Chiggs17

Yeah it just has such a negative connotation, I think that's what bothers me. Although it also isn't the case for me. I have a lot of anxiety over my visuals but other than that my cognition is okay. I don't feel like I'm tripping. Rather I just have some messed up vision.

At the worst of my HPPD (still occasionally) I would experience profound warping of objects in my visual field almost exclusively in the dark. This was most pronounced when I would first turn all of my lights off

Am I the only one who hates this term? It's what people (average people, not docs)usually respond with when I tell them what's going on with me. I don't think it accurately describes what most of us go through and it aggravates me. That term makes it seem like we're a bunch of people just walking around fried. My vision is messed up and I have a lot of anxiety, but I think for me and most of us, what we experience isn't really like what being on an actual trip is like.

K.B, supposedly acid although probably a research chemical. And around nine months at this point. Progress is sooo slow but I do appear to be moving forward. But you know I'm not 100% sure and that's the worst part.

Well the idea Iof permanent worsening is a little scary. I have a neurologist appointment coming up, my pdoc prescribed the Lamictal so I'm going to wait until I see this dr to start anything.

For me it's not knowing. If you're a long termer this probably doesn't apply but for somebody who's had HPPD for less than a year it's absolutely brutal. Constant worries "Will I recover?" sometimes I think I'd be better off if somebody just said "it's never going away get used to it" Holding out hope is somehow kind of terrifying.

Lol thanks for your enthusiasm, I'm not sure Lamictal will give me "happiness" but perhaps. Some people have seen improvements in depression with it but others have become more depressed.

I'm trying Lamotrigine but I'm a little worried about possible side-effects. I'm wondering not only about people's experiences with effectiveness but about side-effects. I'm also concerned that some seem to have reported the drug making their symptoms worse. Any input would be very welcome.

No worries I think you just misunderstood what I was trying to say. I mean maybe I'm wrong but for somebody like me (and others) with mild-ish HPPD part of the problem is obsessing over things that in fact could be perfectly normal. If we could separate the true symptoms from physiological responses maybe we could gain a small amount of piece of mind.

I don't think you really read my post very carefully. I would never downplay the suffering we endure. All I was trying to say is that on top of the numerous things that occur that aren't supposed to, sweeping trails of my arms, movement of stationary objects etc, the anxiety that many (not all) experience causes us to be concerned about things that are in fact normal. I can't speak for anyone else with HPPD but prior to it I didn't pay a bit of attention to any visual anomalies I may have had, consequently I'm always paranoid that normal things are symptoms, causing more anxiety. I made this post really just to see if we could identify things that are normal physiological responses and perhaps ease our minds a bit.

I also think that the idea that normal symptoms become unbearable has more to do with anxiety than HPPD itself. I'm constantly questioning my vision, once I realize the thing I was worried about are normal they become easy to ignore. Of course I could be wrong.

Bugger my after images are like if I'm looking at the professor for awhile while she's giving a lecture and I move my eyes an imprint of her will be visible. If I'm staring at anything for any period of time some image of it will be visible for a bit of time after I look away. It's nothing really distinct. Like I said it could be perfectly normal.

No for sure that's not normal, if you get halos off your phone or car lights that may be an issue haha

That's definitely true. Halos are another one, I think we all see halos around streetlights, it's just that for some they are much more intense. I would consider my halos within the normal range. What about trails and afterimages? Waving your phone around in the dark should produce some trails even to someone without HPPD no? And some afterimages are normal. That's the one I struggle with the most, are my after images within the normal range or not? Of course everybody experiences some after imaging.

That's definitely true. Halos are another one, I think we all see halos around streetlights, it's just that for some they are much more intense. I would consider my halos within the normal range. What about trails and afterimages? Waving your phone around in the dark should produce some trails even to someone without HPPD no? And some afterimages are normal. That's the one I struggle with the most, are my after images within the normal range or not? Of course everybody experiences some after imaging.

Let me start of by saying I definitely have HPPD, some things are clearly not normal and it's fairly obvious. On the other hand I have a habit of seeing perfectly normal things as symptoms on a regular basis, when I ask other people if they can see them they say yes, and I then know that it's a normal physiological response. I'm curious to see if anyone has noticed things that are perfectly that they may have thought were HPPD symptoms. This does not include say floaters which we all have but are much more noticeable for those of us with this disorder.

Still on it yeah and it seems to help with my anxiety but overall I'm still a bit of a wreck

Did anyone find that quitting smoking helped with their visual symtoms at all? I'm a regular smoker and while I know I should quit, I've kind of got bigger concerns atm. However if I people found quitting eased their symtoms I might ensure the struggle

My psych agreed to start me on clonidine, saying that there's at least anecdotal reports of it easing HPPD symptoms. Has anyone had success with it?

I was that person I'm just starting to put my life back together. I think that without klonopin I would not be alive today.

If your biggest problem is anxiety over the visual abnormalities then that theoretically should be the easiest symptom to overcome. Just remember they're only visuals - they're not a threat and they're not themselves dangerous. You just have to get use to them and not focus on them - that way you ignore them and even forget about them. I'm so used to my visuals now I often forget about them - even at night time when they're worst. My vision has changed now and I just accept it. That's what you've got to do. You might even want to consider taking a break from this site - for some people they find that helps.

Does Klonopin help you in any other way? If not it's pretty pointless taking it.

Klonopin=Anxiety relief, at least to some extent. Id love to be taking more but obviously that's a poor choice given benzodiazepine withdrawals are possibly more hell than HPPD itself. Plus I've seem minor improvements even in these three and a half months. And thanks for everyone's enthusiastic help. As for leaving this site, I guess I'm not quite at that point yet, still want to figure out of my case really is as bad as Abraham said. It tortures me for sure but are my visual anomolies really that severe in comparison to others? Given what I've read on this forum I find that a little tough to believe. My regular pdoc also expressed surprise upon hearing that. I just have trouble coping with any little visual anomaly they scare the hell out of me

I am taking klonopin that's why it's in the tags, although for me it seems to not help my visuals at all. So for most of you is HPPD inescapable every second of the day? Because I can go long periods of time not noticing any symptoms, especially if I'm outside. I am just a very ocd like person I suppose and I don't have much dp/dr, although I did at first. I am just terrified by all the little visual anomolies.

Once you don't have your cognition completely fucked and you dont consider yourself living in hell while being alive like me, than your case may not be "that" serious. Every HPPD is a serious condition - because you basically can't take drugs, have to be carefull with drink or very often not be able to drink at all, not smoke cigs - or like me, can't even be around people who smoke cigarretes - once i smell them the day finishes for me. My visual (nevermind that) AND my cognitive reaction decreases.

So, its a serious condition, but once it doesn't SERIOUSLY destroys your life/personality etc,.. if your cognition is intact, then you should be super happy.

If you think your case its mild, than it probably IS mild.. unless you have some unreal methods of coping with really serious problems, but then ud probably say my problem is serious, but I learnt to cope with

enjoy life bro

and join our hppd project if you wanna improve your HPPD, no matter how serious it is

It's more that I just can't stop fixating on it, I just mean that the visual distortions that I experience seem mild compared to most and my biggest hold onto hope was that I had a mild version of HPPD and would be more likely to recover because of it. That and (beyond all probability) my best friend developed the same symtoms from using the same drug and he's able to just tune it out, and his distortions are honestly a little worse than mine. I just got real discouraged by that statement from the Dr. Also Id love to join the project if that could be explained to me.

Let's see I have trails but only on contrasting colors. Weird running of parallel lines that are visible on carper patterns. Shoots of light along lined surfaces (ie border of a rug) but only if I'm watching TV usually. I get negative afterimages but not horrible, virtually no positive ones. My phone screen will leave a hell of a trail in the dark but none at all in the light. I get shoots of light out of my peripheries sometimes if I catch a bright light source. I can go outside without noticing anything in bright daylight. No visual snow, faint geometric patterning in pitch dark. And if I look directly at a light source it will appear to get brighter and dimmer. I also get halos from streetlights but not from most lighting. That's the exhaustive list of my symptoms. A couple I left out because they've seemed to have gone away. I've had HPPD for a little over three months now

I saw dr Abraham yesterday and his visit was both a positive and negative experience. He told me it was likely that my HPPD would go away. He also said that my case was fairly serious. I have about 8 different symptoms that I described to him. However each symptom is fairly mild and I can go hours sometimes without noticing anything out of the ordinary. I got kind of depressed hearing that my case was "serious" how many symptoms do you guys have and to some extent how severe are they? Id love to compare symptoms since I was always convinced I had fairly mild HPPD and was fairly distressed to here it was "serious" and that he'd dealt with much milder cases. Thanks for any replies