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by _qjno 589 days ago
He does work in a lab with serious compounds, but I have since been told by a member of his crisis team that they know about previous (relatively minor) mental health incidents in his past. I was completely unaware of this, so I am assuming he has dealt with this on his own for a long time, until he was unable to anymore.

I am near certain he is not a drug user either. I have never seen any evidence of this, and in my experience drug addicts are not very good at hiding it when they lose control.

Also, I contacted his work abbout his absense (without details) from my own phone. His colleague (boss?) called me back because they were already concerned about him late last week at work. If they suspected something concerning the work they do, they would have told me or the hospital.

3 comments

> in my experience drug addicts are not very good at hiding it when they lose control.

Addiction takes a lot of forms and its very likely you know people that are good at hiding it.

I'd spent my childhood around alcoholics and was confident in my ability to see addiction, only to be confronted with someone close to me going off the rails after years of completely hidden amphetamine addiction. Sometimes you really don't know!
> in my experience drug addicts are not very good at hiding it when they lose control

Not sure if it's relevant, but psychedelics (mushrooms) broke a college friend after minimal recreational use. Like, maybe twice, with zero past history of any other controlled substance.

His delusions were similar to what you described. In hindsight, I wasn't qualified to handle his deeply troubled mind.

You did the right thing contacting family and seeking professional help.

If he harms himself, it's not your fault.

Did your friend suffer permanent harm?
Terminal, sadly.
Oh my. Hard to contemplate.
got a real mad scientist here, haha.

could it be possible though that prolonged exposure to chemicals excacerbated his preexisting conditions?