Melting at Night?

[WOLF70M]

I've had HPPD for about 5 months now. I'm 100% sure it was caused by two intense mushroom trips spaced about a week apart.

My symptoms include:

-Trails and static

-Moving patterns

-Objects changing shape/size

-Anxiety

These last three symptoms seem to be the easiest to cope with in my case. The symptoms that really scare me are the ones that seem to happen more inside my head.

-I get racing thoughts that move extremely fast and seem to branch out on to different strings of thoughts so I end up thinking about too many things at once and this seems to trigger a lot of my anxiety.

- All of my perceptions and memories feel hazy which is usually accompanied by deep thoughts about what is going to happen when I die and other philosophical things like that which seem to also increase my anxiety

-Random disturbing or confusing thoughts pop into my head for example picturing in my head my throat being sliced or other images of harming myself or being harmed. I have never self mutilated or even considered it which is also one of the reasons why this really troubles me.

-Sometimes while trying to sleep I get extreme depersonalization accompanied by a feeling that I am melting which I experienced while on the trip. I also have distorted perception of the feeling of my body as in my body will feel long and stretched out as if i were made out of putty and pulled across the room. Also another thing that really bothers me is sometimes I perceive and extra limb, like I can feel an extra arm or leg.

I have various other symptoms, but most cannot even be put into words.

I take this condition very seriously and I've completely cut all drugs out of my system and severely cut down on my drinking(about once every month and a half and only having 1 or 2 beers). I run collegiate cross country and track so I run every day so my exercise is taken care of. I try to avoid caffeine as much as possible because it makes my symptoms slightly worse. I try to make sure to get a decent amount of sleep; I feel like this has a lot to do with worsening or bettering of my symptoms. The problem with sleep is that I have to find a happy medium because too little sleep makes symptoms worse and too much sleep makes symptoms worse.

Also my symptoms seemed like they were getting better about 3 months in, but I was prescribed an SSRI which drastically worsened symptoms.

Anyway sorry to write a book, but I would really appreciate your comments and suggestions

[leefulford]

Wolf, I get your exact same symptoms! I get visuals, anxiety, derealization etc but the worst by far is my body feeling like my body is the entire room or something i know exactly what you are going through! (im not sure what triggered mine, lsd mushrooms m or salvia) but I get INSANE images in my head going a mile a minute especially when trying to go to sleep. These images are like not of this world. I am slowly learning to enjoy them though and accept them. You are not crazy for having these you just have a wild imagination as do I. Feel free to add me on facebook www.facebook.com/pure.ballin if you need someone to talk to about it.

Good luck!

[VisualDude]

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[WOLF70M]

Leefulford - First off thanks so much for posting. I actually also used salvia pretty frequently for a period of time which may just be a coincidence, but maybe that plus other things brought out some of our symptoms. Also accepting the thoughts and feelings and just going with the flow makes it much more bearable, but when I am stressed for other reasons or sometimes just randomly it gets so far out of my control that I freak. Its nice to know that you know how I have been feeling.

Visual - First off, I do not take any other meds besides the SSRI which was lexapro. Also it did help me focus and relax a bit more during the day, but at night it made all my symptoms far worse. It caused panic attacks where my heart felt like it was beating out of my chest almost every night once it started building up in my system. I am off the meds now and things have settled down since then. I decided not to try any others because I really want to deal with this on my own without the help of drugs. This is just my opinion though, not trying to diss anyone using meds.

[WOLF70M]

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[leefulford]

Yo thats weird Wolf I used salvia soo much this summer. I definitly think the salvia (which is one of the most fucked drugs in my opinion) is responsible for the body feelings as some of my body feelings are similar to salvia. Yea i have tried that wolf70 and it has worked before trying consciously to trip instead of trying to fight your imagination. A drug that has reduced this I find is naltrexone 5 mg. I take it speratically about once a week and not sure if it helps or if it is more a placebo but since I've started taking the naltrexone there is a definite improvement. Take it at least 4 hours before bedtime though.

[John Smith]

I can definitely see how that could be salvia related, i only tried it twice, but that shit literally made my arms force themselves down to the ground the first time and become a part of it, i couldnt move and i thought i was gonna be stuck to the ground forever hahaha, my friend started goin chill out youre on salvia, and the word salvia didnt sound real all i could say was, whats salvia? until i came out of it...i woulda tried it again, but it's a delicacy where i live