I first tried GBL at a house party in 2022. A friend measured out 1ml into a shot glass of orange juice and told me to wait at least two hours before thinking about another dose. The come-up took about 20 minutes and the feeling was incredible -- warm, social, disinhibited without the sloppy confusion of alcohol. I felt like the best version of myself. The whole thing lasted maybe 90 minutes and I went to sleep feeling great.
That was the problem. It was too good and too short. Within a few weeks I was buying my own bottle from a cleaning supply vendor online. At first it was weekends only. Then Thursday became part of the weekend. Then I started dosing on Tuesday evenings "to relax after work." By the six-week mark I was dosing every 2-3 hours during waking hours. My tolerance had climbed from 1ml to about 1.8ml per dose. I set alarms at night -- 2:30am and 5:00am -- because if I slept through a dose I would wake up drenched in sweat with my heart hammering and my hands shaking uncontrollably.
I knew I was dependent when I ran out on a Sunday evening. Within four hours of my last dose I was trembling, my vision was doing strange things, and I could hear sounds that weren't there. By hour eight I was in full withdrawal -- tachycardia, profuse sweating, visual and auditory hallucinations, overwhelming anxiety that felt like I was about to die. My girlfriend called an ambulance. The paramedics initially thought it was alcohol withdrawal because the symptoms are nearly identical -- both act on GABA receptors. I spent three days in hospital on a diazepam taper.
The thing that makes GBL uniquely dangerous compared to GHB is the shorter duration. GHB lasts 3-4 hours so you dose a few times a day. GBL converts to GHB in your body but the peak is sharper and the drop-off is faster, so you end up dosing every 2 hours. That means your GABA receptors never get a break. Dependence can develop in two to three weeks of daily use. I have been clean for 14 months now and I still think about it. The withdrawal nearly killed me and it can -- GBL/GHB withdrawal is one of the few that can cause fatal seizures, right alongside alcohol and barbiturates.