DOSE: T+ 0:00		oral	Mushrooms
T+ 0:45	4 hits	smoked	Cannabis	(plant material)

BODY WEIGHT:

205 lb

[Erowid Note: Author interchangeably refers to ingesting 'shrooms' and a 'psilocybin pill', and the reported dose was '1.75g psilocybin'. This is most likely a powdered mushroom report, but the ambiguity of the form makes it hard to say definitively what's going on. A 1.75 g mushroom dose in multiple capsules is possible, but it's unbelievable that that mass of material would fit in any single normal gel capsule.]

BACKGROUND:

The night before our shrooms trip, three of my other friends and I tried LSD. We all only took one hit of it and decided it wasn't quite enough for what we wanted, so we went with shrooms the second night. Please note, we didn't sleep at all the first night we tripped LSD, so when I took the shrooms my mind was already fragile and running on 36+ hours of no sleep. I tripped with three of my friends - J, S, and K. We also had another one of our friends there who wasn't tripping, let's call him A.

J had tripped shrooms once before while K, S, and myself were all first timers. S had no experience with LSD, either, as only myself, K, and J were present for the LSD trip the night before. The location was my apartment, as I was the only person who didn't live on campus or at home with parents. We all took our pills at different intervals - K and J took their pill at midnight, I took mine around 1:00 in the morning, and S took his around 1:45am. Surprisingly, we all seemed to be start tripping in the same time frame, despite taking them so far apart. I will be going step by step through my own trip.

THE TRIP, PART ONE - SCRAPING THE SURFACE - T+0:45

For awhile, I felt absolutely nothing. I thought the psilocybin pills we had taken were duds, and it felt like nothing was working. For awhile we sat on my apartment balcony smoking cigarettes. J came out on the back porch with our mini-bong, Dr. Phish, and we passed that around a couple of times. The party migrated back inside my apartment into my room, where we all first started feeling the effects of the shrooms. I have a large painted mural on my ceiling, and staring at that thing was incredible. I could see each individual color distinctly and clearly, to the point where it almost gave the mural a 3-D quality.

The shrooms gave me a funny feeling. I felt like my equilibrium was off and I struggled to maintain balance. I sat against the wall at the foot of my bed and looked up at the mural, just staring. That's when I started to be fascinated by literally everything around me. Every little detail was in crystal-clear high definition. Eventually we made our way back out to the balcony so we could listen to music and smoke some more cigarettes. J really wanted to go to this place called the 'Rose Garden' and walk through there while on shrooms. I didn't want to ride in a car with someone who was tripping, but he went down and pulled the car around anyway.

I didn't want to leave my apartment, or at least stray too far away from it. As I stood at the top of the stairs outside my apartment leading down to the car, I felt like I started to experience exactly why it was called a 'trip'.

THE TRIP, PART TWO - BROTHERHOOD - T+1:35

For awhile, J just sat in his car while waiting for me, K, S, and A to come down and get in so we could drive to the Rose Garden. We were originally going to have A drive us, but he started drinking, so that was out of the question. I still lingered at the top of my staircase, refusing to get in the car with J. K, S, and I stood at the top of the stairs even longer, and suddenly I felt the urge to be completely alone. I walked back through my apartment and went out onto the balcony. I felt my phone vibrating - it was my friend T. T was an experienced shrooms tripper, and he wanted to get an update on how I was doing.

Standing on the balcony once again, I started to see minor hallucinations. Lights would change colors and tint on the fly, the power lines outside my apartment complex were bending and shifting, and I felt light-headed. It was tons of fun. Soon enough, A, K, S, and J all join me on the balcony. They're trying to convince me to at least come down to the car and listen to music. At that moment, my roommate returned home with six of his drunk friends, and that's when things started to go downhill.

I felt like a kid lost in a huge crowd. I made a beeline towards the door and went down the steps, getting in the car and turning on the iPod to listen to some chill music. For awhile we all (except A) sat in the car just talking and enjoying the other-worldly connection we all felt with each other. We played my favorite song on the stereo and it brought me to tears. This was too much, so I jumped out of the car and started walking back up towards my apartment. I found A sitting in my room on my computer, about to pack up another bowl. I felt connected to him. We were brothers. All five of us were brothers.

After a short conversation with A, the other three came back inside and waded their way through the pool of my roommate's drunk friends before reaching my position in my room. Their faces were strange, so I shut my eyes. After a few minutes of waking me up, they all convinced me to walk out on the balcony and smoke a cigarette. It had felt like an eternity since we first started tripping. It had to be at least 5:30 by now. I flip out my phone and look at it in shock. It reads 3:45. We had only been tripping for less than three hours!? That meant we still had another three hours plus to go. This is when the sinking realization set in that a 'trip' was an actual 'trip' through another reality, and that very minute was the moment I began the downward spiral.

THE TRIP, PART THREE - WHERE IS MY MIND? - T+2:50

At first I didn't even notice my mind begin to slip. I didn't notice it at all until S approached me and started talking what sounded like nonsense. The drunk kids at the apartment were scratching their heads at our odd behavior. I, however, was losing grasp of reality. I felt like I had been launched out into outer space without a harness or a spaceship, and I was beginning to float forever with no end in sight.

I kept trying to talk myself out of it. 'This is just a pill, you idiot' I would say to myself. 'Stop worrying about going insane, this'll be over with in... *looks at phone*... oh my god it's only 3:50.' Time and space literally stopped and collapsed in on itself, and that's when I slipped inside my own mind and began the 'bad' portion of the trip. I was questioning everything I had ever been taught. What is reality? What is real? Was the soda I was drinking real, or were the thoughts I was thinking that teetered on the brink of insanity real? For a few moments, I felt my mind leave my body. I tried to bring myself back, but I couldn't. I could not make my mind become one with my body again. J walked outside, completely not tripping. S couldn't handle it anymore, so he went to be alone. It was obvious J had never had anywhere close to a trip as intense as I was having... he had no idea what I was talking about.

My pointless banter continued on and on until finally, I just let go. I kept repeating 'There's a time limit on this stuff, it'll be over with by 9am. Just don't lose your mind. Keep your head straight.' I also decided, during this time, that I should go lay down in my bed and try to pass out so I could skip all of the bad parts of the trip. This ended up only causing me to slip further away from reality, and I began to shiver. I started to think about all the rumors you hear of people trying LSD or shrooms and permanently going insane, and I was all but convinced I was one of those people. The bed was obviously making me worse, so I went back outside to talk to S.

S was pacing the hallway outside my apartment. Since he had taken his pill before me, it seemed I was starting to peak while he was actually just starting to lose his identity inside his own head. Being around S and seeing him freak out only made me freak out further. It felt as if I was trying so hard to stay anchored to the ground of this reality, but S was spiraling out into space now and he was pulling me out there with him. One of the drunk kids came outside and started yelling random things at the top of his lungs. This was far too much for me to experience. I returned to my room and went to bed, but both K and J were way ahead of me. They were both passed out. I couldn't pass out. I turned and looked at my phone. Surely it was almost over.... it wasn't. It was only 4:30am, and it was time for me to face whatever it was I was trying to avoid.

Instead of running from the unknown, I was going to walk right up to the cliff at the edge of insanity and peer over the edge. Perhaps there was something important there. Perhaps it had to get a lot worse before it got better. The idea of insanity was scary to me, but I felt like it had to be done. Shivers ran through my body as I got out of bed and went into the bathroom, stripped down, and turned on the hot shower water.

THE TRIP, PART FOUR - BATTLING MYSELF - T+3:30

The hot water put me in a trance. I was hoping the noise from the water combined with the noise from the bathroom fan would put me to sleep and I wouldn't have to deal with whatever it was I was facing. My stomach churned. It was a big deal to face my demons, and it wasn't easy. The exact details of what I thought about and debated are completely unclear to me right now, as if I sealed off that part of my brain after the shrooms trip.

Questions raced through my head: What if there is no God? What if there is a God? What is reality? Can we create our own realities? Is there an alternate dimension? Why did it feel like a black hole was ripping my soul out of my body? I was surrounded by hot, steamy water in the bathroom, but I sat on the floor of the shower shivering still. I could have sworn I heard whispers. Maybe I did. 'No, this is ridiculous', I said. I ran a hand through my hair and turned off the shower water before getting out. As I reached for the door handle to the bathroom, however, I felt like I couldn't leave. I left anyway, and a few moments later I was scared and back in the bathroom. Whatever it was that was causing me to lose my mind, it had to be dealt with right there in that bathroom. I looked at myself in the mirror. Bad call.

The intensity of the trip caused me to vomit. I puked a couple of times before laying in a pool of shower water on the floor. The wet water didn't matter to me - what mattered was falling asleep. I had to escape from the terrifying realm I was in and come back to reality. Water. I needed to drink water. I made my way to the faucet and got a big glass of water. It took all my convincing to tell myself that the glass of water was as real as could be. To me, the black hole I felt inside of me was a hundred times more real than a glass of water. It wasn't good.

I broke down crying at this point. I felt a voice talking to me. Was this God? Sure, it had to be God, he was all knowing. What was he saying? It came in faint whispers, but the mere idea of talking to God was enough to make me sob. He spoke to me through the black hole in my soul, as if I was opening a portal to the otherworld in my soul and he was calling out to me through it. 'You can't fight it anymore', He told me. So I let go completely and embraced this void I felt. The vomit and the crying was nothing compared to the emotion I felt. It was beyond fear. It was sheer, utter terror. Why did I have to explore the damn void? I freaked. I didn't want this anymore. I fumbled around in my shorts for my phone and pulled it out, calling T again to see how he could help me or what advice he could give me. T didn't answer his phone. I was literally all alone, and for all I knew I was going to be locked in this bathroom exploring the abyss and puking my brains out for the rest of my life. I curled up in the fetal position on the floor and shivered violently on the bath mat.

After about two lifetimes of this in the bathroom, I came to a spiritual epiphany. I don't remember anything past the shaking violently on the floor and being all alone, but I can assure you it was bigger than anything else you've read about my trip so far. I understood that I wasn't losing my mind, it was simply being expanded. It was a painful process for someone who had only smoked marijuana before, and that is why I was so scared and unable to control my thoughts. I tried to reign myself back down to Earth, reasoning that I would have a lot to think about the next day. I exited the bathroom and returned to my bed.

THE TRIP, PART FIVE - DEALING WITH IT - T+6:35

I exited the bathroom at 7:35 in the morning. I was done peaking, and though the thoughts of getting lost in my own head still haunted me, I was able to at least focus on other things for brief moments. I was starting to come out of it. About this time, my phone rings. It's S. I pick up. 'Where the hell have you been this whole time?' S explains that J was becoming 'annoyed' by his constant paranoia and locked him out of my bedroom, leaving him in the room with the drunk kids by himself. I couldn't imagine the panic and fear he felt for those two hours I was in the bathroom, but it was obvious he was still sketching out despite his assurance to me that he was 'done tripping'. The sun was now up, my mind was still racing, and I wanted it to be over.

I journeyed to the back porch to watch the sun rise all the way, followed closely behind by S. It was such a bad trip that my hand was too shaky to light a cigarette. S lit it for me and I sat back and inhaled the fire deeply into my lungs before breathing it out. We sat in silence for awhile before S brought up what we had just experienced. 'Not now', I told him. 'Wait until we get some sleep and the shrooms are completely gone. I don't want to freak out again.' Of course, by saying this, I started thinking about my freaking out again, and that sinking feeling began to creep up my stomach and towards my brain again.

I wasn't about to let it happen. I turned on music, went inside, and took two benadryl. My bed was looking mighty comfy, despite all the negative energy I felt in my room. S followed me in the room and made a mattress out of couch cushions on the floor beside my bed. He was scared shitless, which was understandable. But I couldn't let him pull me back down into his spiral... I had to get through it on my own, and now it was his turn... but maybe I'll just stay awake just in case...

AFTERMATH - T+11:00

I wake up and look at the clock. It was only noon. That meant I had been asleep for only four hours. I look around me in the room. J, K, S, and A were all still passed out. A sudden phone ringing causes everyone to shoot up to a sitting position before looking around warily at each other. J, A, and K were all relatively fine, immediately waking up to smoke a cigarette and smoke a bowl of marijuana (we had an entire half ounce). S and I looked at each other, and without saying a word we communicated an entire thought.

'...that wasn't really real... was it?'

All in all, the trip was a little too intense for me. I think I might prefer LSD, which seems to be more 'fun' from what I hear. The LSD trip I took the night before was only one hit and it was shitty acid (my friend took two hits and licked the envelope and felt nothing). I'm not sure if I'll try acid again, but I'm sure as hell not trying shrooms again. The mental anguish and torture I went through during those 8 hours was something I never want to come close to experiencing again. I'm glad I did it, though, as I dealt with some really tough issues in the shower during my meltdown.

Not what I was expecting, not what I wanted, not doing it again... but I'm sure as hell glad I got through it.

Exp Year: 2008	ExpID: 71191
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: May 15, 2010	Views: 569
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