DOSE:
80 mg
oral
4-AcO-DMT
(extract)
BODY WEIGHT:
140 lb
SOME BACKGROUND
Yes, I really did accidentally and recklessly consume around 80mg of of some kind of psilocybin salt/ester. It was the most intense psychedelic experience of my life, past and hopefully future - I'm not keen on repeating it (to put it mildly). It's the only one I've had that left me with HPPD.
As reckless as this was, I also can't quite say I regret it. It showed me my self, at its most raw and vulnerable, nothing more or less. It was remarkable to behold, and something not many people ever experience, so in a way I feel privileged. And in a twisted way I even feel pride - not that drug use like this is something to be proud of... but... gosh, my mind is really something, withstanding a dose like this alone in my apartment without making a peep!
About me: I'm a heavy cannabis user with a history of depression, body dysmorphia, anorexia and a stressful lifestyle, and I've started using psychedelic drugs again recently for the first time in more than a decade. For about three months I've been taking either a lysergamide or psilocybin ester obtained from a street pharmacist about once every two weeks.
The experience occurred after an emotionally draining, lonely, hopeless, exhausting work-week of very little sleep (probably less than 6 hours of sleep over four days). The pharmacist had two great deals, one for an ounce of hash oil and another for psilocybin chocolates, and I ordered both. This was unusual for me, as I usually stuck to whole dried mushrooms. The bars were sold as containing psilocybin but it's well-known that products like this frequently contain so-called synthetic shrooms. But I thought I might try it to see if I could avoid some of the nausea and dysphoria of psilocybin by taking the drug in a tastier form, and I wasn't discouraged by what I'd read online about 4-AcO-DMT.
To say I was unprepared for what I'd experience is an understatement.
THE EXPERIENCE
T0:00 � I wake up after a fitful night of no sleep and prepared a cup of coffee. I briefly consider eating only one bar before deciding, with a Greek chorus admonishing me in the background, to throw caution to the wind and gobble down both. The bars are branded simply: "4000." It's a scheduled drug so actual substance/dose can't be ascertained.
T0:15 - I recognize the distinct "swoon" of serotonin, from SSRIs prescribed as a young man. This is distinct from and much stronger than a typical mushroom foreglow.
T0:30 - Whoa, nelly, this kick's got a mule... uh, I mean... wait, what was I thinking about? My body's so heavy, and my balance is so bad, and this room feels so big... The walls and lights are throbbing and shifting. The venetian blinds now extend all the way across my wall. I can't stop squinting and stretching my face muscles - it just feels so pleasant and sensuous.
T0:40 - I take a nice big healthy yank from a battery-powered hash oil pen and lie down. Bright, intricate fractal patterns glow and shift on my white ceiling and walls. A creeping, terrible sense of dread and impending doom begins. Mild nausea, but I steel my stomach and avoid vomiting. The mushroom takes complete control.
I can't create a timeline for the next few hours of the experience because time lost all meaning in the state I was in. An overwhelming hallucinatory psychosis - that's the only way to describe it. I experienced complete ego/memory loss, blinding visual distortions & hallucinations, bizarre delusions, and a total shutdown of analysis and language skills. My appearance would have shocked and horrified anyone.
Suddenly I can feel myself struggling - a struggle I perceive very acutely as a fight for the last shreds of my sanity. I keep repeating aloud to myself small phrases to anchor myself to reality: I'll be fine. It's Saturday. I'm on X Street, in Y City. But... suddenly I realize these "facts" have become meaningless - just as meaningless as this "reality" I'm struggling to stay connected to for some reason. Why am I telling myself it's Saturday? What is Saturday? I reach for my cell phone absent-mindedly out of habit - then quickly realize I can't remember why. I have a vague memory of this thing, that it belongs to me, and that it's called a "cell phone" - but I can't understand anything I'm seeing on it or what purpose it serves. I can see distinctly the word "Saturday" on it, and some numbers... but I don't relate what I see to anything useful. I don't realize that seeing "Saturday" confirms what I'm repeating aloud to comfort myself - that it is, in fact, Saturday. To be perfectly honest, now that I'm trying to think about what I'm doing, I realize I don't understand what Saturday is, or what today is, or even what days are...
(In a sober state, I remember the numbers on my phone at this point - they indicate about 2 hours had passed since ingestion.)
I turn, see the folded textures of a couch in the dark, and suddenly it becomes a face with eyes - distinctly cat-like eyes, blinking, shifting, focusing on me... I turn, sure that I see them everywhere - hundreds of sets of eyes, cat-like and feral, watching me - but they vanish as soon as I'm sure I've caught sight of them... I see them everywhere - hundreds of sets of eyes, cat-like and feral, watching me - but they vanish as soon as I'm sure I've caught sight of them...