As gravity dictates, whatever goes up must come down. During parties, we expose our bodies to an avalanche of stimuli that, once everything fades, leaves a mark not just on the body but on our state of consciousness. After that whirlwind comes a sort of “depersonalization” or “derealization” of the soul: a struggle to return to a more limited way of being in the world. And no, it’s not just a chemical effect. It’s the living proof that we’re not robots, that our bodies are territories where experiences, absences, mind trips, and desires get burned in deep —like scars, branded by fire on our flesh.
“The feeling of emptiness after using certain substances isn’t a random psychological thing; it has a pretty clear neurobiological basis. Many drugs, especially those that act on systems like serotonin, dopamine, or norepinephrine, trigger a huge spike in neurotransmitters during the trip. That high is what produces euphoria, connection, emotional openness, or sensory intensity,” explains Lucas Otazu, a medical doctor specializing in cannabis therapeutics and trained as a harm-reduction agent.
When we use, especially stimulants or perception-altering substances, the nervous system speeds up and eventually overloads. Later, as that activation drops, moments of disconnection can appear: a feeling of watching yourself from the outside, detached, less present, as if there’s a slight delay between your body and your self.
That’s why, when that high “drops” and the exposure period ends, our anatomy enters a rebalancing phase. The body isn’t just biology; it’s also desire, language, and memory. “The neurochemistry needs to return to its baseline after it’s been ‘drained,’ and during that comedown, sensations of emptiness, apathy, fatigue, or even sadness can show up,” Otazu adds. Often, that “emptiness” is simply the echo of an intensity that couldn’t be sustained.
“Psychoactive substances can open zones of experience where sensations that once seemed out of reach—connection, pleasure, expansion, relief—become more accessible. But the social and emotional environment around us is usually designed to deny them. So the crash isn’t always chemical; it’s existential. It’s the clash between our inner drive to transcend and a world that gives us little room for that kind of expansion,” says Pato Liddle, general secretary of Argentina’s Harm Reduction Association (ARDA) and a communicator specializing in drug policy.
But relax, the brain always bounces back. Or at least it tries to. “The key is not to force the process,” warns the specialist. After an intense experience, the brain doesn’t always return to the exact same starting point, but rather finds a new balance that inevitably includes what happened. “Substances don’t ‘steal’ anything; they open doors. What changes is what we do with what we ‘saw’ on the other side. Sometimes the return to feeling ‘normal’ is quick. Other times it’s slower, because it means processing emotions, relationships, and contradictions that the experience might have awakened,” adds Liddle.
In some way, returning to daily life means processing and integrating. And in that transition from “hyperstimulation” to “normality”, each person discovers their own rhythm, their own way of syncing up, and their unique path to reconnecting with themselves. One concrete fact: for most psychoactives, the neurochemical re-equilibration happens within 24 to 72 hours.
“This doesn’t mean irreversible damage, but it does show how important it is to rest, eat well, stay hydrated, and avoid using too frequently. In harm reduction, we talk about respecting the body’s biological timing between experiences so both body and mind can recover without getting stuck in a high-and-crash cycle,” says Otazu.
So, the expert advises against frequent or back-to-back use, especially under stress, poor diet, or sleep deprivation. “Because the brain doesn’t get to finish its full reset between sessions, and that’s when feelings of accumulated exhaustion, irritability, or deeper lows appear,” he continues.
As the years go by, the body becomes more aware of its limits, but it also learns to read its own signals better. “What sometimes feels like a harsher crash may actually be a new kind of sensitivity: the awareness that energy isn’t infinite and that enjoyment now requires different care,” says Liddle. “The organism always tries to recover its homeostasis, and in the vast majority of cases, it does so without consequences. What changes is the speed and how that process feels,” explains Otazu.
With age, the body gets less efficient at metabolizing substances, regulating sleep, and resetting neurotransmitters. “What used to be fixed with a nap at 20, at 30 or 40 demands more rest, more hydration, and more care,” notes the doctor. It is known: the liver slows down, sleep quality drops, basal inflammation rises, and energy reserves just aren’t the same. “All of that makes the neurochemical rebound, the period when the brain tries to get back to homeostasis after consumption, feel rougher,” Otazu adds.
So again, what can you actually do to be better prepared for “the day after”? Start with the basics: get restorative sleep, eat something nutritious, stay hydrated, replenish minerals, tone down sensory overload, space out your use, and get some physical activity. Those aren’t just tips; they’re “ways of acknowledging ourselves as vulnerable in a world that demands performance even when we’re running on fumes,” says Liddle.
“Taking care of ourselves before, during, and after is both a health mandate and a political act. The day after shouldn’t feel like punishment; it’s part of the trip itself. The body just wants to find its rhythm again, and listening to it is also a way of being present,” says Liddle, who openly identifies as a drug user. Meanwhile, that negative perception of reality that tends to hit post-bash usually comes from a mix of biological and emotional factors that predispose us to read everything in a heavier tone. “The rebound of neurotransmitters, especially serotonin and dopamine, can create a state of emotional vulnerability: mood drops, stress sensitivity increases, and negative thoughts get amplified. That internal chemistry colors how we interpret the day, even if there’s no real conflict happening,” Otazu explains, skimming the technical details.
So when the body’s wiped out, the brain interprets any sensation as heavier than it is. And if the night was intense or overstimulating, the contrast with the calm of the next day can feel like a void or inner chaos. After the openness, connection, and euphoria, there’s often a slap of realization that can trigger thoughts like “What am I doing with my life?” or “This makes no sense.” But breathe. Just breathe.
The expert reassures: “What matters is knowing it’s temporary. With sleep, hydration, food, and time, the nervous system returns to its usual range. And once you understand that the feeling isn’t an absolute truth but a biological effect of the post-use phase, the anxiety drops a lot.”
So chillax, it’s not that everything’s falling apart. Those alarms are just your body and mind processing what went down, digesting the experience. Existential hangovers are real, and they usually echo what’s, let’s say, “missing”. “We live in a culture that invites us to use without limits, but not to sustain ourselves. And that gets worse under the moral stigma of prohibitionism, which paints drug users as the root of all evil,” closes Liddle.
And in the end, when everything fades, the silence carries its own heartbeat. After the music, the lights, the rush, and the vertigo of the search itself, there lingers an echo that pulls you to listen inward. That nothingness isn’t always a void. Sometimes it’s the body trying to remember who it is, without lights, without noise, stripped down to bare existence. And then, in that quiet that follows, the soul doesn’t really crash. It lands.
