[throwaway163]

I had a similar experience. Except it was caused by marijuana.

It sounds like a classic case of Depersonalization disorder, which is a subset/interconnected with anxiety. Google it.

The consensus is that it can be triggered by substances in approx 3% of the population. Weed, mushrooms, ectstacy and LSD are the most common culprits. It's extremely common, though it has very little mindshare among mental health professionals. Probably because there is no pharmaceutical treatment.

It took me about 2 years to get back to reality after my trip. I'm still not quite the same. But I'm thankful for the experience because it's been the hardest thing I've experienced and I've learned a lot about myself, self care and the importance of relationships

Good luck sailor!

[throwaway9839]

I had a similar experience (depersonalization) also caused by marijuana. Mine lasted for several months until I was back to normal-ish. It was very scary and disorienting.

For anyone experiencing this, I have three pieces of advice: (1) Don't worry too much. Things will get back to normal, and worrying is part of the cause. (2) Try meditating. When I started to meditate while depersonalized, the effect was incredible: it changed from a negative experience to a very positive one. I'm now actually glad for the experience overall, despite the initial scariness. (3) Your worldview is changing. Try not to fight it too much.

[throwaway102942]

I tried marijuana and my experience with it was a lot more like what my friends and you describe LSD or similar drugs to be like. Before marijuana I already had mild hallucinations and I was diagnosed with schizophrenia from a mild psychosis. It's definitely made my existing hallucinations much stronger even years after smoking.

For me the general feel of the trip was as if some sort of filter had been removed so you get to experience things you probably shouldn't experience. This includes experiencing experiences (fractals). What we experience tends to be individual so I won't go into that. But you get a wider eye view, motions are more defined, shapes are more defined, etc. It's like a burn in effect (in an image editing sense) but applied to other senses as well.

My favorite was probably not being able to determine the size of objects (or that it would fluctuate) which made sitting in front of a computer like sitting in a gigantic room with a gigantic tv.

It was a bit uneasy after the trip at first but I got used to it quickly. I've already had similar experiences but of course not as strong.

In my experience with all of this so far the best tool for me is being skeptic. My only fear is that I'll lose the ability to reason forever, which I have already lost in short bursts here and there.

[ethanbond]

I'm immediately skeptical of people who claim to have felt "similar" effects to LSD without LSD, but that's a pretty interesting scenario involving weed (how much?!) and schizophrenia. No clue how close you could get to emulating it, but it sounds like at least a few of the common effects of an acid trip.

[soundwave106]

There does seem to be some links between the endocannabinoid system (the primary target of marijuana) and the serotonin system (the primary target of LSD). EG:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17944876 http://www.jneurosci.org/content/27/43/11700.abstract

From what I can see, the relationship isn't terribly clear at this time. As dopamine and serotonin systems are linked to schizophrenia, until more is known, I personally think anyone with even mild signs of schizophrenia would do best to avoid chemicals like marijuana, LSD, stimulants, etc.

[throwaway102942]

Just one big drag with some tobacco. (i don't smoke so maybe nicotine also has a say) although I've had plain as well and I remember it being somewhat the same.

I have never taken LSD so I can't really say for sure but it just sounds more relatable. Maybe something in between?

Some of the things I vaguely remember: There are fractals, although not as strong as people suggest on lsd. If i close my eyes it's like I'm going through different scenes (kinda like a dream I guess). Sound and touch feeling kind of echos Events are somewhat quantized or it's like you can see them before they happen/react to them Mild synthesisa (it doesn't seem as strong as people who say they have it is) Some mild out of body experiences (I've had stronger out of body experiences without) Sound volume becomes meaningless so I can't tell if a sound is close or distant Very vivid side vision hallucinations like I can see my friends gaming or whatever in my side vision but when i look I realize they went out to the grocery store Almost human like facial expression in cats

Without drugs I've had: Out of body experiences Different household ish sounds, usually slamming sounds People talking (although mostly gibberish) as if i'm at a party Explosions and sometimes screams (sometimes my name) Seeing bodies and faces in for instance piles of clothes or similar randomness lots of programming related experiences where I think I can program in real life (I thought stack overflows would cause my consciousness to pop and reset) sudden "messages" such as i see an image of my fridge being on fire so I have to run and check. I've had ghost-like people (I don't believe in ghosts) pull my skin, feet, etc Sudden bizarre realizations with strong visuals and sometimes out of body experiences that show how to solve them (for instance I thought a programming problem I couldn't solve was caused by my kitchen chairs not being aligned properly to the table) I thought I was talking to people telepathically (mostly people I know online)

Fortunately I don't have much of this anymore but when I do it's a lot easier to handle than before. I dropped out of college because of this and I wasn't particularly good with school in general so it really really helps reading and understanding how the brain and technology works.

This is something I've always wanted to talk about. I keep most of this kind of secret as I don't really like talking about some of the experiences I had and I don't like feeling as if I'm bragging about it so a throwaway account turns out to be a nice idea.

[fernly]

Nasty sounding condition. Here's a link[1] and a summary,

> ...a mental disorder in which the people have persistent or recurrent feelings of depersonalization and/or derealization... Depersonalization is described as feeling disconnected or estranged from one's body, thoughts, or emotions. Individuals experiencing depersonalization may report feeling as if they are in a dream or are watching themselves in a movie... derealization is described as detachment from one's surroundings. Individuals experiencing derealization may report perceiving the world around them as foggy, dreamlike/surreal, or visually distorted... the inner turmoil created by the disorder can result in depression, self-harm, low self-esteem, anxiety attacks, panic attacks, phobias, etc.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization_disorder

[lovemenot]

Never heard of this before.

It sounds somewhat like what many people report having experienced during their trip proper. But extended well beyond that time.

I wonder whether people with DePersonalisation Disorder had somehow held on at a time when most would have just let go.

Disorder is another word for chaos, which has, of necessity, been embraced by many.

[jsonne]

I don't partake in any kind of drugs outside of alcohol in social settings. I do however have an anxiety disorder that comes with a lot of panic. I always described myself in the throws of panic as feeling like I was playing a video game. It's a very surreal experience to feel like you're driving a car except your body is the car. You think right arm move and it does, but it doesn't quite feel like yourself. Very strange experience. Incidentally, it took me about 2 very long years to get a good handle on it where I'll only have an episode like that once or twice a year.