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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).

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?

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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