‘I had a six-hour episode of psychosis after doing chemsex – it was really scary’

‘Do it and you will be naked in a second.’

While it wasn’t exactly a second, Mattia (not his real name), his friend and their drug dealer all ended up naked. They had a threesome.

This was the first time Mattia, who was 33 at the time and now in his 40s, engaged in chemsex.

The practice, which is also called party and play or wired play, involves using drugs, typically illegal psychoactive substances, to enhance sex.

‘I was bored, my job did not satisfy me as well as my relationship,’ Mattia told Metro. ‘I did chemsex for seven years. Sometimes, I could go three days without sleeping, rarely one month without using.’

Mattia’s days soon became all the same. Wake up, smoke crack, watch porn, scroll on the dating app Grindr and masturbate.

‘I was more interested in the drugs and their effects on me,’ he says.

‘My mind was totally out of control. I spent a lot, often £2,000 or more, on escorts on chems. Again and again. Money wasted, unhealthy behaviours, my mind was flipped out.’

Even while having sex with an escort, Mattia, between hits of crack cocaine, would load up escort websites and ask others to join.

‘One, two, three. More and more. And more money wasted,’ he says. ‘I used to tell lies to my boyfriend, to my family, I just wanted to get out of work at 5pm and start that crazy circle until the day after.’

Mattia isn’t alone. Between 3–29% of men who have sex with men have participated in chemsex, which typically involves drugs like crystal meth, mephedrone and GHB.

Chems can create an instant, false sense of trust and invincibility, says Ignacio Labayen de Inza, the founder and CEO of the support group Controlling Chemsex. Most people smoke the substances, though there has been a rise in people ‘slamming’ – injecting – them instead.

‘There’s also a sense that “everybody does it” so it’s a way of fitting in. It’s a bit of a perfect storm,’ he tells Metro.

As euphoric people can feel, however, chemsex is associated with an increased risk of acquiring HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases as well as depression, anxiety, weight loss and paranoia.

Chemsex isn’t a new issue. Neither are the practices and beliefs that fuel it. ‘Our community often struggles with low self-esteem, fear of rejection, loneliness, isolation, need for validation and internalised homophobia,’ de Inza says.

Hook-up apps make finding chems – and men to use them with – fast and easy, adds de Inza. Users add terms like ‘hnh’ (‘high and horny’), T (meth’s street name, ‘Tina’) and diamond emojis in their names and bios to make it implicitly clear what they’re looking for, while chatrooms connect people to dealers.

Health leaders identified chemsex as a health priority a decade ago. But a lack of understanding, research, funding and access can make rehabilitation tricky for some, experts say.

Take Adam (not his real name). He was 30 when he first tried meth in 2014. He was having sex with a man he met on Grindr when the man took out a pipe for them to smoke.

They didn’t sleep at all that night. But the Londoner didn’t think much of using meth – that is, until after the coronavirus pandemic.

‘My mental health was extremely poor during that time, as was a lot of people’s, and I felt very lonely and isolated,’ the writer says.

‘But as things opened up, I found myself friends with these guys doing drugs. It felt like an explosion all these people back out, life starting again.

‘So when I was offered a line, I thought, “Why not?” I don’t think people know how addictive and all-encompassing it can become – it can take over your life. It’s scary how fast things can spiral.’

Soon enough, Adam says it’s easier to list the parts of his life that weren’t upended by his chem cravings than detail what was.

‘I started slamming T,’ he says. ‘I was mixing in terrible circles, met people who were completely broken, who had nothing. This was their only existence.

‘It’s either so long ago that they felt happiness that it’s a distant dream to them, or they never had it in the first place.’

Like Mattia, Adam says his days were spent waiting to leave work so he could go on a bender – and then another. All he could think about was the next time he could take drugs.

‘Slamming crystal meth is incredibly addicting. All your inhibitions go – you just don’t give a s**t.’

‘Slamming’, which is where people inject crystal meth into their veins, is becoming increasingly common among chem users in London, according to research by charity Controlling Chemsex.

Around two in 10 people who sought the group’s help were injecting, with four in 10 saying taking chems once a week. For one in 10, it’s daily.

‘An increase in slamming suggests that people who are using chems are being drawn into a dangerous cycle of always needing more, to push their boundaries further,’ says de Inza.

‘There also used to be more of a stigma associated with slamming – as it has become more normalised, there are more people trying it and feeling the impacts of that.’

Crystal meth can lead to psychosis and increases the chance of heart attack or stroke. Adam says he knows this all too well.

‘I had an episode of psychosis that lasted six hours. It was really, really scary,’ he says. ‘Quite a few of these episodes happened, while I was surrounded by really unpleasant, awful people… I knew this time was up and I couldn’t go on.’

Adam doesn’t use chems any more. Suffering from a comedown while meeting a friend, a therapist, last year, Adam had a panic attack. ‘I just couldn’t cope anymore,’ he says.

‘I’d lost a lot of weight. Not been sleeping. My friend asked if I was on chems and suggested places I could get help like Controlling Chemsex.

‘It hasn’t been plain sailing, I’ve had a couple of relapses but overall, this has been the best year of my life. I turned 40 last year and have been surrounded by love, friends, family and wonderful experiences.’

Adam has undergone psychosexual therapy as part of his rehabilitation, spent some time sober and deleted Grindr.

‘When I think about what my life was like a few years ago to today, it’s incomparable. Recovery is about thinking about your long-term goals and putting those ahead of your short-term fixes and wants,’ Adam adds.

For Mattia, who works at a large corporation in northern Italy, he woke up in a hotel room after three days of misuse, picked up the phone and told his boss everything.

‘He helped me a lot to get out of this hell,’ Mattia says, adding that he also sought help from Controlling Chemsex.

He now spends his days running marathons and began a training course this month to become a specialist advisor to help chem users.

‘There’s life after chemsex,’ Mattia says. ‘Just look at me.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.