Experience:~80-100 Psilocybe Subaeruginosa

Generally, with psychedelics, I never 'suffer' a comedown at all. This is one of the many reasons why that family of experiences are high on my list of things to do. There have been times however when the comedown has been a negative experience, something which I was reminded of last time I took magic mushrooms, late last week.

The mushroom season this year is the best I've ever seen. The little beasts are everywhere, so I've been collecting caps every day and building quite a stockpile for future use and enjoying the occasional trip as I go. Late last week I made some apple cider vinegar and honey elixir using more than 800 caps in various states of drying.

I fucked up a little on the weight calculations and ended up with 816mls of solution of unknown (extreme) potency which needed to go into a 750ml wine bottle. After filling the bottle, I was left with 66mls of liquid, which I drank in order to taste and test the potion.

I took a level four trip (manageable but intense) the day before, figuring that I'd build a hefty tolerance in order to safeguard against overdoing it in case the potion turned out more potent than I expected. It was luck I did, because it was. Despite the tolerance I had, the trip was extremely intense, with vivid open and closed eye visuals, extremely convincing auditory and tactile hallucinations, and profound emotional impact.

If I had to guess, I think I may have consumed the equivalent of 100 or so caps, where 15-20 would normally be required for a solid trip with no tolerance.

The peak of the trip was short lived, followed by more than six hours of level 2-3 psychedelic experience. Right at the end, as I was growing sleepy and ready to settle in for the night, my car alarm went off as someone had thrown a rock out the window of a car as it passed my own, shattering the windcreen.

I got off the call I was on and called to cops, then stayed on the line to them as I rowed ashore to see what was up. I found the damage and went through the process of filling the cops in on the details as the trip started taking over again and the anxiety and stress of the situation began to take firm hold.

After half an hour or so, the car from which the rock was thrown came back past and I tried to get a glimpse of the number plate. They pulled over a little up the road and came back. I got back in the dinghy, still on the phone to the cops, and put about 50m of water between myself and the car park where my car was parked. The car pulled up and two big dudes got out and came over to the boat ramp, getting very aggressive and accusing me of stealing the wheels of my other car which is jacked up on blocks since it's wheels were stolen a few weeks ago.

I'm usually not the type to be afraid of physical violence, but at this point I was shitting myself. I felt very small and vulnerable and was grateful for the deep water which lay between myself and the vandals. I told them that I was on the phone to the cops and that I saw them go past as the rock was thrown, that I knew they were the only thing on the road (I live in the middle of nowhere on a dead end road) and knew that they had smashed my windscreen. I got the distinct impression that they were busted, but they kept trying to turn the conversation to my other car which was on blocks.

Eventually one of the guys who was still in the car convinced the others to get in the car and leave before the cops showed up. The cops never came.

I got home and called the person who I was in the phone with when the whole thing happened. She helped me calm down and settle, though I was still left with a profound feeling of being violated and abused by the vandals. Normally such a thing would wear off quickly for me, as I'm very practised at compartmentalising traumatic experiences and discociating from them, but I simply couldn't shake the feeling.

The following morning I woke up grumpy and depressed, a completely new experience for me after a mushroom trip. The feeling has been easing slowly over the last few days, but I still have a nagging sense of loss and a vulnerability and sadness which feels much deeper than that which I would normally experience following such an event.

For me, the residue of that trip wasn't so much a physiological thing, as a deep emotional scar resulting from the aggressive and threatening encounter at the end of the trip. It's left me feeling the usual numbness which I would normally experience following an extreme trauma, such as witnessing a violent death or being involved with a disaster (I suffer from complex post traumatic stress disorder) only this time I'm failing to fully compartmentalise and fully disscociate from the event and it's emotional impact.

It's really as if my own defence mechanisms, which are a factor of PTSD and have served me well in being able to operate in the face of terrible situations, have been significantly eroded by the effects of the mushrooms. I feel highly disinclined to consume any more of the elixir I've prepared, though I believe that the feeling will dissipate within a week or two.

If nothing else, I think this story is a testament to the importance of set and setting when consuming psychedelics, particularly where trauma related mental illness is involved and there is a possibility for things to take a negative turn. There's no way that I could have predicted or prevented the situation which unfolded, as random as it was, and the fact of its occurrence goes to show just how vulnerable people are when under the influence of mushrooms and other psychedelic drugs.

I feel much better today, though I still feel like I'm at the tail end of a harsh comedown from psilocin/psilocibin.

Submitted by Budgetadvisoryservice