I am writing this after my first bad (and, indeed, truly horrible) experience with psychedelics, in hopes that some of you might be able to help me make sense of what has happened to me yesterday.
Some context first: I am male, 35 years old, weigh around 92kgs at 197cm of height, and am in perfectly good health physically. I do suffer from mild, but persistent depression, which episodically leads to periods of substance abuse, mainly amphetamine and alcohol, though for the past several weeks prior to the trip, I had not been taking any stimulants, had only been drinking occasionally and in moderation, and while I did feel the all-too-familiar grey cloud hanging over my head somewhat, I was far from heavily depressed. Given that my interest in psychedelics is mostly due to their therapeutic potential for treating depression and addiction, the timing seemed pretty much ideal: I was feeling bad enough for this type of intervention to make sense, but good enough to feel like I had the inner fortitude to take on the psychedelic experience, for which I have a healthy dose of respect and then some. On this particularly day, the weather was lovely, I had been on a beautiful hike through nature, and I took the mushrooms sitting in a comfy chair on the balcony of a holiday house that I come to frequently, overlooking gorgeous natural scenery and listening to the John Hopkins psilocybin trial playlist. I also had my wife, who is a psychologist, around to help me through any potentially challenging parts of the trip. All of this to say, my mindset was overall good, and the setting was quite literally perfect.
I should also add that I have so far had a bunch of minor LSD and mushroom trips, as well as one moderate mushroom trips (2.5 grams), one moderate-to-intense LSD trip (about 250 microgram), and one fairly intense, though not quite heroic mushroom trip (4 grams after several days of fasting), all of which were either pleasant or – sometimes, in part, - strange or challenging, but never horrible, and the more intense of those experiences did indeed have a markedly positive impact on my issues with depression and addiction, though unfortunately, this effect subsided after a couple of months. To date, however, I have not had a full-blown mystical experience, and I was hoping to get there this time around, as the research suggests that the most intense and meaningful trips also have the greatest therapeutic benefit. Finally, I should add that I have read “How to change your mind” by Michael Pollan, I have listened to probably dozens of podcasts with leading scientists and psychedelic explorers, and I am very much aware of the importance of surrendering to the experience, encountering everything with an open heart and mind, etc. Also, aside from my issues with depression, I do consider myself quite mentally study, I have never had any issues with anxiety, and I couldn’t even conceive of how people get panic attacks.
So, with all of this out the way, I ingested 5.5 grams of mushrooms at 3pm. The come-up was not particularly pleasant, but I managed to relax through the first 30-40 minutes of it. However, the unpleasantness only increased: I felt a pretty heavy bodyload and sense of physical exertion, and the sun, which was actually at a perfectly pleasant, mildly warm temperature, felt like it stung or burned me, so I went inside and lay on the cool carpet for about 5 minutes, after which I became nauseous and had to run to the toilet to throw up. I still told myself that this was all normal – I had never personally become nauseous from shrooms before, but I knew that other people did, so I just figured this time around my stomach was more sensitive. After that, I lay down in bed, where the sense of physical unpleasantness and exertion only rose further: I was literally panting, groaning, involuntarily grimacing and throwing myself around in the sheets, and all the closed eye visuals I was getting were of rotten and disfigured body parts that clustered together to create grotesque monstrosities like out of a David Fincher movie. Even at this point, I was still keeping my cool (like I said, I don’t panic easily), trying to meet these horrible creatures that my mind’s eye was throwing at me with an open heart and wondering if perhaps the trip was trying to tell me that I had some physical ill that was as yet undiscovered and needed medical attention. However, the body load just kept getting heavier and heavier, and even my wife’s holding my hand and talking to me gently didn’t help much, because the problem was less in my mind (as in: scary thoughts) and more in my body (or at least so it felt to me). Also, the strong (and strongly unpleasant) physical aspect of all this kept me from tripping as hard I otherwise would have. I was tripping, to be sure, but I wasn’t experiencing any sense of ego dissolution or oneness of space and time or any of the other high-dose phenomena, that I had at least approached on the 4 gram trip, and that 5.5 grams should by all means have engendered, because this pronounced physical unwellness kept me at least halfway tied to reality.
Eventually, it all got too much, I dropped 20mg of valium, stumbled into the bathroom, splashed water in my face, lay down on the ground, and, now shivering with cold and feeling even worse still, the thought finally hit me: Fuck. The mushrooms aren’t trying to tell me that there is some other, undiscovered, long-term problem with my body. The mushrooms ARE the problem. Mushrooms can be deadly if you get the wrong type. These sensations I am feeling are no tactile or physical hallucinations, but real signs of acute poisoning. Ok, the mushrooms I ate were from the same order as those I had some months before on the 4-gram-trip, but they came sealed in two separate bags, so maybe the bag I had back then was fine and the one I had this time around was bad somehow. Who knows how bad? I could be in the process of dying. I could literally be in the process of fucking dying from these mushrooms, and while my wife assured me that I wasn’t going to, I had enough of my rational mind left to realize that the thought wasn’t completely absurd – after all, poisonous mushrooms really do exist, and people really do die from them. Also, my physical unwellness (the unbearableness heat of the sun, the unbearable cold of the carpet, the vomiting, the sense of extreme exertion, the geometry involving all manner of body horror) were far more intense than any physical hallucinations I had ever heard of, and these could NOT be explained away as the signs of a panic attack, because the panic attack was only starting now, AFTER I had gone through all this bodily unpleasantness for about 90 minutes or so. I think you can see how the possibility that you might have lethally poisoned yourself would be really fucking scary even if you weren’t tripping on top of it – mix the two, and you get real existential terror. At this point, we called the paramedics, and I was rushed to the hospital. On the way there and during my first hour in the hospital, I was drifting in and out of consciousness; alternately fearing that I was going to die and wishing to see my wife (who couldn’t come with me due to covid restrictions) one last time and drifting off into some non-aware state. I got a saline infusion and they took some blood and urine samples, and after 2-3 hours, and many insurances that nothing about my state suggested lethal danger, I felt the terror slowly fade and my mind resume normal functioning again, and I broke into a crying fit after realizing that I would survive. An hour later, the lab results came in, I showed no signs of poisoning whatsoever, and felt pretty fucking stupid.
So, what do you guys make of all this? I don’t think this was what is classically called a bad trip, because I wasn’t tripping super hard, and I wasn’t getting caught up in negative thought loops per se. Rather, I felt largely the same kind of fear that any sober, non-tripping person would also feel when faced with strong physical unpleasantness that might conceivable stem from an acute poisoning. Finally, I don’t think “panic attack” alone fully explains it either – I did eventually have a panic attack to be sure, but again, this was only after 90 minutes of increasing physical comfort, through most of which I had remained calm and tried to relax in all the ways usually recommended. And yet, I show no signs of poisoning. Could it be the case that, while there was no actual poison In the shrooms, the high dose of psylocibin somehow threw my nervous system badly out of whack, mimicking the effects of a poisoning, which then eventually caused me to incorrectly assume I really was poisoned and panick? I have no idea if any of that makes sense, but I’d love to hear your thoughts so I can hopefully integrate this experience in a way that I can grow from, or at least not be permanently diminished by, going forward.
Some context first: I am male, 35 years old, weigh around 92kgs at 197cm of height, and am in perfectly good health physically. I do suffer from mild, but persistent depression, which episodically leads to periods of substance abuse, mainly amphetamine and alcohol, though for the past several weeks prior to the trip, I had not been taking any stimulants, had only been drinking occasionally and in moderation, and while I did feel the all-too-familiar grey cloud hanging over my head somewhat, I was far from heavily depressed. Given that my interest in psychedelics is mostly due to their therapeutic potential for treating depression and addiction, the timing seemed pretty much ideal: I was feeling bad enough for this type of intervention to make sense, but good enough to feel like I had the inner fortitude to take on the psychedelic experience, for which I have a healthy dose of respect and then some. On this particularly day, the weather was lovely, I had been on a beautiful hike through nature, and I took the mushrooms sitting in a comfy chair on the balcony of a holiday house that I come to frequently, overlooking gorgeous natural scenery and listening to the John Hopkins psilocybin trial playlist. I also had my wife, who is a psychologist, around to help me through any potentially challenging parts of the trip. All of this to say, my mindset was overall good, and the setting was quite literally perfect.
I should also add that I have so far had a bunch of minor LSD and mushroom trips, as well as one moderate mushroom trips (2.5 grams), one moderate-to-intense LSD trip (about 250 microgram), and one fairly intense, though not quite heroic mushroom trip (4 grams after several days of fasting), all of which were either pleasant or – sometimes, in part, - strange or challenging, but never horrible, and the more intense of those experiences did indeed have a markedly positive impact on my issues with depression and addiction, though unfortunately, this effect subsided after a couple of months. To date, however, I have not had a full-blown mystical experience, and I was hoping to get there this time around, as the research suggests that the most intense and meaningful trips also have the greatest therapeutic benefit. Finally, I should add that I have read “How to change your mind” by Michael Pollan, I have listened to probably dozens of podcasts with leading scientists and psychedelic explorers, and I am very much aware of the importance of surrendering to the experience, encountering everything with an open heart and mind, etc. Also, aside from my issues with depression, I do consider myself quite mentally study, I have never had any issues with anxiety, and I couldn’t even conceive of how people get panic attacks.
So, with all of this out the way, I ingested 5.5 grams of mushrooms at 3pm. The come-up was not particularly pleasant, but I managed to relax through the first 30-40 minutes of it. However, the unpleasantness only increased: I felt a pretty heavy bodyload and sense of physical exertion, and the sun, which was actually at a perfectly pleasant, mildly warm temperature, felt like it stung or burned me, so I went inside and lay on the cool carpet for about 5 minutes, after which I became nauseous and had to run to the toilet to throw up. I still told myself that this was all normal – I had never personally become nauseous from shrooms before, but I knew that other people did, so I just figured this time around my stomach was more sensitive. After that, I lay down in bed, where the sense of physical unpleasantness and exertion only rose further: I was literally panting, groaning, involuntarily grimacing and throwing myself around in the sheets, and all the closed eye visuals I was getting were of rotten and disfigured body parts that clustered together to create grotesque monstrosities like out of a David Fincher movie. Even at this point, I was still keeping my cool (like I said, I don’t panic easily), trying to meet these horrible creatures that my mind’s eye was throwing at me with an open heart and wondering if perhaps the trip was trying to tell me that I had some physical ill that was as yet undiscovered and needed medical attention. However, the body load just kept getting heavier and heavier, and even my wife’s holding my hand and talking to me gently didn’t help much, because the problem was less in my mind (as in: scary thoughts) and more in my body (or at least so it felt to me). Also, the strong (and strongly unpleasant) physical aspect of all this kept me from tripping as hard I otherwise would have. I was tripping, to be sure, but I wasn’t experiencing any sense of ego dissolution or oneness of space and time or any of the other high-dose phenomena, that I had at least approached on the 4 gram trip, and that 5.5 grams should by all means have engendered, because this pronounced physical unwellness kept me at least halfway tied to reality.
Eventually, it all got too much, I dropped 20mg of valium, stumbled into the bathroom, splashed water in my face, lay down on the ground, and, now shivering with cold and feeling even worse still, the thought finally hit me: Fuck. The mushrooms aren’t trying to tell me that there is some other, undiscovered, long-term problem with my body. The mushrooms ARE the problem. Mushrooms can be deadly if you get the wrong type. These sensations I am feeling are no tactile or physical hallucinations, but real signs of acute poisoning. Ok, the mushrooms I ate were from the same order as those I had some months before on the 4-gram-trip, but they came sealed in two separate bags, so maybe the bag I had back then was fine and the one I had this time around was bad somehow. Who knows how bad? I could be in the process of dying. I could literally be in the process of fucking dying from these mushrooms, and while my wife assured me that I wasn’t going to, I had enough of my rational mind left to realize that the thought wasn’t completely absurd – after all, poisonous mushrooms really do exist, and people really do die from them. Also, my physical unwellness (the unbearableness heat of the sun, the unbearable cold of the carpet, the vomiting, the sense of extreme exertion, the geometry involving all manner of body horror) were far more intense than any physical hallucinations I had ever heard of, and these could NOT be explained away as the signs of a panic attack, because the panic attack was only starting now, AFTER I had gone through all this bodily unpleasantness for about 90 minutes or so. I think you can see how the possibility that you might have lethally poisoned yourself would be really fucking scary even if you weren’t tripping on top of it – mix the two, and you get real existential terror. At this point, we called the paramedics, and I was rushed to the hospital. On the way there and during my first hour in the hospital, I was drifting in and out of consciousness; alternately fearing that I was going to die and wishing to see my wife (who couldn’t come with me due to covid restrictions) one last time and drifting off into some non-aware state. I got a saline infusion and they took some blood and urine samples, and after 2-3 hours, and many insurances that nothing about my state suggested lethal danger, I felt the terror slowly fade and my mind resume normal functioning again, and I broke into a crying fit after realizing that I would survive. An hour later, the lab results came in, I showed no signs of poisoning whatsoever, and felt pretty fucking stupid.
So, what do you guys make of all this? I don’t think this was what is classically called a bad trip, because I wasn’t tripping super hard, and I wasn’t getting caught up in negative thought loops per se. Rather, I felt largely the same kind of fear that any sober, non-tripping person would also feel when faced with strong physical unpleasantness that might conceivable stem from an acute poisoning. Finally, I don’t think “panic attack” alone fully explains it either – I did eventually have a panic attack to be sure, but again, this was only after 90 minutes of increasing physical comfort, through most of which I had remained calm and tried to relax in all the ways usually recommended. And yet, I show no signs of poisoning. Could it be the case that, while there was no actual poison In the shrooms, the high dose of psylocibin somehow threw my nervous system badly out of whack, mimicking the effects of a poisoning, which then eventually caused me to incorrectly assume I really was poisoned and panick? I have no idea if any of that makes sense, but I’d love to hear your thoughts so I can hopefully integrate this experience in a way that I can grow from, or at least not be permanently diminished by, going forward.
