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Mentally Impaired From Long Term Abuse
MDMA
Citation:   PhiberOptik. "Mentally Impaired From Long Term Abuse: An Experience with MDMA (exp85844)". Erowid.org. Jul 19, 2020. erowid.org/exp/85844

 
DOSE:
  repeated oral MDMA
    repeated smoked Cannabis
BODY WEIGHT: 180 lb
I used the drug MDMA for about 5 years. The first 2 years it was 1-2 times a month, then the next two it was 2-3 times a month, and the final year it was 1-3 times a week, usually taking 3 pills per setting, one every 2 hours per roll. And it wasn’t until the last second that I started thinking about the long term effects.

Some which I have noticed are nothing is really that fun anymore. My reaction time is heavily slowed, it is very difficult to concentrate on things, and even simple tasks take a lot longer to do. I don't really have too many intelligent thoughts, sometimes I feel like my mind is blank. I also don't really have my own opinions about certain things, I’ll just go along with whatever anyone else is saying. I used to be rather intelligent but now I'm very slow and stupid. I have looked up the symptoms of ADD on the web and am sure I am experiencing a lot of them such as being very easily distracted, shifting from one incomplete task to another, often not listening to what is being said, often failing to give close attention to details, often not listening to when spoken to directly, and difficulty keeping my mind on any one thing. I get bored easily with a task and bounce to the next task, and the next task after that. Organizing and completing a task proves troublesome. Focusing deliberate, conscious attention to learning something new is extremely difficult.

Also one of the symptoms that scare me the most is continuous on and off blurred vision. These episodes last usually from 5-10 seconds but occur anywhere from 5-50 times a day. I have never experienced these symptoms before. I don't know what I should do. I am scared that I have done severe damage to my brain. I get lost in other peoples conversations. It is too difficult to follow along. Often when people talk to me directly I just zone out and lose track of what they're saying. I usually get very confused with things that involve short term memory, like I'll say I won't forget to do something and I forget second later, and remember minutes, hours, or even sometimes days after. I have no sense of direction.

I am scared shitless that I have damaged my brain and ruined my whole life. I have noticed that because after rolling so much, even reading is a lot harder. I tend to overlook a lot of things and skim through words, continuously having to tell myself to slow down and read slower. I guess I can't read as fast as I used to. Being mentally disabled to such an extent is the worst thing that ever happened to me. I have sampled pretty much every drug in the book during those 5 years and E was my drug of choice. After rolling for a few years, nothing compared to it. Also I smoked a shitload of pot when I could during rolling, which could have prolonged the long term effects. I took many adulterated pills with MDXX, but I didn't care because once I took that 3rd one, I rolled balls every time, even with a high tolerance.

Yea I know I am responsible for ruining my life, but since E was the drug I used the most, it probably had a lot to do with it. Also now on any job interview, I’m fucked because I can't pay enough attention to listen to the questions they ask. I won't get any job I want for a long time. I graduated with honors and got very good grades but reading became extremely difficult my final year like I'd skim too fast, continually telling myself to slow down. And I’d forget a sentence as soon as I read it. I came out of college much dumber than when I started. A full blown E-tard. I was so hooked on E during my final 2 years doing it, that I simply did not care about what anyone said. People were telling me to slow down but I didn’t listen.
People were telling me to slow down but I didn’t listen.
That it was gonna catch up and kill me if I didn't stop. But I just kept on rolling. I can relate to being very pissed if I knew people were gonna roll but not me. To me, E was extremely addictive on a weekly basis. If a whole week passed and I haven’t rolled , I’d get an intense craving to get pills. Or if I heard the word club or heard a dance or techno song, I would automatically think of E. Whatever social setting I went to, club, bar, restaurant, someone’s house, I’d get enough E to roll balls. Sadly I never rolled for the magic, which probably faded years before I stopped. I continued to roll for the kick ass buzz it gave and the very affordable cost. Spending $30 on 3 pills as opposed to $100 for drinks at the bar always seemed like a good idea.

I can relate to people not wanting to diss X or give it a bad name when they are loving it. I couldn’t agree more. When I was a weekly user I was simply offended by people who weren't down with eating pills. I wanted everyone to experience what I was feeling and it just didn't make sense to say anything bad about the drug that I simply lived for. I thought about it every day. I think I am somewhat feeling the weight of the world around me but I am sure it had a lot to do with building up my whole week for the weekend when I was going to roll and have a wonderful comedown smoking pot all day. I lived for that. The comedown was phase 2 and very important. If I didn't have pot on the comedown it would really suck.

As much progress as I have made so far through recovery, I can see myself recovering in a decade, but it really does seem like an eternity. My biggest problem was confusing moderation for abuse. Maybe my brain couldn’t handle any more pills. It was sending me a message when during comedowns everything was melting and morphing like mild shroom like visuals. It has been 4 years since I've touched it and I even saw a neurologist who ran tests like an MRI of the brain, and EEG, which came back fine. However the neuropsychological evaluation from a neuropsychologist showed significant mental impairment with tasks involving learning and memory. After 4 years off of the drug I feel significant improvement in short term memory, but sadly the blurred vision has not gone away and my concentration is not good at best.

I have been taking Zoloft prescribed by the neurologist to deal with the depression of being permanently mentally impaired because of long term MDMA abuse.

Exp Year: 2010ExpID: 85844
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: 23
Published: Jul 19, 2020Views: 3,539
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MDMA (3) : Various (28), Post Trip Problems (8), Depression (15), Addiction & Habituation (10), Health Problems (27), Retrospective / Summary (11)

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