Been in a "dream like state" for 10 days. Need Ans

[sullenboy]

Hello everyone,

Me and my ex girlfriend, (still very close friend) are in a dire situation. I was wondering if anyone has any answers to my questions.

My ex isnt a daily smoker, usually when something really devastating happens, she self medicates with marijuana. So shes smoked like 4 times or so last year. This is probably the result of going through lots of traumatic events in the last 5 years, such as loosing her mother, and being evicted.

About 10 days ago, she smoked "2 ten packs" of marijana, which is supposed to be way to much to smoke in one day(im guessing).

After she smoked, she said shes been feeling like she was in a dream like state. Like she was dissociated with the world and didnt know if what she was seeing was real or just a dream. she said she was feeling "out of it".

This 'dream like state" has been going on for the 10th day now. And im extremely worried about her.

The situation has a lot of other problems attached to it and i wont go into details but...
Can anyone give any answers to why she has been feeling this for for 10 days now and if this is normal?

Has anyone else had this effect of feeling "out of it" for this long?

Is it possibly because of the "2 10 packs" she smoked? And is that way to much to smoke in one day?

Any answers will be greatly appreciated. Thank You

 

[MindAstronaut]

I dont know man maybe she triggerd somekind of psychosis.
If shes mentaly unstable because of these events and she smokes like big amounts weed to depress it, its not a good thing and will probably make it worse so i reconmend quit the weed.
atleast till shes out of the dreamstate, and try to support and help her in this difficult period.

Quiting weed is difficult, try to find healty alternatives to get her busy so she wont think of getting high all the time.

Wish you all the best Peace..

 

[st.bot.32]

Agreed, if she hadn't smoked for ages and then bucketloads all at once, and to deal with a bad experience, sounds like borderline bad-trip territory.

Also is she sleeping at all? Just guessing because being underslept for days on end puts you into that category.. (been there, done that.. feels like a bad trip that doesnt end) and goes hand in hand with these kinds of problems. Being underslept can trigger mental health problems as well. combine that with smoking lots of weed in one sitting.. not good.

Also, being profoundly disconnected from the world around you.. that sounds a lot like being in a state of deep depression.

Take care of your good friend. If it is persisting.. and if she needs help... !

 

[ararat]

I know that state and I've experienced it too, it's awful.. I don't remember how long it lasted, but I went to a homeopathic too, no idea if it helped, but I had the feeling as if.
from that point I quit weed for, I don't know, half a year of more. now I smoke sometimes some, and I don't get those effects anymore.. or at least not in that intensity (+ I've learned how to deal with the feelings)


I can give you one advice: don't panic.
this state will end in some time. sometimes it can also be permanent, but I think that this is rarely the case. just wait and see, often there is not much a psychiatrist can do about that (in case of it being a primary illness).
I think that it is very likely that your friend has this dissociation as a secondary illness, meaning that it results out of her trauma. if you solve the trauma (I know, I know... easy to say, hard to do...) the dissociation maybe will disappear too.
I had a tumor and my cousin died of cancer. I think that those dissociations often are triggered by drugs, such as cannabis. in my case it was a mix of large quantities of weed, wormwood and nitrous oxide (a dissociative..).

--> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization
--> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derealization
be careful with such information though.. it may make the situation worse, happened to me. it brought some things to my mind which I didn't recognize and wouldn't have bothered about. it's like reading the article about HPPD and thinking that you have it, just because of some visual effects... I think many people already experienced that..

tell her not to smoke weed under any circumstances. as she wasn't a regular user she won't have too much problems doing it I guess.

may I ask what problems it brought?

 

[sullenboy]

Thank you very much for the answers, and thank u misery, derealization is absolutely what i was looking for. Reading the wiki article fits her to the T.

As for not smoking, she isn't addicted and couldn't get her hands on it anyway because she checked herself into a psychiatric ward.

I guess the effects have to wear off and she can kinda go back to resuming her life.

Anyway, thank you for the answers.

Btw, misery, how long did the 'derealization' last for you?

 

[Guest]

i advice all that are reading this thread: when feeling depersonalized, don't do psychedelics. i spent some time feeling completely disconnected from my body, about three years ago and i did some acid. acid got completely dissociative, to the point that i did not knew that if what i was seeing with my eyes open was reality. my body sometimes did things by itself, like walking around, and i seemed to watch it like a movie, forgetting that i was my body. please be careful. sorry for the offtopic, but i thought it was appropriate to say.

 

[st.bot.32]

Timothy Leary said it best (copied from the Mushroom FAQ

ACID IS NOT FOR EVERY BRAIN .... ONLY THE HEALTHY, HAPPY, WHOLESOME, HANDSOME, HOPEFUL, HUMOROUS, HIGH-VELOCITY SHOULD SEEK THESE EXPERIENCES. THIS ELITISM IS TOTALLY SELF-DETERMINED. UNLESS YOU ARE SELF-CONFIDENT, SELF-DIRECTED, SELF-SELECTED, PLEASE ABSTAIN.

Even on Cannabis I've had bad experiences where I wasn't in the right headspace and just should NOT have taken it...

 

[ararat]

i advice all that are reading this thread: when feeling depersonalized, don't do psychedelics. i spent some time feeling completely disconnected from my body, about three years ago and i did some acid. acid got completely dissociative, to the point that i did not knew that if what i was seeing with my eyes open was reality. my body sometimes did things by itself, like walking around, and i seemed to watch it like a movie, forgetting that i was my body. please be careful. sorry for the offtopic, but i thought it was appropriate to say.

so you did acid when you were feeling depersonalised?
and the things you describe, have you experienced them after you have done acid or during your trip? how long did those feelings stay?
and do you know why you were having this dissociation?

hm, I was thinking about doing shrooms in summer. it would be two year since I've done them the last time. the last time I had a kind of bad trip, feeling depersonalized directly after, which lasted for 2 weeks or so.
I really want to trip again, but this makes me worry that those feelings may return.. I don't feel depersonalized anymore though.

Btw, misery, how long did the 'derealization' last for you?

hm hard to tell. I don't know, I guess it was really bad for 3 - 5 weeks and after that I had it in a slight way for, hmm..., 2 - 6 months. it was a gradual process.. I'm not very sure on that though

 

[Guest]

so you did acid when you were feeling depersonalised?

yes.

and the things you describe, have you experienced them after you have done acid or during your trip?

i have felt them during my trip, and still, i do not feel "down to earth" yet. i don't know why is it. i spent many time beliving that all that i saw was a lie, and this was just a dream. acid seemed to help, making me realize with extreme violence what was reality. the root of this happened when i was 12. in the city where i was born, it was very, very hot. it could easily reach 40-42ºC in the summer, and temperatures like 45ºC until 48ºC were not uncommon at all. once, i was out to play with a friend, and then i came home, and when i was about to reach my house, i turned back and saw my friend, right after me, and i started talking to him. then, i bend over to pick something up, and my friend was not there at all, and was impossible for him to go away without me seeing it. it had been an hallucination caused (i think) by heat. i searched for him, and never found no one, because he was at home eating a sandwich. after that, i deeply started to question that experience, and "being" started being a really dissassociative experience to me. it seemed that my life was a movie, and i was watching it alone in a theater, seating on the last row. i have made plenty of efforts to "cure" this, by meditation, psychedelics, and so on, but i haven't been able to find a permanent cure, although meditation REALLY helps.

how long did those feelings stay?

lsd really helped. meditation helped me even more. i don't feel so depersonalized now, but i somewhat feel that i am not yet down.

and do you know why you were having this dissociation?

it happened like the story i told. other reasons, i don't know.

 

[ararat]

wow, crazy story, so you were playing with a halucination-friend all the time?

what I don't really get is, for one part you say that lsd made the feeling way worse, and later you write that it really helped. did you trip again afterwards?

 

[tryptonaut]

I dont know man maybe she triggerd somekind of psychosis.

That was my first thought as well. Feeling the effects from weed for 10 days isn't possible unless there is something really going wrong in your brain (I don't mean that demeaning, an illness of the brain is just an illness like a cold or a broken leg - it needs to be cured)

A good friend of mine once triggered a psychosis with weed and shrooms and he felt spaced out for half a year. Even after 8 months or so he was still afraid to smoke cigarettes because he said they sometimes sent him on kind of a "bad trip". My friend was lucky because he found a good doctor who took him seriously - the doctor was used to drug addicts and kind of spaced out people and had dedicated himself to helping these people. The doctor (a psychiatrist) he went to at first was really bad - he subsribed him haloperidol which the second doctor (the good one) said was absolutely out of bounds for his psychosis and even dangerous.

I don't especially like psychiatrists myself, but in certain cases I think you need to look for a good one - and when you feel spaced out 10 days in a row from smoking weed (be it as good as it can be, but 10 days is way too long!) you probably need some help. If it doesn't get better, try to find a psychiatrist who is kind of a freak himself. If you can't find one that you trust, then you'll be on your own, but take it seriously!

Has anyone else had this effect of feeling "out of it" for this long?

Well it depends on how you define "feeling out of it"
I have had the feeling of being "out of it" sometimes for weeks when I was depressed, but it wasn't life threatening. You'll have to decide how bad it is - take it seriously but don't overreact and try to judge it objectively - can your friend come over it, or do you feel she is totally lost and needs external help?

 

[sullenboy]

So which is it?

The feeling of "out of it" isnt a mild depression, but she saids it feels like nothing is real. Its basically like what is says in the wiki page. It isnt mild, and i think she needs help.

So misery is saying 2 weeks, and tryptonaut is saying 10 days is not possible. So which is it?

Im pretty sure this is an effect of the marijuana, but i just wanna know if this "out of it" state is possible and happened to anyone else for 10 days 2 weeks now...

Just so i know it'll go away sooner or later.

 

[user_1919]

Maybe she is actually awake to reality and realized that nothing is actually real. Just flow with it and everything will be fine.

 

[Guest]

misery, while on the influence of lsd, i felt completely dissociated. then, afterwards, it began to get better, but not to the point of complete cure. when the trip is understood, days or weeks later, i continue to feel dissociated.
i truly think that this "out of it" has something to do with depression. i have been with the same depression 11 years, the psychologist says that the only thing i can do is stuff my brain with antidepressants. there are countless "medicines" and "diets", though the ONLY thing that really helps me focus on the present and bring me closer to myself is meditation. i have felt like this for ages, so i truly belive that 10 days is completely possible. i would be happy if you said that mine was about to end in 300 days, let alone 10!
and yes, i played with my hallucination for about 10 minutes, and had a talk with it. then, it vanished. i think it was caused by the extreme heat. it hit me real hard...so what was real ? what really happened on my mind ? how could i be sure that someone that i talked to was real, and that everyone else didn't saw me talking to a wall and think i had gone insane ? this was very hard to me and i isolated myself from everyone, also due to the fact that in extreme stressed conditions, i also heard voices, and bells. one thing led to another, and depression was obviously the road where i was heading to. even today, i sometimes "incidentally" touch the people that i am talking to, so i am sure that he/she is truly there. for many time, i thought i was crazy. then, i began looking at things another way and learned that maybe this was a blessing, and i had the chance of choosing not to mix with the rest.

i guess the only option is to go with the flow and forget about it. if it passes, great. if it doesn't, you'll learn to live with it and it is not so bad once you get the hang of it.

 

[Elfinn]

In dealing with psychedelics,or also called entheogens
one is dealing with spirits,and they have a way of obsessing
the soul,and take it out of time.
This is really a healing plant,cannabis
but the power of the spirit world should not be taken for granted.

One should be in a proper setting
where people who do not smoke the weed
should relax in their proper STRAIGHT setting.

It is much like taking shrooms with people around
who do not partake. (i have experienced this o n c e )
Realiy-clash!!

I think your girl friend should take it easy on the Cannabis
and use it ritualistic,to relax,with music,or nature around
and where there is no need to explain once
feelings at all times,to unknowing observers.

Love,Elfinn.

 

[BrainEater]

well i'm not sure what you mean by 2 ten packs of MJ. well if it refers to 20 euro or somethin of MJ smoked in one day i'd say it's not even close to the extreme of being able to smoke infinite amounts of MJ

i once smoked 50 euro in one day.... 8[ its like 5-7 g ... well it was a bit exagerated but we were 2 ...

i find this kind of mind state very cool though a bit creepy... i was in it a lot too...when i travelled in thailand ... i just didn't have anything to do except smoking and hanging around in the hammock or on the beach or go swimming.

If you're mentally fragile it might be a bit heavy, but it can make you stronger too.

Peace. :weedman:

 

[tryptonaut]

Well, I was feeling out of it after I had been smoking cannabis daily for three years, the last year I was home-growing it and therefore my daily intake was around 3-4g of good bud. But the feeling out of it had been slowly induced over time, and when I realized I had to stop I needed a while to come over it - but I clearly felt it became better within days.

My perception of a trip nowadays is a different one: when I'm tripping hard I often get the feeling that everything has changed, I won't come out of this sane, and so on - but then when I come down everything starts to normalize which makes me appreciate "normality" so much more again. I might still be a little desoriented the next day, but the day after that I feel more normal than ever before. This is one of the reasons I love tripping once in a while, it kind of grounds me, gives me back my healthy optimism and joy of life. If I was feeling out of it for days after every trip, hell I wouldn't be tripping!