![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 9 of 9. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
Howdy All,
When I was 19 (Im now 33) I was under the influence of a hit of acid one night and while looking in the mirror I noticed that my hairline had receded SLIGHTLY at the temples. I immediately became convinced that I was going bald and a depression (one of the worst, strongest, darkest, most unimaginably painful) hit me like a sledge hammer. I hoped that I was just having a bad reaction to the acid, but it didnt go away. It began a severe depressive episode that had me convinced I was balding, that Id be bald within months to several years and that the only way out of the pain of going bald was to kill myself. The pain was THAT severe that I simply could not imagine going through life with thinning hair. There was NO hope and I would rather have died. I was obsessed with it and I could not think or imagine any other thing on earth except the hopeless feeling that I was balding and Id have to eventually kill myself to end this pain. The obsession was so ridiculous that I would literally burn with a lighter every hair I found on my clothes, or where ever, in order to gauge how many were falling out each day. I was also convinced that everyone else could notice the hairloss, which added severely to my already severe and life long social anxiety. I even had blood tests done in hopes that I was suffering from something hormonal that would cause hairloss... I wasnt (and thanks to my idiot parents and Dr. for not recognizing that I needed mental help instead).
I suffered through this hell for over a year until I finally decided that before I killed myself I would have to force myself into having sex/intimacy, as due to my life long severe social anxiety, depression and severely low self esteem I had never had any sexual experiance. When I was almost 21 I finally met someone and developed a relationship (first and last one) and I tried to "pretend" that I wasnt balding. The depression got better but the hair thoughts remained in the back of my head always.
Then when I was about 25 it happened all over again only this time was almost worse (and without the acid this time). I guess I had a "nervous breakdown". I became unimaginably depressed, obsessed and convinced that I was still balding and that my hair was all of a sudden very thin and very noticable.
Luckily I had myself in therapy at that point and I went on prozac, which basically allowed me to think clearly after a few months and realize that I wasnt balding as rapidly as I thought....(and BTW, I probably never was balding since now at age 33 I still have basically as much hair as I always had, which is basically a full head of hair... just receded a bit at the temples to form a slight widows peak...). But I honestly still grapple with fear of it getting worse though.
My question (finally) is can the acid have caused or contributed to the first crazy, depressive episode even though I suffered from depression/anxiety long before the acid? And does anyone have any opinion on what or why I would have such severe depressive/obsessive episodes that only focussed on hair loss and wanting to kill myself over it?
thanks, Jeff
Posted by Alice Anne on October 3, 2002, at 17:46:09
In reply to Can an Acid Trip cause severe depression?, posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
I am convinced that doing acid in my teen years contributed to my lifelong depression/anxiety/obsessive thinking-- even though I was depressed before I ever took it. I think depression was one of the reasons I ever took it to begin with, and depression led me to try to "self-medicate"-- the whole chicken/egg thing. Much to my despair, I also think it screwed my brain chemistry up in terms of being able to get help now from anti-depressant medication. I am ultra sensitive to side effects, and my depression is primarily "treatment resistant" although I've tried so many things. Maybe we are predisposed to depression or OCD and the acid just triggers it off and exacerbates it. I have read more than a few posts now referring to adjusting to these AD's like feeling some of the uncomfortable effects of acid, which I have also felt. I think the effects of acid (and worse Ecstacy) are so much greater than we ever realize they might be. Of course I was so depressed and self-destructive at that age I wouldn't have cared anyway. Boy, now I do. You are lucky you have found a medication that works for you. Best of luck.
Posted by Alice Anne on October 3, 2002, at 17:52:24
In reply to Can an Acid Trip cause severe depression?, posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
Also, the two "bad trips" I had on acid were so profoundly devastating (one time I was mute, almost catatonic for the entire evening)-- I don't know how that is encoded in our cellular memory (if that isn't too esoteric), but I'm sure it is somehow. I have to remain optimistic that there is healing on those levels too, maybe through meditation and the like.
Posted by MJC on October 3, 2002, at 19:21:00
In reply to Can an Acid Trip cause severe depression?, posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
I've been suffering through a severe anxiety disorder most of my life. I've always showed signs of it but through the years it's gotten much worse. I honestly believe that part of the trigger that made it so bad was all the acid that I did during my teenage years. But on the other hand, I think I might have just been doing it because my anxiety was screwing up everything else and I just didn't care *shrugs*
On the extacy level though... let's just say that for anybody with a little bit of a chemical imbalance, that stuff is HORRIBLE. One of my good friends had a chemical imbalance in his head, I forget exactly what it was called but it was pretty severe, made him pretty psychotic, and he didn't know about it untill he really started binging on the old Extacy. I mean there were signs since his brother has it and his father has it but we all believed that it passed him in the family tree. Then one night after doing E, he went nuts, beat the crap out of his girlfriend, trashed his house, beat up two of his friends who came and tried to stop him, had to be sedated and took to the hospital, once there and he had a bunch of tests done on him where they found out that his brain had produced waaaaay too much of this certain chemical, found out that he had been doing very high levels of Extacy, and the Doctor's words which basically shook everybody were "if you had popped one more pill, you would be lucky not to be a vegetable". My friend is better now though he had to spend 6 months in a hospital and lost about 100lbs (which is good though since he was pretty overweight) and is completely sober now but will be on medication for the rest of his life.
So that's my belief, Extacy is extremely dangerous if you even have a small chemical imbalance. For somebody to do it while they're on medication, you're basically asking for a death wish.
Posted by BrittPark on October 3, 2002, at 19:26:44
In reply to Can an Acid Trip cause severe depression?, posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
I'm convinced that bad trips can have permanent effects. When I was 19 I took what I believed to be mescaline (it was probably acid) with a friend. We were having a dandy time but then my friend had to go home. Within minutes of his departure I fell victim to an unreasoning terror. Terror with no object, but terror nevertheless. The acute effects dissipated by the time I went to bed. When I woke the next morning, I realized that something was still wrong. I wan't in terror, but I was afraid of that terror returning.
To cut a long story short, from that day I never felt right again. I've been taking antidepressants and other meds now for 20 years, and most of the time they work. But I'm still not what I was when I was 18.
My doctor and I have a theory that I suffer from some sort of PTSD, the trauma being the bad trip.
I'm sorry if this isn't very comforting. Remember though that with proper meds you can learn to live and even enjoy most of your life.
Britt
Posted by BarbaraCat on October 5, 2002, at 1:31:23
In reply to Can an Acid Trip cause severe depression?, posted by Jefff on October 3, 2002, at 16:08:56
I'm curious, did these symtpoms start after acid in general, or only after having a bad trip? Here are my theories on a subject I'm all too acquainted with. LSD and other psychedelics affect the serotonin system so it's likely that we've messed with something in the chemical neighborhood of our depressions. Whether or not it's permanent is anybody's guess, just like no one knows whether taking antidepressants permanently affect the brain's structure.
I have done acid, mescaline, psilocybin, mushrooms, MDA, MDMA (are there any left?) many, many times. I lived through the 60's, went to Woodstock and was a proper hippie chick. I had mostly wonderful mind-opening transformational experiences, but a handful that were nightmarish, horrific. The worst of my blackest depressions are like these bad trips and I wonder if my psyche and brain 'learned how to be depressed' from these frightening and traumatically real fantasies.
I think that traumatic incidents, whether drug induced or otherwise, carve chemical grooves into our wiring. Our brains and bodies don't differentiate between the real or imagined horrors. Trauma kindles the amygdala, the fear center in our brain, and once this pathway is carved, the route becomes all too familiar. Although I wonder about my drug experiences being the cause of my brain's sensitivity, my father was depressed in the same horrific way. He seemed to be on a lifelong bad trip, without any help from drugs. He very rarely drank and did not take medicine of any kind. Nine kids in his family and 5 suffered from the same thing. However, they all had a very dysfunctional and traumatic upbringing, and my father continued his legacy with me. Trauma is trauma. So the jury's still out for me as to whether or not I'd have the same difficulties had I not had indulged. I probably would, but without the colorful insights and transcendent experiences for which I am very grateful. Whatever, I sure didn't need drop quite so much. - Barbara
Posted by Panic_Attack on October 5, 2002, at 8:09:37
In reply to Acid Trips » Jefff, posted by BarbaraCat on October 5, 2002, at 1:31:23
I know Acid is 99% of the cause of my panic/anxiety attacks. I use to have severe depression but thats gone. (thank god). I am only 21 years old and when i was 13-16 years old i was a very heavy acid user. In my lifetime I have taken over 100 hits of acid. We tripped every other day... 3 hits @ a time. Then at the age of 20 i got into cocaine... and 1 year ago i have a cocaine overdose.... and ever since then i have had horrific anxiety attacks. I am pretty much drug free now (except for the alcohol) I am a very social drinker (every weekend). I Baker Acted myself about a month ago. I know im not crazy (i found that out when i was around all those real crazy people). I always think to myself... If i didnt do all that acid and cocaine, would i have these panic/anxiety issues? I wish i could take it all back (even though it was fun at the time). If I was to take ACID today in my life... I would die. I know my body or mind could not handle. I couldnt dream of doing something like that to my body today! I now take Serzone for my anxiety (which doesnt do SH*T!!)
Posted by BarbaraCat on October 5, 2002, at 11:28:04
In reply to Re: Acid Trips, posted by Panic_Attack on October 5, 2002, at 8:09:37
I'm not discounting the acid, but do you think that it was the acid or the cocaine that affected you more? I also did methamphetamine alot during my acid days and think that it fried my neurons more than acid. I think I learned the form of how to be psychotically depressed from the acid, but it was the heavy meth use that structurally affected my brain and compromised my physical health. I know I'll never do a psychotropic again, ever. Even with pot I can feel my neurons kinking and bending. But jeeze, all these ADs I've been on have got to be doing some weird stuff as well.
BTW, Serzone didn't do SH*T for me either except to turn me into a zonked-out dimwit. You could probably do much better with another AD with a benzo.
> I know Acid is 99% of the cause of my panic/anxiety attacks. I use to have severe depression but thats gone. (thank god). I am only 21 years old and when i was 13-16 years old i was a very heavy acid user. In my lifetime I have taken over 100 hits of acid. We tripped every other day... 3 hits @ a time. Then at the age of 20 i got into cocaine... and 1 year ago i have a cocaine overdose.... and ever since then i have had horrific anxiety attacks. I am pretty much drug free now (except for the alcohol) I am a very social drinker (every weekend). I Baker Acted myself about a month ago. I know im not crazy (i found that out when i was around all those real crazy people). I always think to myself... If i didnt do all that acid and cocaine, would i have these panic/anxiety issues? I wish i could take it all back (even though it was fun at the time). If I was to take ACID today in my life... I would die. I know my body or mind could not handle. I couldnt dream of doing something like that to my body today! I now take Serzone for my anxiety (which doesnt do SH*T!!)
Posted by Jefff on October 5, 2002, at 18:15:22
In reply to Re: Acid Trips » Panic_Attack, posted by BarbaraCat on October 5, 2002, at 11:28:04
Thanks everyone for your opinions and for sharing your experiences too. Just to answer a few questions (Im trying to recall them and combine it into one post : ) ). Actually that particular acid trip I referred to was only the second (or maybe third) time I had done acid (although I had done mescaline about 20 times when I was about 15/16). It definitely wasnt at all a "bad trip" for the first few hours until I happened to notice my hairline in the mirror... and then literally at that moment this panic/severe depression hit me and lasted in that severity for about a year (give or take sometime). Other than that and the rare cocain line or special K (and of course my daily pot "habit" or "addiction") I never really used other drugs or alcohol (which I really dislike as it depresses the hell out of me).
Im seeing my psychiatrist on 10/11 and I cant wait as Ive been reading so much about Klonopin and Im hoping he wont give me a problem when I ask him to prescribe it to me (for severe anxiety). This past week my friend gave me a few Xanax which he coincidentally had lying around (50mg a day for five days) and I was thrilled with the calming, anti anxiety, anti anger affect it had on me. Interestingly it also really eased my "need" to smoke so much damn pot.
Jeff
This is the end of the thread.
Psycho-Babble Medication | Extras | FAQ
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.org
Script revised: February 4, 2008
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/cgi-bin/pb/mget.pl
Copyright 2006-17 Robert Hsiung.
Owned and operated by Dr. Bob LLC and not the University of Chicago.