# *Letting everyone know it does go away* Long time lurker first time poster



## Keel1992 (Mar 28, 2015)

Hi all,
my name is Jack and am currently 21 years old. I would really like to open this thread by stating that I have have had this disorder and it does go away. It may not go away quickly or it may vanish tomorrow, the truth being it will only disappear when YOU become the right person!

A bit of background on my story. As a child I had always been very anxious and analytical when it came to every aspect of my life. I always tried to analyse things until the nth degree. My mind seemed to function at a higher rate than most. Up until 20 years old however, I had not experienced DP/DR until one night when I decided to try marijuana for the first time (note: this drug is harmless to some but very damaging to others, you truly don't know until you try it. However, I am a libertarian and believe in everyone having access to be free with their choices, I digress!) Myself and 3 other friends decided to consume an edible version of THC in a candy form called "Cheba Chews". On first thoughts I was excited and wanted to finally be in a position where my mind could slow down to a normal pace! It was not to be. Within the first hour my perception of time had completely been distorted. Minutes felt like they were days! I was at a park when this first started and I made me friend take me back to his house. Upon arriving I had this weird experience where I thought I had been "sucked back" from my vision. At that moment all I could do was observe my actions from a different perspective. My vision was also very vivid. I could see many geometric like patterns transparent over proper reality.

After arriving at my friend's house, I checked my phone as I believed it was time to go home. It had felt as if I had been at the house for hours, when I did only 15 minutes had passed. This put an anxiety on top of another anxiety. At this point my heart rate was very high (I think it was), I couldn't see straight, I was panicking, could not focus and had MASSIVE slowing in time perception. After, 20 more minutes of checking my phone every minute, checking the time to see how long it had been and seeing if my perception had gone back to normal, I made my friends drop me home. I tried going inside my house and speaking to my parents without them knowing, this increased my anxiety. Eventually I buckled and told them, which did decrease my anxiety a small amount. My dad has experience with weed and gave me a sugary snack to calm myself down, apparently it nullifies weed. This did not help one bit. ALL of the prior symptoms were still present an hour later plus now I felt like I couldn't breathe.

Without making this any longer than it has to be, I ended up going to hospital and getting some Valium to calm me down.

Waking up the next morning I had this strange feeling. EVERYTHING looked different. Colours seemed strange, my parents seemed less familiar and I still couldn't see straight! I was still very anxious however I did not know that at the time. Plus the time distortion was still present. Upon commencing my day everything seemed to feel as if I had died and I was living in a dream.

I could continue on with my symptoms, they lasted for a good 8 months with me on this forum every day trying to find a cure that somebody might have (I can almost guarantee if you are reading this you have done that, right?) but I would prefer to focus on the positives and getting YOU better!

FICTION: It doesn't go away 
FACT: It actually does, I don't care if you have it without any particular reason or it's drug induced, it WILL go away! This is the hard part however, before it can go away you must acknowledge that you must become the right person before it will! A hard perspective I had to come to was accepting that the *old me* no longer existed. For some reason coming to this realisation really scared, probably to the same extent that you were scared when you read that last sentence. It does, for some reason, scare a person will DP/DR to tell them they need to become new people and the old version of themselves is gone. Don't think of it this way though, think of yourself turning into a stronger version of yourself and the DP/DR is just allowing you to observe the weakness in yourself from before your experience. I believe it truly made me a stronger happier person after coming out of it!

FICTION:It's a disease you're stuck with
FACT: It's a symptom of anxiety. I cannot stress enough that this is just a symptom of anxiety! I thought for the months following my experience that I was not anxious and I was just going crazy! (Another myth, you're not going crazy, because crazy people don't know they're going crazy!!!) I kept thinking that I was calm but I truly wasn't I had lots of anxiety within me fuelling the DR/DP.

The thing I quickly want to finish on is saying everyone does get cured, just like I did but after the experience we just think that it was such a small issue (even though when you're going through it you believe it is the worst thing to happen!) and never bother coming back to post our experiences and pathways to becoming cured. Heck it took me a year after being cured to come back but here I am!

I really want to help everyone get better, I will be around these forums a lot now days. 
Please contact me on here! Or if you want my email let me know!

If anyone has any questions regarding this thread please let me know 

Jack.


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## Jodie (Oct 14, 2014)

nice one Jack


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## Soflo (Apr 1, 2015)

What was your first step into becoming the "right person?"


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