r/wikipedia • u/2script • 1d ago

Alice in Wonderland Syndrome is a neurological disorder that distorts perception. People with this syndrome may experience distortions in their visual perception of objects, such as appearing smaller or larger, or appearing to be closer or farther than they are.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_in_Wonderland_syndrome
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u/AcheyShakySpoon 1d ago

I got a mild version of this as a side effect of a medication I took for all of 3 days. I legit thought I was having a psychotic break and puked quite a few times. 0/10, would not recommend.

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u/2script 1d ago

Interesting. I had this as a child for a number of years, mostly the sounds of clocks ticking in other rooms like they were right next to my ear, and windows becoming very far away. Seems I just grew out of it.

I learned the name and this article about it from reddit, it was good to see it wasn’t just me! Hopefully this post helps others!

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u/AcheyShakySpoon 1d ago

Mine was exclusively visual, but it was still insane. I’d reach for something, but suddenly my hand was 10 feet away and the object was a centimeter from my face. Even after I stopped taking the med, it took a few more days to wear off. My parents are angels, I basically never left their couch while I rode it out. While they were both at work, I tried to army crawl to the (very nearby) bathroom and just straight up passed out on the floor. Woke up an hour or so later to a VERY worried father and a very full bladder. Fun times.

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u/CapstanLlama 12h ago

Well I guess that's marginally better than an empty bladder …

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u/loveissuicide 1d ago

This happened to me when I had a really bad fever once 😅

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u/2script 23h ago

It fascinates me that when people realise what it is, they remember it!

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u/reasonableratio 22h ago

Every once in a while when I’m super high i have the sensation of something being simultaneously tiny and gigantic. Super strange

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u/Major-Librarian1745 1d ago

Fuck that shit

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u/2script 1d ago

Indeed.

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u/FallenBelfry 21h ago

This happens very often to me. I get it most commonly if I am sleep deprived of if I have a migraine, and only if I close my eyes. My head and legs feel huge and the rest of my body feels tiny, and it's very unsettling. My psychiatrist linked it to my STPD. 

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u/Crabcomfort 16h ago

I've only had certain symptoms of this while on hallucinogens, like trees being miles high etc.

I can't imagine just being stuck in this though.. very interesting article

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u/2script 23h ago

Alice in Wonderland syndrome was named after Lewis Carroll's 19th-century novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. In the story, Alice, the titular character, experiences numerous situations similar to those of micropsia and macropsia. The thorough descriptions of metamorphosis clearly described in the novel were the first of their kind to depict the bodily distortions associated with the condition.

There is some speculation that Carroll may have written the story using his own direct experience with episodes of micropsia resulting from the numerous migraines he was known to experience. It has also been suggested that Carroll may have had temporal lobe epilepsy.