9 minute read
OUR TRIPPIEST EXPERIENCES
TRIPPIEST EXPERIENCES
THE YEAR WAS 2012 and I was already more than several years into my relationship with Mary Jane. At the time, the Cannabis I often consumed came from a local OMMP grower who frequently left me with a few extra goodies. On one particular occasion, he presented me with one of his wife’s famous cookies and warned me of their potency. Basking in the glow of my 20-year-old arrogance, I gobbled the entire thing.
What I experienced for the next five to six hours can only be described as psychedelic. I wandered through my house taking in the psilocybin-like effects. My visual experience resembled waves and standing up straight wasn’t an option. I finally gave in to gravity and fell face first into the couch. Attempting to sleep it off was my only hope - or so I thought.
Instead, I laid there in a dizzy misery for several hours, with plenty of time to respect the madwoman behind that formidable confection. -Amanda Day @Terpodactyl_Media
THE YEAR IS 1996. The setting: a college dorm suite in Western Pennsylvania. My friends and I had been smoking the predominant type of Cannabis that people smoked back in the mid 90s - a compressed, seedy ‘Mexican schwag’ of dubious origin. Who knows how many awful pesticides we consumed thanks to the failed war on drugs?
As we got more and more into Cannabis, doors started to open up to ‘the good stuff.’ At that time, high grade Cannabis was called ‘kind bud’ and to us it was the stuff of dreams. These were uncompressed, beautiful buds that looked like just about anything middle-of-the-road that you’d find in a dispensary nowadays.
The particular strain of kind bud we were smoking that night we knew little about. It was called Old Man and was said to be grown somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains south of us. Its effects, however, were otherworldly.
The stuff came on quick after a few bong rips and before we knew it, we were all locked to the couch. Then the hallucinations started. “What was that?” I asked. It sounded like an elephant had entered the apartment! Turned out it was just my roommate walking down the hallway. Colors were intensified, laughter ensued - and it remains to this day, the trippiest experience of my Cannabis life. -Pacer Stacktrain @thepacerstacktrain
REMEMBER BEFORE any of us knew what a milligram was concerning an edible dosage? Those were some fun times - the days of uniting with your buddies after school, scrounging up any money possible, and putting it all together to find whatever ganja that was currently available. This takes me back to a certain time and place when I was 16-years-old and had my first opportunity to make cannabutter. After being put on by an older friend with the technique, I was eager to craft my first batch of Cannabis infused sweets.
I then went to the grocery store and picked up a few of my favorite cereals: Fruity Pebbles, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Trix. From there, it was back to the house to concoct what is now known as Ganja Goo Balls - a combination of marshmallows, cereal and canna-butter.
After eating a treat or two, and licking the spoon maybe one too many times, my head started to spin out of control. I quickly made my way to the couch, where I found myself struggling to keep my eyes open as South Park blasted in the background. I then felt my body float to the kitchen, where I stuffed my face with almost a full box of Oreos. After settling into this brand new high, my buddies and I appropriately threw on “Half Baked” and laughed the night away. -Max Early @Lifted_Stardust
MY TRIPPIEST weed experience dates back to my sophomore year of high school in Massachusetts. My friend Jordan and I had just picked up a bag from someone we knew through a friend. We snuck down to the basement to grab Jordan’s dad’s pipe out of his stash box, smoking a few bowls out back by the garage.
Within about 10 minutes of smoking we both began to feel pretty weird, nothing like anything we’d smoked or felt before.
From what I remember, we were convinced our vision had gone to black and white and that we could feel our bones through our skin. We attempted to mitigate the situation with a bowl of Cheerios, but were hardly able to eat any since we were so high and paranoid. I ended up falling asleep sprawled across the basement floor, while my buddy somehow made it into his bed.
No further purchases were made from this dealer. -Will Ferguson @_710dencies
RATHER THAN giving you juicy details of my over-consumption of psilocybin, I’d rather write about the best times I’ve had with my favorite psychedelic pastime.
Back in 2012 and 2013, I was an avid music festival goer and attended the (now cancelled) Sasquatch! Music Festival. I was with my best friend and we probably went through an ounce of mushrooms during the four-day festival. The psilocybin helped reduce my mild agoraphobia and kept me sane around a crowd that was fucked up for four days.
If you didn’t already know this, music is especially heavenly on mushrooms. But music combined with lights and visuals made the experience hilarious and transcendent. Mushrooms are cinematic in the sense that you perceive time and your surroundings through a colorful and stimulating lens. I feel like I can see through people on mushrooms, almost like a heightened intuition where I can feel peoples’ hidden motivations.
To be honest, I believe I have superpowers whenever I take shrooms. -Simone Fischer @SimoneFischerr
For as long as I can remember, anxiety has always manifested itself in me in some way. Whether it was ordering a burger as a child and being unable to make eye contact with the waiter, or simply feeling uncomfortable in situations out of my control, anxiety has always been present in my life.
LIKE MOST souls struggling with mental illness, I tried to find comfort from this disorder in any way that I could. Some of the most popular anti-anxiety drugs for immediate relief are benzodiazepines such as Xanax, Klonopin and Valium.
Around the age of 18, I had my first experience with a benzodiazepine after having what felt like a heart attack (little did I know I was having an anxiety attack). From that point forward, every time I had what I now know as generalized anxiety, I convinced myself that I needed this medication to continue my day without any additional internal disruptions. After a rocky and unhealthy relationship with Xanax over five years, which ultimately led me to a sense of numbness and lack of connection, I knew a change had to be made - a healthy change for myself in order to live a meaningful life.
In November of 2018 I embarked on my journey to Tijuana, Mexico for ibogaine therapy, in hopes of finding out what caused me these great levels of anxiety, and how I could potentially find a better way to live my day-to-day life without the use of benzodiazepines.
To give a little back story on ibogaine, traditionally the root barks of the iboga tree from which ibogaine is extracted, was first discovered by the Pygmy tribes of Central Africa hundreds of years ago. Ibogaine is still used today in their culture in the transformation process while helping turn young boys into men.
Moving forward into today’s day and age, ibogaine is now used as an alternative medicine treatment for drug addiction in some countries, as it has been proven to also facilitate psychological introspection and spiritual exploration.
After flying into San Diego, I was met by a driver who facilitates the transfer of getting patients to the treatment facility in Tijuana.
During our two hour drive from California to Mexico, I had no idea what I was in for and the transformations that were to come.
As I settled into what would be my home for the next week, I slowly started putting together the pieces and created a list of reasons and intentions of why I was there to begin with. I was asked to curate this list in hopes that it would better help guide me during what is known as “the trip from hell.” While most ceremonies or treatments tend to be done in a more natural environment and are performed by shamans, the facility I attended was fully staffed with on-call doctors and nurses in case anything were to go south.
Following a series of blood tests and heart scans, I was ready to commence what would be a life-changing experience. I was then laid down in a bed with all of the lights turned off, when the attending doctor started to walk me through what I may experience throughout the night ahead.
Nothing that he said could have prepared me for what was next. Following the ingestions of two large capsules, I started to feel the effects of the ibogaine take hold. “In this space, I was no longer connected to my internal monologue, but was speaking to an unfamiliar voice that seemed to be a higher power.” “The West African medicinal plant iboga reveals truly wide-ranging potential to treat multi-substance addiction.” -PsychedelicTimes.com
As this was a rather unfamiliar feeling to me, I was unsure as to what I was feeling exactly, or the possibility that it was just a placebo effect. About what felt like an hour after ingesting said capsules, I was now sure that these effects were no longer a placebo. I had fully transcended into another level of consciousness and existence. In this space, I was no longer connected to my internal monologue, but was speaking to an unfamiliar voice that seemed to be a higher power.
Additionally, I was able to connect with a handful of friends that unfortunately are no longer physically here. I was rest assured that they were all in a better place, now watching over and protecting me. Though I tried deeply to connect and ask questions to those friends of the past, they reminded me that this experience was about me, and shortly after I began to start fighting all of my internal demons.
During my experience, I was met with a vast majority of my self-doubts, insecurities, and reasons for benzodiazepine use. These were some of the most anxiety-ridden and terrifying moments of my life and existence.
Throughout my 20s, I had used benzodiazepines as a coping mechanism to numb myself and try to hide from the world after feeling an unmanageable amount of anxiety.
Overall, what I proved to myself during these 12 hours of hell, is that I am stronger than the drug that once ruled my life. And most importantly, that if I can get through an experience as intense as one like this without pharmaceutical medication, I can probably get through day-today life without it as well!
I currently have been free of benzodiazepines for two years and counting, and owe a big majority of my transcendence to ibogaine.
It is a great aid in fighting addiction, but without my self perseverance and dedication to that path of recovery, I am unsure that I would still be alive today.
If you or a loved one are struggling with addiction, I highly recommend looking into ibogaine therapy as an alternative to the typical rehab route.
