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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 5 of 5. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Delphi on November 7, 2001, at 20:05:05
I have recently deliberately abused diphenhydramine in order to produce central anticholinergic syndrome. I took doses of 300mg, 375mg, and 425mg respectively on three different nights, with 24 hours between the first two, and 48 hours between the latter two. The second night was combined with 90mg pseudoephedrine, and all three involved approximately 100mg of caffeine (one cup of coffee). I realize it's a stupid thing to do, and I don't intend to ever do it again, but I want to know whether this may have caused any permanent damage and, if so, whether there are any steps I can take to reduce the damage.
In addition, does anyone know whether anticholinergic symptoms may be followed up by symptoms of excess muscarinic acetylcholine stimulation? I've noticed hangover symptoms, including increased salivation, and I wanted to make sure it wouldn't progress to anything more dangerous, akin to the neurotoxic action of organophosphorus compounds. Also, I haven't been able to figure out why I repeated the experience twice, particularly in such close proximity to the original event, as it wasn't particularly pleasant. Could the lack of better judgement have been somehow associated with the chemical action or is there a deeper psychological problem I should worry about?
-beginning to realize that curiosity may well have killed the cat
Posted by christophrejmc on November 7, 2001, at 21:16:12
In reply to Diphenhydramine abuse, posted by Delphi on November 7, 2001, at 20:05:05
I took between 1000-1500mg years ago. I got up in the middle of the night and passed out in the hall (where my brother found me the following morning, totally incoherent). I had my stomach pumped about 12 hours after I took it (too late? they couldn't figure out what I took and later called it a panic attack and gave me a shot of valium). I guess this doesn't really help you.. but I'm still alive.
Posted by kid_A on November 8, 2001, at 16:16:16
In reply to Re: Diphenhydramine abuse, posted by christophrejmc on November 7, 2001, at 21:16:12
Wow... back before I could legally get slepping pills (nothing like the blues for the allowance of legal addictions)... I used to use this to try to sleep between different drug binges...I remember just taking a few too many above the recomended dosage and feeling totally knackered, like I had the flu or some other full body ailment, couldnt sleep and I had a headache, so I can't even Imagine an intentional overdose.
I can't even remember if this drug ever produced any noticeable sleep induction in me whatsoever, if it does have some sort of somnolence effect Id be damned to know that whenever I took it, it just always made me feel sick afterwards... I think it's one of those drugs that if you take 'exactly' the recomended dosage, you will get some initial sleepyness, but anything over will totally skew your evening...
I dont know if this can cause any 'permanant' damage, any more so than pumping your body full of SSRIs year after year, you might consult a doctor on this if you are really worried though.
Posted by Adam on November 8, 2001, at 17:49:46
In reply to Diphenhydramine abuse, posted by Delphi on November 7, 2001, at 20:05:05
I do know that OD-ing on diphenhydramine can be relatively serious (supposedly it can cause siezures), but I've never heard of any permanent neurological damage or other sequellae as a result.
I just have to know: Why on earth would you want to OD on Benadryl? All anyone seems to get from high doses is worse side-effects, and I've never heard of any kind of narcotic effect or whatever. What were you hoping to discover in this experiment?
> I have recently deliberately abused diphenhydramine in order to produce central anticholinergic syndrome. I took doses of 300mg, 375mg, and 425mg respectively on three different nights, with 24 hours between the first two, and 48 hours between the latter two. The second night was combined with 90mg pseudoephedrine, and all three involved approximately 100mg of caffeine (one cup of coffee). I realize it's a stupid thing to do, and I don't intend to ever do it again, but I want to know whether this may have caused any permanent damage and, if so, whether there are any steps I can take to reduce the damage.
>
> In addition, does anyone know whether anticholinergic symptoms may be followed up by symptoms of excess muscarinic acetylcholine stimulation? I've noticed hangover symptoms, including increased salivation, and I wanted to make sure it wouldn't progress to anything more dangerous, akin to the neurotoxic action of organophosphorus compounds. Also, I haven't been able to figure out why I repeated the experience twice, particularly in such close proximity to the original event, as it wasn't particularly pleasant. Could the lack of better judgement have been somehow associated with the chemical action or is there a deeper psychological problem I should worry about?
>
> -beginning to realize that curiosity may well have killed the cat
Posted by Delphi on November 8, 2001, at 23:00:31
In reply to Re: Diphenhydramine abuse, posted by Adam on November 8, 2001, at 17:49:46
The lethal dose of diphenhydramine is fairly high compared to the doses I was using, which were only intended to produce anticholinergic effects as opposed to dangerous suppression of cholinergic activity. Seizures and coma have been reported at very high exposures, but at the level I was using, the most common cause of danger is actually from confusion (i.e. subjects may end up drowning or being hit by cars, caused by maladaptive or self-destructive behavior).
The main reason I chose to abuse the substance was because of my fascination with altered conciousness, in its varied forms. I had read numerous accounts of dimenhydrinate and diphenhydramine intoxication (dimenhydrinate is the active ingredient in dramamine and is a salt of diphenhydramine--25mg diphenhydramine is equivalent to 50mg dimenhydrinate), but my curiosity lead me to want to experience firsthand the conciousness alteration.
Most incidents of intentional intoxication result from the mistaken belief that anti-cholinergic hallucinations are similar to those produced by the classic psychedelics, popularized by their assocation with the sixties. However, anticholingeric syndrome is more physically unpleasant, tends to have an amnesiac effect (acetylcholine is involved in memory retention) and the hallucinations produced tend to lapse into delerium--in other words, it is difficult to tell what is real from what is not real. I realized this at the outset, but part of me was very curious as to what types of effects might be produced in such a delerium. In all three trials, I endevored to take notes of the events, but unfortunately was held back by two factors: hand-written notes become illegible as the experience takes full hold, and the energy required to type seems daunting, because of the general CNS depressant effect, and also possibly because of anticholinergic inhibition at the skeletal muscle receptors (the nicotinic, I believe), which makes it seem harder to move. My ability to remember the experiences was better than I had expected (perhaps because of my practice with remembering dreams), which is what I've based most of my observations upon.
The main issue anticholinergic delerium is that it truly is difficult to seperate real perceptions from hallucinated perceptions. In particular, I recall hearing footsteps on numerous ocassions that, in retrospect, could not possibly have been so numerous. In addition, such things as a speck of dust appearing as a spider crawling on the wall and a pile of paperclips appearing at random in the middle of the floor are hard to shake as real until you logically reason and realize that such a thing wasn't there before, and so it couldn't have just appeared there. I've read accounts of people having conversations with people that aren't actually there, which I did not experience myself, but that may well be a factor of the setting (i.e. I wasn't in a social context, thus no social aspects of the delerium were expressed.)
The only thing about this experience that worried me was that I felt compelled to do it three times, rather than a single time, and without even taking proper time to control for possible tolerance or anti-tolerance effects (some drug exposures actually seem to have the paradoxial property of weakening the systemic counter-response to their exposure.) In addition, the apparent hangover symptoms consistent with muscarinic overstimulation (i.e. salivation, tachycardia) had me somewhat worried, as cholinesterase inhibition is the method of fatal action for nerve toxins such as VX or Sarin, but the symptoms have since begun to subside, and after reading more information on cholinergic syndrome, I can conclude that any stimulation was rather mild.
Hopefully this helps you to understand why I chose to do it at all, although even I still don't know why I did it three times instead of only once.
> I do know that OD-ing on diphenhydramine can be relatively serious (supposedly it can cause siezures), but I've never heard of any permanent neurological damage or other sequellae as a result.
>
> I just have to know: Why on earth would you want to OD on Benadryl? All anyone seems to get from high doses is worse side-effects, and I've never heard of any kind of narcotic effect or whatever. What were you hoping to discover in this experiment?
This is the end of the thread.
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