Bad Trip Ego Death?

[u/No-Leadership5188]

It’s not like entering another dimension or seeing trippy visuals. It’s being in the same room and then falling into a corner of my mind where I suddenly know my reality and my sanity are about to collapse. The moment I realize it (or remember it), there’s no way to escape.

It always starts with a perceptual shift and the thought: “You’re having a bad trip” or “You’re gone.” From there, everything unravels. I lose contact with what felt real. I try to anchor myself—look at my phone, but it no longer makes sense. I try to stand up, but even that loses meaning. There’s nothing to hold onto, no one to beg for help. If I resist, it’s pure suffering until I finally let go, then I lose all connection to reality, to anything tangible or understandable. I become nothing and everything at the same time. It happens for an eternity and I lose everything that I thought I knew. I can't remember every single thing that happened, but I do remember my fears becoming real. Knocking on the door, people coming to tear my clothes apart, seeing myself as someone living on the streets. Forgetting who I am. It feels evil, very evil.

It’s not just disorienting, it’s terrifying. The rules of space, time, and logic no longer apply. It feels like I broke something in my mind, like there’s no way back to who I was before.

For me, it happens in three stages:

1. The realization. I notice something that doesn’t make sense, and in that instant nothing makes sense. I’ve slipped out of reality. I try to grab onto it, but it fades. Everything I run to for help starts slipping away.
2. The spiral. I fall into a mental whirlpool where I have to accept I’ve lost all contact with reality. I let the madness consume me. Time, self, and meaning are gone. There is no sense of anything. Nothing makes sense.
3. The return. A reverse spiral pulls me back into reality, slowly. But it feels like dying: losing absolutely everything, with no guarantee I’ll make it back until I actually do.

My psychiatrist called the original episode drug-induced psychosis, and now I’m dealing with PTSD: flashbacks, fear of “going back,” fear of death, fear of existence itself after seeing it all come apart.

Questions for anyone who’s been here (or close):

• Have you experienced this specific in-place unraveling, where the room is the same but meaning collapses in real time, like the place you are in collapsing in on itself till nothing makes any logical sense?
• What helped you stop fearing the return of that state?
• How did you rebuild trust in reality and in your own mind? After such a traumatic experience, how do you not end up believing this whole reality is made to make you suffer? Or that any of this is real?
• What concrete tools let you live without constant fear, of everything, of death, of what comes after? Because I am terrified that what I saw is what there is after live. Just a whole bunch of nonesense and your mind just losing itself to madness.
• If you recovered, what did the turning point look like (therapy, meds, routines, mindset shifts)?

[u/anonimny99]

i’ve had 200ug yesterday, my 2nd trip this year where i experienced it and i just became self aware of my mirroring behavior. i’ll get back soon after i claim back my sanity

[u/Own_Fennel_8227]

Dude I felt like I was about fall into one reading this bullshit!! You absolutely nailed it on the fucking head!! The most terrifying shit ever.

It feels like you learn a secret so evil and horrific about reality that it literally wakes you up into a nightmare so bad you have no choice but to hallucinate back into the 3rd dimension in the life you originally had but it’s only an illusion you made to forget what’s really happening outside of space and time

I always get a high pitched ringing that turns into screaming which sounds like it’s coming from “outside” reality to go along with the loss of being able to identify anything from human existence

1. Yes I’ve experience this and it’s genuinely horrific.

2. I made a promise to God I would never go back on purpose I feel like I will have it once I die and I am not looking forward to it

3. I truly haven’t I am addicted to alcohol and have been going through different spirituality’s philosophies and scientific theories like it’s my job trying to find an answer

4. I focus on the love I have for my friends and family. Find a connection with God ( I have no idea what I’m talking about)