What is acid drugs called

Do You Know the History of Acid or LSD?

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What exactly is acid? Acid, or lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), is an illegal recreational drug derived from a parasitic fungus that grows on rye, known as ergot. Acid is the most well-known hallucinogenic drug, and due to the extended effects of the drug, the experience of taking or «dropping» acid is known as a «trip» or «acid trip.»

The History of LSD

The psychoactive properties of acid were discovered almost by accident by Dr. Albert Hofmann, a research chemist working for the Sandoz Company, in 1943. Dr. Hofmann had been synthesizing LSD-25, and some crystals of the substance made contact with his fingertips and were absorbed through his skin. In the middle of the afternoon, while at work, Hofmann started to feel dizzy and restless. He went home and experienced «a not unpleasant intoxicated-like condition, characterized by an extremely stimulated imagination.»

Hofmann decided to experiment on himself and took a small quantity of the drug. After 40 minutes, he started feeling dizzy, anxious, noticing visual distortions, the symptoms of paralysis, and the desire to laugh. An hour later, he went home by bicycle, and even though he was escorted by his laboratory assistant for safety’s sake, the trip was still difficult given the effects of LSD. He requested milk from a neighbor, who appeared to be «a malevolent, insidious witch with a colored mask.» He also experienced unpleasant feelings about himself.

Believing that lysergic acid had potential use in neurology and psychiatry, he proceeded with animal experimentation and further human studies. It was found that with both humans and animals, there seemed to be a capacity for breaking down the ego, and it appeared to show potential for people «who are bogged down in an egocentric problem cycle [who] can thereby be helped to release themselves from their fixating and isolation.» LSD also released long-forgotten memories and traumas into consciousness, which could then be worked through therapeutically.

Using and Misusing LSD

LSD was used in European psychotherapy clinics in an approach called psycholytic therapy—meaning «the dissolution of tension or conflicts in the human psyche»—in which patients took lower doses of LSD over a series of sessions. After each session, the patients would rest, then have a period where they would paint or work with clay to depict the visions they saw while hallucinating. After the art session, the patients would have a therapist-led group discussion about their experiences. 

Another approach, known as psychedelic therapy—meaning «mind-manifesting» or «mind-expanding»—involved patients taking a single high dose of LSD, after a period of intensive psychological preparation, to attempt to restructure and cure the patient’s personality problems. LSD was also explored as a model for psychosis and as a treatment for severe pain associated with cancer.

LSD began to be used recreationally and was extremely popular during the 1960s, when it was still legal. It was promoted by Drs. Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert at Harvard University. Many well-meaning people encouraged the use of LSD, believing it spread love and peace and broke down antiquated and oppressive social hierarchies. But this did not prove to be the case, and by the end of the 1960s, the dangerous side of LSD was revealed. Reports of accidents, mental breakdowns, criminal acts, murders, and suicide were reported, as well as psychotic reactions to the drug, resulting in social hysteria about LSD.

Recognizing the dangers of the drug, Sandoz stopped LSD production and distribution in 1965, and psychotherapists abandoned its use in therapy.

Although LSD has waxed and waned in popularity, it has remained a staple on the illicit drug scene. It regained popularity during the Acid House movement of the 1980s, but this was greatly superseded by the rise of first ecstasy, then crystal meth. 

If you or a loved one are struggling with substance use or addiction, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-4357 for information on support and treatment facilities in your area.

For more mental health resources, see our National Helpline Database.

Leuner H. Psycholytic therapy: Hallucinogenics as an aid in psychodynamically oriented psychotherapy. In: Grinspoon L, Bakalar JB, eds. Psychedelic Reflections. New York: Human Sciences Press; 1983.

Hoffman A. LSD—My Problem Child. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company; 1980.

What is Acid?

Learn what you should know about acid, the drug.

Contents

1. Acid is a street name for the compound LSD.

2. Acid’s effects include visual distortions and a “dreamlike” state for

The effects of acid include:

3. Acid can sometimes be “fake”

NBOMes are sometimes sold as acid, which is bad, because NBOMes appear to be dangerous compounds.

4. Acid and LSD are two words that are used to mean the same thing

5. Bad trips do happen, though possibly not as often as you’d think

A 1955 paper found that anxiety occured in 9% more people who took 25-75 micrograms of LSD, and 14% more people who took 100-225 micrograms of LSD, compared with the placebo group. 2

6. Acid has a good safety profile relative to other drugs

“This inquiry … indicates that with proper precautions [LSD and mescaline] are safe when given to a selected healthy group.” 3

“A large number of previous human trials indicate that LSD [acid] can be safely administered within a research or psychotherapeutic setting.” 1

“if you look at the literature with clinical use, both with psilocybin and with LSD, you see that those drugs can be administered safely in research settings.” 4

7. The inventor of Alcoholics Anonymous believed that LSD had great benefits

“Some of my AA friends and I have taken the material (LSD) frequently and with much benefit,” Wilson told Jung, adding that the powerful psychedelic drug sparks “a great broadening and deepening and heightening of consciousness.” 4

MDMA vs. Acid

MDMA may be the most popular party drug for the current generation of intrepid clubbers who are looking for a way to enhance their experience. But how does it compare to the popular psychedelic drug of the previous generation? Acid was once a widely used psychedelic drug with potent effects on the brain. Both drugs are used today, but what are they and how do they compare? Are they dangerous to their users?

Learn more about MDMA, acid, and their effects on your brain and body.

What Is MDMA?

MDMA is the shorthand name for 3,4-Methyl​enedioxy​methamphetamine, more commonly known as Molly or Ecstasy. It’s one of the most popular party drugs in the United States, and it’s often used in rave settings to achieve a euphoric high.

MDMA refers to the chemical found in popular party drugs like Molly, and it’s often sold in pill forms. However, the pills you might find on the street may not only contain the pure chemical. The term ecstasy refers to MDMA that’s been altered by adding stimulants like caffeine or amphetamines.

In your brain, MDMA has a powerful influence on the chemical process that sends messages throughout your nervous system. Specifically, MDMA affects a chemical messenger called serotonin, which is closely tied to things like appetite, sleep, and mood.

MDMA is often called an empathogen because of the way it influences feelings of empathy and closeness with others. This could also be tied to serotonin. When you experience feelings of love, interpersonal connection, and romance, your brain releases serotonin that gives you those warm fuzzy feelings.

Serotonin is released in large amounts when MDMA is in your system, which enhances feelings of love and empathy. This is also why it’s popular at parties and in club culture. A surge of social emotions can help partiers have a good time. However, your brain can only release so much serotonin at one time. Excessive amounts are recycled or destroyed through normal processes.

When you take MDMA, it releases and then destroys larger amounts than usual, leaving you with unpleasant feelings when the drug starts to wear off. This is called a comedown, and it refers to the unpleasant process your body goes through in recovering from a night of psychoactive chemicals.

Your brain releases serotonin and other rewarding chemicals through normal everyday activities. A healthy flow of the chemical messengers in your brain is an essential part of your mental health. However, after using MDMA, your brain won’t have enough serotonin to release during normal activities for the next several hours. This can cause depression, irritability, and fatigue.

What Is Acid?

Acid is the street name for a chemical called lysergic acid diethylamide (or LSD). The drug was first synthesized in 1938 by a scientist named Albert Hoffman that learned about its psychedelic effects after he accidentally gave himself a small dose.

For the next couple of decades, LSD was heavily researched all over the world, especially in the United States. In fact, the world was so enamored with this strange drug, even the CIA got involved with secret, controversial, and unethical LSD experiments that were made public. Though the CIA had dreams of using the drug for mind control, psychonauts in the 60s and 70s used it as a recreational drug. As illicit use spread, the drug was made illegal, and research slowed.

LSD is a potent drug, and it can be active in the microgram levels. It works in the brain by affecting several receptors, including dopamine, adrenergic, glutamate, and a specific serotonin receptor (5H2TA).

This serotonin receptor has been identified to be the most likely cause for some of LSD’s most dramatic effects, including hallucinations. LSD causes the receptor to activate continually for more than 12 hours until the drug is broken down. For that reason, LSD’s effects can last for a long time. Users may be experiencing the psychoactive effects of LSD long after they’re ready to be done with their drug trip.

LSD was a popular recreational drug in the 60s and 70s, but it’s long-lasting effects and the fact that other drugs can offer more euphoric highs have made recreational use less common. However, people today use LSD in practice called microdosing, which is when very small amounts of the drug are used to tap into the drug’s benefits without causing an intoxicating high. Researchers are still studying the effects of microdosing, but some say that the effects are mild, with very little reports of significant effects on perception, concentration, and consciousness.

How Dangerous Are These Drugs?

Both MDMA and LSD are powerful psychoactive drugs, and they should be taken seriously.

MDMA has a few immediate dangers when the drug is taken. One of the most famous is the risk of dehydration. MDMA raises your body temperature, and it can cause you to sweat, especially in a party setting when you’re dancing and moving around.

Ecstasy that’s mixed with stimulants can also increase the dehydrating effects of MDMA. For that reason, MDMA users need to drink water before, during, and after using the drug. In some cases, serious medical complications have occurred because MDMA users neglected to properly hydrate.

MDMA may cause some more long-term issues as a result of neurotoxicity. In studies of rats and monkeys, MDMA has shown some evidence of causing damaging effects to the brain. The evidence suggests that MDMA may have some damaging effects on serotonin neurons.

However, other studies have concluded that MDMA’s potential neurotoxicity needs more study before it can be ruled out as a chemical that’s used in certain therapeutic settings. Either way, most studies conclude that recreational users of MDMA are putting themselves at risk.

Acid has very few adverse physical effects and may not cause damage or dehydration as MDMA can. However, it can have some negative psychological effects. Because LSD alters your consciousness, causes hallucinations, and breaks down your sense of self, it can be dangerous for people who have mental health issues like schizophrenia.

A study in the 80s looked at people who were said to have “LSD psychosis” and found that they were clinically indistinguishable from schizophrenia patients. This means that the drug might actually induce schizophrenia in people that are vulnerable or predisposed to it.

LSD can also cause disturbing psychological events referred to as bad trips by psychedelic users. These trips can cause severe anxiety, panic attacks, and trauma. In some cases, people who used LSD experienced flashbacks that produce the effects of the high months after the drug has worn off. In the most extreme cases, users developed hallucinogen persisting perception disorder, which causes recurring, chronic psychedelic effects.

Is Acid a Drug?

Acid is the popular nickname for a drug called LSD, which belongs to a class of drugs called psychedelics. Psychedelics drugs are known to affect the mind and cause both dissociation and hallucinations. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, LSD is not an addictive drug because it does not create the compulsion to seek the drug out. Only very rarely is drug seeking behavior seen in LSD users. In order to understand why acid is a drug, you need to know what it is, what its short and long term effects are, the types of treatment, and how to find help.

What is Acid?

Acid is another name for LSD a potent hallucinogen discovered in the 1930’s while scientists were looking for a respiratory stimulant. People use LSD for both its hallucinogenic properties and because it is said to expand consciousness. Most people who try LSD describe the experience as eye opening and pleasant but as with anything there are positives and negatives to using LSD. These positives and negatives are:

Positives:

Negatives:

Along with these positives and negatives, there are also some short and long term side effects to taking this very powerful drug.

Short Term Side Effects of Acid

One short term effect of acid is hallucinations.

There are many short term effects of doing acid. When you are actively using acid, people call it tripping or a trip. During the trip, you can experience:

Most of these side effects go away quickly after the drug leaves the system. Fortunately, acid has a short half life and only stays in the system a very short time. This means that the likelihood of overdose is very low.

Long Term Side Effects of Acid

The long term side effects of acid vary depending on the person, how much acid they took, and how long they have taken LSD for. Many people only experience very minimal long term effects, while others have a more severe reaction.

The long term side effects of acid are:

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration LSD is a very powerful psychedelic and a hallucinogenic drug. If you are one of the few that developed at psychological addiction to acid, it is important to seek help. The longer someone takes acid, the higher the risk of developing these severe long term effects.

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Calls to any general helpline (non-facility specific 1-8XX numbers) for your visit will be answered by a licensed drug and alcohol rehab facility, a paid advertiser on Hallucinogens.com.

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What is acid drugs called

A chemical usually sold in tiny amounts on blotter paper, as a liquid, or a pellet/micro-dot.

Quick info

How the drug works varies from person to person

How it looks, tastes and smells

What does it look like?

LSD is usually sold as small squares of paper with pictures on them, known as tabs or blotters.

LSD can also be sold as a liquid or as tiny pellets, known as micro dots.

What does it taste/smell like?

Liquid LSD (often called liquid acid) has no taste at all. LSD tabs taste like the paper.

How do people take it?

LSD stands for its chemical name, lysergic acid diethylamide, and is commonly called acid.

It’s a powerful hallucinogenic drug, which means you’re likely to experience a distorted view of objects and reality if you take it. The experience of taking LSD is called tripping.

LSD trips can last several hours and can be very intense. Trips are often described as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ depending on whether the experience was enjoyable or distressing.

When you take LSD, there’s no way of knowing how you might feel or what kind of trip you’re going to go on. And once you start tripping it’s difficult to control the effects.

LSD can also be taken in very small amounts, and this is sometimes called micro-dosing.

How it feels

How does it make you feel?

For most people, the world appears distorted when they take LSD. Colours, sounds, objects and even time can all seem very strange and disturbing.

Taking LSD can make you feel:

It can also make you:

LSD feeds off your imagination so every person’s experience is unique.

How the trip goes will be affected by how much you take, your surroundings, who you’re with and how comfortable you are with them, as well as by your mood.

If you’re in a bad mood, feeling worried or depressed, the LSD might make those feelings worse.

How does it make people behave?

This depends on how much LSD the person has taken. If the person has taken a small dose of LSD you may not even notice they’re on it.

People on LSD might be quieter than usual as they’re so ‘in their heads’. Some people have trouble speaking when they’re on LSD.

People who take larger doses can act unpredictably. They can become fixated on certain things, emotional, paranoid or even aggressive.

Duration

How long the effects last and the drug stays in your system depends on how much you’ve taken, your size and what other drugs you may have also taken.

To kick in

Acid can take from 20 minutes to two hours to take effect, but it really depends on how much the user takes.

If you feel that you’re having, or are going to have, a bad trip, let your friends know and get their help. Go to a nice, quiet spot where you feel safe and can relax.

How long will it be detectable?

LSD will typically show up in a urine sample for 1 to 3 days.

How long a drug can be detected for depends on how much is taken and which testing kit is used. This is only a general guide.

The risks

Physical health risks

There’s no evidence to suggest that LSD does any long-term physical damage.

However, people have been known to harm themselves during a bad trip. So people in a bad mood, feeling depressed or worried should avoid taking the drug.

Mental health risks

If you have mental health problems, or a history of mental health problems in your family, taking LSD could make them worse.

If you panic on a trip it can be scary and confusing. A bad trip could be your worst nightmare come to life.

LSD could have serious, longer-term implications for somebody who has a history of mental health problems. It may also be responsible for setting off a mental health problem that had previously gone unnoticed.

Flashbacks, or ongoing visual distortions, can occasionally happen, often causing great distress. Sometimes these experiences are called Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (HPPD), although very little is known about why some people are vulnerable or how to help them.

What is LSD cut with?

LSD is cheap to produce so it’s not usually cut with other drugs.

But you may hear people talk about pure LSD, good quality LSD and bad quality LSD. This is to do with how the drug is made and whether there were impurities as a result of the production process.

Mixing

Is it dangerous to mix with other drugs?

Yes. Everytime you mix drugs you take on new risks. However, some drugs are more dangerous to mix with LSD than others.

Addiction

Can you get addicted?

There is no evidence to suggest that LSD is addictive, but you can become tolerant to its effects. This means you need to take more of it to get the same effect as before.

The law

This is a Class A drug, which means it’s illegal to have for yourself, give away or sell.

Possession can get you up to 7 years in prison, an unlimited fine or both.

Supplying someone else, even your friends, can get you life in prison, an unlimited fine or both.

Like drink-driving, driving when high is dangerous and illegal. If you’re caught driving under the influence, you may receive a heavy fine, driving ban, or prison sentence.

If the police catch people supplying illegal drugs in a home, club, bar or hostel, they can potentially prosecute the landlord, club owner or any other person concerned in the management of the premises.

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