DOSE:	300 mg	oral	Mushrooms	(edible / food)
			Chocolate	(edible / food)

BODY WEIGHT:

210 lb

I first used magic mushrooms (p. semilanceata as it happened to be) in 2002, at the beginning of a long and strange journey that 'ended' some years later. Really what happened was I went on various pharmaceuticals starting in 2005, hoping to be able to 'fit in' more, and to numb the pain of recent losses, all it did was give me a lasting case of tardive akathisia. No pharms since late 2015.

I have suffered from cluster headaches even longer, and was one of those that made the chance discovery that psychedelics improves matters, back in 2004 I think. But the pharms (particularly risperidone and venlafaxine) pretty much nullified any beneficial effect from them, so I was a rather boring miserable individual for a decade. In addition to the cluster headaches I also have lupus (treated daily with cannabis). And have rather severe anxiety and depression that can lessen but never goes away completely, the akathisia doesn't help there.

Fast-forward to today, recently lost my father, personal life was in shambles even before then, my combination of mental and physical health is very very isolating. And a week ago the next cluster begins, hoo boy, two months of hell.

Last April I happened to have the foresight to purchase some magic chocolates, I was no longer on interfering pharms, and it had been ages since my last cluster, 18 months, about six months longer than usual... was told they contained a gram each of some psilocybe, can't remember the specific one. Anyway I've been working on the assumption of 1 gram of p. cubensis per chocolate.

For some reason I left them alone completely until the cluster started. Kind of scared of them actually, not sure why, they had always been gentle to me in the past, even the time I took 3 grams (well, maybe not gentle that time, but wasn't a bad trip). But my reactions to other substances I had revisited after that decade (such as MDMA), wasn't encouraging. Seems my brain has shifted slightly with either age or that akathisia. Pretty much everything induced anxiety in the first 30-60 minutes, until settling down into more familiar territory for a little while before wearing off. Not really worth it. Would mushrooms be the same?

The first cluster headache decided things, a psychedelic freak-out is preferable to an hour or so of what feels like a blow torch aimed at my skull. Still cautious though, so only took 0.1g (equivalent, actual mass of the chocolate fragment was 1.5g as each 1 gram chocolate weighed a total of 15g - weighed out with a scale).

Blessed relief within 15 minutes! And then noticed, for the first time in years, the grey drabness everything has when depressed, it was gone. I could see true colours again. That's as far as it got though. Kind of happy. And happy the next day.

Then came the next headache... 0.1g didn't do it this time... a second dose, for a total of 0.2g did. Next day, next headache, a baaaad one this time, got bolder and took 0.3g. Blessed relief again, noticed some giddiness this time. ;-) Curiously for the 60-odd minutes when I normally would have been screaming, I could feel the headache-location kind of quivering, like some creature was trying to wiggle its way out. That eye remained puffy and half-closed. But no pain.

I am now several days into this pattern, mostly headache-free during the day, then treating the evening monster with 0.3g. It disappears within 20 minutes, I again can't stress enough how incredible that is. And I'm then allowed to sleep through the night, untreated there's usually two 60-minute-long nightmares per night.

And my daily life has improved, it seems? I'm more optimistic, can't imagine why, my life is still in shambles. Although maybe I can actually do some small things about that now.

I have to admit, I was hoping to end the cluster entirely. Perhaps that requires even bolder doses, or my body is just one of those outliers. I might try a full gram at some point, but at 0.3g I can see the mystic lands in the distance, and not entirely sure I want to visit them again... in the past that usually happened around people I trusted, today I'm basically in this alone. But, still, being able to end individual headaches, it's more than I had before! :-)

Exp Year: 2017	ExpID: 110777
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 39
Published: Sep 1, 2018	Views: 2,409
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Mushrooms (39) : Alone (16), Therapeutic Intent or Outcome (49), Medical Use (47), Retrospective / Summary (11), General (1)