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Antidepressants, Potentiators, and Economics
Mushrooms, Sceletium tortuosum, Passion Flower, Calea zacatechichi, & Pedicularis densiflora
Citation:   Mr. Y. "Antidepressants, Potentiators, and Economics: An Experience with Mushrooms, Sceletium tortuosum, Passion Flower, Calea zacatechichi, & Pedicularis densiflora (exp84310)". Erowid.org. Oct 6, 2016. erowid.org/exp/84310

 
DOSE:
200 mg smoked Sceletium tortuosum (extract)
  1 bowl smoked Calea zacatechichi (dried)
    smoked Calea zacatechichi (extract)
  200 mg smoked Indian Warrior (dried)
  700 mg smoked Passion Flower (dried)
  0.5 g oral Mushrooms  
BODY WEIGHT: 190 lb
I guess this is a retrospective, my experiences of various herbal 'highs' and one particular recent event involving all of them at once.

I've been smoking passion flower extract for a little while now. It seemed to me like an interesting herb, promising to relieve anxiety, depression and help with insomnia....I suffer from all three. In addition, it was said to be a potent potentiator of psilocybe mushrooms; a .7g of shrooms and a similar quantity of passion flower easily sums to a very enjoyable and slightly more visual and for lack of a better word *entheogenic* experience than the shrooms alone would be, somewhere at the subjective neighborhood of 1.5g for me. I purchased it for economic reasons initially, I do alot of shrooms lately. Passion flower is a cheap way to make an 8th of shrooms last for 3 equal and very enjoyable and intense trips. It also helps take the edge off the ride, I often get anxiety in the beginning stages which melt away. And it 'brightens' the hallucinations, enhances colors more than the shroom alone would. Personal insights become more positive as well.

Indeed, I've also taken doses of hallucinogenic mushrooms for purposes of anxiety and depression relief, as well as to just escape the boredom and monotony of everyday life. Some people would call me a shroom head... But the afterglow for me lasts for days, and accomplishes for me what prescription drugs have not. Its' also helped me with many of my addictions and negative habits, including alcoholism, chronic weed smoking, anger issues, shyness and some help with neuroticism.

Since I've done shrooms, I've stopped taking an assortment of prescription drugs including quinetapine, desvenlafaxine, buproprion, trazodone, remeron and atarax (I was on all at once while also being a chronic pot smoker and alcoholic). I've experienced no negative effects over all (except maybe a heightened disdain for boredom and monotony), and positive effects include a better awareness of myself and feelings, heightened creativity (I've started getting into drawing lately), increased motivation, a drive for balance and moderation in all things, increased outgoingness/extroversion, less shyness and social anxiety, and a decreased neuroticism which included inordinate obsessive qualities.

I bought calea z, just cause the idea of a dream potentiator seemed to resonate well with my dreams of shamanism and personal exploration and insight. It mixes pretty great with pot, definitely an economic benefit, a little of this a little of that and less bud is smoked over all. I'm saving money right? wtf, why not, can't beat that huh? Unfortunately, it never potentiated dreams, seemed to cause forgetfulness of unknown significance (who knows, it might be killing brain cells, this shit isn't really researched like that), and certainly didn't help with my insomnia at all (it exacerbated it).

As for the syrian rue, I bought that for its MAOI effects, to potentiate shrooms again, and to alleviate depression. It did what I suspected it would, but however increased the raw effects, and on the occasions I've used it, it generally seemed less forgiving and less positive than the passion flower. It also caused tingling and parasthesia.

Pedicularis densiflora I bought just to potentiate weed and possibly save money in the long run. Its not very impressive...Kills back pain though, and is ever so slightly cannabinoid like. Mixes kinda nice with passion flower. My extract was hard to burn.

Anyway. I recently purchased some kanna 15x extract for similar reasons to the above, I like telling people I'm a shaman now. Maybe I'm a little weird, but nobody really cares. The kanna feels kinda like a nice stoning, without so much the heady 'high', sorta like a small amount of high CBD medical grade weed. It is anti-anxiety and helps with depression too.

I've tried all of these things except the kanna in combination...Until recently. I read that kanna was an SSRI and nd that mixing it with passion flower would be a definite no no (serotonin syndrome). Seeing as I've fucked up and took pills (remeron) with passion flower before to no ill effect (I simply forgot I took the remeron 16 hours previous, and it has a half life of nearly 30 hours).....It probably influenced my lack of caution in this adventure, though, I used small amounts of the kanna to minimize the perceived danger in the combination.

My first day of college ever:

I feel depressed, anxious. I do my laundry so that at least I can wear my favorite clothes...

I got a shipment of various herbs coincidentally on the same day, little while before I was to leave. Seemed like a good idea at the time to try out my new shit. I was in a smoking mood, figured I'd try out a bunch of shit I just got. Never did the kanna or pedicularis densiflora before. I smoked some passion flower. About .5g. It helps. Relieves my anxiety, gives me energy, helps with depression. Makes me a little sleepy, though I feel good. I smoke some calea, gives me a mild high. Time to hit up the kanna. I take a small amount, wary of serotonin syndrome. It's sposed to be 15x...It's hard as fuck to light. I mix some more calea with it, to catch its resin and help it light, no such luck. This extract is really fuckin hard to light. Would probably have been better in a blunt, but I've kinda quit smoking pot so fuck it. Just kept trying, scraping it up to keep it from going wasted into my bong. It don't taste to bad, but it's kinda oily smoke. Something tells me water pipe is not the way to go. Pedicularis densiflora time. Also hard to light...Mildly stoning. Tastes not to bad...Oily smoke too, not sure if that makes sense to anyone.

While I was at all this, I figured let's go for gold. I took some shrooms.

All in all, I took a .5g of shrooms, smoked about a .2g mix of kanna 15x extract, about a bowl sized amount of calea z leaves with a pinch of extract (more than enough wouldn't bother to weigh it out, experience was enough to know how much to use), a .2g of pedicularis and a .7g of passion flower (Passiflora incarnata). Being a small amount of shrooms, I really wasn't expecting too much, .75 or so is generally the cut off point for intense experiences for me when mixed with the passion flower. It also helps my source is particularly potent as I understand these things, if this dosage doesn't sound 'right' to anyone.

t-0 hours:
The kanna instantly hit, first time I smoked it too. Was interesting. Like a potent bong hit, just not as intense and mellowing like the body high off weed. This was the kinda shit would kill pain...Like medical grade weed with a high CBD content, indica like. It's definitely not pot, but that's not why I bought it anyway, the antidepressant and social entheogenic aspect was what I was interested in. The passion flower is generally mellowing too, by itself it seems to enhance colors, introspection and insight. The calea definitely slows time, clarifies the senses, also like a mellow highness. I felt pretty good. Definitely ready for school now. Wanted to have a fucking GREAT day, and not just a good one. So I took some shrooms. The pedicularis tastes kinda nice. Killed my back pain, but I hit up the chiropractor anyway.

t-30 minutes :
Was kinda anxious about leaving my house, first day of college and all, I kept going back inside to get shit, constantly forgetting stuff and wanting to go back and get more .The shrooms were coming on, I tend to get nervous and neurotic about shit when it's doing its thing coming on. Obsessed about small details and worried I'd forget important things. I almost forget to write down my classes and where they're at before I leave. I worried I might have taken a particularly potent little shroom, but it might have just been first day jitters combined with all the drugs I did. And lord did I do alot of drugs......Maybe it wasn't such a good idea huh?? MAOIs, SSRIs, fuckin caleas diterpenoids or whatever and shrooms and god knows whats in pedicularis. Why would someone do that to themselves is what I thought, do I really wanna remember my first day of school as being all fucked up? What's my problem man... I certainly do alot of drugs. Why can't I just be normal like everyone else? It can't be good to be doing shrooms all the time. What if I bug out in class, what if I act stupid or something? First impressions really count don't they? Along with all the normal shit anyone would think on their first day anyway. But fuck it. I'm excited to attend. With some thought control, positive affirmations, I'm good to go and head off to school.

t-40: minutes
I walked to school. The shroom presence was definitely there, appreciation for the beauty of things, nature... A thoughtfulness. Definitely a stronger trip than I had expected, and I've done the passion flower shroom thing before, maybe the calea and kanna, I feel a little more confused than a shroom trip would normally make me. My mind is wandery. Maybe wasn't a good idea to tack on to an already intense day. Pedicularis not very important at this point, don't even notice it at all, but I smoked alot of shit, maybe it all just blended together nicely. I figured a .5g of shrooms would just be barely there, but there it was anyway. And still coming on. I worried with the combination that I might freak out or something in school, but reminded myself I've never done so before and usually nobody can tell I'm all fucked up anyway. I'm just a calm and collected individual...Intellectual at that. So what if people think I say weird shit. Soon enough I'd show em anyway. I'm a smart guy right??

t-60 minutes:
Anxious and energetic, that described me. I'm running late, it took me entirely too long to leave that house, shrooms making me paranoid and slightly obsessive about making myself comfortable through the trip and the walk to school is nearly 50 minutes. What was I thinking? And I still have to find my friggen classes, don't know where they are, and the paper in my hand is hard to make out cause I don't even know too much about campus anyway, never met any of my teachers before, and my peers, who knows? I'm sweating cause I'm walking fast and not really feeling all that awesome, nervous and a little scared, this is more intense than I planned, I'm kinda hot and sweating, I really don't like that, going to meet people dripping with sweat. But it was a warm day and I was power walking. I wasn't too concerned about serotonin syndrome even though I was flushed and sweating. I flush and sweat easy all the time after all. And shrooms generally make me like that anyway, shivering, hot, sweaty, muscle spasms, fast heart rate...Dude, I probably did get serotonin syndrome. But it's hard to distinguish those effects from what I normally get off shrooms anyway. All of those aren't abnormal experiences for me.

t-1:30 hours:
I take care of business, find my class with ease and sureness, it's cold as shit and that bothers me more than it would if I were sober, though I'm feeling pretty confident and good at this moment. No worries, the jitters have faded and the shroom high is mild and still coming on. It's not entirely super euphoric, but personal insight is increased, odd thoughts prevail, my mind is simply open, I notice details of things around me, girls are prettier and I just wanna talk to all of them, and I take in my world and surroundings greedily with my eyes. Suiting for my english class which turns out to be mostly bullshitting and rambling anyway. Nobody seems to notice anything is wrong with me, why would they?

I'm the first person to start talking in class when the professor is fishing for people to make comments and pass what is otherwise the most boring day of the semester, and when I start, everyone follows suit. This is a class about shooting the shit and sharing ideas, definitely my modus operandi anyway, and in the mood I'm in, no worries man. I'm good at that.

t-2 hours:
I notice a lot of distraction. I start doodling randomly, write a pair of cursive a's and turn them into a face (which I saw before I drew it), I draw a strange desert scene on my paper (which didn't look too bad considering I've never saw myself the artist), I'm not even taking notes, why bother. Doodling is oddly fun, and I fall in love with a doodle of a girl I drew. I laugh to myself, share insights about random topics, I probably annoy people with my randomness, but who gives a shit....Let them talk if they care so much, its not my fault they're not extroverted like me. This is a boring class, there's no lesson plan really. This is about getting to know your peers and the teacher getting to know you.

t-3 hours.
Oddly enough, the shrooms are still coming on. For such a small amount, they certainly came a long way. Not a full blown shroom trip, but wtf, definitely far cry from baseline. Surprisingly so, even for me....I wonder if over time I've gotten more sensitive to their effects rather than less. The passion flower sure helps intensify things, the kanna I think has worn off long ago, shrooms is the star of this show. Still in class, shooting shit, doing my thing, I'm starting to get bored. Class is less stimulating than I thought it would be, not the best place to be doing shrooms if you ask me, but not the worst either. The teacher lets us out early.

t-4:30 hours.
I wander campus, get lost and eventually find my way to Spanish class. Still doodling. I make my presence known, the shrooms have died down mostly except for a mild after glow. I can concentrate more now which is suiting cause surprisingly the instructor gives us work. I find myself learning spanish vocabulary very quickly and easily. I'm tired as shit now, but whatever.

t-6 hours
I went home. Not much to say after somewhere in the middle of my Spanish class. Went to sleep.

Retrospective:
Kanna, calea, passion flower, shrooms.

Alot of drugs, mostly legal. Kanna and passion flower, people say it's a no no. I've done it. I'm not dead. I've done it also without the shrooms...Serotonin syndrome? In the doses I've taken, probably not a concern, though definitely possible, probably something that could be assuaged with copious amounts of water similar to what I SHOULD be doing with an e trip anyway, and anything remotely similar to the symptoms of serotonin syndrome I've encountered are indistinguishable from the physical aspects of shrooms anyway. Taken without shrooms, I don't notice anything particularly noteworthy. I'm not even sure the passion flower can be said to potentiate its effects at all, so if I'm gonna do it, I'd say why bother? There's not really a point. if anything, it brings on a very energetic side to the kanna, and the kanna kills the anti-anxiety effects of the passion flower. For me, there's no point.

Passion flower and pedicularis, nice mix, tastes alright.
Calea....Mixes great with just about anything, but it gives me a headache. Nice cannabis like effects. Fucks up my sleeping. But in the morning I feel great. Brings the magic back to pot. My favorite. Kanna needs more experimenting.

Exp Year: 2008ExpID: 84310
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: 23
Published: Oct 6, 2016Views: 6,262
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Mushrooms (39), Sceletium tortuosum (179), Calea zacatechichi (97), Passion Flower (121), Indian Warrior (531), Syrian Rue (45) : School (35), Depression (15), Retrospective / Summary (11), Combinations (3)

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