# Has anyone ever gotten better from drug induced DP?



## optimusrhyme (Aug 24, 2004)

I got my DP/DR from weed, i've had it 24/7 has anyone here gotten better from it?


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## Guest (Feb 26, 2005)

I got it from weed and I've gotten "better" from it over the year but not fully recovered :x


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## bat (Aug 18, 2004)

mine came on through drug use and I'm a comfortable 95% ok these days


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## lyssy (Dec 7, 2004)

I also got my from weed and have had it since oct but have improved significantly and feel almost normal again.


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## Depersonalized (Feb 11, 2005)

Same here. I think marijuana is a gateway not to the other drugs but to DP, all those who want to legalize it should consider that.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2005)

got mine from a bad acid trip and mary jane, still very foggy and scared a lot of the time but only recently have I discovered this site. annyone elses dp from lsd, if so I could realy use some support. i'll try to maintain hopeful and positive till then.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2005)

this guy named ziggomatic, he used to come around here and he got it from LSD too.


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## falling_free (Nov 3, 2004)

I got my anxiety dp/dr sympons from weed, thankfully over the last year I have improved a lot but I still tend to isolate myself more than I did prior to develping dp/dr.

But I have certainlly got better, just a case of lowering my anxiety

a day at a time

A think that ziggomatic's acid induced dp/dr got better, I think his last post was something about feeling his dp/dr had gone, but Im not sure as I don't know about acid induced dp/dr hppd etc etc as I have never taken acid, but i would imagine that the recoevery is simliar to weed induced since as far as I know acid induced dp/dr is simliar if not the same as weed induced apart from maybe hppd but again I have no first hand experience so don't know.


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## optimusrhyme (Aug 24, 2004)

You see I have had mine 24/7 for almost 3 years now, do you think there is still a chance to get rid of the symptoms?


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2005)

I got it from herb too. It is 24/7 but i can force normal feelings... it just doesnt feel natural. anyone else feel this way? like the feeling of being "emotionally lazy?"


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## falling_free (Nov 3, 2004)

^^ Yes I know what you mean about being emotioneely lazy, as I am deciding to spend less time around people for the last two weeks and at the moment don't feek like seeing that many people or being overly social, recently I just like being on my own.


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2005)

same here i have no wanting to go out and have fun i just like stayin in my room surfin the net and playin ps2 till maybe summer


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## falling_free (Nov 3, 2004)

yeh not much point going out anyway in the UK ,always snowing but but the snow is crap , now I would'nt mind if the snow sticked so I could do some sledging or snowball fights etc etc but the snow stays around and looks really heavy for about 4 hours then is completly gone, Im always like WTF every morning as I keep up waking up to snow only to find that the snow is completly cleared mere hours later.

Iv'e always liked staying in playing computer games a lot of the time any way , cos I can lose my self in another world instead of being in a world where I have the spectre of dp to live with every day.

summer time should be good though, hopefully I can get to some festival or other though I doubt i'll be able to get glastonbery tickets, still a glastobery virgin


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2005)

yea, it helps knowing that im not the only one that likes hiding in my cave at my desk with my pc n' tv... emotional laziness is what i think started this, then it turned into the wierd introverted thoughts and obsessive self-analysis. whats weird is i went all the way through school normal with alot of friends, going to partying n such. ive been thinking lately it was drug induced (weed and alittle experimenting with other substances). how ironic i did drugs for that "fun" numb :shock: feeling... and now that i always have that feeling the thing i want most is to get some emotion back.


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## stickdude (Aug 13, 2004)

falling_free said:


> Iv'e always liked staying in playing computer games a lot of the time any way , cos I can lose my self in another world instead of being in a world where I have the spectre of dp to live with every day.


true. surfing the net and playing games a lot does that to me too. playing some counter-strike helps take away some thoughts 8)

and yea i like chilling alone mostly now. i'm not sure when i'm more introverted, being alone or outside.


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## Martinelv (Aug 10, 2004)

In answer to the original question - definately YES. I am a case in point. Not only did I recover once, I recovered twice !!! First time around was from weed, which took me about a year for the DR to fade away. Second time was from loads of 'e', which again took about a year to fade away. In my case, it was the panic following drug overload that brought on my DR, definately.

Without dashing the hopes of non-drug DP'ers, it seems to me that the prognosis for drug-induced DP is better than other causes...basically because it's just a temporary chemical cock-up in your brain, and not some other psychological trauma which may be more difficult to pin down and treat.


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2005)

Thanks, Martin, you always know how to make me feel better  
So using real opiates instead of ideas as opiates is actually better? Darn it with my childhood psychological traumas!


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## optimusrhyme (Aug 24, 2004)

Martinelv said:


> In answer to the original question - definately YES. I am a case in point. Not only did I recover once, I recovered twice !!! First time around was from weed, which took me about a year for the DR to fade away. Second time was from loads of 'e', which again took about a year to fade away. In my case, it was the panic following drug overload that brought on my DR, definately.
> 
> Without dashing the hopes of non-drug DP'ers, it seems to me that the prognosis for drug-induced DP is better than other causes...basically because it's just a temporary chemical cock-up in your brain, and not some other psychological trauma which may be more difficult to pin down and treat.


I know but almost 3 years of DP/DR 24/7, with no relief? Im not sure if i still have a chance...


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## stickdude (Aug 13, 2004)

was smoking weed from summer 2002-may 2003, when i started getting anxiety and panic attacks. i was pretty much better, i think, by early 2004, because i was going to school and was thinking less. then i took ecstasy summer 2004. it went good but at the end, i had a bad panic attack and thought i had brain damage because i went to use the bathroom and had a big headrush and couldn't hear anything for about 10 seconds after i used to. i've had dp/dr/ocd thinking/anxiety since then and keep thinking i have brain damage. me thinking i have brain damage from it i think is what's making my dp and anxiety hold on to me longer. since the ecstasy incident, smoking weed would make me nervous as hell and increase dp & anxiety. i think if i lay off the weed and get this idea that i haven't got brain damage from ecstasy off, i will be on the road to recovery


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## Martinelv (Aug 10, 2004)

Privateer - you know I didn't mean it like that. Would you prefer it if I told you that everyone here was doomed to a life of total misery ?

All I was trying to point out is that, perhaps, the prognosis for recovery 'might' be 'simpler' for drug-induced DP peeps, because of the nature of the onset of their condition. But who know's, maybe the drug abuse uncovered some deep lying trauma which the person didn't know about ?

The difficulty with recovery, seems to me anyway, (and this is going to seem blindingly obvious), to find your own particular 'mindset' (for wont of a better word) that enables you to crush the DP state. It really is as simple as that, but as difficult as that too. With some people it might take years, others, weeks. No one persons route to recovery is the same, which is why this beast is so difficult.


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## person3 (Aug 10, 2004)

Jordan13-

a) yes you absolutely have a chance still, silly! 

b)The drugs were out of your system within a few days of taking them (any drug still in the system is in traces so small that even Scientology's detox program wouldn't make a difference haha); there is obviously another element here. There is the medication side of things (which could help you stabilize) and the psychological part of it.

You will be fine. You just have to start looking at other avenues to approach this with.


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## person3 (Aug 10, 2004)

I have freaked out on acid, at age 16.

I smoked a LOT of pot at age 16, and I had a high amount of OCD and anxiety unrelated to the pot.

I did cocaine.

I took Ritalin, it made me paranoid because of the somewhat large dose for my system and because of the chemical makeup.

I smoked cigarettes, which gave me more anxiety than all the above drugs combined.

I drank.

I did not have a breakdown and DP until age 19.

My first ever slight fleeting of DP was at age 15, before any remarkable amount of drugs entered my system.

Anyway, back to age 19. I smoked pot during the days I was actually breaking down.

AFter the breakdown:
I smoked pot, took ecstacy every week for a couple months straight, did cocaine every week for a month or two, did nitrous oxide, even COMBNED IT WITH COCAINE (and yes, that is a BAD BAD idea for anxiety), and DXM (twice, it's dextromethorphan, a dissociative), taken hydrocodne, oxycodone, methadone, and demerol, taken adderall, xanax, valium, klonopin, ativan, benadryl, antipsychotics, SSRIs, venflaxine, alcohol of all kinds.

And I still smoke, take adderall, trazodone, Lexapro, and the occasional Xanax as needed.

Did drugs cause my dp?

I would say not.

I have had time periods in my life where these drugs had NO detrimental effect on me, and times when the drugs made me feel somewhat panicky, and times that the drugs had a really good effect. But none of it 'caused' the dp.

It FELT like, it felt like this for two years almost, that the effexor I had taken at age 19 caused the dp, and I tried to focus all my attention on reversing the effects on that.

But later I realized it was a cover up.

I had this coming for a long time. The effexor just helped cause enough of a shift to tip me over the edge. But I was already out of my mind for two weeks prior. Looking back on it now, it almost seems integrated into the rest of my past (whereas it previously didn't), it seems like, oh yeah, I did that, I ran for miles to try to wear the adrenaline down, yeah I was 99 pounds and could see my ribs, yeah yeah. Weird.

But yeah.

Drugs can cause enough of a shift for people with rigid personalities to crack under. But those rigid personalities were not made to withstand life anyway. Now there are CERTAIN drugs (PCP and Ketamine) that I believe NO one in their right MIND should EVER touch. Especially dissociative types. And LSD is a big no no too. But none of it on its own is a cause for DP. If that were the case, NO ONE would be smoking pot. OR doing acid or X. NO one would do that stuff if it landed them here as a direct result.

But its not. We have other stuff going on. We have other things that make the smallest dose of cocaine freak us out while all of our friends can eat books worth of acid. and be on their merry way the next day.

It's part of the obsession. As if it was a cancer or a drug or something separate that you got as a result of doing the drug. No, it's you and how you responded and how you think.

That means that there is total hope for all you who think you hvae drug-induced DP.

But it means that you absolutely must stop blaming the drug.

If you can't stop it forever, at least tell yourself today: "Today I will NOT think about the drug I took that supposedly gave me DP. If, tomorrow, I feel the need to find an answer about or obsess about it, then I will do that tomorrow. But not today"

Usually this is a good way to dissipate obesession, as by tomorrow you will be obsessing about something else anyway.

The problem here is obsessive traits, NOT drugs, not other things. The obessession is tricking you into believing that is the cause.

Because your mind wants to, at all costs, keep you from figuring out it might be something about YOU that needs to change.


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## Martinelv (Aug 10, 2004)

Interesting post Person3. I think there is some truth in that.

I was (and still am to a certain extent) 100% sure that my excessive intake of drugs (weed, pills, coke, ketamine, mushrooms, booze, ****) was entirely to blame for my DR/DP episode. While I'm still absolutely convinced that this was the trigger for my meltdown, I'm sure that my underlying neurosis was already there waiting. Still, I think that avoids the real issue. I'm sure I could have gone through my life as a 'highly functioning' neurotic, if I had never taken drugs, and, let's be truthfull, most people are neurotic to some extent. There are a lot of people who have never had any conscious problems until they have taken drugs. That doesn't mean that didn't have any 'hidden' problems, but hey - they are hidden for a reason. Let them stay hidden I say. If we were all confronting our hidden demons, then the world would be in chaos.

My 'inner demons' can go fuck themselves. I'm not going to spend a lifetime in therapy waiting for a cure that probably won't arrive. I've haven't got the time. I live with my 'problems', and to hell with anxiety/depression. The less I worry about them, the less of a problem they are. They are buried, and they can goddam stay buried.


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## optimusrhyme (Aug 24, 2004)

person3 said:


> Jordan13-
> 
> a) yes you absolutely have a chance still, silly!
> 
> ...


Thanks person3 you gave me some hope to work with... I think your right with your post below, but it just feels like the weed gave me brain damage, and its hard to think i will ever get out of this state, i've been in it so long that I forget what I use to feel like....


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## person3 (Aug 10, 2004)

That's part of the obsessive symptoms...you're obsessing, and it's just a symptom. You say you are convinced that you have brain damage from the weed, while I may say that I feel absolutely certain that I have a brain tumor. Say that we both think those things, and that we both have DP. Well. We are both actually experiencing the same symptom, the symptom of obsessing over an illusory thing.

That obsession is keeping you busy from focusing on the parts of YOU and your personality that you really DO need to work on. And they have nothing to do with brain damage.


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## optimusrhyme (Aug 24, 2004)

^ Thanks you've really helped me, it also dosen't make it any easier to stop Obbsessing having ADD and Obbsesive Compulsive Disorder... I'm hoping I can find some Meds that help me with those though..


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## jft (Jan 10, 2005)

All I know is that if I had never done drugs I probably would never had gone into dr/dp land. I say this becasue I have three siblings with obvious similiar psycho/social backgrounds, genetics, Freudian stuff and predispoitions galore. They all have major anxiety disorders, but they have lived very functional "neurotic lives" as Martiniv mentioned. I have dp/dr, they do not. The variable I can shoot at first is drug use.

Does this mean drugs soley caused my dp/dr? No. (Can some drugs casue dp/dr without predispostions? I think so.) My predispositons were there and were the foundation. But without drugs I feel I would have lived a "very functional neurotic life". In this sense I blame drugs. He is the one I would hang first if I was the judge, and I would give the rest probation. He had the gun.

I am still sorting out the difference between drug induced and non drug incuded dr/dp. Actually I am hoping the researchers take some closer looks into it. As I sit here I jsut feel stoned ya know. But what comes closest (as far as I can find) to my journey in relating to others is what ya all decsribe as plain old dr/dp, and that is what I go by in terms of treatment. I do not think I am 
brain damaged (that is a very relative term anyway and not easily defined). I know I do not have any drug traces in my system etc. I have obsessed about all these things myself and it is pure gobbletygook. I do not obsess any more becasue the data is not there to support it.

We do need, as someone else stated above, to not think of this in terms of past drug use. Treatment options and aveneues are all the same anyway, drug use or not. Until told otherwise I will continue to think and act on it as anyone else would, drug use or not. Still makes me wonder though why I just feel stoned. I would love to sit in a room and do Vulcan mind locks with you all to see if our pee pees compare. Were we jsut experiencing "normal" dr/dp while stoned, the exact same type that non druggies feel now, and that is why it seems like we are stoned now when in fact it is only "normal: dr/dp? At least my inquiring mind still wants to know. 
jft


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2005)

if i would of known weed could cause this trance state then i would have never smoked, i didnt even smoke that much i smoked maybe 1 or twice every 3 months.


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2005)

In response to the original question. Yes. My symptons were brought on by a lsd\marijuana trip in which my concept of self, mainly my religious and social conditioning was totally obliterated. I recovered over the course of a year... It was a very difficult time yet I am glad it happened. I am sure that it would have happened eventually whether or not I had taken drugs. Its all part of the journey. I guess I'm not complety over the dp. It does occurr from time to time, but I know how to deal with it now. How do I deal with it? I don't. I just let go. Let go of fear and worry and it ceases to be a problem.

Remember, drugs like marijuana, mushrooms, and lsd, are extremely non toxic. You can't overdose on them. They don't cause permanent damage. Its the way you respond to the drugs that is the problem. IMHO.


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## eldoofus (Aug 10, 2004)

My totally incapacitating DP/DR was the result of a multidrug combination:

Zoloft, Valium, Prozac, Luvox, Celexa, Parnate, Roboxetine, Remeron, Aurorix, Effexor -- mixed with chronic pain, and a history of childhood trauma.

And I'm getting better -goddamnit!


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## Guest (Jun 17, 2005)

i had 2 minute(my-nuut spelling?) cases of DR as a child and at the age of 13 i smoked pot and quite soon after and had DR for 6 months to wich i fully recovered from at the time.


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## Guest (Sep 5, 2005)

i got mine from mj about three years ago ,and it is still here 24/7 , and hasnt eased up any. I just found info on it before that i thought i was dying, or going blind , then i thought i had cancer, and all kinds of crazy thoughts.


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## Da'Burgh (Apr 25, 2005)

It's almost gone and i've had it for 6-7 months. Drug induced.


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## MrMortgage (Aug 26, 2005)

radikall777 said:


> i got mine from mj about three years ago ,and it is still here 24/7 , and hasnt eased up any. I just found info on it before that i thought i was dying, or going blind , then i thought i had cancer, and all kinds of crazy thoughts.


I thought I had brain caner and all the crazy stuff! I thought I was going blind! It's kinda funny when I think about it now.

I got my DP/DR from WEED, and Speed. In FEB. of this year I had a really bad trip off the speed and it set me in to a moderate DP/DR. Then about a month later my EX girl left me and that set it into a more serious DP/DR.

I think that drugs open the way for my disorder but when the girl left it was so traumatic like, "this can never happen to me" that my mind went into a state of DP/DR.

Like a state of unbelief and feeling lost, and it got worse and worse, till I didnt know who I was anymore and why I was here..... :?


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## Guest (Sep 15, 2005)

ok ive been reading this thread and i was wondering if the OCD THC people are taking medication for their OCD. Because if you aren?t, maybe that will cure the DP/DR.

Because, the OCD problem is obsessing about things, take the medication and you no longer obsess. therefore no DP/DR?


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## Martinelv (Aug 10, 2004)

Yes. Me. Twice.


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## Guest_ (Sep 17, 2005)

.


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## Guest (Sep 18, 2005)

That?s very interesting (and encouraging). So, you say that ALL dp/dr caused by weed is actually this "acute stress disorder"? That?s new to me, never heard anything like that. Could you talk some more about the symptoms of this (are they the same as dp/dr symptoms)? Anyway, it?s good to hear people DO recover, however you call it.


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## Guest_ (Sep 17, 2005)

.


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## Guest (Sep 19, 2005)

It?s still interesting, but I?m just not sure about it. The definition of Acute stress disorder says, that it lasts maximum of four weeks - and there are folks here who experience this for four months and more.

Maybe there?s a difference between two kinds of people: 1) THC or other drug leads just to chemical imbalance and can last for few months and/or the medication is helpful, 2) THC or other drug TRIGGERS something that?s allready there waiting - and that?s not so easy to get rid of.

I suppose people who recover quickly are the first kind and people who have longer and harder way to recover are the second kind.


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## Guest (Sep 19, 2005)

This seems more like it:

ACUTE and CHRONIC SYMPTOMS OF CANNABIS PSYCHOSIS

http://www.priory.com/psych/cannabis.htm

You will find such symptoms as DP, DR and "amotivational syndrome" here.


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## Guest_ (Sep 17, 2005)

.


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## Phill (Sep 27, 2004)

Sharpezor said:


> ok ive been reading this thread and i was wondering if the OCD THC people are taking medication for their OCD. Because if you aren't, maybe that will cure the DP/DR.
> 
> Because, the OCD problem is obsessing about things, take the medication and you no longer obsess. therefore no DP/DR?


You definitely hit the nail on the head with that one Sharpezor.
I have ocd and take pills for it but the symptoms still exist to a 
degree. So that means dp/dr still is there to a degree.

I know what to do to recover temporarily though which is very
important to me.


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## jft (Jan 10, 2005)

This a question I have. If dp/dr has such a strong relationship with anxiety and also obsessing, rumination,hypervigalence, self scrutiny and "focusing inward" than why do not more people respond to the ssri's? I tried them all as well as anxiolytics and found relief from anxiety but that is about all. I mean if a drug targets precisely the thing that most folks say here maintains dp than it would seem that we all would respond to ssri's.

For sure it is probalby the best advice to "focus outward", I only do not understand why meds are so ineffective for so many in this context,

I myself have been obessional, but over the years have lost most of my obsession and self scrutiny. And I rarely focus inward on ,my symptoms. They are jsut me. But I still have them even though I do not focus on them.
jft


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## baddream13 (Sep 10, 2005)

Someone here wrote about being "emotionally lazy". That's how I am most of the time. I'll stick to what I've said before about emotions being so draining that your mind builds a self-defense mechanism for them....hence dp/dr. I hate socializing most of the time because if I'm forced to "feel" something, I may shut down and go into emotionally lethargic mode. I still smoke. Maybe not the best thing. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's not. I go into off again on again phases with my good friend "bud", and in that sense it seems like all other friendships in my life.

I did do quite a few hallucinogens in my teenage days. I don't think that caused my dp/dr because I had that already, that's why I did the hallucinagens, anything to escape reality and try to feel something. What I DO think is very very bad and that really screwed me up more than anything was speed. Very very bad stuff. Permanent damage. I was stupid, what can I say.

To surmise I would say that healing from drug-induced dp/dr is totally possible, AND probable.

I would also like to add that SPEED IS VERY VERY VERY BAD!

Okay, that's all, have a lovely day!


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