DOSE: T+ 0:00	0.7 ml	sublingual	Cannabis - High THC	(extract)
T+ 0:20	0.5 ml	sublingual	Cannabis - High THC	(extract)
T+ 1:00	1 ml	sublingual	Cannabis - High THC	(extract)
T+ 0:00	repeated	vaporized	Cannabis	(extract)

BODY WEIGHT:

160 lb

A little background on my experience with THC might be necessary here. I've been around the stuff a lot, at one point in time being a weed dealer and living with pothead parents, and so I've had many, many opportunities to partake. It wasn't something I did remotely often with years between usage. Despite this, I have an abnormally high tolerance to the stuff. A tolerance high enough that, until fairly recently, I've never managed to smoke enough of it to feel anything in particular. Three joints deep I'll be 100% sober. When I do get high, It's nearly always using a [vaporizer] and it takes a ton of draws before I can get there. This here is my first experience with sublingual THC.

It was 4/20 and my partner and I, both of whom just recently moved to California, decided it might be fun to get high and play board games during the lockdown and used the holiday as an excuse to do just that. Besides, the novelty of being able to get the stuff delivered right to your door here hasn't worn off. We hopped on [delivery service] and placed an order for some chocolates, some [vape extract], and a [tincture]. All of it sativa. This is, as far as I know, the most potent tincture on the market with about 66.8mg per ml. When the time comes, we broke out all of the weed gear and sat down in the living room for some board games.

I started my consumption with .7ml of the tincture. My partner decided he would stick to the [vape extract] for the time being. I held the tincture under my tongue for multiple minutes. It stung a tiny bit near the back of my throat as if there was alcohol in it, but this tincture is non-alcoholic so it must've been something else. The bottle suggests that it should take 10-15 minutes to kick in.

[0:20] - It had been well over the time I expected it to kick in by, so I dropped another .5ml into my mouth and continued with the board games. I also started using the [vaped extract], probably taking 12-15 hits of it over the course of the night. So far I'm underwhelmed and assuming my strangely high tolerance is the problem.

[1:00] - I'm winning at the board game, I'm having a good time, but there's just one problem... I'm barely feeling anything at all. I continue to use the [vaped extract].

[1:15] - Still not very high. Maybe I need more? I load up a full milliliter and place it under my tongue. I continue to use the [vaped extract].

[1:35] - Okay, now I'm feeling it. It's definitely working. Turning my head gives me a slight whiplash effect where I percieve more motion to be occurring than there actually is. My throat is kind of dry, so I get up to grab some water. Walking around at this point has the familiar marijuana sensation of feeling like I'm piloting my body. Almost as if I was playing myself like a video game. I would press forward on the joystick and my legs would do the walking for me. Still, at this point, it isn't as intense as I've experienced in the past. My head is still clear.

[1:45] - Things are escalating quickly, but I hadnt realized it yet. We had just finished up the final phase of the game and it was up to me to score it. All of a sudden, simple addition is very hard. I stand up and lean over the board to move my piece further along the scoring track. I've resorted to counting step by step like a six-year-old because adding two numbers together in my head is simply too challenging for me at this moment. I keep losing track of where I was in the counting process and start over. My partner gets my attention and points out to me that I'm counting backwards when I should be counting forwards. I say something to him like "I don't think I can do this right now. Can you score it?" He stares at me and doesnt answer. All of a sudden, I'm on the couch, feeling like I just woke up from a dream. I dont remember sitting back down. I don't know how I got from a standing position to here. My partner says to me "So, time to score the game." I try to explain that I had just been doing that and asked him to do it for me, he responds confused, claiming that no such thing happened. The moment I realized that entire sequence, something that felt like it transpired over the course of 15 minutes, was entirely in my head, I knew I had made a huge mistake. I also knew this was only the beginning, a fact that terrified me. Not yet being super uncomfortable, I decided to just play it cool and try to enjoy it.

[1:55] - Only about ten minutes later, the experience started to get seriously uncomfortable. I was no longer able to hold a thought in my head for more than the barest moment. Images and ideas, most of them nonsense, were flashing through my mind at lightspeed. The worst part was the degree to which my perception of time had been slowed. Seconds felt like minutes. After spacing out and staring into space for what felt like an eternity, I would snap out of it (usually triggered by a voice) and discover that I wasn't even out of it for long enough to break the flow of conversation. My ability to walk was getting worse by the minute, so I requested that we retreat to the bedroom. The walk in there was challenging for me. I was off balance and unable to keep still, pacing back and forth for no reason, forgetting what I was doing, etc. It must've taken forever to get back to the bedroom. I got out of my clothes, got under the covers, and laid still for a while, trying with little success to make logical sense of what I was experiencing. The only solace I had at this point was the knowledge that the packaging for the tincture claimed the high would last 3-4 hours.

[2:30] - Super freaked out, I tried to stay focused on something by putting on some vintage game shows. Something mindless, a constant voice to fixate on would help. It didn't help enough to ease my discomfort, sadly. By this point, I was starting to feel an intense and tactile body high come over me. It felt like my whole torso was filled with hot coals. My mouth was a desert. Occasional jolts would run through my limbs, causing them to twitch uncontrollably, as if it was a reflexive reaction to something. My mind is still racing so fast that I can't keep up. I turn to my partner and ask how long we've been in the bedroom. I expected his answer to be something like "five hours", not "35 minutes". Learning we had practically just moved in there caused me significant distress. I thought it was going to be over soon. I sure was ready for it to be over. From this realization forward, I was constantly checking the clock in a paranoid and frantic sort of way.

[2:40] - The body sensations started getting more targeted and intense. It felt like someone was putting a cigarette out on my thigh, minus the pain. Whatever you would expect the sensation of a lit cigarette being pressed against your skin to be with the pain subtracted from it, that's what I was feeling. This sensation started increasing in frequency until it became unbearable. I jumped up out of bed and it immediately stopped. Not long after this, I started to feel like my body was on fire (again, minus the pain part - hard to describe). When I would close my eyes, images would flash through my mind too fast to keep track of them. There was one image that appeared with great enough frequency for me to notice it, though. It was a silhouette of me, laying on the bed with my arms and legs spread out like the Vitruvian Man. This silhouette was burning, but the fire cast no light. I began to connect deeply with this image, thinking it was an omen of things to come. During this, I noticed that I wasn't actually spreading out like the Vitruvian Man and decided the thing to do was to try put myself in the exact position of the silhouette. Once I had done that, a task that took a bizarre amount of effort, I had some thoughts about how the omen had been realized. Following this, I fell asleep for a little while.

[4:30] - I wake up. It's around 5:30 AM and I'm still stoned out of my mind, but feeling very different. Math is no longer hard to do in my head, my perception of time is closer to normal, the body high is gone, and I'm capable of holding onto a thought for long enough to talk. The high at this point feels sort of like I'd expect to feel after drinking a half of a bottle of gin. It's nothing like previous highs I've had with weed, mimicking the effects of alcohol nearly identically. My head hurts, my mouth is dry, my chest hurts, and I'm hungry. We order some food. My partner currently has badly injured legs and walking is painful for him because of it, so it's up to me to get the food at the door. The doorbell rings, I stand up, clumsily pull on the nearest articles of clothing, and stumble over to the door of our apartment. I bring the food back to the bedroom. All of a sudden I feel like I'm on a ship and haven't gotten my sea legs yet. I'm going to be sick. Kneeling on the floor in front of the toilet, I kept coming close to throwing up but never did. Back in the bedroom, I eat some fries and chicken tenders while we watch Forensic Files on HLN.

[6:00] - By this time I'm feeling really tired and the effects, while unchanged, have faded slightly. We go to sleep.

[16:00] - I wake up again. Ten hours of sleep is not atypical for me. I look at the clock and assume the time being displayed is AM rather than PM. When I get up to use the bathroom, I realize that I'm still feeling pretty high and wobbly on my feet. This time it's a general lightheadedness, as if I'd just had a few drinks. Back in the bedroom, my partner is awake and doing something on his laptop. I say good morning, he says "Morning? It's 5 PM." He's right, it is 5 PM, and I had stuff to get done today. So much for that, I'll do it tomorrow.

[23:00] - Almost a full 24 hours later, the high is nearly completely gone. I'm experiencing some amnesia about what happened the previous night. There are events I don't remember and others I do remember that never actually happened. The entire rest of the night, I'm unable to shake the feeling that the previous day didn't happen. It's like I traveled in time from the moment I took the tincture to now.

This is NOT an experience I would like to repeat. Lesson learned. When experimenting with new (and extremely potent) methods of delivery for any substance, exercise caution. Find out using a small to moderate dosage how long it takes for it to kick in, don't just trust the labels on the packaging or testimonies online. I would gladly do the tincture again, I plan on trying it today after a week of not using, but this time I'm going to be smart about it.

Additional effects experienced:

-Hearing a replay of something I had just said in a higher-pitched voice than I have
-Feeling like I was moving my head around while it was sitting still
-Perceiving motion where there is none
-Paranoia
-Accelerated heart rate, to a scary extent

Exp Year: 2020	ExpID: 114342
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 21
Published: May 15, 2020	Views: 1,858
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Cannabis (1) : Difficult Experiences (5), General (1), Small Group (2-9) (17)