Review Erowid at GreatNonprofits.org
Help us be a "Top Rated Nonprofit" again this year and spread
honest info (good or bad) about psychedelics & other psychoactive drugs.
("Share Your Story" link. Needs quick login creation but no verification of contact info)
Tripping All the Way to the ER
Dimenhydrinate (Dramamine)
Citation:   Ford Prefect. "Tripping All the Way to the ER: An Experience with Dimenhydrinate (Dramamine) (exp801)". Erowid.org. Sep 15, 2000. erowid.org/exp/801

 
DOSE:
350 mg oral Dimenhydrinate (pill / tablet)
BODY WEIGHT: 150 lb
Previous Drug Experience: 2-3 2nd plateau DXM expirences, much experience with THC, 3-5 low dose acid trips, 10-15 mid dose acid trips, 3-4 high dose acid trips, drunk 10-15 times.

Setting: My bedroom, alone. 3pm. Fall break.

Mindset: Fairly clear and unburdened, except for the normal reservations I have about surrendering some control over my mind, or the possibility thereof.

Dose: 14 25mg tablets for a total of 350mg.

Expirence: I had never done dramamine before, and I was curious to try it. I didn't think anyone was going to be home, at least for a while, and though I knew a tripsitter was advised, I have had many good experiences with LSD by myself, partly because I didn't feel a constant urge to describe what I was experiencing. I took the pills and tried to just relax, and allow the drug to run its course, give it time. After a while, I was staring at a table about 12 feet away, and became aware that there was gas rising from it. This struck me as odd, so I rose and went over to it. When I was about 5 feet from it, the gas just vanished.

I shrugged and sat back down, only to see the gas reappear. It then hit me that this was a drug-induced hallucination. It was not what I would describe as an LSD-like hallucination or pseudo hallucination, because in my expirences with acid, if I relaxed my eyes and just stared into the distance, I would hallucinate more, whereas this time, the gas or steam was just there, rising into the air, and I could look at it from any angle and blink and it would still be there. I found this very funny.

Then things turned sour. My mouth felt too tight, my tongue was thrashing around not knowing what to do. I decided to take a shower. When I got into the bathroom, the walls were shimmering and white, with wild geometeric patterns flying across them. It wasn't like acid-type patterns in grass, sand or carpets: I saw an apparent glossy, 80% translucent film with bubbles in it that moved like skin over the wall. I was also having an odd kind of visual misinformation, a kind of jumping sensation. If I looked at point A, I would see something seem to 'jump' in at point B, like it had teleported in. This continued for the next 2-3 hours. Looking at a tree, branches in my peripharal vision would just 'jump' in. I don't know if they had been there all along and were not being reported, or if they weren't there at all. Anyway, I got in the shower and felt even more uncomfortable. By this time I was feeling very unpleasent physically and that made the mental changes hard to enjoy. My skin was crawling, and I think I was shaking. i felt very sick. i went back to my room, dried off and tried to sleep. My body felt heavy, and tired, but in a drunk way and I couldn't sleep.

That is where I should have just held on 40 minutes, but I panicked and called poison control. They advised me to go to the hospital. At this point someone had come home, and i told them what was up and they said they'd take me to ER. By the time I was actually in the car most of the physical discomfort was gone and I was wishing that i could call it off, but it was a little late for that. A tripsitter could have calmed me that crucial 20-30 minutes. The ride there was actually fairly interesting. There were, it seemed, far too many trees along the road, and I still don't know if some of them were phantasmal. I kept seeing identical dead black and white cats at even intervals along the road. I wonder if any of them were real. When i got to ER, I could hardly walk, my body felt very drunk. Everything seemed dreamy and unreal. Not anything specifically, more like I was in a lucid dream instead of on a drug. This was an interesting sensation since higher mental functioning was not actually that impaired: I think I could have multiplied 2 and 3 digit numbers in my head and calmy told you how to spell long words, something I would find impossable on LSD. I sheepishly told them what i had done, and they hooked me up to a cardiograph and monitored me for 2 hours until I fell asleep. I woke up 2 hours later, was shortly thereafter discharged and went home. I felt somewhat dissassocated for 3-4 days.

All in all, it would have been a much better exprience if I had forced myself to suffer through those 30 hellish minutes, but even if the trip to the ER had not happened, I would have to say the physical discomfort at the trip's outset that led to my panic attack and the long hangover would outweigh the interesting aspects of the trip. This did not seem to me to be a drug that broke down mental workings and re-assembled them, or led to a great internal insight. it was just kind of like a waking dream, with a very uncomfortable physical component. I would advise against doing this drug, but if you are, do it gradually, take 2 tablets on day a, then maybe skip day b, then try 3, etc. And have a tripsitter once you get to a point where you're going to notice it.

As a side note, I took 2-3 50mg tabs (2 was the actual dose the package said to take) some time later for allergies, and had the same 'jumping' visuals, albiet at a much smaller level, as before. i don't know if I would have anyway, or if the high dose taken before better acclamated my brain to respond to dramamine.

Exp Year: 2000ExpID: 801
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Sep 15, 2000Views: 52,054
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Dimenhydrinate (17) : Difficult Experiences (5), Train Wrecks & Trip Disasters (7), Various (28)

COPYRIGHTS: All reports copyright Erowid.
No AI Training use allowed without written permission.
TERMS OF USE: By accessing this page, you agree not to download, analyze, distill, reuse, digest, or feed into any AI-type system the report data without first contacting Erowid Center and receiving written permission.

Experience Reports are the writings and opinions of the authors who submit them. Some of the activities described are dangerous and/or illegal and none are recommended by Erowid Center.


Experience Vaults Index Full List of Substances Search Submit Report User Settings About Main Psychoactive Vaults