Hello guys,
I don't really know where to start. This is one of these stories about good experiences gone bad.
It all started about two or something years ago. I was depressed during my entire high school period. Not the "I wanna kill myself" depressed but rather "Life is boring" depressed. This made me fearless or so I thought. I didn't value life much so I was like "Screw it, I live once I'll do all the shit they tell me not to". I want to say that I am no rich kid and you might think that I am yet another spoiled brat who is not mature enough to value life but the truth is I'm not spoiled - I grew without a father and didn't have a lot of money, wasn't poor either though. Just a regular life. However I always wanted more and more and I couldn't see that blind ambition in my friends or family. They all seemed to want so little from life. So one day my personal trainer just mentions out of the blue that he heard that Nutmeg could be an opiate. He meant in a purely scientific way, like one of those "Did you know that..." quotes in children encyclopedias. So this is when it all started, a couple weeks later I decided I decided to get some nutmeg (not another erowid, please try to bear with me until the end of it)
So I did some nutmeg and 4 hours later I fu**ed up real bad. Let's just say this toxic trip went for the next 4 days. I probably od-ed then but I didn't care. I started doing more and more shit later - DXM. My first DXM trip was awesome. Then a few days I did DXM again at a slightly higher dose (in this entheogen site it said that this was way below the dangerous threshold). However I did feel quite weird and got a panic attack. Went on calling 911 with all that "what have I done, why I am so stupid" thoughts. However then I remembered about my parents and their potential reaction so I was like "Nah, I ain't calling shit". So I just felt so sick and puked it all over the place. I instantly felt relieved. No more fear, no more panic, the trip just went on, so this "You live once" thing got worse. I really decided it doesn't. This short panic attack didn't have any long-term effects on me. In fact I did a few more trouble free DXM trips later but that was all. I stopped doing drugs for a while. Not for a particular reason, plus the taste of DXM is the worst shi* ever. Then I started doing bodybuilding, went into steroids and insane shi* like 2,4-Dinitrophenol and more. I was literally asking for it, playing with fire. I guess that was the last thing to make me feel alive. I had never been afraid. Later I started cannabis and a lot of it. I would wake up in the morning and get a strong hit first thing before breakfast, then keep hitting it until bedtime. It was all so awesome you know. Life was serene, meaningless, but in a good responsibility-free way. So I decided there was still much stuff I haven't tried. I went on with mushrooms. Had a few cannabis + psilocin awesome trips - I thought I was a movie director and kept talking to myself. In one of those trips I took a little bit too much and it all went crazy but I still wasn't afraid. I was like "Damn it I took too much, I'll just have to go to sleep now and wait until the morning to freshen up". And so I did. I did some Salvia Divinorum too - pretty scary shi* but I could appreciate the bad trip, it was an opening experience.
... "Why kid ?"
Well... I moved on to MDMA with cannabis, just once though cause I took three tabs at once and I od-ed again. Still didn't matter. Just went to bed and waited until the morning. No long-term alterations (or who knows ?).
And then one night...
I was really mad and angry at some person. So I decided to take just a little mushrooms. I actually forced myself a little out of habit. I didn't smoke any weed with it for the first time - just 2-3 mushrooms. And then just 10 mins after ingestion I talked with a hypochondriac friend of mine who is like "Hey man I ate some weird tasting peanut, am I gonna die ?" all the time. I used to bully him about it. Well seems fate is not without a sense of irony. So this same day as I was talking with him the horrible panic attack unleashed. Out of nothing I decided I'm done for. Went to bathroom. Couldn't get it out. It went on for maybe 30-40 mins or more I had no idea, but it was so severe that I just took a taxi and went to the ER. Stayed there for a few days, my mom found out about the drugs and shi*. And I'm not sure whether this happened because the panic attack went for too long but since then I haven't been the same person. Truth is the anxiety actually started a few days before the mushrooms but no panic attacks. I was on some ACE inhibitors as I was getting really interested in biochemistry. And I wanted to decrease the amount of my Alpha 2a adreno receptors. I did Captopril + Losartan. And since my blood pressure is already somewhat lower this time it got very low or so I thought. I mean now when I think of it - it was low but I wasn't gonna die. However this was the first time I started feeling long-term fear. As of then I stopped all the shit I was taking but I became concerned with my heart rate, blood pressure - weird I know. So anyway I went to a cardiologist my heart was actually fine. However blood work showed elevated TSH, and endocrinologist said that could be a Hashimoto and they needed to make some additional tests to prove it which I didn't bother to do.
So if you really took your time to read all this, maybe you get the picture - a sad story of a depressed dumbas* with low self-esteem. Nothing special really.
As I said I wasn't the same after that horrible panic attack. After a couple week I got better, then I got better again. No I can sleep. I do listen to my heart rate sometimes but I don't panic so much. Notice that I say so much. I started doing some stuff like L-Theanine, I became obsessed with health. In fact I got a vision while I was in the hospital. I decided I wanted to be a doctor. True story. I started studying like never before in my life - 6-7 hours a day and I hated studying. I am the laziest person you know. And so on and so on. It's already too much. The point is that I'm stuck with some mild to moderate anxiety disorder now. I don't get panic attacks, I can control myself but for example I got up this bruising on my hand and I didn't remember hitting my hand and it's rather big. So I was like damn it could this be some internal hemorrhaging ? Is there something wrong with me ? You know the drill...
I'm stuck with this anxiety and the funny thing is that I'm not really afraid to die, it like it's on purely physical level. I first went to a psychiatrist who immediately prescribed me an SNRI called Laroxin (Effexor). I didn't take it though. I then went to a neurologist who said Effexor is bs for my condition and instead I need to confront my fears. Do something that makes me uncomfortable. So I did roll a joint again and smoked it all. It sucked a lot. I didn't get a panic attack but I was all anxious and waiting for it all to end. I did it a few more times hoping to get over anxiety by being brave. Still no panic attacks but no improvement either. Maybe somewhere throughout all this things I did to myself I messed something on a physical level. Thyroid or some brain stuff. I started doing yoga, meditations, zen all the relaxing things but I'm nowhere near where I was in the beginning - 100% careless. I wanna get there again. Maybe it's the tiny bits of medical knowledge that makes afraid now (you know being able to think of more potential symptoms).
I've received a lot of help here before so I was really hoping I could fix my brain again. I'll appreciate any help you can give me. I refuse to be anxious until the end. Thanks so much in advance.