Hi fellow members!
I'm very new to this forum and I'm happy to be a member. I hope I'm not inadvertently breaking any rules, because I read all the rules, but, yeah, I'm still new here.

What made me make up my mind about joining is that I wanted to share a friend's experience which has been a little disturbing, and contribute to the experiences databases, and perhaps get some feedback or interpretations on this.

Since about 2 years ago my friend has experimented with harmalas from Peganum harmala, while living in a country where it is almost endemic and perfectly legal. 1st time they had a memorable experience, insightful, richly symbolic, met some "entities" (they's not a believer at all) from 7.5 g of seeds boiled to a putrid chills inducing "tea".
Throughout the year they tried more "tea" once in a while, and as usual in their experience with psychedelics, experiences gradually turned deeper, more archetypal, more "cosmic"... and nonetheless more "cosmically demonic" and terrifying. Not a bad thing per se, as the understanding and knowledge gained was very valuable indeed, as my friend informs me.

During the last year they decided to to experiment with extracted crude mix. Microdoses (or rather threshold doses, about 75 to 150 mg) proved quite beautifully effective as mood booster for a week or two after a single dose. Fully active doses of 250mg, varied from barely noticeable to "fully active" for the same dose. Possibly due to whether it was an empty stomach or not.
The full experiences again had a very persistently demonic feature to them, together with the realisation that this cosmic terror including dually benign and perverse gods and goddesses, was at least to an important degree influenced by a one sidedness on my friend's part towards being fearful, and seeing the dark/bad side of life as prevalent over the good, as a result of their psychological history.

Under this premise, my friend decided to further explore the depths of their unconscious mind and -inevitably- the collective unconscious, through harmalas.

Their last experience consisted of 250mg on an empty stomach. Throughput the experience she managed to fend off "the demons", while being attacked by them... permanently. Remember They's not a believer in the usual sense but mostly uses the notion of "demon" and "god" or "entities" as a useful symbolic tool, while not really discarding a priori a possible ontological reality of these entities ("Orch OR" theory will need to clarify this some day). Sleep was obviously impossible as it could be suspected by those well versed in these matters. It must be noted my friend was slightly stressed when doing that.

Next morning they awoke with a sense of disorientation, relatively impaired fine motor control, slightly impaired gross motor skills, sensation of dissociation; also something they could only refer as something akin to Tourette's/ tic "premonitoty urge", something like generalised discomfort (which might be the cause of the impaired motor skills, as they felt very weird, like a nausea/body tickling from trying to perform motor functions. According to them, even typing on the keyboard felt "weird"\) etc. The "generalised discomfort", had on the other side a "pleasurable" sensation to it, almost verging on the "orgasmic", as if performing the action further would cause an uncontrollable tickling throughout the body (something they had experienced sparsely when meditating, and usually with mescaline and shrooms).
They also noticed deep breathing and/or focusing on other things improved these sensations. Something like "doing it on your peripheral awareness" (here they used this as a comparison with the idea of using peripheral vision). Focusing directly on the action would make the "weird/anxious/orgasmic/unpleasant" sensation stronger. They had experienced this before during (but not after) experiences with mescaline and shrooms. On the other side, rational thinking oscillates from impaired to foggy, and sometimes fully functional.


Being a slightly "hypochondriac" person they immediately feared brain damage or something. Although existing evidence would suggest this is unlikely, and even the other way around (like studies suggesting neuroprotective effects), especially at a dose which is well within "safe" ranges.

As morning habit commands, they drank their first coffee late that morning. All the above "symptoms" worsened noticeably. For the next 2 days they naturally abstained from any caffeinated beverages. "Symptoms" oscillated throughout those 2 days on a daily basis. Almost non existent in the early morning (except for the dissociation) worsening later on, and receding at night, but overall less marked compared to "coffee" day.

2 days later, they decided to again go for the morning caffeinated sacrament, only to be smacked on the face by the Methylxanthines' Gods through loss of motor coordination, the weird sensation, difficulty concentrating etc.

Until now, my friend's still "impaired", with daily oscillations of "symptoms" etc. They are really wondering what neuropsychological issues could be involved in such a reaction. Dopamine? Serotonin? Deep psychology? (as yet unheard of) Possibility of MAO depletion? Mere so called HPPD? Residual elevated levels of serotonin/dopamine due to MAO inhibition?
Were it brain damage it would probably be constant not come and go throughout the day, they suppose, when we talked about it.

I'm not sure, i mean Harmalas do have some side-effects but they're mainly physical symptoms ime, i've never had any issues psychologically though due to Harmalas. I'm a daily consumer of Harmalas/Rue, i'll take em' daily for months on end in full dosages and letting the reverse tolerance build up which makes things stronger and stronger as you go along, but also with regular consumption the side-effects at least ime will go away and the Harmalas clean up pretty well and become more of a functional medicine, it feels quite healthy to me. I've been consuming them regularly since 2012, i consume them more often than not, although i have had periods of time where i wouldn't take them or where i'd take them every other day instead of daily, but for the most part i consume them daily. Granted, when i dose the Rue/Harmalas, i typically don't go over a certain dosage, so like with Rue for example, i don't go over 4.5 grams usually, unless it's roasted seed (roasting breaks down the Harmaline) since 4.5 grams of Rue with the Harmaline is already plenty strong enough, and i'll just take that same dosage and let the Harmala content get stronger so i don't end up having to consume higher dosages of other stuff in Rue that would come with a higher dose of Rue.

The demon/entity stuff though, i have no idea, never experienced that and Harmalas aren't particularly hallucinatory or visual or what not for me, i mean i get some tracers as far as visuals go, or i can more clearly see mental imagery if i think about or try to imagine something, and my dreams to become a bit more vivid and a bit different than usual, but aside from that it's purely medicinal and far from "demonic" or what not, so i think that likely has more to do with the person's psychology and how they see/view things/what influences them.

If they are concerned about brain damage, on the one side, whatever was done is done, be it brain damage or not, their way now its fordwards, on the other side if you guys really want to figure out if its a physiological matter Id say contact a profesional who can check that out.

That being said, the worrying itself can cause a lot of "symptoms", which then increases the worrying in a negative feedback loop.

Also, I imagine having demonic experiences on a regular basis has to have a certain toll upon oneself.
Sounds like they have become somewhat separated from themselves too.
Id say give it a few months of soberty to see how things evolve.

Honestly, I dont feel too worried about this person, I feel like they might be integrating all these experiences primarily through their body instead of the mind like we usually do.
If that is the case consciously taking part on that integration should improve things, being present with this generalised discomfort and taking care of their body if possible, exercise, healthy eating, meditation...

Sounds like you are good friends with this person, Im sure they appreciate you taking care of them.
Give them a good heartfelt hug if thats appropiate, that might help more than anything else.

This seems much more like improper diet and a failure to watch intake of other substances - i.e. caffeine in the coffee.

MAOIs increase all monoamines in the brain by preventing their breakdown. By adding in additional caffeine and such into the mix it created a minor-moderate case of hypertension.

There's a reason why people say to follow an MAOI diet plan, even with reversible MAOIs. Just because it's short-acting and reversible, doesn't mean the side effects won't totally suck.

Followup - I realize that for our purpose, when we think of utilizing MAOIs it's to prevent breakdown of DMT and other psychoactive alkaloids in the gut, where a majority of Monoamine Oxidase is present. However, they still work on our endogenous monoamines in neural tissue as well.

MAO-A inhibitors don't really touch Dopamine though, that's MAO-B inhibitors, as well as COMT inhibitors, Harmalaine aside from inhibiting MAO-A also inhibits COMT, so that technically can raise Dopamine levels, and further raise Noradrenaline levels (on top of the MAO-A inhibition). So technically MAO-A inhibitors only really raise Serotonin and Noradrenaline levels, not so much Dopamine or trace amines, apparently, that seems to be more of an MAO-B thing from my understanding.

With that said, i've never dieted and don't diet, i don't avoid any foods or substances except the substances which obviously should be avoided like SSRI's, Amphetamines and some other things. Caffeine though isn't an issue with MAO-A inhibition Harmalas do inhibit CYP1A2 though, and quite potently, and Caffeine is metabolized by CYP1A2, thus Harmalas can potentiate Caffeine and thus the dosage of Caffeine needs to be cut in half at the least, probably more. I've consumed Caffeine with Harmalas (as well as Moclobemide) on many occasions, so long as i didn't overdo it on the Caffeine, hasn't been an issue.

The diet thing has been really overblown/overexaggerated and really doesn't apply to reversible and selective MAO-A inhibitors, plus the gut's MAO-A enzyme is only inhibited for about 2 hours after consuming Harmalas, it's transient, after two hours gut MAO-A goes back to normal and things like Tyramine and DMT will be broken down again, whereas MAO-A elsewhere in the body like the brain and liver maybe, stay inhibited for a few more hours.

And actually a great deal of side-effects actually come from properties of Harmalas other than the MAO-A inhibition, like in the case of Harmaline, it's GABA-A inverse agonism is a large contributor to it's side-effect profile as well as the bodyload. With Moclobemide as an MAO-A inhibitor for example, the only side-effect i get from that is dizziness, and both Moclobemide and Harmalas can sometimes cause an uptick in my irritability for a few days while my body is getting used to them, but after a few days the irritability will go away, so really the only side-effect i've ever gotten from MAO-A inhibition in itself would be dizziness, but since it does raise Serotonin and Noradrenaline levels in the brain, i'm sure some people can have side-effects from that much like any other anti-depressant/medicine.

Another question regarding side effects (maybe ShamansStamen could provide some insight):

I have been taking daily doses of peganum harmala nearly every evening for around 2 years. The dose is usually around 2-3 grams of raw seed. My preferred way to ingest this medicine is to grind the raw seed into a very fine powder (the inner core of the seed does not powder well and is filtered out with a fine flour sieve for the most part). I mix the peganum seed hull powder with the perfect amount of honey so that the honey absorbs and creates a soft clay-like substance that can be rolled into pill shape and swallowed with no taste. I love this method and get no nausea even at higher doses. Anyway, i have absolutely fallen in love with peganum harmala and feel like it has benefited me physically and mentally in so many ways. I also absolutely love the way it makes me feel during and after the experience. I look forward to taking it every evening and then meditating into a deep sleep. I am very interested in studying the regenerative effects that harmine and harmaline can have on bone, cartilage, ligaments, and organ tissues. I personally feel that harmala has potentially helped to regenerate cartilage in my knee that i hurt snowboarding as a teen. My knee funtion has improved tremendously after two years of near daily intake of the seed.

My one concern is that i started to develop venous insufficiency and varicose veins sometime before or maybe around the same time i started daily doses of p. harmala and the condition seems to be getting slowly worse up to now. I unfortunately don't remember exactly when the vein problems started as i was not really paying attention until recently when a friend pointed it out i started to became more concerned and notice it more. The location is on the back of my calves and my feet. I have read in several documents that peganum harmala is actually traditionally used to treat this condition, but somehow i fear that regular usage may actually be causing the venous insufficiency as it is the only really experimental thing i am doing and the problem seems to potentially have arisen around the same time as my daily harmala consumption (although it could have existed earlier without me really noticing). The only other health situation that i have had in the past that i think could be a contributing factor is long term malnutrition (20 year vegan and high fruit diet) that resulted in b12 deficiency and severe reactive hypoglycemia (excessive release of insulin when consuming carbohydrates that results in low blood sugar). This malnutrition and dietary deficiency was corrected about 2 years ago and i no longer have reactive hypoglycemia episodes if i am very careful to eat a diet of mostly protein and fat with limited carbs and plenty of high quality animal foods. Anyway, i mention this because diabetes and blood sugar disorders along with b12 deficiency are known to be contributors to venous insufficiency. I also have read that high blood pressure could be a contributing factor. I do not suffer from that condition and harmala is known to lower blood pressure and act as a vasodilator and vasorelaxant so one would think it would be a beneficial treatment for venous insufficiency. Nonetheless, i still feel concerned that this problem may have been a side effect of daily harmala use and am curious to here if anyone has had a similar experience, heard of this side effect, or have any insights to share with me. Much appreciation for any advice. Peace.

Well if it calms your mind at all, i haven't had anything like that happen with me, so i wouldn't think it has to do with regular consumption of Rue.

no more coffee

Glad to hear that you have not experienced any similar side effect ShamensStamen. Definitely reassuring.

I never ingest coffee or any stimulants.

I have been drinking peganum teas for several months (1 to 5 times per week) and I don't feel any negative side effect for the moment. Positive effects, in my case, are real though : smoother digestion/transit, clearer/more analytical thoughts and effective alcohol distancing. Last but not least, more beneficial and easier to integrate DMT intakes.

It may be that harmalas after a certain dosage may cause toxicity in nerve centers in the cerebellum, which might explain a part of the symptoms of your buddy.
if someone wants to read in more detail in.... mice studies...
https://www.sciencedirec...bs/pii/S0378874120330658
https://shefayekhatam.ir...amp;sid=1&slc_lang=e

At the end of the we don't know what chronic exposure to high-dose and frequent harmale use does in humans. We can cite some ayahuasca studies, but we don't know what happens if someone REALLY wants to overdo it with harmalas. People with a busy life can't afford to take too much because they have to be ready for the next day, and among the youngsters with more leisure time harmalas are obscure, so it is very rare that someone really wants to overdo it. It could be that infrequent, once every 2 weeks of high-dose harmalas are not damaging long-term. Harmaline interacts more with the blood-brain barrier when compared to harmine. And obviously there are also the other psychedelics he used. I would not be surprised if your buddy ends up with full blown psychosis if he wants to tempt fate more. Some users here can report that they have used harmalas in high doses for long periods with no isssues

I've been consuming Rue/Harmalas since 2012, from 2012 to 2015 i took it, alongside Mimosa/Acacia, daily/near daily that whole 4 years straight. And since then i've consumed Rue/Harmalas once a night every night for long periods of time, usually about up to 9 months or a year and then i back off for a little bit but get back around to it again at some point.

When i dose Rue/Harmalas, i take the usual dosages (3 to 4.5 grams of Rue, or 180 to 200mgs of freebased full spectrum Rue extract or freebased Manske'd Harmala extract), and because of the Harmala reverse tolerance, especially with Harmaline, the more regularly it's consumed the stronger it gets and the heavier the dosage becomes, but also in time the side-effects will go away so no more nausea/vomiting/possible diarrhea, no more bodyload or weird headspace, the motor function impairment goes away, the Rue/Harmalas cleans up very nicely and feels clear and medicinal.

So i let the reverse tolerance build up and enter pretty heavy territory and i've never noticed any issues, physical or psychological, from regular, daily, long term, heavy OD territory dosages of Harmalas (Harmaline/Harmine), in fact i feel healthier, calmer, kinder, more level-headed, in tune, and grounded when i take them regularly, it is an effective anti-depressant for sure.

I can't say for certain that long term high/heavy dosage consumption of Harmalas for years and years and years won't cause some sort of issue, but so far at least for me personally it seems rather improbable that there's going to be any issue. Now, maybe if you're significantly OD'ing on Harmaline where toxicity might show up (which iirc there was a study where 6 grams of Harmaline showed some sort of neurotoxicity), but no one in their right mind is going to take 6 grams of Harmaline, or the equivalent in Rue most certainly, and i don't think the reverse tolerance is going to take anybody there either because ime there seems to be a ceiling/limit to the reverse tolerance where it tops out and that's like around the time that it feels cleaner/clearer and the side-effects have gone away, after that it just feels pretty much like the same max dosage, and doesn't seem to get any stronger that i've noticed.

So while i can't say for certain, i'm like at least 95% sure that nothing negative will come from long term consumption of high/heavy doses of Harmalas. I recently, like maybe a month ago? stopped taking the Rue again for a bit, and just re-adjusting and getting back to my "normal" neurochemistry, no issues, and best of all, no real withdrawal symptoms that i've ever noticed personally, only thing i've ever noticed was a bit of an uptick in my frustration/irritability like maybe a couple weeks or so into starting to take Rue regularly, and like after i quit taking it there can be a few weeks of it subsiding in my system and my neurochemistry getting back to normal and once it reaches that certain level of i'm sure Noradrenaline (because some other Noradrenergic agents do that to me too), which seems to correlate with about the same timeframe as when i first start taking it so it goes up and comes down but when it reaches a certain level going up or coming down i get more irritable, but that only lasts like a few days maybe and then it goes away. So that's really the only "negative" side-effect i've noticed, and wouldn't even really call it negative, just an undesirable side-effect much like some other side-effects (nausea, vomiting, etc).

I really appreciate you in depth reply ShamansStamen and very much value your experimental studies with harmala.

My daily evening doses have never been over 3 grams of the whole seed and perhaps often a bit less when i get sensitized and definitely less if i have not eaten much food as that tends to make me way more sensitive to the effects. The dose i take definitely provides full MAOI but in no way feels like an overdose or toxic. In fact, it makes me feel a sense of enhanced health and well being when feeling the effects and also that day after. The enhanced lucidity and mental cognition is very attractive. I have also never experienced any withdrawal symptoms when stopping for several days. I have been exploring harmala in combination with chacruna for around 20 years(somaruna). I also have fallen in love with combination of harmala with various acacia phyllodes (somacacia). I have a massive abundance of mature caapi vine in the garden that i don't even personally utilize as i much prefer the medicinal effects and spirit peganum harmala. I actually find it very difficult to drink caapi these days as i find it nauseating, heavier, and more dreamy. With the harmala honey, i experience absolutely no nausea or discomfort and that allows me to go much deeper and the effects in combination with the spirit molecule feel lighter, brighter, and more spacious. I also feel more of a connection with eastern mysticism through the harmala. I am more into a Buddhist meditation approach to working with the plants.

ShamansStamen, what is the longest period of time you have gone taking the whole harmala seed daily and not a full spectrum extract? I would like to rule out that the vein problem is not being caused by any of the additional alkaloids in peganum harmalas whole seed. Also, do you know of anyone else that has taken whole seed harmala daily for long periods of time without negative side effects?

I really doubt that this vein problem i am experiencing is from harmala use as it would seem strange to me that a seed that feels absolutely healthy and imparts such infinite intelligence and masterful healing when combined with spirit molecule admixtures would then be causing serious vein problems. Regardless, i don't want to take any chances so i am dialing back my consumption to only the once week journeys when i partake in the full somaruna or somacacia combination. Makes me quite sad though as i am truly in love with peganum harmala and absolutely enjoy the nightly heart opening and deeply relaxation meditations.

I read in another thread that you (ShamensStamen) feel that much of the medicinal magic of harmala is from harmaline. I also sense this to be true in my experience. A lot of people talk down on harmaline and like to purify it out by i really love the effects of harmaline and it also allows full MAOI to occur at a much lower doses. Interestingly, it has now been proven that long boils of caapi convert harmine to hamaline and that could explain why many traditional ayahuasqueros prefer long boil brews as it changes the alkaloid profile. I have personally noticed a sweet spot of brewing length that provides optimal potency and effects and that brewing for too long has a negative result on potency. I think that is because extremely long cooking times results in the harmine and harmaline being converted too much into THH. It seems that THH is not an effective MAOI. I also have never noticed anything too special about THH but i have never taken it in an isolated form. I have only drank brews that where cooked so long that it appeared that large amounts of the harmine and harmaline had degraded into THH as full MOAI was hard to achieve with these super long boil brews even at really high dosages (like 600 grams of vine).

Good news. I looked through old photos searching for ones that predated my nightly harmala adventures and included my lower legs and feet. Found several that clearly indicate that the condition already occurred before the frequent harmala use. My current state may be slightly worse but it was definitely in full effect prior to the regular use of the seeds. What a relief.

I'd say the longest i've taken the actual Rue seed is when i dosed it daily/near daily for 4 years together with Mimosa/Acacia, i've almost always consumed Rue in the form of Rue seed powder capsules, with some extract capsules here and there, but i seem to usually prefer the seed itself, even the full spectrum extract can feel a bit "too clean" at times whereas i kinda prefer the planty feel of the seed itself, so i've almost always used the actual seed. The last few years though i usually end up taking the Rue daily for about 9 months to a year, then i take a break for a bit, sometimes i change it up with the extract and use that for a bit, but i usually always end up going back to the seed.

I've come across quite a few people on here and other forums who have taken Rue, or Caapi, or Harmala extracts on a regular long term basis and i haven't seen anyone mention any issues because of it that i can remember. I'm pretty sure

Nice. Very good to hear the details of your personal experiences with rue. Also, nice to know that there are others with long term frequent forays without negative effects.

In my experience, the whole seed feels absolutely perfect and i cannot imagine wanting to extract or isolate any of it. Rue feels made for human comsumption as we can literally just chew or swallow it raw in small amounts. Cappi does not feel as natural to me as it requires extensive processing and refining to render comfortable to consume. But i still experience caapi as an absolutely great medicine and teacher/unteacher. I feel way more comfortable with rue though on many levels.

your problem with the veins is more likely due to the animal protein you're consuming, you could google it

Actually the vein problem started while being a vegan for 20 years along with many other health problems that arose from this experimental and unnatural way of eating.

After starting to include high quality dairy products my health improved tremendously. In the last year, i added grass fed beef and my health has improved further. Everyone that knows me long term, notes the massive improvement in health that came with me adding animal foods to my diet. Unfortunately, the venous insufficiency was one thing that was not resolved by the dietary changes. Supposedly previously damaged venous valves cannot regenerate.

My best guess at this point is that the vein valve damage is a result of the high carb vegan diet that was deficient in vitamin b12 , vitamin D, and vitamin K2 MK4. Along with the chronic blood sugar problems from the high carb vegan diet. It took quite the toll after 20 years. Vein problems are common in people with blood sugar disorders like diabetes.

All of my relatives and ancestors have eaten diets heavy in animal foods (meat and dairy) and there have been zero cases of venous insufficiency besides me. I am the only one that deviated from the ancestral diet and experimented with vegetarian and vegan diets.

your ancestors were stuck in the predicament of living that way, it was not their natural choice in a situation where anything is available, consider there were no fridges and freezers even a few decades ago, and animal husbandry was not universal through human prehistory, so gathering seeds and grains and herbs and leafy vegetables and tubers and berries and nuts likely (and due to evidence from stomach contents of people) comprised the majority of what people ate, and people likely resorted to consuming animal remains and bone marrow, eggs and fish when their environment wasn't very rich in other foods, and hunted meat as a last resort, because of the sheer difficulty of obtaining animal foods and the energy required for it

of course a fruitarian diet would not be sustainable, but subsisting on sprouted grains, seeds and legumes (and other seed families like the mustard family aka broccoli sprouts, ...) soaked nuts and fruits, herbs and vegetables and a sublingual b12 pill and sunshine is perfectly possible, and vitamin k2 can be produced in the gut if you introduce the related microbe responsible for its synthesis and provide it with the material it needs to do so, as a matter of fact, evidentially speaking the most nutrient dense diet would be a fully sprout/microgreen based diet rather than an animal based diet

anyway tho i was in your shoes before, which is why im saying what im saying, it can be traumatic to go through an experience which intimately affects your on that sort of level and can change how you prefer to see the world you live in, look at the rue , they are seeds, we are not monkeys who eat fruits and bugs, we are humans with extensive and complex needs, and we are not our ancestors