychosis. It is tricky......but it went away eventually......
 
i believe with opiates, the sensation is caused when the opiates are "stripped" from the nerve endings rapidly, with chronic pain this is when the "slap-back" pains come and this really fucking sucks!lol...

your pores opening to try and help you detox and sweat, this causes the ambient temperature to feel too far up or down.
it makes it so much more bearable, personally; understanding wtf is happening to my body - and interesting at times maybe even.



<3
 
I wake up most mornings with this skin crawling sensation and it gets me real irritable. But it actually helps me get out of bed in the morning but it sucks at night when trying to sleep. I find L-theanine helps heaps.

Interesting about that alpha 2 pathways cause i use propranolol at night to sleep and i believe it works via alpha 2 paths ways as it releases HGH like clonidine does.

Yeah understand whats going on helps I mean other wise I would end up like one of those homeless crack addicts who scratch holes right the way through there own arms. Its bad enough i pick my pimples.
 
negrogesic said:
The medical terminology for this is 'formication', and can occur with toxic psychosis from stimulant abuse, benzo withdrawal, etc.

Formication from toxic psychosis/withdrawal is typically accompanied with Ekborns (delusional parasitosis), particularly in the case of benzo/GABAergic withdrawal. I know this first hand; when I was in diazepam withdrawal, I was convinced I had some sort of parasite, etc. The tricky thing is, parasites are very common in humans, for example the tiny demodex follicularum mite can be found in most adults, and virtually all aged patients. Benzodiazepine withdrawal, simply put, acts as a "magnifying glass" and makes these things "stand out", and combined with the anxiety, you know have pseudo-delusional parasitosis, in which yes, there is a parasite (mites, lice, bed-bugs etc), but the reaction to these common pests are more noticeable and worrysome than they would be without the toxic psychosis. It is tricky......but it went away eventually......
Click to expand...

Great now you got me pazzing about bed bugs :\
Does spraying tea on your bed and UV light kill them. I going to fly spray my bed now. lol
 
^
it seems more likely you would feel the hairs and hair follicles on your body, or your arteries and veins, sending and receiving blood. also the 'spider' and varicose veins all along the subsurface of the skin would be far more noticeable it seems in such a state...



:\
:)
 
If you feel bugs crawling underneath your skin; that is a great sign to STOP your cocaine usage, if you are consuming cocaine....
 
It's a protozoan that is crawling all over your skin. It's not merely a sensation. Crack bugs are real. The name of the protozoa is Giardia Lamblia. Giardia lamblia is a flagellated protozoan parasite that colonizes and reproduces in the small intestine, causing giardiasis. The parasite attaches to the epithelium by a ventral adhesive disc, and reproduces via binary fission. Cocaine users that have giardiasis will feel the parasites crawling out of their mouths and anuses and all over their skin when they ingest the drug.
 
I guess the paresthesia is real as others have described but when you slip into stimulant psychosis from sleep deprivation or just binging too long and/or too high, there comes some choline depletion into the picture & you'll end up with seeing the paresthesias as bugs or insects under your skin as people do when they are on anticholinergics like e.g. atropine or benadryl. This combination makes a bad time of course, but the explanation sounds well possible in my eyes.

:)
 
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