The Terrifying World of Benadryl Addiction
By: Raisa Nastukova
Tags: Addiction, Trends, Mental Health, Reddit, Drugs

The Terrifying World of Benadryl Addiction

Photo by Pavel Krugley on Unsplash

“First thing I want to say, I hate DPH. I think DPH is horrible. I took DPH because I wanted to mentally hurt myself. I will never take DPH again,” a user posted to the r/DPH subreddit as a preface to his experience taking 1200 milligrams of DPH — shortened form of diphenhydramine, or more commonly, Benadryl — during a suicide attempt. He took two entire boxes of Benadryl, which is around 50 to 100 times the therapeutic dose. By the time I spoke to him a month after his post, he had gone back on this reassurance and said he now found himself “hooked” on Benadryl.

“It has this unsettling and inherent darkness that I’ve never experienced with any other drug,” mentioned one user with years of heavy Benadryl dependence. With trip reports detailing walls covered in spiders, shadowy ghost figures skulking around their bedrooms, and pets melting in their owner’s arms, DPH possesses a unique ability to cause almost wholly nightmarish trips, transporting the user to a world reminiscent of the Silent Hill franchise. While in this delirium, the user often can’t tell where reality ends and the drug begins. It’s not uncommon to completely lose touch with reality, forgetting they swallowed the pills, forgetting where they are, and even forgetting who they are. Seizures. Lifelike hallucinations. Psychosis. Coma. Death. Doctors have noted the often inconsistent but often deadly serious symptoms of antihistamine overdose.

Photo via Reddit screenshot

DPH, once an obscure high, has risen in popularity due to social media personalities and its spread on social media. For instance, the “Benadryl challenge” on TikTok sees users down massive amounts of Benadryl and record the experience for their followers. Often the drug’s most common users are teenagers and other young adults without access to traditional recreational drugs, and Benadryl’s over-the-counter availability placates any of their health concerns. After all, if it comes from a Walgreens shelf, how bad can it be?

The DPH community on Reddit is a popular forum for recreational Benadryl users. While some brag with photos of hundreds of pills laid out, similar to how traditional drug dealers might post their hauls, most adamantly tell new users to stay far away from this drug. DPH addicts are a dime a dozen here, often lamenting the drug and how it has ruined their life, relationships, and brain health, whilst remaining in the throes of their addiction.

Is the brain damage permanent? Did the drugs break my brain? Questions plaguing the subreddit in between posts about trip reports, dosage questions, and memes. Others make posts warning about their use exacerbating their mental health problems, from depression to borderline personality disorder, to one user waking up in a mental hospital after a DPH binge. The teenager constantly felt intense paranoia and was unable to stop experiencing tactile and visual hallucinations. Others report brain fog, suicidal ideation, heart issues, memory problems, and vision and hearing loss. The lives of these users — many of them teenagers in already vulnerable situations — make Requiem for a Dream look like Sesame Street.

“I’m honestly quite sad how many people, especially teens, are taking this drug recreationally. I don’t want anyone else to have to experience the pure agony, terror, and confusion DPH has caused me,” infamously wrote one user of the Reddit forum. The user is believed to have fatally overdosed, after publicly and bluntly speaking about their addiction on the board for months. According to their comments, they started taking DPH in 2019 as a legal and cheap alternative to LSD and quickly became addicted as their physical and mental health deteriorated. On several experiences, medics rushed them to the hospital after seizures while shopping; they drove to work while on 2000 mg and described swerving to avoid hitting hallucinations; and had several stays in the cardiac intensive care unit. Their last post was a photo of 276 pink Benadryl pills — 6900 milligrams or 172 to 276 times the recommended dose. Responding to concerned users on the board, this person replied “6.9g may be the dose that finally frees me.”

Many users on Reddit discuss the adverse neurological effects they’ve suffered from DPH abuse, yet there have been nearly no studies on the effects of heavy Benadryl addiction on a young person’s brain. However, overdosing on Benadryl isn’t a new phenomenon in medical journals.

In another case reported by researchers, a distraught 14-year-old girl swallowed 150 capsules, each containing 50 mg of diphenhydramine. She quickly fell unconscious and experienced seizures. Despite aggressive and speedy treatment, doctors declared her brain dead the following day after detecting no cerebral blood flow. Fatal doses for children can be as low as 500 mg, while the fatal dose for adults is generally considered to be between 20 to 40 mg/kg.

Addiction, regardless of the drug, regularly ravages the user’s life in catastrophic ways but few substances are as wholly negative and all-consuming as recreational Benadryl. While substances like mushrooms, LSD, and even cannabis in some areas remain illegal, some young and vulnerable users resort to over-the-counter drugs that prove ruinous for their physical and mental health.

Those pushed to obscure highs like DPH might get some relief next year, at least for those in Oregon. Starting February 1, 2021, Oregon’s drug decriminalization law takes effect and drug users will no longer be arrested for possessing small amounts of illegal substances. Instead of a prison sentence, small possession charges will be punished with only a small fee similar to a traffic ticket. Under this new law, Oregon drug users won’t be pushed into the prison system and instead can get the help they need. Hopefully, this will allow local drug users to make safer choices. If you’d like to help the drug decriminalization effort nationwide, research drug decriminalization and its intersections with prison reform. By starting the conversation in your friend circle, these issues will become less stigmatized.