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)
Pink and Pill
Diphenhydramine (Benadryl)
Citation:   the cloud. "Pink and Pill: An Experience with Diphenhydramine (Benadryl) (exp73397)". Erowid.org. Apr 7, 2012. erowid.org/exp/73397

 
DOSE:
325 mg oral Diphenhydramine (pill / tablet)
  175 mg oral Diphenhydramine (pill / tablet)
BODY WEIGHT: 220 lb
At around 10:15 PM I ingested 13 pills of generic 25mg DPH tablets, there's a reason for this, benadryl has either provided me with an incredible, indescribable dreamlike haze which is just unmatched by all drugs that are available, much like salvia the experience is only understood once met, and even then things can get a little hazy.

DPH is a chemical high, nothing more. Unlike psilocybin, the effects are purely science. I believe there is an element of metaphysical properties that pertain to magic mushrooms and other 'natural' hallucinogens, including marijuana, LSD being on a plane of its own existence worthy of mentioning as a psychedelic. That also pertains to DXM, or cough syrup. That drug alone has provided me with profound visions of grandeur that has taken me into a state of pure awareness and bliss, and surprisingly, enlightened me. Despite it's sickly aroma and very chemical first hour of the experience, the following 3 to 4 hours of a 4th plateau DXM induced coma can be one of the most unbelievably earth shattering, ego destroyingly powerful experience ever.

Tonight I plan to experiment upon the possible metaphysical effects of this dreaded drug. Like Hunter S Thompson's aversion to Ether, I feel the same way about this substance. Yet we do it. I believe that, like salvia, this is NOT a recreational drug. It could be nothing more than a chemical that humans just should not take, maybe another alien species may find religious use of this horrible substance, but not humans. But tonight I will put that to the test. I leave now to fill my water bottle in preparation for the staggering weight of cottonmouth and an easily tripled body load.

For atmosphere, it is dark out, fair weather. My room is small, but very relaxed. I will burn some incense in a minute after I get back. I have some ambient music playing tonight, specifically Orbital, for those of you who are familiar with this duo, you'll be quite sympathetic to the place I am about to venture in to. Though not all of my tale will be told here, I will attempt to document things as they happen.

After returning I've just consumed an additional 7 pills, taking my final dosage level to 500 mg of Diphenhydramine HCl to counter out my weight of 220 lbs at 10:40 PM. It should be noted that this is the highest single dosage that I have taken of this substance, my earlier highest being 300 mg. Now my mind is in god's hands.

Sitting here I begin to feel the long drawl that is an allergy medicine buzz, something so simple yet somehow mind frighteningly brain shattering. My mind is beginning to float a little, I'm feeling an apprehension in my body, and a slight queasiness in my stomach. What will soon be an irritating cottonmouth fit is beginning to come to fruition, my lips drying out, constant drinking of water, the whole deal. I know that as soon as peak effects hit my body will become weighted, and my brain tricked by vivid hallucination. My goal for the night will be to meditate upon the effects of this drug without falling victim to mental fatigue and falling asleep, though this drug has a very notorious element to it that makes it nearly impossible to stay awake while at the same time you cannot sleep for the same reason. It's like a drug invented a Catch-22. I need to sleep, but I can't because I'm too awake, but I want to, and I can't.

At 10:50 I'm beginning to feel heavier, at 30 minutes most of the pills will be intact but they are slowly melting into my bloodstream. The feeling of apprehension within me is rising a bit, I am in pain from exercising earlier today and having woke up at 6 o' clock for work. I am mentally tired but spiritually awake. In the events of tonight, I will try to replace my physical tiredness with spiritual awakening. Upon closing my eyes I enter a sense of well-being. As if things are going to be okay.

So many people take this drug expecting it to be a LSD-reminiscent trip of colors and geometric figures, euphoria, visions, and downright enjoyable. But so many people don't realize what this drug does. It makes me hallucinate. Real, real hallucinations. Quite simply, seeing people and talking to them only to realize that they are not there.

I am beginning to become quite tired. I fear that before this night is over I will succumb to the sleep-aid effects of this drug. Currently I am in the range of a 50-60 mg dose. Something is happening.

The effects are... beginning to build. My fingers are beginning to become... inverted, upon this keyboard. I feel my mind slipping away from the arena of linear thought perception and falling into the abstracted world of psychedelic tongue. Sitting scares me. I have to keep thinking, I have to keep talking. I need thought provoking words to come from my mind. I feel I am entering the phase of dreams, a place between reality and the bizarre surrealism that is a full on DPH trip. More stomach discomfort appears at the bottom of my stomach, and I meditate it away.

It feels like the left and the right side of my brain are beginning to quarrel, my vision is not impaired but I can definitely feel as if half of my vision is attempting to take over the other. This same feeling appears with my body movements when I adjust my weight in my chair.

Re-reading parts of this entry are baffling to me. Why did I write as I did? Maybe this drug's metaphysical properties is akin to salvia's in that it doesn't act IN the body, it acts as a PART of the body. In other words, it takes control of my reality, makes it's own spin on things and I see and feel the result. If there is a world of chemicals, then the world of DPH would be of a sleepy insomniac state, much akin to the feeling right before you fall asleep. Speaking of which, astral projection is on the list of things I intend to practice tonight. I will see how that goes seeing as I will not be able to sleep until early on into the morning.

My body is beginning to heat up a little, I should probably make a nest on my bed and prepare for what is to come. Things can't stay the way they are forever, of course.

--

It's the following day at 12:00 AM, I couldn't get to sleep until about 3 or 4 in the morning, at one point I lost all contact with time and space. I feel a bit lightheaded and spacey, drained and a little unmotivated but writing this here to reflect on the experience should help my mental state of things.

After I finished that last sentence I put the computer down next to my bed, just in case I needed to write something important in case I forget it. I never touched the computer until after the trip was over. I sat in bed and at around midnight the weight on my body kept increasing. I had a familiar sensation of being extremely heavy, yet light footed, extremely tired, yet very much awake. I started to get cold and my stomach was starting to get upset so I pulled my comforter over my body, I put in some music, it was Tangerine Dream's 'Zeit' album, later I changed the music but I have since forgotten what it was. There is a profound change in the way I hear music when I'm on DPH, deeper, more powerful tones in the song is overwhelming while softer tones are go unnoticed. It's impossible to get a clear mix of the two, so listening to music is just like the drug, restless.

I looked up at the corner of my room, and I saw a faint ripple in the wall paint, like it was moving. 'That's a rat,' I thought, I kept staring at that spot until a rat materialized out of the wall. It was dark, with not features, all that there was was a silhouette of a rat colored in with stars and space. The rat ran flat across the top of my wall, like it was some sort of ledge. The rat ran across a lamp wire I have running across my ceiling and disappeared into the lamp itself. Another part of the wall suddenly sported a large windowsill, but the shutters were closed so you could not see out of it. I blinked and the image was gone. Effectively in the throes of a DPH experience I closed my eyes and began to meditate. There was no flow, nothing. It was like I was dead, no energy was going through me or out of me. Concentration on a meditation was useless. I opened my eyes and the world was chaos, it seemed as if a film of rainbow paper had been placed over my eyes, the entire room shook and waved with a psychedelic pulse of color, overwhelmed I closed my eyes again and just relaxed. Relaxing would seem hard to do on this drug but when you tell yourself that these incredibly real hallucinations are not actually real everything will be okay. Hallucinations procured from LSD or mushrooms are different, they're entertaining. These are downright real.

Through the night I listened to music, afraid to open my eyes to see the world ablaze in a frightening explosion of hallucinations, but my world remained intact. Eventually I became physically tired and tried to go to sleep. Of course I couldn't, I knew this was going to happen so I did all that I could do. Wait it out. Throughout the night I kept getting up and stumbled into the bathroom to pee. Walking is very difficult on this drug, as is talking, because it feels like I'm going to just fall through the floor at any moment, it feels like the brain's hemispheres have switched places and everything seems to be going the wrong way. Along with this is benadryl's infamous insomnia characteristic. I could not sleep for a very long time and when I did I had a very lucid dream that was essentially one long hallucination fest after another.

I woke up a little confused, slightly hungry but otherwise okay. I feel pretty drained at the moment, but as the day wears on everything will slowly return to normal. I still have a slight visual component from last night, focusing on one thing makes me feel very strange.

In closing, this is not a hallucinogen, this is not a psychedelic, this is not anything. At all. The world of DPH is a very discordant, dysfunctional realm of space and time. It is neither enlightening nor fun, and its purpose as a sleep aid seems to be it's only off-label use. This drug should stay as an antihistamine, as I don't find it spiritually enlightening or fun. If one would wish to take a dip into the world of DPH I have this advice, go slow, don't underestimate the power of this strange drug. The effects of it are the result of an antihistamine overdose, not a 'high.'
Respect the Pink Panther at all costs.

Peace, Love and Happiness

Exp Year: 2008ExpID: 73397
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Apr 7, 2012Views: 56,138
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Diphenhydramine (109) : Alone (16), Difficult Experiences (5), General (1)

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