Another case of serotonin syndrome?

Combining SSRI & 5-HTP turns out to be a bad idea

Substances: 5-HTP

After reading a trip report on here, I went out and bought 5-HTP, a most peculiar compound as far as I'm concerned. It metabolizes into serotonin, boosting the levels of it in your body. So, taking Prozac and 5-HTP is not a wise thing to do. Unfortunately, I found out the hard way. I'm submitting this experience so that none of you ever have to go through with this yourselves.

As soon as I got the 5-HTP, I read the instructions (1-3 a day) and took 3. An hour later, I took another one. About an hour after that I got back home and started to feel sick. Not sick like a parasite, but like a hangover. Or perhaps eating WAY too much turkey. This concerned me so I called the pharmacy to ask if I could take 5-HTP while being prescribed Prozac. The grocery store pharmacist said, sure, just keep the time span between eating 5-HTP and Prozac at least an hour apart (nothing on the 5-HTP bottle said anything about contraindictions with antidepressants. It just said don't eat vitamin B-6 until atleast 3 hours before or afterward). I didn't think this was fulfilling information, and this pharmacist sounded unsure. So I called up Eckerd's, with a startling new response. She was very concerned that I had developed what she called serotonin syndrome, a hypersotonergic state in which one feels euphoria, mental confusion, persistent REM, and an irratic movement of the foot caused by relaxation of the nerves in the ankle, as well as diarrhea, gastric upset, and somnolescence. After she gave me these symptoms to compare to my own, I became more relaxed. I had none of these symptoms.

However, as night came, I noticed an increasing hyperactivity growing and a sense of well being. I couldn't sleep when it came time to do so, so I took 2 melatonin (3 mg). 30 minutes later, I crashed like a baby.

5 am rolls around and I wake up, after the most incredibly psychedelic dreams i can remember. Infact, there was this weird dream where I was looking at a friend's poster on his wall of what looked like butterfly wings, but then they became a human face, and then a clam shell. But when I woke up, I had extreme vivid CEVs which, because it was dark, could be viewed with my eyes open. I've never experienced DMT, but from what I've read about the chrysanthemum realm, I believe I was seeing something very similar if not the actual thing. This experience was exactly like an LSD experience emotionally for me. I remember wanting to get up to go to the bathroom but I was too confused. If I laid perfectly still, I felt dead. If that was what death is like, I don't think I'll mind it too much in the future.

After that odd experience, I grabbed the melatonin bottle (much later in the morning) and read the ingredients. Oops! The side ingredient in there was vitamin B6. Won't you believe it it's just my luck? I was very lucky. It could have been much much worse. If any of you are on SSRIs, make sure you aren't dumping extra serotonin into your bodies with peculiar chemicals such as 5-HTP.