Health - How to deal with LSD-Induced paranoia

[yuval]

ok so your friend is tripping hard, maybe it's their first time, and
you realize that they're really scared. so here is what you should do
as far as i am able to figure it out:



1. anxiety is irrational. it's an emotion. so you don't ride it or
relate to it in any way, or even ignore it: you can go to sleep on a
marijuana paranoia (done it) but you had better take care of an LSD
paranoia as fast as you can.



2. so what do you do? you INTRODUCE a new emotion.



3. how you do that you ask? you cut through whatever argumentation the
scared person has. the room is freaking you out? lets go to another
room and look at a flower. constructing a narrative for the paranoia is
an automatic process. it can't be helped - 100% sure there will be some
reason that started the paranoia and now it's blown out of proportion.
but of course it makes no sense, it's a paranoia. so you feel your body
crumbling apart, sitting down? so what. lets walk. i said look at the
flower, you trust me don't you? just look and appreciate it's beauty.
how does the flower make you feel?



4. the important thing is to give empathy WITHOUT acknowledging the
underlying rationale (rather, irrationality) given for the paranoia.
just talk about something, do something with your friend, force a
different emotion down their throat. you can show love and affection
WITHOUT accepting the bullshit paranoia rationale. say you might have
thought or felt the same if you were in their shoes, sure, but in fact
you feel better and if they just look at the nice thingie here they
will feel better, too.



5. it's important so i'll repeat: don't say "if you take your mind off
this you won't feel bad". a) you don't want to ask them to lose
awareness of something bad they feel that's happening to them. it
implies you don't understand what they're going through, so why should
they trust you? b) you don't want to talk about the negative feeling AT
ALL!!! because when they think about something bad then it becomes
worse. say "do this and feel good". don't say "don't feel bad".
otherwise they dwell on the bad and it intensifies. give an
alternative. an emotional alternative (e.g. appreciation of beauty)
wrapped in a narrative (e.g. the flower, doing some activity such as
walking to another place).



thoughts / suggestions?

peace

y

[Solidly-here]

Gee, reading your Post (even though straight) is making me paranoid.


A Good Guide is quiet and soothing. A good guide has a smile on her face when talking to the Tripper. A good guide will simply "change the subject" when the Tripper is spiraling into negativity on a "touchy" subject: "NEXT!" Once the New subject is accepted the other situation is over.

[Nagognog2]

I reiterate from another thread elsewhere: Nine out of ten just asking if the person knows they have taken a drug, and that drugs wear off, is enough. They usually go "Oh yeah!" and that's that. The one out of ten, change the setting, suggest a shower/bath. Throw out the heavy metal rock CD, calm, sooth. Don't make a big deal out of it - or they will, too.

[Nature Boy]

I gotta go with SH and nago with this one. Bringing attention to the situation will only make matters worse. Don't over question the person. Change the setting if possible, try and do something normal/relative e.g. "Let's head into the kitchen and build spliffs".

Sometimes a person should be left alone. I've been in that situation and often, if you can get away for an hour or so and gather your senses without disturbance, it's one of the best ways of getting over the fear.

[hellion]

I think all if you remind the person that he or she is tripping on some drug, he/she will be calmed down. It's worked for me.