Not Transcendental Enough
Ketamine
Citation:   Malamute-Boy. "Not Transcendental Enough: An Experience with Ketamine (exp19846)". Erowid.org. Sep 21, 2004. erowid.org/exp/19846

 
DOSE:
80 mg insufflated Ketamine (powder / crystals)
  10 mg insufflated Ketamine (powder / crystals)
BODY WEIGHT: 170 lb
Setting: My apartment, drapes closed, J___ was over
Dose: ~80mg to start, ~20mg more at T+10min, insufflated
Gender/Weight: Male/170 lb

I have done nitrous a lot since I was about 15. My first experiences and many for years thereafter were awe inspiring, breathtaking, beatiful and wonderful and transcendental. If you read any of the K trip reports that describe the more transcendental experiences: being granted knowledge, meeting entities, phlanging, and eternal moments, you can get a sense of what nitrous did to me.

But recently, I had been getting worried about my level of usage of nitrous. Honestly, it was like going to church for me, and I was addicted to it. I had to go at least twice a week. And even more recently, it had begun to take combination with other substances (marijuana, MDMA, LSD) to really get me to the same places it used to take me all by itself. Finally becoming bored and frustrated with it, I decided to dispose of all of my supply and give it up altogether. At the same time, I had been reading up on ketamine. From the descriptions of various experiences, I decided that here was the drug for me. Ego dissolution, alternate realities, self exploration... this is exactly what I'm looking for. A friend and I finally were able to pick some up from an acquaintance. I was very excited to try it, but we had to wait a couple of weeks for a good time to do so. Finally, the day came. I was excited and nervous, just like when I was a kid and getting ready to go somewhere really fun like Disney World or something.

We were worried about getting an appropriate dose, so we cross checked on each others' scales. It took a while until we were satisfied because it seemed like so much and we really weren't sure if we could trust the scales. Finally satisfied that we had an accurate reading, we line it up and up the nose with a rolled up one dollar bill. It was a little tangy, burned a little, but not too bad I guess. I sat and waited for it to come on.

About six minutes later I was feeling it. Tingling and numbness in my extremities. I put on a CD for us to listen to: some new age soft music. After a few more minutes, I decided to do some more, so scooped out a little bit and snorted it with difficulty. It was hard to focus and judge the distance between the dollar tube and the little pile of white powder on the table. Getting up to this point itself was difficult. It was hard for me to get the motivation to move to the table and measure out this dose. Part of me wanted to just keep sitting where I was.

So now, I'm sort of vegged out on the couch. Lost and wandering a bit, but still, there is this core part of my consciousness that feels clear and normal. The objective observer in me, my conscience maybe? He's the yardstick by which I judge any drug. If he gets fucked up, I know it's good. But he's not; I was really hoping that this drug would jog him loose and allow him to wander -- like happens on nitrous or salvia. But he's still stuck in this messed up body, and getting bored.

The music was getting pretty annoying. I really wanted to listen to some good music, and was half tempted to go out to my car to get some more CDs. Fortunately, I thought better of it and stayed inside, looking over what CDs I had in the house already instead. I had to crawl, haltingly, to get them down, and sort of sat looking through them, unable to decide on one. My vision was pretty distorted, but I'm used to not being able to see straight and still getting by, and it's only in retrospect that I really realize how fish-eyed everything was. There also was some static in my vision, which I have to a small degree all the time anyway. It has a very similar feeling to the tinnitus I have (which I feel was caused by nitrous), only it's visual -- visual tinnitus. When I finally did pick a CD out, I found that it sounded just as annoying as the other music, and I sort of gave up on that endeavor. I have to wonder, however: I have read that K messes up your perception of sound, and it seemed to be the case to a small degree, but was the music annoying simply because of that, or because it just was music that I didn't really even like all that much when sober (I keep all the 'good' CDs in my car)?

Anyway, I decided to just curl up sitting on the floor with a blanket around me, and wait to see what would happen. My feet and hands felt cold, but the rest of my body felt okay, if a little distant and out of touch.

Now it's about 20 or 30 minutes into the experience. I feel a little off put by the fact that I didn't really go anywhere, and instead am still sitting in this impaired flesh. I decide to start talking to J___, and we talk about different things. It's me talking mostly. I say how I wish I had some nitrous, how I got rid of all of it several weeks ago. I say how n2o and salvia really make me feel like I don't belong on this earth, like I'm really some kind of other being stuck here for a little while. I told him the story of my culminative nitrous experience, where some part of me decided that I had everything I ever wanted in one moment and I could die happy, and that after that I -had- been feeling dead in my waking life. He told me that I think too much, and maybe that is true.

Oh well, a steady, easy decline of the K high, and after about 45 minutes to an hour I was basically back to the ground, except a lingering numbness in my extremities that would take the better part of four hours to finally leave me. But no ill after effects to speak of.

So, it was okay. But on the other hand I was dissappointed that I didn't get transported anywhere. I was really ready to go. I suppose that I'll be trying a larger dose next time, even though my nose wasn't too happy having some odd chemical put up in it. Maybe I swallowed too much, or maybe snorting it isn't really the way for me to go. But it was at least an introduction, and I'm still looking forward to the sorts of transcendental experiences I've read about. Nitrous gave them to me, but it's become boring itself recently. I was hoping I could use K to go to the same places. Maybe I've visted them so much that they're old news to me, or maybe the nitrous burned it all out of me already. I hope not. Well, we'll see...

Another note: I had to pee an average of about every 10 minutes during the four hour come-down period. I really hadn't had that much water to drink either. Seems like the K wrung me out big time, and kept me going back to the bathroom over and over. And they weren't any little tinkles either. Every 10 minutes for three or four hours, I was going in there to pee like I had been drinking beer and water all day or something. It wasn't all that fun. This may be a discouragement for doing it before I go to bed -- I don't want to have to keep getting up during the night to go to the bathroom if I'm trying to sleep.

Exp Year: 2002ExpID: 19846
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Sep 21, 2004Views: 15,325
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Ketamine (31) : First Times (2), Small Group (2-9) (17)

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