DOSE: T+ 0:00	2 caps	oral	Mushrooms	(dried)
T+ 2:35	3 caps	oral	Mushrooms	(dried)

BODY WEIGHT:

50 kg

I've always been really prudish about 'drugs.' I liked my body and mind the way they are, wouldn't take medication for headaches, nothing during childbirth etc, and was always freaked out by the idea peddled in the media that take anything and you're on the path to becoming a slavering addict. All that changed recently when I met my boyfriend, I felt instantly that I'd go anywhere and do anything with him. Well in a short space of time I was introduced to ecstacy, marijuana, and acid, and with all of them, I had issues come up soon after taking them, and usually right through the trip.

There was such a lot going on in my head, I was in the process of splitting up with mu husband, I'd fallen in love with this man who lived 1000 miles away, I have 4 kids and 3 exes and I wanted to move to be with my new boyfriend, and was getting a lot of opposition to that idea from all sides. I wasn't very calm or secure in my inner world. Taking eccy in particular, with nitrous oxide as well, was a total REVELATION to me, it felt so GOOD!~! Wow, drugs are good! This is why people like them! I was so amazed, it opened my horizons right out.

So, I wanted to try mushrooms, some of my friends said they would suit me really well and it'd be good for me. So, I read up and got an idea of what to expect, but it's so true you can never know until you go there yourself. My ex is a longtime devotee of mushrooms, he had a large quantity of dried ones, he always picks way more than he could ever use but there are so many in our local park in Autumn. He was taking the kids overnight and gave me a bag of mushrooms, suggested I try 2 to start with for my first time, and picked out 2 nice big ones, the biggest in the bag. If they lose a lot of size when they dry they must have been huge when fresh.

I followed some of the recommendations for a good trip, cleaned up the house a bit first and also did some practical things, like feeding my cat and dog and taking out the rubbish, things I didn't want to forget if things got really interesting.
I started at 5.30pm, and just chewed the mushrooms up with honey. I chewed them really well, about 5 minutes for each one. There was a tiny inclination to gag but I didn't think about it and they went down fine. I had no problem with the taste or texture at all, I just ate them, They were really well dried and might have even been 2 or 3 years old, I don't know if they were from last year or older.

My kids had messed up the kitchen before going out so I got on with the washing up, I was going to be alone for the trip and I wanted to have nice surroundings so that was what I did while I waited to see what would happen. At 15 minutes after taking them I suddenly had a painful pang or spasm in my stomach, and then at 6pm I heard knocking on my door. Two policemen were there, wanting to check there were no children alone in the house, someone had rung and told them there were. I was glad they had come so soon into the trip, I could talk lucidly and said yes, I'd gone to the shop on the corner and left a child in the house briefly; they could see that everything was fine and I thanked them for checking up.

They went away. I was calm and not worried, I had some friendly busy music on, I wrote in my diary a bit and could feel a buzzing charge through my whole body, especially up the back of my neck, it felt warm. It reminded me of a good acupuncture treatment but more so. But that was all. I did a few more chores around my house and danced when a song I like came on the radio. Then I felt tired and heavy and lay down a few minutes. Every time I lay down I felt the same warm rushy buzz, I thought maybe I was too busy to notice this before, I'll try being a bit slower.

Oh I also saw in the mirror that I looked cuter than usual, I felt friendly and relaxed and said hi to myself, noted that my eyes were quite dilated. The music was becoming annoying so I turned it off. I was a bit disappointed that not much was happening, by now it was 7.10 pm, more than one and a half hours into the trip. I thought I'll go for a walk with the dog and if it's not stronger by then I'll take more. What the heck I'll take more now.

I thought about the dose for a bit, all the other mushrooms in the bag were much smaller, I reckoned half the size of the ones I'd eaten. My ex thought they might be too old to be any good, but I had read that they stay potent. My boyfriend used to live in this state and he thought a standard dose would have been 30, but then he is pretty full on and likes to trip hard, whereas I am slight in build and until recently, I didn't even take any caffeine (haha, he got me back onto chocolate, and everything else he could find. cept nicotine, I have never used it and wouldn't ever go near it) so thinking about the dose, I thought if 2 big ones doesn't do much, I would want at least the same amount, that's 4 small ones, add one on for luck. I put 5 small ones in my cup and got out my honey bucket. I ate 3 quickly and immediately felt a warm rush go over my head, probably the first ones still but I decided to keep the other 2 in the cup, I could always eat them later.

I felt different walking, a bit woozy and pleasant. I also noticed I was still a bit hungry and had a slight headache, my baseline had been that anyway. So off I went for my walk. At first it was not too different from normal, although I seemed to be seeing the landscape differently, like more of a wide angle view seeing the slope of the land and just how the trees grow up out of it. But then I began noticing birds. Whatever it was about them I can't say. I could see just how their wings beat in the air as they fly, and there seemed to be more of them. OK it was around teatime, there weren't any other people in the park at this hour, but I really saw more birds than usual.

I had walked 1 km along the creek, going at a fairly steady pace, come to the road and turned back along the other side. I was enjoying the walk and felt very peaceful, before this I had been thinking about how I would describe it, what I would write in my diary, wondering what was going to happen next etc, now my mind was letting go. Gradually but suddenly too it came on more strongly, I could see beauty all around.

It was a very gentle experience, it came on so softly and kindly, it was just the nicest experience. I stopped analysing, just briefly thought, aaaah, it's all about NOW. So I sat on the ground and enjoyed the perfect, utter, beautiful perfectness of beauty of nature all around me. It was late in the day and the evening light was shining from under some clouds, this is a special kind of light I have always loved, I call it under-the-cloud-light which looks silly in writing, but it gives things a golden glow and I only ever see it near a storm or when the sun is low in the sky and there are clouds.

The park was subtly lit with this light, the grass was green, there were yellow poplar leaves scattered on the grass and the wind played with them a little, and of course there were birds. Flying birds on a dead tree taking it in turns to swoop off and go wherever, and grey galahs with bright pink necks and heads and white caps. The sky was grey too and these galahs were just so bright. All the time in the park the birds were not afraid of me, even though I came walking there with a large dog, I did not feel like they were reacting to me as a human at all. These galahs were feeding from grass seeds on the ground, they came really close. I stroked my dog gently and she stayed really still too.

The whole time I was washed in the feeling of beauty and peace, there was also an intensity about it which felt very comfortable and enjoyable, it was exciting and fun. Eventually I noticed that my back seemed to be feeling a little cold, I couldn't really feel it but I knew I was starting to get a bit too cool. We went on our way and then I saw eastern rosellas and lorikeets also feeding on the grass. Again they weren't scared of me as I walked softly by.

It was interesting to see how each plant seemed to be saying something different, and the ones with the clearest -I can't say voices, as I didn't hear sound or words- but the ones that communicated the clearest were the wild ones in the park; my neighbours' trimmed and shaped shrubs didn't have much of that quality. My garden is a bit bushy and wild so some of that communicating beauty was there, but again less than the ones in the park. This feeling of joy and beauty was by far the strongest along the stretch were the mushrooms grow, I was so happy to be walking where they come from, it was like the ones I'd eaten were singing to their soil, even though I couldn't hear it I could feel it. A truly remarkable and special experience.

So I was home again, what would I do now? I wanted to share it with someone, so I rang a friend. I had invited her over to join in or be a sitter but she thought mushrooms were too out there for her, so I wanted to give her a trip report and say how gentle and beautifully peaceful mushrooms are but she wasn't home, so I rang my boyfriend instead. He had just snorted some eccy so he was feeling pretty mellow too, I wandered round inside my house with my cordless phone, blown away by how beautiful everything was. If he was with me I'd have been gazing at him for sure, but this patch of threadbare carpet was just lovely to look at. It's yellow carpet but there was a beautiful blue haze through the air and flower patterns both on the carpet and a bit in the hazy air above it too.

Physically I could feel that my body felt a little strung up, a bit almost-nauseous and edgy in my belly, but emotionally just so relaxed and gentle and happy. I could feel the second lot of mushrooms come on, this would have been about 8.30 pm. I wanted to move, swaying and dancing, circling as I hugged myself, still talking to my darling Johnny, who was with me all the way, with insights and laughter and companionship, we talked maybe for nearly 2 hours. As the evening got dark around me, kookaburras laughed down in the park somewhere. The candles I'd lit earlier overflowed and dripped wax into my tea, which was very funny to me. I laughed till I cried.

The rush gradually leveled off and we found it was time to stop talking on the phone, we each said our kind goodbyes and there I was alone again. I still felt like sharing so I rang my friend who'd been out before, just told her the trip on mushrooms was lovely, gentle and beautiful and perfect for looking at nature, her reaction was slightly mixed, she seemed to think my trip must be over for me to be talking about it, when I said it was still happening she became slightly uncomfortable, although she'd seemed pleased that it was mild. Anyway she didn't want to talk so I didn't want to bother her, I could easily read her emotional nuances.

I rang another girlfriend, again she lives far away so my phone bill may be high for the night but it was a cheap trip anyway, the mushrooms didn't cost anything. Talking to my friend was very good, it was helpful for both of us, seeing things about past boyfriends, the insights were great. It really was useful. Unfortunately her phone cut out, by then I was sitting cosy in bed, starting to come down a bit.

I'd kept getting thirsty, going to make a cup of tea, forgetting what I was doing, that I'd need a cup, and tea bag, and to turn the kettle on, then being surprised because the sound of the water boiling was so loud. That happened a few times, but I did get 2 cups of tea. Another thing that happened when I was first talking to my girlfriend who lives far away, I saw the stones around my fireplace rearrange themselves into an unleasant looking face, it was a scary face but I wasn't scared, I just thought, oh, it's one of those scary faces people sometimes see. I have been reading absurd numbers of trip reports, it's been a valuable thing to do in preparing myself, knowing it's not uncommon to see things like this was reassuring but I was already in a calm and good frame of mind.

A few other faces appeared and while they didn't alarm me, I found them distracting and slightly unpleasant so I simply turned off the light in that room. Actually through most of the evening the only light I've had was the 5 candles in my bedroom, and now the computer, but it never seemed dark. So by now I'd spoken to all the friends I wanted to be with, I never felt the need for music and the one cd that tempted has gone missing. I already looked for it the last 2 days, so I wasn't wasting this evening looking for it, I lay on my bed and felt the energy moving through my body, then still felt like sharing the experience so I got up and wrote this trip report.

It's now almost midnight, I'm pretty much most of the way down I think, coming down has been about a 2 hour long phase but it's been gentle like the rest of the trip. It wasn't very psychedelic , except maybe for the patterns of flowers in my carpect (my carpet is plain mustard yellow in ordinary life).

What was exceptional was the beauty in everything, especially nature, and the park where the mushrooms grew, and the ease my mind let go of thought, worries, analysis- it was very special and wonderful to simply be, be present and be what I am, part of everything around me, part of nature. For a first time experience, this was damn near perfect.

I came into the exprerience with no clear expectation, only to see what mushrooms are like; when the experience looked like being less than I'd hoped I just upped the dose a bit but not over the top, and if it had gone the other way and been very strong for me I was prepared to go with that too. I have just enough experience with different substances now to know that what happens is temporary, I'll still be me when it wears off; so I have a lot of trust now and I'm not apprehensive about what I discover. Also I had told my boyfriend I was taking the trip tonight, even though he's so far away I knew I could call him any time, and my ex is experienced with mushrooms and lives nearby, I actually called him to report in a couple of times too.

I should add that I'm 36 years old and have done a heck of a lot of work on myself; I'm a student of martial arts, have done a few years of somatic yoga therapy both privately and in a closed encounter group, and have about 12 years experience giving and receiving shiatsu massage. So I feel I know my body pretty well and am in tune with myself; there's a lot of emotional stuff going on but I just face it and go with it, overall I'm an optimist who loves learning.

I've seen that sometimes people get a bit mushroomed out and don't like to take them very much any more; I LOVED this expereience, it was just so gentle. I know I keep saying it but it was like the mushrooms carried me along in the bosom of nature, it felt very nurturing and a real gift and blessing. Very different to acid and eccy- they were both good but a bit intense and edgy for me. It could be simply a matter of dose, setting and all that, but this had a subtlety about it, like the difference between eating an apple with all the tiny shades of flavour, the bit near the skin, the bit near the core, the bit that grew in the sun etc all taste different; I get this from marijuana and this time with the mushrooms, maybe because it's from something that grew, alive? A presence as well as a chemical?

I'll leave it for a bit and do another mushroom trip in maybe a month or 6 weeks, definitely not sooner than 3 weeks. I like to give things time to settle in and give the ripples a chance to die down. Insight and knowing come with waiting as well as doing. Next time I'll either do another low dose trip like this one, or go for a stronger experience, but I'll decide at the time when I know what the mood and setting are. I would like to try fresh ones. I intend a nutmeg trip sometime too but would want a longer time around it than just one night.

Exp Year: 2004	ExpID: 30341
Gender: Female
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Feb 27, 2007	Views: 23,327
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Mushrooms (39) : Alone (16), Glowing Experiences (4), Personal Preparation (45), Relationships (44), Nature / Outdoors (23), First Times (2)