Hi there. Due to a messed up childhood situation that I won't detail, I ended up being exposed to chloroform pretty systematically for some time. I don't know how early it started, but it lasted years, and then abruptly ended when I was six years old. Hallucination (brightly colored flashes, black shadowy "flashes" in peripheral vision, visual snow on neutral backdrops, buzzing gold haze, floating colored blobs) has been such a normal feature of my life that I never even bothered to question it most of the time. In fact, until I was in middle school, I even thought everyone hallucinated, I thought it was just normal. When I realized I was on my own with this one, I sort of just shrugged and didn't think about it much. I'm so used to the colors and flashes that I can pretty much ignore them most of the time (unless I'm extra sleep deprived or stressed). I did not even link it to the exposure to drugs until later, when I became interested in why I seem to have this hallucinatory tendency that others do not seem to have. I pretty much ignored my hallucinations for over a quarter of a century. I am finally more interested in them now that I've been dealing with and processing my traumatic past. I was surprised to learn today that there's a diagnosable disorder associated with this lasting drug effect, and even more surprised to learn that extreme stress and dissociation seems to be associated with it. I do have the stress and dissociation too, but I assumed it had more to do with my PTSD than with these random visual disturbances I've comfortably lived with my whole life. Not sure I would be diagnosed with HPPD… I certainly have the persistent hallucination, but it doesn't bother me much, and that seems to be a key feature of the "disorder." In any case, I'm interested to know what you all think. Thanks in advance.
