Tigress7 Posted February 18, 2014 Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 Hello I have posted previously - and now I am nearing the grand age of 60 - it's best to tell you guys out there that are suffering - that you will be OK. Truly!! Truly. truly. You will be fine. I took (really not much) acid in 1969/70 - AND IT KNOCKED ME FOR SIX. I woke up one day and I was tripping - and that's pretty much how it has been for a long time. No one believed me - I was called crazy, silly - 'making up stories up'. God - where are those doctors now?? Bunch of twats. They didn't and still don't have, any idea what this problem is. I keep my mouth shut about it now. HPPD is indeed strange - look what happened to Syd Barrett??? I mean WHAT happened to that man? I am glad I found this site - what 7 years ago? I thought I was the only one with this shit! But...you do get over it. I know that sounds trite and crap, but you truly do get over it. There are some people that should just never mess with drugs - I suppose that is you and me right? The whs and the wherefores are all done and dusted. We did do some crap drugs that have fucked up our heads and we have and we are reaping the consequences. Funny, I would never say now 'I wish I had never taken LSD' (though I would have said that with conviction when I was 16!!). I am effing glad I took acid - it was good, and horrible, and scary, but ultimately it's an experience that I am glad to have had.......(I hope that statement doesn't come back to bite me...) I just want to say - hang on in. Don't do ANY MORE acid or whatever it is out there now that is fucking you up, again. Just don't do it!! Your brain is saying 'enough!'. Listen to that. Smoke some weed. I have found that is OK, though it makes things a lot more 'trippy' it does go away; as does all the pain. Remember time is the healer - and will get you through. Come on kids - love your youth - it goes very quickly. But maturity does have its rewards. My best good love to all of you. Please email me if you need some help. Though I am not so wise - just a soul in the 'strangest life I have ever known'. xxxxx . 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StateOfRegret Posted February 18, 2014 Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 Sorry, haven't read the whole thing, but; 53 years? Dont you mean 43? You said that you are almost 60 years old, and that you were tripping in 1970. That would be approximately 43 years ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigress7 Posted February 18, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 Ooops apols to person that looks like Mr Engels. . Of course it is 43 years and not 53. The sentiments are the same. Regards Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VisualDude Posted February 18, 2014 Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 Well, with HPPD a 4 is very close to a 5, lol. When you get past a half-century, decades sort of blend... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigress7 Posted February 18, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 ...especially if you have 'endured' HPPD all that time! I will report with correct maths. Hey anyway - I am on that old- it beats the alternative...... xxx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silva Posted February 18, 2014 Report Share Posted February 18, 2014 Welcome! At which moment did you went over HPPD? Did you have any particular things that have helped you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hppd24years Posted February 19, 2014 Report Share Posted February 19, 2014 I guess I've been striped from my belt by Tigress7 for the longest man or woman to have hppd. 25yearsnowandstopedfeelingsorryformyselftodayandprobablytodayonly. Thanks man!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VisualDude Posted February 19, 2014 Report Share Posted February 19, 2014 25yearsnowandstopedfeelingsorryformyselftodayandprobablytodayonly Great new name ... it was needed once you passed 24, lol. Kind of rolls off the tonge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigress7 Posted February 19, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 19, 2014 Hello Lovely People actually I DID get my Maths wrong. I have had HPPD for 43 years - not 53. But heck it is still a long time eh? Sorry to have stripped anyone of their HPPD longevity title......I have posted on this board previously and explained, written a lot of stuff, which all seems to have disappeared into the ether, or cloud or whatever the thing is called what is meant to remember our stuff!! I even wrote a poem about my experience - which has disappeared - sad. Someone has asked if I have any tips for 'survival' of this HPPD crisis? Well I suppose it is just getting on out there and try to live as 'normal' a life as possible. It is hard at first, I know that. I didn't come from a moneyed family and had to get work, Although I was pretty bright and got to grammar school in 1965 (that was a pretty big educational achievement for a working class bod in England at that time), I did have all sorts of emotional problems stemming from early youth. Consequently I didn't do too well at school - met up with some 'weird' people in 1969, when I was 15 - and took loads of drugs! I honestly think that this is where the BIG MISTAKE lies. If you have emotional problems - do not do acid. But there is the conundrum. People with emotional problems DO take drugs and take acid....... tick, tick, tick. I have to emphasise I honestly didn't take a lot of acid. Really. Probably 6 times? I do not have a clue why this HPPD thing happened to me. I tripped (for the last time in 1970) - came down - and like two weeks after that, I woke up one day to HPPD! A shell shocking experience as you are all too aware. I was in absolute TORMENT for months. There was no one I could talk to. I remember seeing a doctor who told me I was being silly. I even went into a psychiatric hospital (I spent my 18th birthday there - great) - and I was told that I was lying. So, I made a decision to shut up about all the visual disturbances, and the trails and all the rest of the crap; and just try to get on. I came to realise the symptoms weren't getting any worse, and tried to cope with them as best as I could. That's not to say that I didn't have the old misgivings about fucking my head up, and the panic attacks and the guilt and the whole bloody lonely horror of the situation. It is truly horrible. I still experience the same nightmare that I have been slipped acid into a drink and wake up sweating before the trip begins! But there you go.....the brain does try to adjust itself. What has helped me over the years? My studies I think. I studied and studies and studied. This, I think is the mainstay of my self-support. I have always enjoyed learning. It takes me out of myself and gives me new horizons. I have achieved a degree in English Lit, and a Masters in Renaissance Art. .I have held down full time jobs, I have to support myself financially. Perhaps that's it? That's the answer...I have no one to fall back on but myself...so I better make a go of it? One teeny point that has helped me is Benzodiazapenes. I have been addicted to these for quite some time now.....but they certainly break the panic barriers. But I have an 'understanding' doctor at the moment (not that he would countenance HPPD realistically) - he thinks I am a neurotic...if only he knew!! But docs can change and I may get another who won't be so free with the legal prescriptions. Hope this helps - please contact me if you wish! Love and peace Tigress Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 19, 2014 Report Share Posted February 19, 2014 I remember seeing a doctor who told me I was being silly. I even went into a psychiatric hospital (I spent my 18th birthday there - great) - and I was told that I was lying. It could have been worse. When I went to doctors and mental hospitals, they would´nt believe me and they accused me of having symptoms I did´nt have and called me schizo. I was forcibly committed and I have been in the belt-bed 3 times becuse I got angry. That was not cool, but I managed to "beat" one of the guards in the hospital!!! At least HPPD is over for me, but I have some after effects I believe that could be due to other things... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lobotomizer Posted February 20, 2014 Report Share Posted February 20, 2014 HI Tigress. Im wondering to what degree are your symptoms. Are you experiencing full blown patterns on surfaces ? Full on tracers form your hands that you can actually count ? I.e., not streaks from your hands but multiple layered tracers in vivid quality? As if you are on a peak acid trip? Also do your symptoms wax and wane through the years? Have they subsided much? Thanks in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hppd24years Posted February 22, 2014 Report Share Posted February 22, 2014 Does anyone think that's the REAL picture of "StateOfRegret"? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StateOfRegret Posted February 22, 2014 Report Share Posted February 22, 2014 Does anyone think that's the REAL picture of "StateOfRegret"?'tis indeed. In fact, this is what I look like using this here forum software: 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hppd24years Posted February 24, 2014 Report Share Posted February 24, 2014 U don't look like Mr. Engels.. I gather that's the dude from Little House on the Prairie?? Tigress7 u need to borrow StateOfRegret's glasses and take another look.. I find the picture to look very intriguing more like a 17th century style with a twist of Abraham Lincoln fun house... Kool pic.. How did u get hppd StateOfRegret?? I might change my name to "StateOfRedemption" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigress7 Posted February 24, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 24, 2014 HI Tigress. Im wondering to what degree are your symptoms. Are you experiencing full blown patterns on surfaces ? Full on tracers form your hands that you can actually count ? I.e., not streaks from your hands but multiple layered tracers in vivid quality? As if you are on a peak acid trip? Also do your symptoms wax and wane through the years? Have they subsided much? Thanks in advance. HI Lobotomiser I think I was really very lucky regards my symptoms especially reading some of the extreme symptoms endured by HPPDers on this board. I can explain exactly. I last took LSD in August 1970. I hadn't taken an awful lot before then - perhaps 5/6 times - I also took mescaline once. My last trip was OK - pretty weak if I recall. But one morning in mid-September 1970 I awoke to find that I was still tripping. The symptoms were not strong - though at the time they seemed to be as I was shocked. I had of course heard about flashbacks - and told myself that this 'weirdness' would pass. But it didn't, thankfully it didn't appear to be getting any worse, and has remained exactly the same all these years. Nothing has waxwd or waned over the years - except if I have smoked weed which has made the visuals 'stronger'. These visuals are as follows: (but not on a peak acid experience - more like when you are coming down from a trip - and in the last stages of the acid - do you understand - say 2/3 out of 10?) Trails after moving objects - particularly noticable in fluorescent light - not so strong that I can count them - more like a shadow following. after images - particularly bright lights - which stay longer than they should! halos around lights no visual snow - though constant patterns/images in the dark Images are also 'stronger' if I move from say the darkness of a cinemas into natural daylight. As I say I think I have been lucky, I dunno. It seemed like an awful thing when it first appeared - and I and my brain have managed to cope with it. Perhaps it has got better over the years? But in all honestly it does seem the same. I think the important point to note is that I still remember what it was like to have 'normal' visuals - and sometimes trails etc. do 'get in the way', Can you let me now if there have been any proper studies of HPPD? How many people have it, extremities of symptoms etc? I found this board in 2006 and was really please to see that I wasn't the 'only one' - but very sad to learn that so many people are suffering. Regards Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
miketusa Posted March 5, 2014 Report Share Posted March 5, 2014 Trails after moving objects - particularly noticable in fluorescent light - not so strong that I can count them - more like a shadow following. after images - particularly bright lights - which stay longer than they should! halos around lights no visual snow - though constant patterns/images in the dark Any symptoms that aren't related to your vision? Out of body feelings? Forgetfulness? Deep anxieties, that sort of thing? It's nice to hear that you have achieved so much. I am supposed to move to France to go to school. But the knowledge that I will have to master French on top of going to school especially in such an unfamiliar place is borderline agonizing. I am a terrible student. And I know much will be expected of me. I have been battling with myself to rise to the occasion. But I continually put off the necessary paper work required to obtain a visa. Though, I suppose some of the anxieties stemming from this might be normal. Anyways, I find it even more comforting to know you also achieved a degree in English Lit. As I find literature to be a passion of mine. However I have found HPPD negativiely affects my cognitive ability to write and read to a degree. I have not been able to decide if this is a product of my own thoughts, though. Did you observe any similar issues in your experience? Sorry for the long rant! Like I said, glad to know life goes on in some capacity! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan L Posted March 5, 2014 Report Share Posted March 5, 2014 Fuck you remind me of my Dad, he has had HPPD since he was in his 20's and still deals with it. That the thing though, the fucker is so tough he does no even adress it, to himself, to anyone. He lives to forget about what he did to his mind, he taught me to do the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hppd33 Posted March 5, 2014 Report Share Posted March 5, 2014 HPPD is dealable, DP DR isnt. Fuck that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigress7 Posted March 18, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 18, 2014 Hello Mikezero I think I must have experienced DP - I probably am still experiencing this - but have got used to it! Have always suffered deep anxiety symptoms. Look you are soooo young and going to school in France should be a fabulous thing for you to do - don't let this HPPD crap wreck your life. I think the only way to overcome HPPD is to forget about it! I know that sounds really hard, but let's say there is a book you really, really love - read it for fun. Don't let HPPD take that away from you. See HPPD as this monster in your head that you are ready to do battle with! You will gradually come out of this - in all honesty. If you can begin to concentrate on something you really like - the HPPD 'goes' - well it doesn't really 'go (as we all know...)', but if you can forget about it for a while, the mind will find a way of coping. We are human beings and brilliant at adaptation. I am really not trying to preach - but don't do any psychedelics ever again. Even weed can make the HPPD symptoms stronger. I think there are some people who just shouldn't do acid - I know I was one of them, but of course we don't know this until it's too late. Funny but now I have come to the stage where I don't regret taking it! Never thought I would say that. Have a great time in France, if you love Eng Lit - you will love the French language - you'll be OK. Keep me posted! Keep well and love life. xx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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