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  • BDD Moderators: Keif’ Richards

Is exhaling smoke wasteful?

GumbyClaymation

Bluelighter
Joined
Sep 24, 2011
Messages
92
I'm not talking about weed, but smoking a pure compound like DMT or JWH (or meth, in theory).

I've read numerous accounts of people smoking whatever and blowing out a cloud of smoke. It seems to me that if I only put DMT into the pipe, the smoke would only contain DMT, so if I blew out a cloud of smoke, that's a bunch of DMT floating in front of my face that isn't in my bloodstream. I generally try to hold my breath for 30 sec or a minute so when I breathe out, I see nothing. For something like DMT, that pretty much means I can only take one hit, so it has to be a good one. Again, I see many other accounts talking about taking two or three hits in a row.
Am I wasting my effort trying to be efficient? Is there some other process here going on - like maybe hot smoke goes in, gets absorbed and the exhaled smoke is water vapor or something? Seems unlikely.

Appreciate any thoughts.

--Gumby
 
The lungs are pretty phenomenal things for absorbing chemicals (purpose of this is to get the oxygen/other compounds out of the air of course) so typically the idea of holding something in for x amount of seconds is just a myth.

I'm not sure of any exceptions to that rule with things such as DMT, but i would venture to guess that past 5 seconds, your really not doing much more but damaging your lungs and withholding them from oxygen.
Other than that just inhale as best you can (obvi) to make sure your not just holding the smoke in your mouth instead of your lungs.

(Edit: Duhhhh well of course salvia is something you need to hold in for about 20 seconds, so i take the above statement back, not sure why/or how that works, but after looking around on the web it seems the general consensus for DMT specifically is about 7-10 seconds, so hopefully that still isn't too hard to accomplish.)
 
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Think of it this way: if you had to hold in anything for it to be absorbed we would breathe oxygen much differently. Your lungs will absorb it really quick, sure holding it in for 3-5 seconds makes it closer to 100% but longer is not needed

Also I would venture to guess no compound that you have inhaled smoke from was pure. Products of combustion both complete and incomplete will be present.
 
There's some left in the smoke, so if you have a friend there you can shotgun it. But if you're on your own, don't let it worry you. You're still getting a lot of the compound.
 
Sure they will decrease in density but smoke contains a lot of things. It could just be insoluble particles cooling and condensing on the lungs so you don't actually absorb it as much as you do "line your lungs" with them. Like how resin condenses in the pipe and lines it. I'm not exactly sure but I support the idea that after 5 maybe 10 seconds at most you have absorbed all but a negligible amount of the good stuff
 
The only thing I hold in for extended periods of time is Nitrous. That shit needs to be held in there for ages (30 secs) before the effects show up. Your mileage may vary but I have found DMT 10 secs, Weed 3 secs, Meth 1-3 secs. Holding it longer makes no difference to me.
 
Anything you exhale visibly from a substance that has been vaporized is a complete waste. You are literally watching it get blown into the air. What the fuck else would it be in that smoke? People come up with all sorts of fantastical rationalizations for wasting smoke but they are all bullshit. Nothing would come out of your mouth if it was all absorbed, water vapour is never that thick. People just do not like holding it in because it is less casual/more difficult but it is indeed a waste. You may absorb a lot of it fast but consider the fact that a normal person can hold their breath for around ten minutes if they inhale pure oxygen. You are not getting it all, no matter how efficient your lungs are, if you exhale right away.

Even with burned substances like weed and tobacco it is worth while to hold it in for a few seconds at least as there is a noticeable increase in effect (assuming you do not have tolerance) compared to exhaling immediately. Longer than that is largely pointless. With meth people have an almost religious fanaticism about wasting the majority of their smoke, you can't argue with them and it blows my mind.
 
Your lungs can also only absorb a finite amount of whatever's in there. DMT, crack, meth and the like recrystallize from vapor extremely quickly (which is part of the reason smokers prefer pipes as short as possible - don't want all that mileage for drugs to residualize all over), but I don't know about absorption into the lungs. I've only read studies on cannabis which seem to indicate that past sort of 4-5 seconds you're only doing your lungs more harm and not getting any more active substance.

I know a shitload of people that swear by holding in their tokes when a joint or a blunt is in circulation until it comes back around again - I'm not convinced you're getting any higher from the smoke so much as you are from oxygen deprivation in these cases, and I don't hold in my weed for very long. With DMT, I only hold it in for about 3-5 seconds; exhaling it right away is wasteful, but I've also rarely been able to get a decent enough hit of DMT in one lungful - only when I've been on MAOIs or other psychedelics as I smoked it. I take as big a hit as I can, hold 'it in for 3-5, immediate rinse and repeat, and take as many hits as I can while I can still operate the pipe. The result is usually the opening of a wormhole.

EDIT: But yes, in my personal DMT experiments (of which there have been a great many) I have invariably found that 3-4 hits within the space of about 30-45 seconds is a lot better than one hit held in for that same amount of time. You only have a short window of time in which to get those 3-4, and it is a matter of finding your technique and that golden middle road between holding it in and taking more hits, but after I got it right it's been consistently successful.

With crack I've also definitely noticed that holding it in for longer gets you higher. It's the only drug for which I do this but I hold it in until I really practically can't - 15-20 seconds at least, and as I start to exhale, I try to inhale a bit again. Again, I don't know if it's the drug or the oxygen deprivation - in any case there's still billows of smoke coming from my mouth after 15 - but even if it is oxygen deprivation, I'll take that. The crack high is only the rush, so if holding my breath gets me higher, then hold my breath is what I'm gonna do.
 
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I'm not sure just "holding it in" will cause more to be absorbed. I would think you'd have to take a few quick gasps of fresh air to spur further exchange. But I could be wrong.
 
It is fucking impossible for any drug to recrystalize on the warm, moist surface of your lungs. There is no limit to absorbing a substance that has been vapourised, the constant exchange of blood as well as the dissolving of substances in the mucus/surfactant is the reason. There may be a limit to how much cannabis you can get high from at a time when it is burned due to the tar saturating the surfactant but this is not true with vaporizing. Note: unlike with most other drugs cannabis is not dissolving in the mucus because it is water based. There is not limit to cigarettes for example because nicotine, beta-Carbolines both dissolve in the mucus, which apparently never becomes saturated, likely because it is constantly replenished.

What would suddenly halt the absorption of a vapour one inhaled? It is non-sensical.
 
It is fucking impossible for any drug to recrystalize on the warm, moist surface of your lungs. There is no limit to absorbing a substance that has been vapourised, the constant exchange of blood as well as the dissolving of substances in the mucus/surfactant is the reason. There may be a limit to how much cannabis you can get high from at a time when it is burned due to the tar saturating the surfactant but this is not true with vaporizing. Note: unlike with most other drugs cannabis is not dissolving in the mucus because it is water based. There is not limit to cigarettes for example because nicotine, beta-Carbolines both dissolve in the mucus, which apparently never becomes saturated, likely because it is constantly replenished.

What would suddenly halt the absorption of a vapour one inhaled? It is non-sensical.

I didn't mean it would crystallize onto your lungs in any harmful way. I was rather stoned so I'm not sure what my line of thinking was, but I suspect it was more along the lines of it being unnecessary to hold the smoke in for very long, as it would diffuse rather quickly. I would suspect.

Also, lipophilic compounds diffuse faster through the lungs than hydrophilic ones do, in general. It varies between all chemicals, but if it occurs too slowly, wouldn't retention also be reduced? I don't know. I've just gotten higher every time by clearing my lungs and taking another hit, that's all.

Could also be just that I can't vaporize enough to smoke in one hit, but then, theoretically, if after 30 seconds of holding in a hit I still exhale vapor, shouldn't that all have been absorbed? :?

With cannabis you're generally also inhaling a lot more inactive materials, I would suspect, than on your average vaped hit of meth/DMT/crack.
 
Are you burning or vaporizing the cannabis?

When I spoke of not getting any higher after a point I meant if you have tolerance and take 12 big hits, getting a meagre high, and you take 12 more it may not do much more. Whereas with vaporizing cannabis you will always get higher.

There are a large number of people that think meth will recrystalize in the lungs. I thought that was what you were getting at. Some people swear it happens if you hold it in despite it being impossible.
 
Are you burning or vaporizing the cannabis?

When I spoke of not getting any higher after a point I meant if you have tolerance and take 12 big hits, getting a meagre high, and you take 12 more it may not do much more. Whereas with vaporizing cannabis you will always get higher.

There are a large number of people that think meth will recrystalize in the lungs. I thought that was what you were getting at. Some people swear it happens if you hold it in despite it being impossible.

Weed I smoke. I've noticed that effect with vaping; it is nice, but I just prefer the feel of smoking. I'm also too broke to invest in a good vape, and the cheap ones are rubbish. I'm often smoking on the go as I'm walking or biking anyway, though.

And yeah, I've heard of this fear - people will hit the pipe and immediately exhale - I've never seen any users of hold in their hits for such a short time (apart from people smoking something for the first time and coughing it out). What I don't get is that if these people think that it's a matter of seconds before their lungs are covered in shards, why are they smoking it? =D
 
I think most of the stuff you exhale from smoking something is mostly waste products or substances the lungs can't pick up. I don't think holding your breath for most drugs will vary the milage (altho nitrous, dmt and saliva are a bit different when it comes to holding the smoke in).
 
What if you held in your smoke for as long as you could and exhale 1/4-1/2 amount of what you are holding in (humor me here..) and then inhale oxygen to fill the now open space so that you can hold in the rest of your drug for a little longer, to absorb more of the active ingredient.

I, tho, am speaking of black tar heroin. I have never tried DMT or other smokable hallucinogens (except salvia, which I dislike a lot) but I think my theory still stands and I look forward to hear about anyone else's input.
 
What if you held in your smoke for as long as you could and exhale 1/4-1/2 amount of what you are holding in (humor me here..) and then inhale oxygen to fill the now open space so that you can hold in the rest of your drug for a little longer, to absorb more of the active ingredient.

I, tho, am speaking of black tar heroin. I have never tried DMT or other smokable hallucinogens (except salvia, which I dislike a lot) but I think my theory still stands and I look forward to hear about anyone else's input.

I have a fair bit of experience with breath holding. What drives your urge to breathe is the partial pressure of CO2 rising, not the lack of oxygen. You can push back that urge to breathe by exhaling. Inhaling will not help very much. I find that exhaling very small bits (way way less than 1/4 lungfull) periodically is most effective. Not that you need to go this far, but if you spend time practicing, you should be able to achieve 2 minutes of breath holding without much trouble. I know people who were much more serious than me about this, and could do a breath hold for 10+ minutes. Not related to any drug ingestion, though.
 
You can push back that urge to breathe by exhaling. Inhaling will not help very much.

When you hold your breath your diaphragm is in a relaxed position as opposed to inhaling, when your diaphragm is contracting thus creating negative pressure in your lungs to draw in more air. If I was to replicate this contraction, but not suck in any air, I can 'hold my breath' far longer as the urge to breathe doesn't seem to kick in until much later.
 
Hey this is my first post here on blue light and i picked a random thread and i need some help! im underaged and i just got caught smoking pot from my parents its a horrible awkward situation. they didn't find any of my bud or pipe and i lied and made up some bullshit excuse like a friend came over and smoked in our room.. should i stick to my story its pretty believable but in your guys experience what should i do? what are some of your experiences getting caught? any advice?
 
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