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Hello and Happy New Year. I am new to the forum and how I got here was from watching a Vice interview with Andrew Callaghan, who has/had a YouTube channel called "All Gas No Brakes". If you are not aware of him, he does a type of Gonzo video journalism with some pretty hilarious results. Anyway, at the end of the interview he mentioned how he had HPPD and had gotten it from overuse of mushrooms which he started using at 13 and he's now 20 something. Anyway, I had never heard of HPPD so I decided to look it up, and that led me down the rabbit hole of YouTube videos, some medical journals and then finally to this forum. After reading about it now for many hours over the last two days, seeing some examples of what it could be it and hearing others' experience with HPPD, it made me wonder if this is something that I have had now, in varying degrees, for over 30 years? Let me explain: I am now 47 and I first took acid when I was 13 and did it twice. Then, when I was 15 until 18 I went full on into the acid world along with almost daily pot smoking which caused my school performance to go completely down the tubes. I went from being an A/B student to just graduating from high school. I eventually stopped using acid when a particularly bad trip, which was brought on by too much pure liquid LSD followed by some serious pot smoking, caused me to have a serious meltdown, making me feel as if I was in some type of cartoon land. It was very scary. I know now that part of what I felt that caused the exteme panic was depersonalization. I felt completely disconnected from the real world, and my friends I was with. I had had some other meltdowns in the past but this one was a doozy. I only did acid one more time after that and after that last trip I remember that the after effects seemed to linger longer than normal and kind of caused me some anxiety and paranoia. I believe that this was also when a fear of choking on my food began to rear it's ugly head. That I have gotten under control now. Around this time, age 18, I also quit smoking weed regularly. Whenever I would do it, feelings of the bad trip would come back, making me anxious, uncomfortable and on some occasions causing depersonalization. Of course at the time, I had no idea what it was. I just felt very weird and outside of myself and wondered if I would ever feel normal again. Of course, I told no one not even my friends about it and just privately dealt with it until I eventually just learned to accept it for what it was (even though I didn't know what "it" was until now). I knew however that taking drugs was not good for me which is why I pretty much cut them out. All except for alcohol. I took magic mushrooms a few times in my 20s, which was fine (no freak outs) and then 5 years ago, when I was 42, I took a microdose for the first time in over 20 years. The experience, since it was very mild, I remember as being quite enjoyable. I don't seem to remember any negative effects other than having a hard time falling asleep due to the visuals with my eyes closed. The next day was also a bit of a struggle. I have never done MDMA, ketamine or other synthetic drugs. While I am fairly anxiety-free now, in my early 20s, which wasn't long after I quit both LSD and pot, I began to have panic attacks. My first one happened when I was 21 and at the time I didn't know what was happening, I just felt like I was having a flashback. It was brought on now doubt, due to my living at the time, which was just existing, and being under a lot of both mental and personal stress. They continued at completely random times for a few years until they went away. This was probably due to my having started to exercise and eat better when I hit 24, and my way of living was getting better. I also did cocaine for the first time and did it very sporadically until about age 35. I continued drinking primarily and then smoking pot when the mood struck me. The decision to get high would usually turn out to be a bad idea because I would always do it when I was drunk. One particular episode when I was 36, of drinking and smoking more than I usually did (one or two bowl hits) led me to have only what I can refer to as a "pot black out" where I don't remember what I did for an hour or more until I came to or began to sober up. I guess it was a DP/DR thing. All I know is that my girlfriend at the time, who was a huge stoner, didn't like the fact that I ran off with a married woman and wandered around this music festival with her for an unspecified period. I often wondered if the weed was laced but it just turns out that weed strains now are very potent. During my teens I started to drink and have continued to do so. For a while it was beer and then wine before turning into drinking hard liquor on a daily basis. At first it didn't seem to be any problem but it eventually began to make me wonder three years ago if I was turning into an alcoholic. Not to mention I was also having depression, anxiety, etc. But again I didn't make the connection between the two. I was also exercising regularly, eating healthy, meditating, doing yoga and other good things. During the pandemic I decided to cut way back on my drinking and smoke more weed. I had always had an on/off again relationship with weed since I cut it out in my teens due to reasons listed above but now I am beginning to think that I need to cut it out once and for all because it aggravates what I believe to be HPPD. It's a shame though, because I feel that now I can truly enjoy weed again after not being able to for so long. Even times when I have gotten too high, while it can feel a little uncomfortable, I can manage. I am sure this all has to do with age, self-awareness and knowing how to handle anxiety. My HPPD symptoms, if that is truly what it is are the following: 1. Mild visual snow when in mid to darkly lit rooms or outside at night. 2. Things changing shape, etc if I stare too long at them or until I blink. This is especially a problem watching TV or having a conversation with people. If I stare (zone out) at the TV or anything too long, after a while everything else in the background will seem to melt away. I have to shake myself out of it. Maybe this is why I don't like to watch a lot of TV?? 3.After images, I seem to get this a lot from computer screens, which is why I have started wearing blue screen glasses 4.Ghosting of things. 5. Floaters. 6.When I was younger and this probably began after I first tripped, I use to always get crazy visuals at night when I would fall asleep. I don't have them so much anymore but every now and then, usually after too much caffeine, I can get little spots of light in my vision. 7.If I concentrate hard enough on things like my carpet, crazy designs, etc. I can "see" vague images but they are not enough to cause me any panic. 8. Reading in dark mode on my IPad at night, in the dark, can also make text kind of weird causing some ghosting. 9. I play music and sometimes after having stared at music notation for a period, the notes can seem to change ever so slightly. While I don't see them now I am sure there was a time when I would get trails from objects, albeit very subtle. I always thought that this had something to do with my bad eyesight: I wear contacts and have an astigmatism in my left eye. At the same time, ALL these things can get amplified when I smoke pot,drink or do both, which I usually do, and will usually persist even when I am sober. They have also happened after having taken an Delta-8 THC edible. Perhaps this is why I feel just as stoned and out of sorts on D8 THC as I do on regular THC? Over the last few years, since I started smoking pot again (or whenever I have decided to smoke it again), I have noticed these HPPD symptoms ramping up. The same thing with OCD, which I only realized I had a few years ago, even though I had gotten negative or weird thoughts throughout my life since I first used either LSD, pot or both. I sought treatment a few years ago after a period of regular pot smoking mixed with alcohol was causing some more than normal intrusive negative thoughts, and causing me some anxiety. I even saw an OCD specialist for a bit, which helped. While I didn't want to believe it at the same time I am 100 percent certain that the pot use caused it. Based on the HPPD survey that you can sign up for on the first page of this forum, I now believe that early age psychedelic use has caused the following symptoms in my life and have been with me since I was a teen. Again, I never made the connection until I came across HPPD, this forum and took the survey. 1.OCD 2.Vertigo - completely took me by surprise but it makes sense because when I was a kid, before I started using drugs, heights didn't bother me as much as they do now. 3.Chronic back pain?! 4.Panic attacks (though I don't have them anymore) 5.HPPD 6. Social anxiety (not so much anymore). I am more introverted than not but I have to be on when I teach, which is my day job. Other things I have considered that may also be due to my early use of psychedelics: I also don't really like driving at night and its made even worse when it rains. This is due to the halo effect that I can get from on-coming cars' headlights. I am not sure if this is HPPD or not but just thought I would mention it. I could never get those damn "Magic Eye" Puzzles to work. Every time I would zone out on the image and try to see the hidden picture the design would just blur out into nothingness. Certain patterns really hurt my eyes It takes me a while to adjust to darkness For a long time I did reality based visual art and now when I do any sort drawing, especially abstract, I have to try really hard to not get too caught up in whatever random patterns I am creating. Anyway, if HPPD is what I have had with for this long (almost 30 years) then I have learned to deal with it. It is what it is as they say. My life now is the best it's ever been: I am married, have a career I love, and have just a basic quality of living that I had when I was younger; I am sure that has helped a lot. Meditation and mindfulness has helped get my OCD under control and now I am going to cut out both pot and alcohol for at least a month and see what happens. I didn't realize that caffeine can aggravate HPPD and I drink at least 3-4 cups a day so, maybe I need to either cut that out too or at least just have one cup each day. I had Covid-19 as well in 2020, before I was vaccinated, and I wonder now if the 'brain fog" amplifed my HPPD a bit? It is obvious from having read some of the other posts on this forum that my case is not as bad as others and nor was it ever to the point where I couldn't function normally day-to-day. However, it is safe to assume that because I used drugs at such a young age, before my brain was fully developed, HPPD, along with the other symptoms that I have listed above, has been with me a long time. It is just now that I am realizing why that is and for that I feel like I have made in a huge leap in my day-to-day life. Again sorry, for the length of this but I feel I had to get it all out there as a way to help me process it better.

Hello All, My name is Allen. I've browsed this site randomly over the past couple years but was afraid share. I'm in my 30's and have had HPPD 2 for 18 years. I was diagnosed 5 years ago after a seeing countless doctors through the years. Recently I found out my wife was pregnant and I became determined to find a treatment or, god willing, a cure. When I was in my mid teens I took lsd about 5 times and I was a chronic marijuana smoker. The last time I took lsd I smoked weed at the same time and I had the worst experience of my life: My heart began to race uncontrollably, my arms and face became numb; I saw long blury trails on everything and I felt hot and cold all at once. It was so intense that I thought for sure I was going to die. In desperation, I curled up in a ball on my couch, closed my eyes, and began to pray to god repeatedly to make it stop and let me live, until eventually I fell asleep. I woke up the next morning and thanked god I was alive. I swore of lsd forever. Unfortunately that didn't stop me from trying to party with my friends as usual. Every time I smoked weed after that I would have severe panic attacks and almost black out. When I'd drink alcohol I felt like I had a lump in my throat and couldn't breathe. A couple weeks after that horrible trip I woke up to a dull version of the same type of visuals I had the night of my bad trip, I was petrified and began having random panic attacks. I finally told my mother what I did and what happened since and she took me to the doctor. The doctor swore it was depression with anxiety and completely dismissed any lsd involvement. She prescribed me Effexor and xanax. The effexor didn't help at all and it made my heart race. The symptoms were not going away. I was afraid I damaged my brain beyond repair. Shortly after I withdrew from school and became a hermit. The xanax helped a lot with anxiety but the visuals remained. Through the years I saw about a dozen different psychiatrists and none of them knew what was wrong with me and continued me on benzodiazepines and ssri's. I lost my insurance and couldn't afford all the doctor appointments and medicine, so I began getting zoloft and Vicodin off the streets to self medicate. Eventually the visuals became less intense and my panic attacks were less frequent. Although the visuals and anxiety are a part of my daily life, I still manage to function. Some days are worse than others but I forced myself back into society and I got a good job in construction, and married my girlfriend who has been with me through this whole experience. I got off the vicodin with suboxone and continued the zoloft. With the news of our first child, I found a new determination to get rid of this horrible disease for good. I told my doctor that I wanted to try anything we can to make this stop and she agreed to start prescribing me different medications to see what, if anything, will work. She prescribed clonidine last visit and I started it 6 days ago. Unfortunately it hasn't helped my visuals at all and last night I began having strange thoughts and seeing weird images when I closed my eyes. I'll keep everyone updated on how it goes. I'm really hopeful that something will get rid of this for good. Wish me luck and good luck to all of you. P.s. I am thankful to whomever started and maintains this site. I hope we can get this horrible disease more attention and find a real treatment for it.

I’ve had multiple psychedelic / out of body experiences that were induced by marijuana. The first one happened after some type of ego death or shift in awareness. I thought I died, but as I got up and walked around, tons of information started flooding into my mind and I guess I came to the realization/conclusion that I was (of) God / the Universe, it’s only the present, everything is much more connected than we realize, and that I as (first name, last name) really don’t exist as a definite THING. So here’s where my problem lies: Normal existing as a person is like sitting in the drivers seat of a car. The driver (the observing presence which you are) controls the car (your body). What I experienced was being a passenger in the car, observing what I, as the driver, was doing. Basically, I had to experience over a year of my life as the passenger with all sensory experiences and the ability to hear my own thoughts. Eventually this experience came to an end, and I woke up back in my body at the time and place where the experience began, this time as the driver again. I created memories while being the passenger, seeing what I would eventually experience as the driver. So now that I’m the driver, I constantly have things that are like deja vu's but they’re different because I can remember “experiencing” them multiple times in the past during these clairvoyant like experiences. No matter what I “choose” to do with my “free will”, recognition that this event is one of the millions of things that I experienced during the clairvoyant experience. This is driving me crazy because I can’t do anything to stop it or calm it down. I feel like a robot with scripted actions and that everything is predetermined. This lack of perceived control is causing anger and anxiety with no way to disperse of it. I barely enjoy anything in life anymore because it feels like the 3rd, 4th, or 5th time I’ve had to experience it. Which leads me to my next point: I’m afraid that my consciousness is stuck in a casual loop consisting of the past couple of years and won’t ever be able to get out and “progress” forward in time where I can live the way I did before I had marijuana. Also, I don’t smoke anymore. It’s been over a year since I have. I'm currently taking 100mg of Zoloft a day and increasing 25mg a week to deal with what my psychiatrist and therapist have diagnosed as OCD. I know it's more than that though because I can remember my agony and thoughts during the drug trips. I'm sure I have PTSD too because I've been emotionally flat for over 2 years. Any help / advice?

I’ve had multiple clairvoyant experiences that were induced by marijuana. The first one happened after my first spiritual awakening / ego death. I thought I died, but as I got up and walked around, tons of information started flooding into my mind and I guess I came to the realization/conclusion that I was (of) God, it’s only the present, everything is much more connected than we realize, and that I as (first name, last name) really don’t exist as a definite THING. So here’s where my problem lies: Normal existing as a person is like sitting in the drivers seat of a car. The driver (the observing presence which you are) controls the car (your body). What I experienced was being a passenger in the car, observing what I, as the driver, was doing. Basically, I had to experience over a year of my life as the passenger with all sensory experiences and the ability to hear my own thoughts. Eventually this experience came to an end, and I woke up back in my body at the time and place where the experience began, this time as the driver again. I created memories while being the passenger, seeing what I would eventually experience as the driver. So now that I’m the driver, I constantly have things that are like deja vus but they’re different because I can remember “experiencing” them multiple times in the past during these clairvoyant experiences. No matter what I “choose” to do with my “free will”, recognition that this event is one of the millions of things that I experienced during the clairvoyant experience. This is driving me crazy because I can’t do anything to stop it or calm it down. I feel like a robot with scripted actions and that everything is predetermined. This lack of perceived control is causing anger and anxiety with no where to put it. I can’t enjoy anything in life anymore because it feels like the 3rd, 4th, or 5th time I’ve had to experience it. Which leads me to my next point: I’m paranoid that my consciousness is stuck in a casual loop throughout the past couple of years and won’t ever be able to get out and “progress” forward in time where I can live normally again. What the hell can I do? I need some sort of coping mechanism. Also, I don’t smoke anymore. It’s been over a year since I have. I'm currently taking 100mg of Zoloft a day and increasing 25mg a week to deal with what my psychiatrist and therapist have diagnosed as OCD. I know it's more than that though because I can remember my agony and thoughts during the drug trips. I'm sure I have PTSD too because I've been emotionally flat for over 2 years.  Any help / advice?

Hello guys, it's been a year since i had the same problem as you. Always exactly 1 year I took 150ug of LSD and had a terrible bad trip that traumatized me and left me sequels. I had flashbacks and I missed a lot because of it. Distorted visions in my peripheral field. All this was cured with antipsychotics, especially risperidone (I can not remember the dosage). But what it took to be cured was the emotional sequel that caused me. Psychedelic experiences transform you radically and unfortunately if you are not prepared for them it may take a long time for you to get back on track and I confess that I am not yet 100% healed of this trauma. But what I can say to you is that the worst of all this is not the visions, but the horrible thoughts that go through our heads thanks to the anxiety that causes us. And what I want to know about this post is just that. What are the thoughts that torment you because of this anxiety? Write them in the comments and we'll help each other by talking about them. For example, I used to think all the time that I was getting schizophrenic, that there would be some outbreak, over time this evolved into existential crises where I thought my soul was lost in space time and I was not living reality, just watching it (depersonalization and derealization helped in this).

So, I have a question for those that are either currently smoking weed or used to when they HPPD. My questionsare, how much did you smoke? Was it the normal amount you smoked? More? Less? A single hit? Additionally, if you did it in small amounts (less than what you normally did or just a single hit, big or small), how much worse did it make your HPPD, if at all? I live in the US in the great state of Washington (there's the state and the capital, I live in the state) where recreational use/purchase of weed is legal. The temptation was just too much and I ended up buying just over an eighth from 2 well known and reputable dispenenaries in my city. One strain is a milder one that the cashier ("budtenders" as they like to call themselves) reccommended for anxiety (low THC indica hybrid), and the other is a high THC, high CBD indica. I haven't smoked any of it though, but when and if I do, I'm only going to take one small hit or enough to feel a little buzz (my tolerance is low enough that one hit is probably going to do it for me) Long story short, if I smoke a tiny amount of weed (one small hit), will my HPPD become significantly worse and/or permanent or will it be benign? Thanks in advance

Hey guys, not sure if you remember me, but I was part of the old HPPDOnline.com before the site and all of it's data was lost. I recorded videos for that site as months went on talking about how life has been. Maybe you remember?? Jay and Merkan better. Anyways, so here I am. Why? ... Anyone? Because I was stupid enough to try smoking Marijuana again. I was curious to see how it would effect my symptoms. I missed the high as well, and wanted to feel it again. I wanted to feel unrestricted. If you remember, I got this lovely vision back in May of 2008 when I was 17, going on 18 in June. It was hella scary, and I must of went to every single doctor title ever created only to be told in a "professionally nice" way, I was crazy. I discovered HPPDOnline and the disorder itself through my mom after going a month of being completely frightened, clueless, house ridden, and suicidal. Google did the trick, and I met all of you inspirational guys. You would think I would of learned my lesson right? I mean I got all of this from Marijuana alone, never did any other drug, and got quite the list of shit vision. -Ghosting -Static -Trails -Afterimages -Awful trouble looking at anything white -Peripheral color distortion -Patterns, negative outlines, and flashes of light -Starbursting -Brain fog -Derealization -Depersonalization And never being able to see the moon correctly again. I always see 1 and a distorted half. Thanks ghosting... I never took medication because I didn't want to go through the scary withdrawal effects I have heard from some of you. Anyways I smoked Marijuana with some friends two nights in a row and had absolutely no after effects. It made me sort of cocky, happy, and felt free. Was I finally able to smoke again with no nightmare awaiting afterwards?? Not that Marijuana was a big thing for me, but it certainly since 2008, has been my biggest mystery. How can Marijuana do so much damage? I've never dropped an Acid tab in my life, but I am certainly seeing like it! ... Anyways so I was happy. Maybe my brain changed! I definitely knew my HPPD had significantly improved. Very slowly to the point of unnoticeable, but surely. So what did I do? I smoked a few nights later with a different friend. Different weed. While I was high, I started seeing trails when moving my hands and I said out loud, "No no no... not again." The trails never went away originally, but these ones while I was high was much more intense and lingered longer. I tried to stay calm, and I did. The visual static became more intense as well. When I finally went to bed, I woke up with pretty bad derealization vision, and a little static. I was still able to get out and go to job interviews, put on a damn good act, and ace a job. Two weeks later, (Now) HPPD has progressed significantly. -Very thick static that flashes fast like a strobe light -Ghosting -Awful vivid trails. Turning pages in a training binder is just disgusting. -Negative outlines of objects and people. -Flashing lights for no reason. -Detailed afterimages And looking at anything white is god awful. It's bright, flickery, blotchy with black and other colors mixed in. Just a mess... HPPD progressed for me the same way after onset in '08, and hit a baseline after about 3 months. This made me realize just how much I have healed since 2008. I think all I had left until two weeks ago, was trails and ghosting. I know I got used to a fair amount over the years, but the vividness of all of it certainly died down. So now I'm literally back to square one, but a square one with much more vividness. I'm scared, frightened, insecure as hell, and house riddden. Well, I do get my ass out to go to work overnight, but that's about it, and it's so hard to do. I don't want to go back out and do what I've been doing. I.E. watch TV, go to Baseball games, drive around, go to familiar places, because I know I'll be freaked and sad when I see just how much these joys have changed visually... I really hope I can still enjoy a Baseball game, but a lot of it is white, including the jerseys and ballpark soooooo . . . I just really needed to vent to you guys. For those who don't know me, hi! Nice to meet you. For those who do, it's been a long time. How are you? I'm just scared that my vision won't improve and this is what I'm left with. I smoked another time back in 2011, which is when I developed trails. Those never went away, but significantly decreased in vividness, and I got used to them, thus becoming part of my everyday life. Do you guys share the same symptoms? Especially the white color problems? What are your symptoms?? What would you rate my HPPD? Texting this story from my phone is quite fun let me tell you! Had to turn the brightness down. Regardless, I just really need to talk to someone who understands, and talking to you guys about this has made me feel a lot better. Thanks for listening, -GMAN P.S. Here's a fairly recent picture of me since the profile picture uploader isn't coded correctly. I lost all my hair! Bruce Willis or NAW???

anyone who got HPPD or Depersonalisation , got headaches as well ? i have derealization and visual snow, and i get terrible headaches, which seem to move around. thanks

hey guys, im new here, so i have been suffering from this thing for about 2 months now, but i actually don't know what it is ? whether DP/DR ? or HPPD ? or something else. i got all this from smoking weed, out of a printing paper (A4). havent touched LSD, MDMA etc ever. ohh!, and i never had that 'i am going to die feeling, when i was high'. and i believe i have a bit of social anxiety. i'm a 22 year old male, with no history of mental illnesses. here is what i have:- visual snow (mostly in darkness and dim lights) very sensitive to all kinds of light. (even sunlight) very intense migrainous headaches at the base of skull slight halos around streetlights, and starbursts from distant lights. only negative afterimages faint ringing in ears, ear pain and popping in the right ear from time to time some sounds feel amplified floaters in white backgrounds changed visual perception the vision where u feel ur still high, or stoned. (is this derealization ?) anxiety (along with the 1001 symptoms that come with it) a strange thing which occurs to me is that, i see streaking/starbursting on lights which are far away, but if the same light source comes close, the streaking goes away! here is what i don't have:- trails/tracers blue field entoptic phenomena colour confusion movement in objects and walls geometric patterns size distortions i saw, both eye doctors and neurologists, got an MRI scan, and everything seems to be normal, according to the doctors! i've yet to see a mental doctor. i got prescribed klonopin, took it a few times, for me it doesn't do much, other than making me sleepy. sorry for making such a long post. any help is greatly appreciated. thanks

hello there, HPPD online members ! i have been smoking marijuana, for about 2 months now, occasionally, and never had any problem before, but after the last time i smoked weed, which was about 4 weeks ago, i have been experiencing some strange symptoms, which has really started to scare the hell out of me, and giving me terrible anxiety. the symptoms include : 1) increased sensitivity to light, it feels like the world around me is brighter than usual, and colours are more saturated. (especially red), every kind of artificial light is bright to me, my eyes hurt when i look at lights and sometimes i get headaches also. 2) i see after images of objects when i look at them, (mostly lights) and computer screens. lights seem to have a glow to them. 3) when i close my eyes, i see grainy & noisy vision. i also see it when i'm somewhere dark. 4) at night, i have starbursts from car headlights and street lights, (mostly lights which are bulbs). this is really bothering me much. 5) if i stare at wavy patterns for a long time (10-15 seconds) they seem to move. 6) it feels like i am able to see things very deeply and clearly, which i was not able to see before. patterns seem to be more visible and pronounced in things i look at. 7)i have a changed perception, where objects seem to be either larger or smaller and they were before. kind of like in 3D. 8)i feel incredibly lazy and always want to sleep. and i find it difficult to remember things from a few days back. 9)i have become kind of a loner, and i dont want to socialize much with people, and the world somewhat feels different to me. these are the symptoms i can currently remember, ive been to eye doctors, and neurologists, and they say that nothing is wrong with me, although they gave me a couple of eye drops, and clonazepam. they say that because i smoked weed, it has changed the way my brain works, and its going to take time to feel normal again. so i want to know, if im suffering from HPPD, Depersonalization/Derealization or just anxiety ? i would like to state that i have never done LSD, shrooms , cocaine , MDMA, Tobacco etc. (only alcohol and marijuana). any kind of help is greatly appriciated, kind regards

Hi guys, im a fellow hppd sufferer and my name is dan. I started smoking weed around age 17 or so and loved it, so I continued to do so until a few months ago after developing hppd. Im currently 20 years old, enrolled as a student at a community college and have had multiple jobs in the past including machine operator, party rental laborer, and landscaper. During the course of my smoking, I started to get into heavier and heavier drugs and ended up doing LSD about 4 times, mushrooms about 5, molly around 4 and other things such as methadone, pills and a bunch of other fun stuff. I always thought I was under control of the drugs I was using, which was correct to an extent because I never got to the point where I used drugs every day. But, as we all know, substance abuse can quickly get out of hand. The fateful night that led ultimately to my hppd involved me and a friend of mine waiting on a connect to score some mushrooms. We waited for hours, thinking he would never get there, and he ended up showing up late at night with acid instead of shrooms. The friends I was with at the time were antsy to begin with so we were content with dropping the acid and putting the wait behind us. I took 3 tabs in overconfidence and after about 30 minutes I began to feel the effects and started driving on the highway and smoking a blunt with the friend I went with to get the "shrooms" and the trip started to get very intense. I dropped him off at his house and I went home too. I started to get a deep feeling of dread along with severe paranoia and feeling that I was going to die. There were extremely intense visuals involved, and I had a hallucination that I thought at the time encompassed the theme of the universe but its very hard to describe. It was kinda like a huge bright light in the upper-right hand corner of my vision and a sewer in the lower left that had rats and vines trying to escape, but kept getting knocked back by the light. I ended up going to the hospital and having saline pumped through my veins to clear the toxicity and the hellish trip finally subsided. The next day, all I wanted to do was smoke some weed to calm my nerves, but when I did, I felt like the trip was coming back all over again and I went home to calm down. A few days later, i came to grips with the fact that I had symptoms that weren't going away. I started to research my symptoms immediately and found that I definitely have at least mild hppd. My symptoms include: Tracers (black squiggly lines that move about occasionally) Afterimages Sensitivity to light Visual snow Some degree of dp/dr with cognitive losses slight anxiety and depression So its been about 2 months and ive been trying different things to resolve these issues such as valerian root, GABA, 5Htp, fish oil and vitamins B and C. Im not too sure what works the best yet, but valerian root seems to be a lifesaver for me right now. My symptoms are a bit less worse than they were when I first got them, but im now abstaining from all drug and alcohol use and im slowly feeling better over time. Im so glad that I found a place where there are people like me suffering with what I thought was a very rare disorder. Thanks for reading my story everyone Best wishes, Dan

So I'm just trying to find some commonalities amongst all of us and determine what the main culprit in causing HPPD is(i.e. frequency, dosage, substance). So if you could just list the drugs you used up until HPPD and what substances you used after HPPD and how frequently, I'd appreciate it. Also, if you could state whether or not your HPPD was instantaneous after a particular experience or gradual.....I guess really I just want like as detailed of an account as your trying to give from the time you started using drugs up until this point. If you don't wanna read this entire thing(It's kinda long) just skip to the bottom. Story: {{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{So for me I smoked weed for about a year before my HPPD "hit" I had done ecstasy around 20-25 times, taken LSD about 5 times, shrooms once, cocaine twice, and pills every now and then(klonopin, xanax, vicodin) but not very often. The bulk of my ecstasy use was the summer before I got into LSD.......After all my ecstasy use I had a little HPPD, I would see trails on certain things and I had a little light sensitivity but nothing out of control. It really didn't bother me at all, everything just looked a little more vibrant and alive. So then sophomore year(when I started using LSD) of college I found a LSD hook up and started trippin. I tripped 3 times over like 1 1/2 months and felt completely fine. No anxiety or weird visuals and my weed highs were still normal. Then I took like a 2 week break and then tripped acid twice more within like 3 weeks of each other. After these two trips things started to go down hill. These last 2 acid trips I had were terrible. I was really paranoid and one of my friends was screwing with me the entire time and the experiences left me in some odd state of mind. Afterwards things started to look a little "acid-like" when I was sober but I still felt like everything was ok. However whenever I would smoke weed I started to clam up and have a lot of anxiety and couldn't really speak straight at all. So I decided to take a break on weed for Christmas break and when I tried to smoke once second semester started the problems were like 20 times worse. From here on out things gradually got worse and worse, I tried to continue smoking as I thought if I regained my tolerance weed would go back to normal. After a bit of this the weird delusional thoughts and anxiety started creeping into my sober life and I decided to stop smoking weed. But, I did decide to do DMT twice and LSD once in an attempt to have a good experience and maybe redirect where everything was heading. It didn't really help....it made the visuals slightly worse but overall was just a waste of time and money. So I decided to stop with all the psychedelics and was "sober" for about a month before I went to a 2 day rave. I took ecstasy both days thinking I could never have a bad experience with that but did and that weekend worsened my visuals quite a bit. So........about a month later I got hit with DP and that was about 7 months ago.....I've taken ecstasy twice since DP hit.....Once was terrible and once was actually enjoyable. I've been more or less sober since around August except for a few drinks from time to time. So yea that's my drug story.....all of that was within about a year and a half from the first time I smoked weed to the time I got DP.}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}} I don't expect most people to of read all of that but mainly what I'm wanting is just to know what you believe the main culprit of your DP/DR/HPPD was. I think for me it was the two negative experiences I had on LSD. Those two experiences just set in a negative undertone to my subsequent drug use from that point forward. I feel like if I had kept the same frequency of drug usage but avoided those negative trips then I never would've developed anxiety that never would've led to DP and I don't believe my HPPD would've gotten as bad.

Sorry about wall of text. Please help me!!! Hello all, my first time posting here, I'll start with my story. I'm 16, 17 in a couple months. I had an 8th of mushrooms the day after my 15th birthday, had a great experience with no noticable persisting effects, tried acid a month later. It was not lsd. It tasted strongly of harsh, metallic, bitter, hairspray-like chemicals. I took 2 hits, the girl who had taken the same stuff said one tab her made her feel it mildly, so I figured 2 was fine. I thought the risks were of a bad trip, I wasn't worried about hppd. After I took it, I read online about lsd mimics and taste and had some anxiety, understandably. I was alone for the whole trip. It went ok, about 12 hours after taking it I went to sleep, I didn't have any freakouts, I was just a little stressed that I had taken a mystery drug. The main effect of the drug was a pattern tied to the floor. It was only on my low-quality, reddish-orange carpet, not on walls or ceilings. It looked like curvy, goopy lines that formed symbols in circular formations on the carpet. I also was able to make flat surfaces "melt"(although with this drug it was more like turn to energy and buzz) while under its influence. I didn't notice static during the trip. I did half an eighth of shrooms 3 months later, and the acid(by acid I mean mystery drug) pattern returned to the floor, like, bam. Never saw it on my first shroom trip. It was just like, normal looking floor, take barely any shrooms, bam, instant spiderweb of lines that won't go away no matter what. This stressed me out quite a bit, and went away completely when the shrooms wore off, and I haven't had a bad trip yet, out of my 3 total. I don't know really if I have hppd or not. My vision is permanently altered. Meaning, everything in my field of vision now buzzes with shimmery, staticky energy. An object I focus on, like a tree, looks totally clear, but my vision is always buzzing and shimmering. Also sometimes when there's a bunch of bits of something on the floor(e.g. white specks on black floor) if I try I can make them separate and move and zone out, and sometimes even melt/buzz. Only if I try though. Closed eyes and dark rooms are comfortable for me. I see light amounts of multicolored static in dark and closed eyes, but it is light, not enough to stress me out. I get no cevs, no pure blackness but nothing disturbing or approaching what I saw when on drugs. When I get stoned and go to bed, the visuals are not distracting, nor are they like they were when I was on the acid, where I had to keep my eyes open just to avoid sensory overload and sharp piercing colors. Smoking weed gives me a little acid high every time I do it. It increases the shimmers and makes it easier to intentionally trip like I just mentioned. Hell, I can't trip out to a surface unless I've smoked weed, drank alcohol, etc recently. I've still been smoking weed multiple times a day every day for the last couple years though. I certainly don't have anything close to the hell some of you describe, absolutely no suicidal impulses, haven't been depressed. I've been living with acid visuals, so to speak. I got myself all worked up about hppd about a year ago by reading about it on the internet, but I just convinced myself I'd get better with time and ignored it, which is for the most part good advice as far as I've read. After I worried about it for a few months, I stopped. I quit worrying about visuals and continued to smoke weed all day every day and enjoy myself high without worrying about visuals, which by the way were just the shimmers, because I was not looking at surfaces and making myself trip. During this time I passed the G.E.D. to graduate high school early and before that got a's in advanced classes(weird guy I know) as if to demonstrate that I was still functional in a spaced-out, foggy, weed/acid state. I did spend a couple months sober last year, but I was very sick during that time with a very physically painful stomach illness and I don't remember that period too well. I believe the visuals subsided only a little, but I was very stressed during that time, purely as a result of physical pain. I resumed smoking weed right when I got better, and I haven't been able to discern any loss or rise in weed visuals over the last year... until a couple days ago. A couple days ago I had nothing to do alone for like 10 hours, and high quantities of top shelf medical cannabis plus excessive indoor shut-in video gaming lead me to begin stressing over my visuals again. I began stressing over the shimmer-vision, which weed greatly increases but does not impair functionality. It seems to only really exist in my peripheral or on flat things like walls, trees don't shimmer, words on books and the web shimmer a little, but I can read smaller print than a lot of functional older folks so I think I'm fine. Then I re-researched hppd, found this site, and worried myself sick while reading all the posts that say don't smoke weed, hppd never got better, hppd came back after a period of none, etc etc. That night, I smoked some weed, felt a little better, looked at my garage floor, and that same pattern was there, and it would not go away. First time I've noticed that pattern in months, used to see it when high at the location of my acid trip, nowhere else, now I'm seeing it on the garage floor and sidewalks. Anything grainy. Flat walls are clean if a bit shimmery and buzzy. Generic carpets have started to show ghosts of these patterns, but not overlays like before. It isn't as strong as it was on the mushrooms trip, it is transitory, transparent, ghostlike, but it bugs me. And last night, I smoked some weed, sat down, stared at the garage floor pattern, and had an intense acid flashback where the floor melted into moving energetic electric goop just like on my acid trip and I felt extreme dp/dr/disassociation/ego loss/what-have-you. I felt extreme pressure in my head and extreme distance from reality during the visual. e.g., I was spaced out and it was difficult to break. One thing to consider is that I've been stuck with sativa-dominant weed after a large purchase by a buddy and I. One other thing to consider is that I've been smoking all kinds of great weed including sativa dominant kinds without significant problems. One other thing to consider is that I used to have problems eating and sleeping before marijuana use and marijuana has helped me with those quite a bit, even after I did acid. So the main advice on this board is, don't focus on the problem, meaning don't look for these ghosts of acid patterns in my floors, and avoid all drug use. But you see, quitting weed just because if I try I can trip would be focusing on the hppd! It'd be changing my whole life based around hppd rehabilitation! I'm afraid, however, that if I don't quit it could get worse, or keep it from getting better. I really don't mind the temporary visuals I get when high enough to stop smoking, I get overall more enjoyment then sadness from marijuana, which is something I am very thankful for. I'm so glad I stopped my hallucinogen use when I did and didn't take more hits.(I was thinking about taking more my 1st time!) I just don't want to make my situation worse! I realize I'm very young, and my mind is still developing, and so I'd like some advice from those experienced with hppd regarding marijuana in a minor case. I want to be able to enjoy marijuana later in my life, and I want to do what will cause the most overall happiness in life. Marijuana gives me a shortcut to happiness, but I read about hppd getting worse and worse with continued marijuana use, and I want to be able to enjoy marijuana when I'm 40, but from what I've read I may be killing my chances at that by smoking so much lately and worrying about this so much lately. I imagine it's possible a few years of sobriety will lessen my hppd symptoms to the point where cannabis doesn't cause me to see this pattern, and it's possible continued daily use will worsen the symptoms until pot becomes unpleasant. I hated the feeling of my acid flashback, felt out of control and physically sick, but if I didn't stare at the floor and zone out, it wouldn't have happened. Although, now that I've noticed it again, I can't get that pattern out of that floor, I see a little ghost of it every time I glance at the floor. Another thing I'm worried about is, if I quit for a few years and try it again, I'll have no tolerance and I'll get crazily high and my visuals will almost definitely come back, give me a bad trip like last night, and scare me away. So I haven't smoked any since last night. The visuals have gone down a little, but it has been a while(maybe 3 months) since I've gone 3 days or more without smoking. The pattern is still there, on the floor, at least little bits and pieces, would it really be logical to discontinue marijuana use, and deal with the problems of no drive to eat(affecting me today) or sleep and make this drastic life change just for the effects I described? Would it be unsafe to get some nice indica and go outside for a change of pace and just avoid tripping by not spacing out at floors and stuff?

I'm 16 right now, a junior in high school and my HPPD starts the summer of me going into freshman year. I smoked for the first time with one of my close friends and it was some cheap mids.Took about 8-10 decent hits out of a soda can and didn't feel much until i went inside and it hit me. The lights were really bright an I felt like a marshmallow on the couch. It took me awhile to get used to the feeling and at first I was really paranoid but later I ended up having a great time. I remember smoking a few more times soon after that and getting really dazed and didn't really do much but think to myself which stopped me from socializing and having a good time with my friends. Every time I would smoke it took me a little bit and then it would hit me, "I remember this feeling", "I feel like I'm in a dream". This is started me down a bad path in my future and I didn't really want to do much with myself except for experiment with weed. I graduated middle school with 10 kids in my class and I had a few REALLY close friends that I hung onto and all we wanted to do is light up, but I did not smoke a lot at all...I'd say on average like once a week. We eventually split up and went to different high schools but we still chilled on weekends and were really close. A whole year goes by very quickly and I slowly start to realize some static vision, floaters, and a bit of a detached feeling. But I thought this was all normal because of the marijuana despite some very unusual experiences/thoughts I've had in the past. I thought maybe my friends were having the same thing but they just didn't worry about it like I did. I remember opening up to one of my friends at the beach and he assured me that it wasn't permanent and it would go away in a month if I stopped using. He said that it was just normal and I shouldn't worry about. At this point, all my friends I had were very close to me and they all smoked so I decided I was going to hold onto it and just enjoy myself...all of my experiences weren't bad and I actually had a lot of exciting, adventurous highs. As the years rolled on I've came across some unusual experiences that I still remember to this day. It just seemed like sometimes I would have a bad reaction off of as little as 2 or 3 hits...Everything just kind of fades away from reality....my friends look like holograms...Everything is static and dreamlike...I lose myself and don't have an idea who I am anyone...I feel like an alien, generic, empty consciousness. I thought I was in some sort of serious danger... My hearts beating extremely fast and I don't want to die...I was stuck like this forever...I thought people viewed me as weird...I begin questioning if the world is real or just an illusion...I think really deeply and my thoughts, mostly negative, begin to manifest themselves on an unfathomable level...I would just tell my friends that I'm tired and don't feel well and go inside to lay down. When I wake up the next morning I'm fine but a bit foggy and depersonalized. This was such a serious self conflict that I couldn't call quits on the weed. The experiences were so surreal that I could not grasp or understand in my sober mind what this was..It was like waking up from a nightmare and feeling a sense of relief but you keep having the same nightmare all the time. Ok so now couple years go by and I'm now a junior in high school. I actually just recently quit smoking but that was because I absolutely had to. I really wish I stopped smoking earlier on but it was a bad case of depression combined with an inner conflict, which I would call anxiety, that led me to keep doing it. HPPD became so intense that every time I smoked pot I would get intense feelings of discomfort. I would cry because I just didn't feel the same anymore and I felt detached from the people who I knew I loved like my mom and dad. The feelings would take me further and further outside reality and into a life where emotions don't exist. These feelings started very small from when I first starting smoking pot and gradually got bigger and bigger to what they are now. My symptoms now are as follows: chronic neck, back, joint pain. Static vision, sparkly shimmering air and walls. Random spots of color and light flashing in my peripherals for a split second then goes away. Afterimages. Extremely bad depersonalization...the derealization seemed to go away after the first year. Pretty bad depression, lack of confidence (mostly because I feel different, stupid). Unable to feel pleasure. Social anxiety. This still is a burden for me but I'm trying to get myself well grounded. Everyone needs something to live for so I'm trying my best to pursue that to get my mind off of things. I'm keeping an optimistic mind and I KNOW that one day I WILL get better from all of this. I just need to think logically and stop making quick decisions that lead me into trouble. The cure for HPPD is just to forget about it completely. It's like a bee that won't sting you if you just ignore it. I've learned many things from this hellish disorder that will change my life for the better when I finally beat HPPD. Having a grasp on reality is priceless, don't ever take it for granted, I still don't understand why so many people want to escape it by doing drugs. Knowledge and wisdom stem from our understanding of the world...and that truly defines who you are. Always keep a positive mind. Thoughts truly have an enormous impact on our lives. Thoughts control moods/feeling which control actions. Turn your negative thoughts into positive ones and they won't haunt you as much because a more positive outlook will be embedded into your subconscious. Thoughts are the way in which we perceive reality...that is why every single one of us is unique, like 1/6,000,000,000 unique...letting negative thoughts engulf you will cause you to truly believe in them because they are so deeply embedded and will make your reality hopeless, full of depression, and fearful...positive thoughts will inspire you to do more things, get active, and live in the present and enjoy life. I think reading a book helps so much because it takes my mind off things and allows me to explore my mind. For those who have trouble with sleeping, I suggest you start reading...it calms your anxiety and shuts down the thinking processes of the mind, allowing you to fall asleep easier. Things that are helpful to know: -Yes you can HPPD from just marijuana, I am 100% positive it wasn't laced and that this led to my problem. -Reading and exercise are very good for the anxiety related issues. But make sure you don't overdo your exercise... I wrestled for a couple months for school and the over exertion made me go through a period of hell on earth for a few weeks. My symptoms magnified like x3. -No SSRIs, my theory is that HPPD comes from an imbalance in the neurotransmitters and if you take the wrong drug it will continue to put an adverse effect on the unbalanced neurotransmitters and worsen HPPD. SSRI inhibit the reuptake of Serotonin. -Clonazepam (klonopin) will decrease anxiety and has been proven to be very helpful in treating HPPD but not curing it. The Benzo class drugs have an effect on the GABA receptors in the brain and the amygdala which controls anxiety and flight or fight response in the brain. -Accept it, move on, forget. It WONT go away unless to make an effort to stop it. RESPECT TO EVERYONE GOING THROUGH HPPD, I WOULDN'T WISH THIS ON MY WORST ENEMY. JUST KNOW THAT YOU WILL GET BETTER ONE DAY! MUCH LOVE