Well, this is my second thread. Perhaps it's not the right section, and even it's wrong to insist with this, but I need you, all of you, 'cos this is the first forum about panic/anxiety/etc where I see there's actually support among users (I won't mention certain forum where there's no support at all, nevermind).

Ok, I'll tell my story for all those who didn't read it.

Ten months ago I went through a really bad trip with pot. It was the first time I smoked. A month later, after suffering a panic attack per week or so, I started with derealization and a very few (though scary enough) episodes of depersonalization.

These are my first twenty days with clonazepam and I'm doing quite well, yet still there are some spurts of unreality and weird sensations. Also I'm undergoing psychotherapy.

There are improvements, I won't deny it. I feel a lot better since the firsts days.

There are feelings that I didn't experienced again (touch wood). For example, the sensation of "I'm not here" or "these is not happening", or "I feel like if I'm going to disolve", or "I can't tell if this is a dream or not", etc. I know I felt really bad... I can remember, though I'm not able anymore to recall those sensations. Those who are mothers in the forum will get my drift. It's like the labors pains when they gave birth to their sons. They can remember them, but not recreate them, do you know what I mean?

But there are something that still scare me, and I want to share them with you, guys, and I'll appreciate SO MUCH if one of you who overcame this would give me some encorauging words.

I was already told (even for some users from here) that cannabis can't ruin your nervous system forever, specially if you only smoked pot once. So I will try not to ask about this again, despite it's almost an obsession of mine.

Well, one thing that happens to me is that if I think about a place or and object which is not right before my eyes, I get sort of frightened... I mean, even when I gain some sense of reality, my heart starts to beat faster and faster... It's very hard to explain.

And also, when I actually have something right before my eyes, I can't believe or understand it. This thing used to happen everytime and in a stronger way before, speccially with people. Now it's very very mild, but it remains there still.

Sometimes I can't tell how near or how far things are. For example, when I was a kid, I remember staring through my window and watch people passing by down the street and merasure them with my fingers. It ammused my the fact that a person could be as tall as my thumb. Do you get it? (I'm not treating you like stupid; I insist on being understood because of my poor english). Now it's the same, and sometimes I wonder if I have to learn what's the world again, like if I was a newborn.

A thing that very irritates me: the things you find on the web. Those stupid books by Daphne Simenon and Madelein Steinberg (I'm not sure about the name of the later) about depersonalization and "the lost of the self"... Grr... I HATE THEM! They are alarmist and sensationalistic and scary as hell. Those things fed my terrors for a very long time, because according to those people, depersonalization may not be due to anxiety disorders and -instead- be an illness per se. This is what scares me the most, I swear, because that would mean that everything about derealization-as-mere-symptom-of-anxiety is a LIE and there's no hope.

The lack of recovery stories scares me, too. And reading about people who has both derealization and depersonalization since YEARS.

Please, I'm very scared. I still can't believe anxiety causes all these "mystical" and supernatural sensations. I used to think that I lost my soul! Not to mention that I was convinced that I'm a squizophrenic.

Please, everyone who has a few encouraging words, please, tell me if everything will be fine... Sometimes I get this horrible feeling that I'm not going to recover my self again, that things won't be again like they used to be. Sometimes I think I sold my soul and ruined my life for a drag of weed.

Well, that's all by the moment. Sorry again if this is the wrong section and if they are currently many other threads like this, but today I feel truly desolated.

Will be back soon and stay tuned to let you know about how I feel.

Thanks a lot in advance for those who post.



Hugs.