When I was 18, I took LSD at a rave, and had a bad trip. I felt irrationally afraid and self-conscious for hours, and went to bed feeling I had permanently damaged my brain. Over the next few weeks, I felt paranoid, panicky and socially anxious. These symptoms faded but came back a few months later, and lasted for years. I was eventually diagnosed with social anxiety and PTSD. It took me five years to stop having panic attacks, a decade to regain my social confidence, and over 20 years for me to be capable of having a long-term relationship.
Was that trip ‘bad’? Yes, it robbed me of confidence, scrambled my nervous system, changed my personality and made my life a lot harder. Do I wish it had never happened? That’s a trickier question. I suspect my life would have been much easier if I had never taken psychedelics. But that adverse experience also had positive impacts. I became interested in mental health, philosophy, spirituality. I experienced ‘post-traumatic growth’, eventually.