Examples of ICD-10 schizophrenia symptoms collected from reports of the intoxication of the sage salvia divinorum, called by the Mazatec Indians of Oaxaca hojas de la maria pastora 'leaves of the Virgin Mary, the Shepherdess':
(a) thought echo,
Excerpted from Usenet archives:
"what happened was i would go into this state where my body seemed to be talking to me...but not in the sense that it really had anything to say, actually it was just my thoughts echoing to themselves, but such that it gave the impression that the echo was really saying something...the echo which echoed off of my body..."
...thought insertion or withdrawal,
Excerpted from The Vaults of Erowid:
"Again, I was aware of entity contact. Both times the first stop was in a sort of anteroom, where I was being examined by what seemed like doctors or psychiatrists, who were curious but largely ambivalent about me. I found out that they were judging whether or not I was worthy. The first time I was here I was nervous, but not frightened. Above all, I didn’t want them to send me back again. A Word inserted itself into my consciousness, although it meant nothing to me. It could have been a name, or a powerful incantation. Whatever it was, the doctors granted me passage through the next door."
... and thought broadcasting
Excerpted from Usenet archives:
"Yeah same here. I had a strong sense that I somehow caused an infinite repetition of the terrifying moments i experienced, like a recording of my mindset being broadcast to everybody and everything forever..."
(b) delusions of control, influence, or passivity, clearly referred to body or limb movements or specific thoughts, actions, or sensations; delusional perception;
Excerpted from The Vaults of Erowid:
"I remember seeing (B), (J), and (M). They were clearly staring at me like I was nuts, therefore making me paranoid and projecting me into a worse state of mind. I had enough time to tell them to "get rid of the shit!!!", meaning the salvia, and to take the dog upstairs. Then both realities became completely unstable and were jumping back and forth so furiously, I was in complete submissiveness. Like I lost the battle of life or something so similarly equal. It was controlling me and had been the whole time without any concept of my part in the whole thing.
I was now back to sitting on my bed with my hand still down my throat trying to grab the black hole that was swallowing my exterior from my interior. I heard my sister (M) say "He’s gonna pop" which threw me back into new reality. I then believed I was in a hospital operating room, tied down, convulsing with my organs spewing from my mouth like some severely sick individual. The imagery was horrendous. I came to the "real" reality and found everyone looking at me in the most uncomfortable manner, like I had lost my mind completely. Or like I was a homeless puppy dog in need of help. I still can’t figure out what the look exactly was, but it did give me one of the worst feelings of my life. I then became completely paranoid, insisting that everyone stop staring at me and to not talk about the situation we had just experienced. I was frightened and unsure and most of all, felt like I was thrown down a rabbit hole that I wasn’t expecting."
(c)hallucinatory voices giving a running commentary on the patient's behaviour,
Excerpted from Usenet archives:
"...I was being pulled, very strongly, into 'something', and it was _worrying_. The radio changed - it was loudly and clearly talking about me, sounded like overhearing a walkie-talkie-talky communication between two coppers..."
...or discussing the patient among themselves,
Excerpted from The Vaults of Erowid:
'Unable to interpret what was happening I simply concluded that nothing could be happening (it’s easier), but just as I reached this decision, it suddenly dawned on me that Bart and Lisa Simpson were standing over me, looking down at me lying in the road, discussing my state, saying things like, "Look what he’s done!" and, "Now he’s gone and done it!"
What the…?
I felt so uncomfortable, raw and exposed, as if Bart and Lisa knew every intimate detail of my life and were examining me to find out about how or why I had come to be in this outrageous circumstance. I didn’t exactly feel like I was being judged by them - they appeared playfully concerned - but I began to feel great shame, like I’d done something beyond naughty! Like I had crossed a line one should never cross, caused a cosmic violation. It was so emotionally intense and unexpected that I felt violated.'
...or other types of hallucinatory voices coming from some part of the body.
Excerpt from the Temple:
'Almost impossible to describe accurately with words, but my entire body shattered and the fragments became other things - the most physical visionary experience I've had, bar none. My internal dialog became an external voice, and the fragments of what used to be my arm sat muttering "arm.arm.arm.arm." - very much a "language defining reality" sensation.'
(d)persistent delusions of other kinds that are culturally inappropriate and completely impossible, such as religious or political identity, or superhuman powers and abilities (e.g. being able to control the weather, or being in communication with aliens from another world);
Differences between acute intoxication and persistent delusion aside, aliens/entities from another world form a repeating constant of salvia divinorum experiences.
(e)persistent hallucinations in any modality, when accompanied either by fleeting or half-formed delusions without clear affective content, or by persistent over-valued ideas, or when occuring every day for weeks or months on end.
Persistency problems again, but half-formed delusions abound:
Excerpt from The Vaults of Erowid:
'The entire bowl was smoked in four giant hits. By the last hit, I was drooling quite a bit and a heavy sweat had broken out all over my body. Again, I felt wrenched and as if I had been struck. I sat in the dark room, vibrating and trying to figure out what the hell had just happened. I was suddenly unclear as to where I was, who I was and what I was doing. The whole room seemed to be vibrating. I was aware of my room mates and knew that I knew them, but didn't have a clue as to who they were. I felt distinctly not-me, like I was someone else. The "else" in question seemed to be at times an Indian, participating in some sort of ritual, and at times a kid in some seventies juvenile delinquent B-movie. I felt a pressing need to figure out what was going on, and this quickly brought me out of it. There was an after buzz that lasted approximately twenty minutes, though I felt slightly "up" all night.'
(f) breaks or interpolations in the train of thought, resulting in incoherence or irrelevant speech, or neologisms;
Here, a person posts a transcription of a recording of themselves speaking under the influence of a kappa opioid agonist.
(g)catatonic behaviour, such as excitement, posturing, or waxy flexibility, negativism, mutism, and stupor.
By fortune, young adults with video cameras unwise enough to inflict salvia on themselves have charitably donated priceless critical evidence that could not be ethically collected in a research setting.
(h)"negative" symptoms such as marked apathy, paucity of speech, and blunting or incongruity of emotional responses, usually resulting in social withdrawal and lowering of social performance; it must be clear that these are not due to depression or to neuroleptic medication.
Humans undergoing extreme distortions of consciousness can be pretty quiet in between delusional outbursts.
(i)a significant and consistent change in the overall quality of some aspects of personal behaviour, manifest as loss of interest, aimlessness, idleness, a self-absorbed attitude and social withdrawal.
Not exactly something that's relevant to acute intoxication. Not that this sort of thing doesn't often come with chronic smoking of plant matter, but only the most foolhardy could consume salvia at length due to it's so frequently being an utterly wretched experience.
Sunday, April 8, 2007
POSITIONS
1) The internal experience of NMDA antagonists on human consciousness clearly does not resemble the critical elements which define schizophrenia, based on the author's experience.
2) The common name for NMDA antagonists is "dissociative drugs" or simply "dissociatives". This term is correct as these chemicals induce a characteristically dissociative state.
3) Depersonalization disorder is reproduced in normal individuals by NMDA antagonists. Descriptions of derealization and depersonalization from a person with this condition who has never taken drugs are also the only found to describe well the effects of NMDA antagonists. The negative symtomps of schizophrenia and strong depersonalization are identical to external observation.
4) Individuals with dissociative disorders (including borderline conditions) can show transient psychosis-like behaviour. Dissociative anaesthetics can induce a state in which the intoxicated individual is operating in a mode akin to a waking dream, which may be confused as schizophrenic in nature.
5) Far from lacking adverse sequelae ketamine like all dissociative drugs has a range of deleterious effects on the human organism.
6) The bulk of the evidence used to support the NMDA antagonist hypothesis involves trying to quantify by external observation elements in conciousness that only appear internally. This is parallel to determining what the inside of a box looks like by measuring the outside.
7) The involvement of opioids in schizophrenia has been proposed as early as the 1970's without having to resort to use of psychotomimesis as evidence.
8) Salvinorin A, a kappa opioid agonist, is a true psychotomimetic, specifically replicating the experience of schizophrenia.
9) Journal evidence supports the connection between kappa opioids and the dopaminergic and NMDA/glutamatergic systems:
i) Kappa opioids have been demonstrated to selectively control dopaminergic neurons projecting to the prefrontal cortex.
ii) A recent study suggests that a kappa opioid antagonist counteracts the effect of an NMDA antagonist in mice.
iii) Kappa opioid agonists have been shown to inhibit glutamatergic transmission in the nucleus accumbens shell.
iv) Kappa-2 Opioid Receptors in Limbic Areas of the Human Brain Are Upregulated by Cocaine in Fatal Overdose Victims
10) Ketamine is a kappa opioid agonist, lesser to it's action as an NMDA antagonist. This has blatant impacts on the validity of research. The stereoisomeric variation in this explains the massive differences between products witnessed by ketamine addicts.
11) The mixed mu-agonist kappa-antagonist buprenorphine showed antipsychotic activity in one clinical trial.
12) It has already been suggested that kappa opioid antagonists could serve as useful medications. Kappa-antagonists could serve as the proper therapeutic adjuncts for controlling schizophrenic psychosis, obsoleting the chemicals currently used and proving superior to those in development (although one wonders about the effect of NMDA 'enhancers' on dissociative and post-traumatic conditions).
[Revised 8/4/07]
---
---
During and following the writing of this the author fell into a severe psychosis. Apologies must be made for the harshness of the original wording. The author is currently under medical care and very appreciative of the hard work of the doctors and medical staff and the difficulties they face. They are very much doing their best with the tools they have. Researchers have also been doing all they are able to try and solve the puzzle, but the tremendous problems involved in quantifying changes in consciousness are a very difficult barrier to overcome.
The author having experienced a full psychosis following the original writing is now even more certain that it is the kappa opioid system that is most implicated in the critical sensory distortions that define schizophrenia. NMDA antagonists emulate well certain aspects of psychosis, such as changes in frame of reality; the class termed 'psychedelics' affecting serotonin receptors emulate much better other aspects such as spiritual thinking and overconnectedness of ideas, events, numbers, and such; dopaminergics the paranoia, overflow of ideas, over-focus on specific things and exaggerated self-importance. Psychosis seems to be a connected cascade of receptor dysfunction - it is chronic and not acute upregulation of dopamine which consistently induces it; from the author's reckless past it can be said with certainty that no single psychotropic substance emulates a full psychosis. Acute administration of a kappa opioid agonist produces a set of effects which very strongly resembles the distinct disturbances of schizophrenia proper.
-We apologize for the inconvenience.
Anonymous
[7/7/07]
2) The common name for NMDA antagonists is "dissociative drugs" or simply "dissociatives". This term is correct as these chemicals induce a characteristically dissociative state.
3) Depersonalization disorder is reproduced in normal individuals by NMDA antagonists. Descriptions of derealization and depersonalization from a person with this condition who has never taken drugs are also the only found to describe well the effects of NMDA antagonists. The negative symtomps of schizophrenia and strong depersonalization are identical to external observation.
4) Individuals with dissociative disorders (including borderline conditions) can show transient psychosis-like behaviour. Dissociative anaesthetics can induce a state in which the intoxicated individual is operating in a mode akin to a waking dream, which may be confused as schizophrenic in nature.
5) Far from lacking adverse sequelae ketamine like all dissociative drugs has a range of deleterious effects on the human organism.
6) The bulk of the evidence used to support the NMDA antagonist hypothesis involves trying to quantify by external observation elements in conciousness that only appear internally. This is parallel to determining what the inside of a box looks like by measuring the outside.
7) The involvement of opioids in schizophrenia has been proposed as early as the 1970's without having to resort to use of psychotomimesis as evidence.
8) Salvinorin A, a kappa opioid agonist, is a true psychotomimetic, specifically replicating the experience of schizophrenia.
9) Journal evidence supports the connection between kappa opioids and the dopaminergic and NMDA/glutamatergic systems:
i) Kappa opioids have been demonstrated to selectively control dopaminergic neurons projecting to the prefrontal cortex.
ii) A recent study suggests that a kappa opioid antagonist counteracts the effect of an NMDA antagonist in mice.
iii) Kappa opioid agonists have been shown to inhibit glutamatergic transmission in the nucleus accumbens shell.
iv) Kappa-2 Opioid Receptors in Limbic Areas of the Human Brain Are Upregulated by Cocaine in Fatal Overdose Victims
10) Ketamine is a kappa opioid agonist, lesser to it's action as an NMDA antagonist. This has blatant impacts on the validity of research. The stereoisomeric variation in this explains the massive differences between products witnessed by ketamine addicts.
11) The mixed mu-agonist kappa-antagonist buprenorphine showed antipsychotic activity in one clinical trial.
12) It has already been suggested that kappa opioid antagonists could serve as useful medications. Kappa-antagonists could serve as the proper therapeutic adjuncts for controlling schizophrenic psychosis, obsoleting the chemicals currently used and proving superior to those in development (although one wonders about the effect of NMDA 'enhancers' on dissociative and post-traumatic conditions).
[Revised 8/4/07]
---
---
During and following the writing of this the author fell into a severe psychosis. Apologies must be made for the harshness of the original wording. The author is currently under medical care and very appreciative of the hard work of the doctors and medical staff and the difficulties they face. They are very much doing their best with the tools they have. Researchers have also been doing all they are able to try and solve the puzzle, but the tremendous problems involved in quantifying changes in consciousness are a very difficult barrier to overcome.
The author having experienced a full psychosis following the original writing is now even more certain that it is the kappa opioid system that is most implicated in the critical sensory distortions that define schizophrenia. NMDA antagonists emulate well certain aspects of psychosis, such as changes in frame of reality; the class termed 'psychedelics' affecting serotonin receptors emulate much better other aspects such as spiritual thinking and overconnectedness of ideas, events, numbers, and such; dopaminergics the paranoia, overflow of ideas, over-focus on specific things and exaggerated self-importance. Psychosis seems to be a connected cascade of receptor dysfunction - it is chronic and not acute upregulation of dopamine which consistently induces it; from the author's reckless past it can be said with certainty that no single psychotropic substance emulates a full psychosis. Acute administration of a kappa opioid agonist produces a set of effects which very strongly resembles the distinct disturbances of schizophrenia proper.
-We apologize for the inconvenience.
Anonymous
[7/7/07]
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