DOSE:		smoked	DMT	(powder / crystals)
	1000 ml	oral	Alcohol - Beer/Wine

BODY WEIGHT:

250 lb

I haven't used psychedelics since my early-20s. Acid and mushroom experiences, some of them completely life changing, and a few quite horrible, but most of which were just slightly uncomfortable but interesting. I eventually quit entirely because I couldn't handle the heavy emotional and bodily load of going through the long duration LSD experience. I didn't have anything else to gain from it, and despite a couple of revelatory and awe-inspiring moments it usually wasn't really pleasant (just bizarre), so I got sick of it.

10 years later, I finally found some DMT, which of course I'd always wanted to try. I'm not a drug user now (except for beer and the occasional cigar), and I'm very happy with most things in my life, stable, in a good place, fulfilling hobbies and work that I enjoy, etc. I figured it was safe to try ramping up doses over the course of a month or so - start with just a tiny bit, try a bit more the next weekend, etc, see if there were any adverse physical or psychological effects, and then decide if I wanted to go all the way into hyperspace and meet the elves with a full, McKenna-esque dose.

The first experience was a tiny tiny amount, maybe 20 or 30 milligrams, just a head rush, but I sensed the power of the drug - it kind of grabs you by the core of your being and pulls you down deep, no resisting. The small dose was over quite quickly, with no hallucinations to speak of, nothing that reminded me of previous LSD or mushroom experiences, and I thought 'okay, no problem, I can try more.'

The second experience, a week later (50 to 100 milligrams), was overwhelmingly terrifying, like a sudden physical wrenching into the heaviest acid peak I'd ever experienced, but not quite enough to breakthrough into hyperspace. I had quaffed 2 x 500ml beers to work up the nerve to try smoking more DMT, and that kind of dulled the experience for me despite the terror, something I reflected on and regretted after coming out of it.

I felt like I'd emerged unscathed despite the overwhelming nature of the trip, and was kind of elated that I'd been able to have a heavy LSD-like experience that only lasted 5 minutes and come out feeling pretty normal. I also noticed that it seemed to have affected me more to the core than LSD ever could; as if LSD screws with your perceptions and your thinking patterns, whereas DMT seemed to leave my cognitive abilities alone (I could rationalize 'Hey, chill out, you just smoked DMT, it'll end soon') but seemed to grab me right in the very core of my conscious experience and throw me into a fragmented hallucinatory paralysis.

I spent the next hour after coming out of the peak walking my dog and enjoying the pleasant psychedelic after effects - big trees looked kind of cartoon-spooky, sounds were vivid and unusual, there were slightly confusing physical sensations, etc - all kind of an amusing return to psychedelia after such a long absence. The next day I felt a bit stupid but it was a relatively easy day - I went for a walk in my favorite park with my dog and thought everything looked especially nice, really pleasant, vibrant and colourful.

Unfortunately the following two weeks became an insane emotional rollercoaster ride, with occasional breakthroughs of normality, mostly normal cognitive function, but extreme states of panic and anxiety and sensory distortion. I've felt like I've been at the mercy of extreme neurochemical oscillations, and honest self-reflection has convinced me that they are simply chemical and not manifestations of any real problems. It's been horrible and it's only now, two weeks later, that I'm starting to feel okay again. I'm pretty positive I'll eventually get through this because I have had a lot of stretches of fairly normal experience and things keep getting incrementally better, but it's been extremely annoying . The actual drug experience was scary and overwhelming, but not particularly interesting, and I honestly felt like I'd integrated it just fine, without any after effects, but unfortunately it's done completely wild things to my neurochemical balance and it's been absolutely exhausting trying to recover from it. It seems to have hit right to the very core of my worldly experience.

Fortunately as I've said I've been in a good emotional place for a long time prior to smoking the stuff, so I've been able to deal with these horrible lows and think 'it'll be over and you'll be back to yourself eventually' (despite having moments of doubt). Were I already in a bad state of mind I can't imagine how I could have dealt with the pure hell that has been the last two weeks.

Exp Year: 2008	ExpID: 69407
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 33
Published: Oct 13, 2017	Views: 3,139
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DMT (18) : Combinations (3), Post Trip Problems (8), Difficult Experiences (5), Alone (16)