Crazy heart rate

Definitely a bad wave mate. I remember I also had long and particularly alarming comebacks at this stage. Some were nearly as intense as months 2-4. I suggest you take your meds when really necessary, there's no point in suffering to the point of becoming useless. Stay strong!

Brokethehabit wrote:Definitely a bad wave mate. I remember I also had long and particularly alarming comebacks at this stage. Some were nearly as intense as months 2-4. I suggest you take your meds when really necessary, there's no point in suffering to the point of becoming useless. Stay strong!

Thanks man. I always appreciate your feedback on my posts. This last 2 weeks have been super insane. I had some good days on month 7-8, but man, this month has been total sh** like starting PAWS all over again. The nonstop suffering has got me crawling with crippling anxiety. This wave has made me so insecure, that I have zero trust in body doing its job now. If I could just have a break, with some quality sleep, I know I’ll be much better. Today I decided to get an appointment with a local therapist, maybe the extra help will do some good on gaining back that trust. I’ve been hit so hard with so many crazy symptoms going all over me in so little time, that I’m close to loosing my mind. But I’m still holding on to faith that this nightmare will be over soon, and I will be able to enjoy life again and have a good night’s sleep like I’ve never had before

No problem man... we're in this together.
Around month 9 I was also a complete wreck. Panic was the worst symptom... I hated it. It hacks your defences and plunges you into another bad spiral.
This bad wave is temporary, ergo taking those meds is also temporary, so relax there's no real chance of you developing another drug addiction. Don't be afraid of prescribed meds mate, they can help you immensely in these dark hours.

Hi John -- I've been following your posts and we're on the same withdrawal timeline. I'm about 9 1/2 months and my symptoms have recently come roaring back with a vengeance. After a quasi-bearable summer where the PAWS leveled down to about a 6ish, I've found myself stuck in a roaring 9/10 the past few weeks. Massive anxiety, muscle tightness/cramping, jerking, and insanely bizarre nerve sensations on my right side from the top of my head to the tips of my fingers that had me solicit my doctor for an MRI of my cervical spine. But when the same sensations crept up on my left side somehow I immediately recognized the absurdity of it all, which made me able to get a hold of myself and say STOP - YOU'RE NOT ILL - THESE ARE JUST PHYSICAL MANIFESTATIONS OF ANXIETY. Nothing more. i know exactly what you mean about not trusting your body - mine's been hijacked by PAWS physical symptoms plus all other manner of legitimate health issues. In June I had back surgery for a herniated disc and yesterday I had knee surgery for a torn meniscus (shitty summer!). With PAWS forever lurking in the background the anxiety became too much! Maybe something heavy is happening in your own life that's triggered this bad wave? I too thought I was done with these intense phases, but from what I've read on Uncommon it seems PAWS reemerges around this time for a nasty butt kicking. I think it's GREAT you're getting a therapist. I recently got a new one who's super helpful, but more importantly I discovered a FREE dude called The Anxiety Guy on YouTube (he's also on IG, does podcasts, etc). PLEASE, I encourage you to look him up. Dude's a godsend. He's an expert on understanding health anxiety and GAD and has loads and loads of amazing techniques for overcoming these dreadful physical issues. Seriously, I must watch 3-5 of his videos and read one of his blogs each day. It's really helped re-wire how I deal with anxiety and how I receive the physical sensations that come with it. My therapist told me to think of anxiety as a good friend that's just trying to protect me from what's harmful or unknown, which is why the messages are so loud. In other words, anxiety is really begging you to do things differently, to be kind to yourself, to choose a different path, to change fear-based thinking. Freaking out about it just ramps up your CNS and keeps you in the loop of panic attacks, muscles spasms, heart palps, etc. Taking meds is your personal choice, but I know one too many people who've unwittingly swapped one "prescription" for another. You quit weed to flush the chemicals out, so might not be wise to take fresh ones in. Breathe more, breathe better, and take calculated steps to understanding and quashing your health anxiety symptoms. Of course PAWS will still be with us for however long, but at least we'll be better equipped to deal with it. It blows, man. PAWS is a crap hand we've been dealt for trying to do something positive and healthy by giving up weed. But after nine months I'm certain we're closer to the bigger, better, brighter side of quitting. Have faith, peep The Anxiety Guy, and don't forget to breathe. Be well and much respect.

@exstonerchick Thank you for posting, reading this has given me a bit of comfort at this dark hour sitting in bed feeling like crap. This has been by far the nastiest wave I’ve experienced so far, still below the indescribable hell of the first few months, but nonetheless a challenge of its own class. Whenever I try to fall asleep, I start feeling just plain sick. I don’t know how to describe it, but its a dreadful feeling. Its like I need to puke, and if I had the worse flu ever, the room starts spinning, I start panicking and I just have to sit up quickly. After I sit it goes away slowly. If not, I get involuntary jerks while falling asleep that wake me up in panic. This month has also bought back severe muscle cramping, tingling, twitching, and involuntary jerks. My abdomen and back feel heavy and cramped-like while standing up, my back muscles hurt a lot. When this happens I feel out of breath and I have to push and strain myself to be able to talk, not sure if that makes any sense. My coordination is out of balance, if I try to pick something up, my hands are so clumsy that I tend to drop stuff. Sometimes I overshoot my movements and accidentally kick or punch stuff flying across the room. Even my tongue gets twisted in a knot while speaking sometimes. Add all of that to the other 10,000 physical symptoms, and its no wonder my mind is racing all day with thoughts of serious illnesses and anxiety. My brain is still rewiring, my memory is still crappy, but a lot better than months ago. I still get bouts of brain fog and can’t seem to remember what I did yesterday or find the right words to express myself. But it has been the trend that it gets a lot better and then gets worse again during a bad wave. I’ve seen way too many doctors, had more CTs and xrays than I should had, and nothing ever comes up that correlate to the nasty symptoms we have during PAWS. Anyways, I’m glad you are on your way to getting better! We are almost there to that 1 year mark!! Of course we may still get out butts kicked by PAWS for longer, but I just wish to get to that point where it transitions from “full-time doom” to “intermittent discomfort”. I’m sure we’ll get there soon enough, but in the meanwhile, we just need to hang tight and let the storm release it’s mighty wrath. Best wishes!

@john5:6

john5:6 wrote: Whenever I try to fall asleep, I start feeling just plain sick. I don’t know how to describe it, but its a dreadful feeling. Its like I need to puke, and if I had the worse flu ever, the room starts spinning, I start panicking and I just have to sit up quickly. After I sit it goes away slowly. If not, I get involuntary jerks while falling asleep that wake me up in panic.

That's a near verbatim account of how I experienced it too. It may be that the cartridges f***ed you up this bad.

@Exstonerchick

Exstonerchick wrote:I immediately recognized the absurdity of it all, which made me able to get a hold of myself and say STOP - YOU'RE NOT ILL - THESE ARE JUST PHYSICAL MANIFESTATIONS OF ANXIETY. Nothing more.

That's the crux of it I believe. On the other hand, though I was able to talk myself out of visiting doctors and making appointments, I was never able to talk my brain out of feeling sick. It is my stoicism that imporved tremmendously in terms of putting up with and enduring the suffering. The physical pain itself did not go away no matter what I did. Okay, the odd Xanax did alleviate things but just like for John, I had many sleepless nights.

Those carts are pure poison man. It eases my mind knowing that I’m not the only one with that experience. Its so intense that sometimes I spiral into doubt and start thinking “this can’t be the PAWS, I must be seriously ill”. It was gone for at least a month, well, not entirely gone, but more like 90% less intense or frequent. But this month its back at full power. I’ve had mixed experiences with benzos. I used Ativan for very short periods when I went sleepless for days, when it kicked in, I would feel more anxious and sick for a while until I eventually fell asleep. But sadly the last time I used it, I had a real bad trip. My HR spiked and I went into full panic mode. It could be the dose. I never take more than 0.25mg. The pills are 1mg and I cut them 4 way and only take a piece at a time. Anyways, I may end up taking something soon if I don’t manage to sleep. This is my 4th sleepless night in a row. I’m sitting in bed watching my wife and my dog peacefully sleep while I’m trapped in a loop on this endless nightmare.

Meanwhile, I’ve gotten around to work on a project idea I’ve been planing for some time. It was really difficult for me to find out what was happening during the first weeks of PAWS. It took some extensive google searching to be able to find something PAWS related. This forum is rich with people’s experiences, but there isn’t a place where all the data is compiled in a way that a unknowing PAWS victim finds and understands easily. So I took some of that remaining energy I have and developed a website that summarizes what PAWS is and helps people find helpful info and resources. The page is WeedPAWS.org

It’s still a bit below when searching on google, but I’m sure it will get to the top with time. This page is what I would have loved to find during my googling phase (which made everything worse with so many illnesses showing up instead of PAWS). There is still a lot of room for improvement, but at least its up and running.

john5:6 wrote:It was really difficult for me to find out what was happening during the first weeks of PAWS. It took some extensive google searching to be able to find something PAWS related. This forum is rich with people’s experiences

Haha, same here. It was a godsend to finally see that I was not crazy!
Nice page man! I think a lot of people will relate.
But in all honesty I think it is you who will really benefit from this project as it will ease your mind and keep your panic at bay.
For me it was reading the UF while the family was slumbering peacefully

Brokethehabit wrote:

john5:6 wrote:It was really difficult for me to find out what was happening during the first weeks of PAWS. It took some extensive google searching to be able to find something PAWS related. This forum is rich with people’s experiences

Haha, same here. It was a godsend to finally see that I was not crazy!
Nice page man! I think a lot of people will relate.
But in all honesty I think it is you who will really benefit from this project as it will ease your mind and keep your panic at bay.
For me it was reading the UF while the family way slumbering peacefully

I know right? People still think I’m crazy lol, but I don’t know what I would have done if I didn’t find this place. I also implemented a BB forum software on the page as well at forum.weedpaws.org It may never be as rich and helpful as UF, but its there as an alternative PAWS dedicated forum. I just wanted to put in my grain of sand to keep making PAWS more mainstream, since sadly most doctors don’t even recognize it as real. So maybe seeing a page like this will put a more serious tone on the subject. But only time will tell.

john5:6 wrote:People still think I’m crazy lol

Again, same here. All my weed buddies thought I was mental. My GP thought I'd gone mad (I didn't dare to tell him the truth). My wife did not believe that weed withdrawal could cause so many health issues. The doctors I saw were clueless and thought I was hypochondriac (I didn't dare to tell them the truth). For a while I had seriuos doubts as to what I was or wasn't.
That was perhaps the worst period

I spent couple of sleepless nights now (8th month) because my use of 5htp supplement backfired. One pill f***ed up my sleep progress and my HR got over 100 at night and I couldn't even meditate. For me who has suffered mostly from insomnia I've noticed that everything related to serotonin is bad for me.

just_PAWS_ wrote:I spent couple of sleepless nights now (8th month) because my use of 5htp supplement backfired. One pill f***ed up my sleep progress and my HR got over 100 at night and I couldn't even meditate. For me who has suffered mostly from insomnia I've noticed that everything related to serotonin is bad for me.

That’s why I try to avoid any new drugs or supplements. I’ve had my share of backfires with supplements. I took too much omega3 and my blood thinned too much, at least I knew I wasn’t gonna die from a blood cloth lol, but it went over by just a bit of the limit on the PTT time test and I was bleeding longer than usual with just one of them tiny butterfly needles at the lab. One night I had a bad acid reflux and drank some gaviscon then had a cup of mint tea. Within 2 minutes I had a reaction with itching and 120bpm HR and almost fainted. I also tried NAC, and damn! It made everything much worse. So I just pop an occasional Ativan if I go sleepless too many nights in a row, and just eat as healthy as I can.

Woah, yeah PAWS is so fragile state of being and It's hard to know how easily you react to stuff. It's like I know from the early evening if I can sleep or not. I am afraid to ask benzo prescription and don't actually even want it because of the possible hook. Dunno if it makes sense to buy some from black market and from friends either.. :I