Methamphetamine Psychosis

The main characteristic of meth psychosis is the presence of prominent hallucinations and delusions (APA, 1994). The diagnosis of methamphetamine psychosis is made after performing a thorough history, physical exam, urine drug screen, and "reality testing."

Clients who are psychotic will be unable to provide a history themselves, so this information will need to be obtained from significant others. The term ”spun” is used by the meth culture for a user who has overdosed on meth and induced a state of psychotic confusion. The user should be assessed for the following manifestations of psychosis:

Hallucinations: Hallucinations, or false perceptions, may be associated with any of the five senses.

* Auditory: This is the false perception of sound and the most frequent type of hallucination. Most frequently the user "hears voices." Command hallucinations are “voices” that may issue commands for violence to others. For example, the user hears voices telling him to kill himself or others. Obviously, this places the user and/or health care professional in a potentially dangerous situation.
* Visual: Seeing a person, object or animal that does not exist in the environment. For example, a user sees a lion coming toward him.
* Olfactory: This is the false perception of smelling odors that are not present in the environment. For example, a user smells his "brain rotting."
* Tactile: This is a false perception of the sense of touch, often of something on or under the skin. Formication (US Dept. of Justice, 1996) is an advanced form of methamphetamine hallucination during which the user feels bugs on his skin. The user scratches at the “bugs” trying to remove them, gouging the skin and leaving scars. These scars indicate that the user has experienced formication or “crank bugs."
* Gustatory: A false perception of the sense of taste. For example, a user refuses to eat because he tastes poison in his food.

http://www.rnceus.com/meth/methpsych.html


I think I've experienced tons of methamphetamine induced psychosis since I first started smoking... I greatly enjoy it, but I never really thought about it being like an 'overdose' like how the article makes it out to be...
It sets in after about 4 days for me, at my current state, because of my low tolerance - but when I used to smoke every day it would take longer and be completely different.
That's one of the main reasons I smoke - It's unexplainable, but I make it very enjoyable in my head.. by smoking more, and more in that state. I also like tripping out over the

Shadow People
Plots(Police, robbers, friends)
Hallucinations sneaking behind corners

not so much while they're happening... but they kill alotta' time

I'm sure It's a very harmful thing to induce on the mind and body in the long run... Well I've even had first hand experience in how my mind now processes things...

Just how bad is this? Do people go to the hospital for shit like this? When do they consider it an overdose?

EDIT: I just kinda' answered my question by researching that a methamphetamine overdose truly results in a heart attack/stroke and sometimes death according to: http://www.montana.edu/wwwai/imsd/rezmeth/effmethod.htm

The first article I linked claimed psychosis to be an overdose.

yes i am very sure i am experiencing similiar symptons and then same at this very moment.

From what i know about it, meth psychosis is mostly caused by the lack of sleep you experience while binging on meth.

If you stay awake on your own for days on end you will experience the same hallucinations and disorientation.

perhaps an overdose, not an instant death overdose but rather walking the line that separates life and heart failure, from a stimulant might have a similar effect on the mind as not sleeping.
From experience, I've managed to stay up for several days without any drugs and only got some mild visual distortion and really spaced out. but every time I stayed awake for several days it would be much worse... shadow people, stuff moving around, disorientation, delusions, strange jello-like smokey energy floating about, auditory hallucinations... etc...

I thought you quit..............

yeah....? what happened there?

smokin' shards ftw!

I did....
But relapse is life.

that was a little crazy/// are ya tryin to kill me? lol

Yes, I'm attacking you.

Now you just have to learn to recognize the psychosis so that you don't come in the IRC channel acting like a total douche :P

Ahaha, good one Theta!
I honestly think you're right...

-But I'm banned forever, I'm sure darkus will never let me back in.