130- PTSD 10- Drugs and long term effects

I have to admit that I hadn't planned on telling you this part of my life ; but, in all honesty, it has been on my mind lately. So, my ***trigger warning*** is probably more valid than ever as I'm about to detail horrendous, criminal acts my father forced on me throughout my youth and adolescence. 



In his craziness, he believed that using certain drugs brings us closer to god - he wasn't the only one to do it, evidently : many humans have sought spiritual enlightenment with many different plants and have expanded to a myriad of artificial drugs. 

But, it's one thing to be an adult and decide that and hurt only oneself in the process - it's a totally different thing to force it on a child! 

Indeed, I remember some occasions during the decade and a half under his thumb, he'd bring me one of three kinds of drugs to take with him (3, to my recollection!) :

• Cannabis (I always thought it was the hash part, but now am not sure which part of the plant he'd given me to smoke in the water pipe) - he actually had grown it in his disciples' house, well hidden and under special lights... 
• Some mushroom - as far as I can remember, also smoked in water pipes
• and lastly and the worst of these was LSD - in paper form

These past few days, I started researching the long-term effects. As far as I understand it, the first two have no long-lasting effects, but LSD have a host of nasty side effects which can last for many years (if not the rest of my lifespan). 

In no particular order, these effects are so numerous that I'll first link you to an article about them- and use it to detail the ones that I have noted as possible effects on me. 

• Higher or lower body temperature :  in my case, I tend to have a lower temperature that has baffled my GP doctor. Most summers, I have measured (with digital thermometers) to about 35.5C, and in winter it can lower to just over 32C. I hadn't thought about the link to LSD, because my mother had told me that I was born early and had hypothermia, so I assumed that it just stuck with me. Now, I come to read this side effect and believe it to be at least a possible long-term effect. 
• Impaired depth perception as well as size of objects can be totally unrelated difficulty, or that the drug didn't worsen a natural disposition towards these difficulties.
• Flashbacks, recurrence of bad trip - now, I can recall at least one common bad trip types I had : feeling all the walls and ceiling closing in on me, and crushing into me. It exacerbated my claustrophobia after my numerous punishment sojourns in narrow WC. I fear that my repressed memories would include far worse flashbacks of bad trips I haven't had, yet... 
• Severe depression : I have talked just in the previous posts about numerous depressive episodes. I think most of them are linked to my various traumas and hopeless situation and life conditions, but I don't discount an added effect from the drug.
• Another page on that same website also mentions extreme changes in mood. I have briefly discussed my cyclothymia which I know is directly linked to my trauma, abuse, separation anxiety and a few other factors, but I'm sure that LSD just didn't help my case... However, as I mentioned in my short entry about it, I did eventually find ways to reduce cyclothymia's impact on my life. 
• I hope that I'll never get ''delayed'' hallucinations and psychosis from my multiple forced intakes. I have had moments seeing weird kaleidoscope brown imagery in front of me, sometimes after staring at the light too long and that can be just the normal afterimage, but maybe some of these occurrences were in fact delayed LSD hallucinations...  I just cannot tell, I don't know how to differentiate and know for sure. 
• Fears, phobias, hopelessness etc : all these are related to my traumas, separation, as well as abuse and domestic violence, but am more than sure that having added odd chemicals in my body didn't help any of these

I never chose to become ''closer to god'', a god that I grew to despise over the years and have finally come to the conclusion that he doesn't exist outside of human invention... 

I have never decided to take any of these drugs, and have become quite firmly against all of them. 

I think it's far better to use one's time and energy on more fruitful pursuits, art and imagination, reading books and so on - than use drugs for any number of reasons. 

I frankly hate drugs, all of them and have no possible forgiveness towards my father who forced them on me just to enforce his control over my psyche and my personality, especially that after I came back to my maternal family, had learned that he started giving me LSD as early as 2-3 years old... 

That's just criminal and I sometimes wish I could do something about it and get justice done but I cannot for a whole host of reasons, including legal statute of limitations... 

I'm now an adult and have to come to terms that certain side effects are going to stay with me for the rest of my life - and haven't discussed this yet with my therapists, out of fear of being forced to take medication that I know will have their own side effects... 
As long as I can, I'll learn to deal with it all, somehow, because I know that healing and learning to function is possible - and will take time, patience and much wait.