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Hi, I'm new to this site, but a veteran of hppd and it's associated symptoms. Anyways, I've been down the traditional routes with little relief; I am now trying a different approach. At the request of my neurologist (a smart guy in his own right) I am going into vision therapy. After reviewing the site -- http://drmccrodan.com/brain-injury/ -- I am fairly confident that this will have an impact. The overlap between hppd symptoms and traditional brain injury symptoms cannot be ignored. If you read that webpage you will see that he is talking about exactly what we are dealing with and I hope that his treatment is effective. Here are the symptoms of a brain injury (chemical imbalances are brain injuries in their own right) Sensitivity to light Sensitivity to patterns Double vision Swimming sensations or moving backgrounds Moving objects appearing to have a trail behind them Not being able to focus for periods of time Difficulty changing point of focus Headaches or Migraines Poor hand-eye coordination Reduced peripheral vision Dizziness/nausea Poor depth perception For me this is very exciting after being static for so long. In my opinion I think the "cure" for what we have will come from retraining of the brain, not retaking of a pill. I will update this thread as the therapy progresses. Wish me luck - Mike ps. A link for the users who wish to read studies on the effectiveness of such treatment http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18156092

I have 'had' HPPD for 32 years and I completely agree with this poster. I don't come to this forum very often - about 3 or 4 times a year, mainly to see if there's been any progress and also to lend support to anyone who may have just 'got' this often confusing thing. For the first 2 years I did the usual round of eye doctors with the same results you've all had. I tried dozens of homeopathic medicines. For anxiety a doctor gave me Valium. Getting out of it on further chemicals isn't going to do it. In the end I realized that this was now 'me'. You can't go back to the 'real you'. I had a tendency to look back on my glory days as a late teen with rose colored specs, but the period I was looking at, I was usually out of it all the time on various substances. And why exactly was I self medicating anyway? The only way through is forward. Do what you want in life and face it down. It's really not easy for anyone and a large percentage of the 'normal' population are miserable and hopped up on anxiety/depression meds and/or drinking every night. Society offers us very little. Marriage/house/cars etc...are the carrots most people chase endlessly without getting anywhere. The poster who said 'you don't want to end up middle aged and grey with HPPD' is part of the reason I avoid this place. I'm not making light of his problems but hey...I'm just going through divorce, have lost full time custody of my beloved son and I'm 51 years of age. I'm still looking to the future, have a wonderful girlfriend who appreciates me for who I am and what I do and I look forward to the next 32 years. My ex, hasn't got HPPD and never did too many drugs but does have a miserable drink problem and is constantly unhappy despite a fairly privaleged upbringing and many opportunities. Don't waste your life waiting for a cure and accept yourself for who you are, not who you were. I think it's admirable that people are putting their heads together here and asking questions but it's the negative obsessing that drags you down. As the above poster said, pretend you're ok and eventually you will be. I still get black/white microbe like specs if I look for them (I rarely do) but the awful DP/DR stopped after a couple of years. I am prone to stress (but maybe I always was). I teach and the worst symptom that comes back occasionally is an inability to form words without slurring or stuttering. I saw one other post regarding this. As I have to lecture classes this can be difficult at times (happens once or twice a year) but experience has told me to soldier on and it goes away after a few days. Do yoga. Excercise. Meditate. Fall in love. Be fascinated in the world. Confront your worst social fears and you'll be ok. I embarrassed myself with my weirdness for years but it gets better. One interesting thing is that I never remember HPPD as part of any life events or experiences after the first couple of years. The first two I remember as a bad trip. But I decided to move on. Good luck.

Was it difficult? I'm considering going to university but due to the cognitive defects of HPPD I'm not sure how easy I'm going to find it, especially with the memory impairment. Has anyone been through university since onset of HPPD, and if so, how was it for you?

I've had HPPD for 17 years or so, and I have 2 masters degrees, from a top 10 school. I'm planning on getting a third from a top 5 next year. Although i can't be certain, HPPD may have helped me along the way. In addition to HPPD, i've also suffered from side effects of concussions, and I feel better when I continually prove to myself that I can 'hang' with some of the smartest people in the world. It validates to me that I haven't done disastrous damage to my mind. Without HPPD or the concussions, perhaps I would be fat, drunk and stupid. Regardless, HPPD has not diminished your intellect. It just makes it difficult to concentrate. If you're studying what you're passionate about, you'll do just fine. Be well.

I just watched this last night on Netflix. Somewhat different from what we've all been through but I found it relatable nonetheless. It's about this guy whose best friend died in a motorcycle accident and afterwards he developed the ability to see ghosts, balls of colored light and auras of energy around people. I've had hppd for 32 years now. It's not something I think about a lot and I tend to discount the theories that suggest this is an advanced kind of vision. However, I seperated from my wife over 2 years ago. On one of the last nights in the house I was sitting greiving in the living room in the dark when a ball of green light appeared at the other end of the room. It wasn't frightening. I looked down then up after about a minute and it had gone. My girlfriend practices yoga and says it was my heart chakra. The guy in the doc saw a ball of light come out of his friend's chest a couple of days before he died. He didn't specify the color. I avoid new age things like the plague in general but I do wonder. My 'bullshit detector' developed at an alarming rate after I got hppd too. I thought I was paranoid about people for a long time but I'm almost always correct about sneaky, underhand people. It's a curse. I'm not a nut and I retain a healthy skepticism about this but...anyone else have similar experiences?

Explain your experience and reaction when you first got the disorder.

"comfort the desperate" as i said before.. glad you can goto other practitioner's now without the evil eye. hope your well.