# 100% Recovered 6-8 Months from Edible Marijuana



## Forge132 (Sep 12, 2016)

TL;DR: I'm recovered, you're going to be fine.

First off, disregard everyone else's post. I know that is a bold statement, but just do it. This is all you need. I'm right.

I'll start off by saying that whatever you're going through, its all in your head. Your brain chemistry has essentially been thrown way off by either a panic attack or drug. Your brain WILL readjust. (And yes I know that this is hard to believe, I didn't believe it for a damn second until I had fully recovered, but sorry, its true)

What happened to you isn't some spiritual thing, nor is it a sign of Schizophrenia or psychosis. You don't have those things. Its funny, I read that all the time, people telling me I don't have schizophrenia or psychosis, and i never once believed them 100%. I would always fall into a circle of worry. BUT YOU DO NOT HAVE SCHIZOPHRENIA OR PSYCHOSIS. Read that a few more times if you need to.

I've been reading these forums for about 8 months now, and have read all sorts of stuff. A lot of people haven't recovered in the time they would have liked to, and a lot of people believe they will never recover. They will.

Recovery has nothing to do with your thought process, or how much weed you smoked, or how large of a panic attack you had, so stop worrying. Actually you can keep worrying, it really doesn't change anything. Recovery comes from your brain's PHYSICAL CHEMICAL RE BALANCE. If you aren't recovered yet, you aren't supposed to be. Your brain needs time to slowly reset everything, just let it do its job. If you need to sit inside for a few months and watch movies because you can't go outside with your condition, that's fine!

I'm going to list some things that helped me.

Have friends over, or go to your friend's places. You basically should get some social interaction, as it takes your mind off the fog that fills your mind. Even if you feel like you are just fooling yourself, and that it isn't really helping, it really is. I never felt normal at any point, even if I forgot about DP for a bit. I'd always remember that I had it. It doesn't matter whether or not you think about it, or don't think about it. You just need to pass the time somehow, and I always felt better, happier at least with my close friends. They never understood what was happening, but they tried to, and they accepted that I was nuts for a while.

Klonopin. If you have anxiety, or panic, or whatever, I strongly recommend trying this out. Its not physically addictive, but can be mentally addictive, as it is so helpful. I took about .5mg a day for two months, and then as an on-needed basis. I personally refused to exceed .5mg a day, and usually took .125mg a day after month two. It can space you out a little bit, but not in a terrible way like DP.

Eat healthy. I don't think eating habits really affect DP, but they do affect your mood, and its always nicer to be happy rather than sad while you're already going through something that seems like hell.

People also say to stop reading these forums. I'd agree, but I think the recovery section is fine to read.

People get all sorts of weird crazy symptoms like visual snow. Don't worry about your individual symptoms, they are different for everyone. Just rest assured that its going to take you anywhere from 3months to 2 years to recover, but you will recover.

For those of you who have had DP for more than two years, or feel that as you are approaching the two year mark and haven't felt any better: Like I said, everyone is different, brains recover at different rates. I'd say 95% of people recover within a two year time frame, but some take longer. I promise you won't be stuck like this forever 

You might "lose" a year of your life, but I was still able to pull my GPA back up to a 3.9 while Dp'ed out, so don't sweat it. It's a learning experience.

My Story:

In the Spring of 2016 I was hanging out with a few "friends" in the dorms and tried a bit of a Medical Grade Pot Brownie. I remember eating it, feeling fine for about a half an hour. After that, my life turned upside down.

All of a sudden, I lost my ability to think. It felt like my mind was exploding, bursting outwards and then compressing a thousand times a second. For the first time in my life, I was experiencing what I now know (but didn't then) a full blown, whopping, massive, panic attack. Suddenly I couldn't control my emotions. I wanted to politely tell my friends that I needed to go back to my dorm room to go to sleep, but instead was for some reason not able to put on a facade, and began to freak out. I threw up everywhere, my heart was racing, and I did not know what was going on.

My friends were not at all helpful, they told me to calm down, and that I was freaking out for no reason. I told them to call 911. They weren't about to risk everything for me, so they just shut me in their room and tried everything to calm me down. They played "Enya" music for me, which didn't help. I begged and begged them to call someone, and that I was dying. I began to jog around in the halls, so that at least my mentality which was racing would be matched with my body. I learned later that I had a heart rate of 140 for over 3 hours. Finally, I didn't even care if I died, I just wanted the pain to stop, so I ran out of the building to the Campus Security office. I didn't even have a shirt or shoes on. All I was wearing was my boxers. I arrived in their office, high out of my mind, jogging, screaming for help. Everyone was extremely confused. They immediately called 911 and EMT arrived. I don't completely remember everything, but I do remember that I was desperately trying to tell myself that I was still sane. I kept saying random things to the EMTs, and they whispered to eachother about how I was the craziest thing they'd seen all week. They stuck an IV in my wrist, injected me with something, threw a white hospital gown over me, sat me down in a chair, and wheeled my crazy ass into their ambulance.

In the ambulance, the emts refused to calm me down. I kept asking them to help me, and that they needed to get my mind off of whatever was going on. Although now understandable, they refused my request to tell me a story hahahaha.

I arrived in the hospital, and was wheeled into a room where I was drug tested, because everyone was sure I was high on something other than weed. I called my parents in a jittery panic, and couldn't even explain to them what was going on. They had to call the hospital back to make sense of what was going on. All I managed to say to them was "I had a bad trip", followed by incoherent muttering. I think the doctors injected me with some sort of depressant, and after another hour, I fell asleep.

I awoke with DP. Everything was foggy, and I felt hungover. I couldn't immediately remember what had happened. I was no longer in a state of panic, and my heart rate had returned to normal They bought me a taxi back to school, and I returned straight to my dorm room. The only reminder that all hell had broken loose that night were my hospital gown, and the inexplicable feeling that had washed over me, which did not leave for another 7 months.

The next month was the worst month of my life. I can say that with complete confidence. I came VERY close to dropping out of school. I immediately sought out a therapist, as the anxiety had slowly crept back over the next few days after the incident, to the point where I, honest to God, thought i had died and was stuck in a state of spiritual limbo. I was confused, beyond all reason. Everytime I woke up, I had a fat panic attack which left my body shaking for hours afterwards. I dropped all but one of my classes. Over those two weeks I called the suicide hotline twice, and finally was given a prescription for Klonopin, which I firmly believed saved my life. My last panic attack occurred before taking klonopin, and i haven't had one since. I remember the morning after taking a .5mg tab of klonopin. I felt like a new man, everything was completely fine, it was as if nothing had happened. Unfortunately klonopin had diminishing returns, and this effect only lasted for about a day. After that I sunk back into a deep depression, coupled with DP/DR. I tried various medications over the next few months including Buspar (didn't work, made my head buzz, gave me anxiety), Lexapro (didnt work), and finally Pristiq, to treat my depression and anxiety.

Pristiq was interesting. I was able to use it to taper my klonopin intake down to zero, as it was a longterm solution to anxiety, but had another unexpected and devastatingly negative side effect.

It brought me into a whole new level of depersonalization. I felt crazed, all of the time, on only 25mg. I can only describe how I felt on pristiq as totally, and utterly confused. I would look at myself in the mirror, and not recognize myself. My doc thought that this was still from the pot brownie incident, so he increased my dosage up from 25mg to 50mg, to 75mg, to 100mg, at which point I became manic. Finally we realized what was going on, and dialed everything down to zero, which is where I'm at now. And I'm finally fine.

You're gonna be fine, and the truth is, the people that do recover don't come back here to tell you they've recovered. Why would they? I'm doing it, and I don't really know why, I'm just bored I guess.

Once again, you don't have schizophrenia and/or psychosis. Read it and believe it. "But dude, you don't know me specifically, I have all these weird symptoms, I dont feel right, I'm confused...".

Hush Hush child, you don't have schizophrenia or psychosis. Relax. You are going to be fine. You won't believe it now, or in a month, or in two months, but you will eventually.

By the way, recovery from DP isn't something that suddenly happens. You kind of just eventually forget about it. So stop waiting around waiting for your brain to snap its fingers and turn you back. Just go watch a Disney movie, eat some popcorn, call up your friends, and chill out.

Hope I helped. Because I'm right.


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## lostit (Sep 12, 2016)

Nice to hear that u are recovered.What about existential thoughts now whennu are recovered?


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## Alan (Jan 26, 2015)

It's unfortunate that this is your first post as I'm sure you mean well, but I've actually approved this as an example of how not to post.



> First off, disregard everyone else's post. I know that is a bold statement, but just do it. This is all you need. I'm right.


It is a bold statement, and quite dismissive with regards to the hundreds of members that have contributed valuable stories, information and research to the forums. From the forum guidelines -



> *Opinions as fact*
> 
> Please avoid presenting your opinions as facts. This includes theories about the mechanism of DP, theories about the origin and causes of DP and opinions about treatments (e.g. I've heard TMS referred to as "dangerously zapping your brain" and said to cause permanent brain damage despite massive evidence to the contrary). There are almost no hard facts about DP. Even the best models of the neurobiology of DP aren't universally applicable and these are things that can be established empirically. No treatment, cause or mechanism is universally applicable. This relates to my previous addendum about guaranteed cures. There are no guarantees with DP.





> Recovery has nothing to do with your thought process, or how much weed you smoked, or how large of a panic attack you had, so stop worrying. Actually you can keep worrying, it really doesn't change anything. Recovery comes from your brain's PHYSICAL CHEMICAL RE BALANCE. If you aren't recovered yet, you aren't supposed to be. Your brain needs time to slowly reset everything, just let it do its job. If you need to sit inside for a few months and watch movies because you can't go outside with your condition, that's fine!


CBT based approaches to DPDR treatment exist and there are several papers in peer reviewed journals detailing this approach, so I'd say that your though process can potentially play a huge part in your recovery.

As with depression, a simple monoamine neurotransmitter based view of the condition is likely an oversimplification at best.



> Klonopin. If you have anxiety, or panic, or whatever, I strongly recommend trying this out. Its not physically addictive, but can be mentally addictive, as it is so helpful.


This is simply incorrect, benzodiazepenes are well known to be physically addictive, as many of our forum members will attest first hand. I agree that they can be very helpful for some people, but their use is not without a certain amount of risk which people should bear in mind when making a decision as to whether to use them or not.



> Just rest assured that its going to take you anywhere from 3months to 2 years to recover, but you will recover.
> 
> For those of you who have had DP for more than two years, or feel that as you are approaching the two year mark and haven't felt any better: Like I said, everyone is different, brains recover at different rates. I'd say 95% of people recover within a two year time frame, but some take longer. I promise you won't be stuck like this forever
> 
> You might "lose" a year of your life, but I was still able to pull my GPA back up to a 3.9 while Dp'ed out, so don't sweat it. It's a learning experience.


I've suffered with this condition for around 13 years, some other members have experienced it for longer. I always try to make the point when people ask about the duration that I'm not indicative of the progress they can make in recovering and I actively promote an optimistic attitude, but your statements again just aren't correct and are rather dismissive to those of us that do have experience with this long term.



> Hush Hush child, you don't have schizophrenia or psychosis. Relax. You are going to be fine. You won't believe it now, or in a month, or in two months, but you will eventually.


I find this to be pretty patronising. I agree that most people that experience DPDR are not psychotic or in the early stages of schizophrenia but these are real concerns for people. It's actually so common I have a canned response post for it. But "Hush hush child"? Really?



> Hope I helped. Because I'm right.


I'm sure that was your intention, but again you're stating your opinion and not fact.


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## Forge132 (Sep 12, 2016)

Alan, I apologize for the misinformation about the Benzo. I agree I was wrong, it is in fact physically addictive. Not sure why I wrote that.


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## Forge132 (Sep 12, 2016)

Edit: Benzos are physically addictive, the first post is misinforming. Always consult your Doctor before starting a medication.


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## Forge132 (Sep 12, 2016)

lostit said:


> Nice to hear that u are recovered.What about existential thoughts now whennu are recovered?


I still get them from time to time, but they aren't those Gnawing, Confusing ones that have to be answered. They're just normal ones, like the ones you used to have before you got DP.


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## partiedtoohard (Feb 24, 2016)

Glad you are doing better friend. Keep up the good health.


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## yoloking123 (Jul 6, 2016)

I sure hope your right bro.


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## yoloking123 (Jul 6, 2016)

Is the anxiety all gone also? Please respond.


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## Alex617 (Sep 23, 2015)

Great post but have to correct you on the Klonopin. It's absolutely physically addictive, benzos are popular street drugs for a reason. Withdrawal can cause seizures, and it does alter your brain chemistry if used long-term. Only use if it's an extreme downspiral.


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