Ok, I'm now going to write a trip report for my friend swim's second experience with shrooms. This experience occurred about a month after swim's first shroom experience, though the circumstances were quite different.
Before starting, I would like to say this was the worst trip swim has ever had and was definitely a lesson learnt through pain and suffering. Hopefully by posting this here I can help prevent people from having an experience as bad as this when they do shrooms.
Trip #2 (Complete Insanity in the Face of Exhaustion)
It had been a month since swim's first shroom experience, which had been quite pleasurable. Swim had a nice little break planned out. He was going to meet up with some friends in a nearby city and go to a DJ performance. After that swim and his friends were going to drive over to another city in a nother state to spend another day or so hanging out before heading back. The preparations were made. Swim brought a quarter ounce of shrooms, his friend Tom (from Trip #1) would bring a quarter ounce of Northern Lights Haze, and his other friend (who we will call John) brought a litre bottle of vodka. Everyone bought their tickets to the DJ event and, hotel reservations and car rentals were made, and it was time to party!
The DJ event in Chicago went great even though swim and his friends couldn't hook up any E, and they just got high and drunk at the hotel afterwards until the sun came up. After sleeping maybe 5-6 hours they went around the city to check things out. They ended up hanging around in various places until about midnight, at which point they joined some other people and began the 6 hour drive to Tom's house. Swim was pretty exhausted at this point, and it didn't help that four people were cramped into the backseat of a car that could barely fit two in the back!
After the arduous car journey was over swim felt pretty beat. He smoked some spliffs with his friends and relaxed. John passed out leaving swim and Tom awake. Swim decided that they might as well take the rest of the shrooms then as they wouldn't have time the next day to do so. Tom agreed so they got the bread, peanut butter, and jelly out. Swim divided the shrooms into two 3.5 gram quantities. In the quantity for himself swim had put one peculiar shroom. Its cap was massive, and it had blue stains all over it, which swim found odd. The cap also had a very large amount of the black stuff you find under the cap. Swim thought that this might mean the shroom is extra potent but decided since the dose worked great the last time he might as well do it again. Swim and Tom worked up two sandwichs and it was eating time. Swim had considerable more difficulty getting the sandwich down this time, as the cap was thick and chewy. He thought it could be a bad omen but was so excited to trip again he didn't care.
About 45 minutes after ingestion swim was feeling the nausea settling in, though it wasn't as strong as the last time. He felt really messed up, even more than last time, and the colours were brightening around him at an incredible rate. He was extemely happy and excited, he loves visuals so he thought this was going to be an excellent trip with lots of cool hallucinations.
The lights began to swirl around the room (its more like a balcony within the apartment that looks down on the main section below) and the walls began to melt. Swim was very happy at this point. However, its also at this point things began to get a bit intense. Swim was lying on the carpet with his upper body resting on a mattress that was sitting on the carpet. Suddenly the carpet turned into thousands of blocks of uncooked ramen noodles in boiling water and swim began sinking into it. He was very freaked out by this as he was quite sure he was drowning in boiling water filled with ramen noodles. The noodles even began to feel soft and disintegrate out of block form as swim was struggling. To stay afloat swim clutched the mattress with all might and pulled himself on it. After he got on it and looked back down the carpet wasn't boiling water anymore but instead seemed to be a normal carpet with a thin layer of water over it. Swim exhaled a huge sigh of relief.
The trip began feeling much more ominous at this point. Swim struggled down the stairs to the futon in the foyer to lie down. It was at this point exhaustion, and panic, began to set in. Swim had taken the shrooms with such a little amount of sleep because he remembered during the last trip the shrooms seemed to keep him up. Unfortunately it was only at this point that he realized it wasn't that the shrooms kept you from wanting to sleep, its that they keep your mind awake and active even if it does want to sleep. It has no stimulant effect at all!! Swim realized what a grievous error he had made at this point, and the room seemed to darken even though the hanging lights were still on. Swim had never been to this apartment before and had only been in it for a few hours before ingesting the shrooms. It didn't help that the design was very different from what swim was used to. The apartment seemed to take on an evil disposition, and swim felt trapped.
Tom had moved down to the couch near the futon and was sitting in silence for the most part. Him and swim traded a few words but soon both were too enveloped in the trip to be able to communicate. Swim buried his head in a pillow and prayed for sleep. He prayed to God that he have mercy and release swim from his mistake and just let him fall into wonderfully thoughtless and peaceful slumber. His prayers weren't answered.
Swim began to have a mental breakdown. He questioned his own sanity, and wondered if he would be insane forever. He looked at the very alien and artificial surroundings of the apartment with such a xenophobic fear he could have been on another planet for all he knew. Things were getting scarier by the minute. One thought began to grip swim's mind. He must get rid of the evil substance that is doing this to him.
Swim crawled up the stairs, pulling himself up with his arms as his legs were too frozen to really move. He worked his way into the bathroom. BIG MISTAKE! The bathroom was by far the freakiest place in the entire apartment. It was a pale lime-ish green that looked worn and decrepit. The worst was the floor though. The tiles were a mixture of brown and white and contained little pieces that glowed in the light, but under the influence of shrooms looked (and felt) like little parasitic creatures that wanted nothing more to consume swim bit by bit and were only prevented from doing so by the thin layer of plastic that seemingly covered the tiles. Swim saw them twist and stretch and snap as they tried to break through to feast on his flesh. He was paralyzed by fear until another wave of nausea passed over him and he remembered his mission. He heaved with all his might to expel every bit of mind altering substance from him. Little came out. He looked at the toilet in disbelief. A few tiny pieces of a psychedelic coloured substance lay in the bowl. He was in for the entire experience, whether he wanted to be or not.
Swim stumbled down the stairs to the futon again and pulled the cover over himself, pushing his head into the pillow as hard as he could. Exhaustion overwhelmed him, and the nicest thing in the whole wide world he could think of was to sleep. For the trip to stop. For his mind to just stop working and for every single neuron in his body to stop firing and just sit silent. Unfortunately for swim, it wouldn't stop, and couldn't stop. The trip had been started and couldn't be stopped, and swim knew this. He felt doomed. Doomed to a lifetime and insanity and inability to perceive or communicate with the real world. He thought about Syd Barrett and how this must be how he feels, and that swim would soon end up like Syd Barrett. Insane to everyone he meets, but trapped in an alternate reality where nothing can be perceived as it should.
Swim wrestled with his sanity for another hour and a half. It was the most mentally gruelling experience of his life. He kept going through cyclical rounds of thinking that always culminated in the same conclusion but was constantly forgotten so swim had to begin the cycle again. He would start by justifying his existence and that he was alive, and then go on to prove to himself in his head that he was sane and that it was only a shroom trip and he would be ok. By the time he got to the point where he could understand that it was only a shroom trip and he only had to wait it out and he would be ok again his mind would go blank, he would forget what he was thinking about again, and the whole process would begin again. This happened countless times, over and over and over, swim kept justifying his own sanity and exisitence in this world to himself. Probably one of the most horrible and exhausting experiences swim has been through in his life, and definitely the worst experience with drugs he has ever had.
After the peak of the trip was over swim started coming back somewhat to reality. He understood where he was and while he was extremely tired and confused, he knew he was going to be ok. Tom had come to his senses as well by this point so the two of them headed up to the balcony area again to smoke some pot to calm down. They rolled a large joint and started talking about the trip. They went over what they experience and why and tried to come up with an explanation of what happened. This started getting freaky after a while though, as it was ALL they could talk about. Swim found himself experiencing things in cycles again, just like during the peak of the hellish trip. Swim and Tom would talk about the trip and reach a conclusion and then pause for a minute or two, and then start talking about the same thing all over again. It reached the point where after talking about the same subject for the umpteenth time either swim or Tom would exclaim "why the fuck are we talking about this again?!?". However, when the conversation died down both of them realized that talking is infinitely better than not talking, as when they stopped talking their inner mind would take over and they would start thinking again and the trip would begin to creep back towards its earlier terrifying state. Swim and Tom quickly agreed that talking about the same shit over and over for another four hours was way better than starting to trip hard again so they continued to smoke pot and make idle conversation about the trip experience that they had said numerous times before. Another topic that would be repeated continually was that John was still asleep. It was quite funny actually, in that swim and Tom had tripped insanely and then talked constantly for about two hours while repeatedly smoking joints and John still didn't wake up, even though he was lying right next to them.
After one hour of digestion, two hours of pure hell, and four hours of confused rambling and anxious pot smoking, the trip was finally over. Swim and Tom passed out and didn't wake up for about another 10 hours. By the time swim got back to his apartment about a day later he still felt mentally drained by the experience. Still, however hellish and terrifying the experience may have been, the negative effects didn't last beyond the trip itself, and swim felt like normal - though a bit tired - by the next week. The experience taught him an important lesson in trip planning and states of mind to trip in. Below I will list the things swim learnt from the trip so that people may avoid such a horrible experience when they take shrooms without having done them before.
Things Learnt From Trip #2
- Don't take shrooms or any other psychedelic substance if you are feeling tired! Be sure you have gotten a good amount of rest and are mentally awake before taking any mind altering substances. I can't stress this enough. The more tired you are the less your mind is able to handle the trip and whatever effects it may have. If you are well rested and awake when you start to trip you are much more in control of the trip, even if you have a bad trip at least you have a better chance of dealing with it than if you are exhausted.
- If you are going to take a psychedelic substance, be sure to do it in a comfortable setting! It doesn't have to be someplace you go all the time, but it should at least be someplace you have been before and know the basics about. Taking a psychedelic substance in a new surrounding can be very disconcerting as you aren't used to the place as it is and when your mind is so warped it looks like a different world yet you can't even recognize some of the parts that aren't warped you are likely to panic and have a bad experience. Swim still gets bad feelings when he goes to that apartment, even though he is used to it now, whereas if he goes to another place he had a bad trip at he is fine as he was comfortable with it beforehand and it wasn't the place that caused the bad experience.
- This was stated in the first trip report section but I will say it again here as I find it so important. HAVE POT READY FOR THE COME-DOWN! It is such a lifesaver when you are coming down to reality slowly and need something to occupy and relax you. I don't even know what would have happened to swim if he didn't have lots of pot to smoke for the come-down of this trip! It could have been far worse if he didn't occupy himself and found himself panicking and falling back into the hell he had just emerged from!
- Trip buddies are great. It gives you someone to share your trip with after the peak is over and allows you to communicate after a few hours of pure internal mental dialogue that can exhaust your brain. In addition to this, swim has found that if he doesn't talk while coming down he starts thinking again, and thinking after an intense and scary shroom trip isn't good. Thinking makes the trip come back, and starts the cycle over again, which if you have read the report above you will know is bad!
- Did I say to get some sleep before you trip? Well I'm going to say it again. Don't let exhaustion ruin what could be a good trip!
- Keep in mind that not all shrooms are the same strength, even if they are from the same batch. Swim got the shrooms from the same person as the first time he tripped and they were from the same batch. Also look for large caps, lots of fungi black looking stuff under the caps, and blue stains on the shrooms. I am not sure if it means anything, but swim certainly feels they could be an indicator of a particularly strong shroom. In any event, if you come across shrooms that look different than usual it can't hurt to take less than normal and see if theres a difference. Caution generally pays off when it comes to psychedelics.
- Swim isn't exactly sure on this one, as he has had several good trips indoors, but he feels that tripping outside on shrooms is much more relaxing than tripping indoors. Indoors swim gets a feeling of paranoia and everything seems fake and artifical which brings up bad feelings in swim. He feels that it is much safer to trip outdoors rather than indoors, and think that especially if it is the first few times a person has tripped they should try to do it outdoors to be comfortable with the feeling of the trip before moving into an enclosed environment that may leave the tripper feeling trapped and cause him/her to panic.
Well that about sums up swim's first two shroom trips. The first trip was quite good, and though it had some creepy parts swim enjoyed it on the whole. The second trip was pure hell for the most part, and swim hated it with all his heart. If anything good came out of it, its that swim learnt some valuable lessons from the experience that he can share with others through Bajeda's participation in this forum.
Remember: Be safe, and good luck with your tripping!