First 40g Caapi Experience:
I spent five days prior doing extra heavy THH mediation (new report here), a healthy diet with no alcohol, and lots of hot baths (to remove toxins). I felt a little intimidated for my first day of school. The morning of, I set up my space with plants, water, a bucket and blankets. I hide all the phones, showered, did some yoga and drank* 40g of vine seeking a celestial curriculum to follow.

I thought often of breaking my brew down into two 20g doses, but my intuition kept telling me to "just have a full go at it." I did so and relaxed with a washcloth over my eyes and waited:

+5 mins- slight buzzing

+10mins- I can hear EVERYTHING, distant trucks, the ticking of the clock in the other
room. Strong Buzzing. “Mental vibrations.” slight nausea. Feel yucky.

+15mins- Intense buzzing, no visuals. Feel very yucky.

+15-30mins- VERY intense, horrible buzzing, slight waves of nausea. My head feels as if it’s in a paint mixer on a ship tossed at sea. No visuals. I also feel like I’m trapped under a lid and get many “throat marbles.”

+31mins- Vomit. Very intense, horrible head-battering buzzing. It hurts to look with open eyes, the carpet is crawling and shaking.

+ THREE HOURS OF DRY-HEAVING and wishing I were dead. No hang over in my life has felt worse. I dry heave every time I move. Much of this time was spent in a warm bath, or a nearly passed out “nap.”

+ 4 hours- I felt slightly violated and vow NEVER to touch Caapi again

+ One DAY- I apologies to the Caapi Vine for my frustration and ignorance. I AM a foolish monkey...

+ Two DAYs- I DO feel more open and am noting emotions I hadn’t felt before: More direct anger in fact. Which is very strange because I hate witnessing or feeling anger; but I suppose this means I significantly repress it?


I may or may not do another condensed Caapi only brew. I WILL try simple Caapi tea, steadily and daily perhaps if we don't abuse each other too much.


My lessons from a 40g B. Caapi “bummer”:
+ The mind learns faster than the body; but the body must also learn, and at its own pace

+ With all these awesome reports on The Nexus, over-expectation is inevitable, and needs to be managed

+ Listening to what The Nexus says is good, BUT REMBERING IS BETTER. I was confused and upset and didn’t know why DESPITE the fact I now see 69ron AND Acolon had mentioned these problems directly to one of my posts! Ha.

+ It hurts to look with open eyes?

+ The path is indeed long

+ Caapi alone can be VERY physically intense/horrible

Thank you Nexus for your love, support and monkey wisdom.


a.


*Preparation Method:
1) Sanitized all equipment, storage vessels with boiling water and vinegar
2) Spent two hours VERY finely shredding a 40g chunk of whole B. Cappi
3) Two 40min “near boils” with 1 gal of bottled water each boil, and eight drops of phosphoric acid (to ph 4)
4) Several hours “near boil” boil off, filter through tea bag, refrigerate until morning
5) Re-heat (not boil) before consumption. Smile.

Just some thoughts about your preparation method:

Was the bottled water distilled or RO? Those are best.

A tried and true method for cooking vine, for the sake of comparing notes:

-whole vine, shredded by hand, with intentions (the outer bark of the vine contains more THH)
-cooking area smudged
-fully submerge vine materials in stainless steel pot (I cook at pH 3 or lower, I hear 4 is fine)
-boil for 3 hours, stirring with consciousness + intentions, topping up with water if necessary
-filter all material through a T-shirt into a second pot
-cover the material with fresh water, cook for another 3 hours as before
-filter a second time, keeping your filtered washes in the same pot
-finally, cook and filter for 3 hours one more time
-take filtered washes and reduce to volume desired.
-find a nice and safe place in nature to return Lady Caapi to the earth

In my experience, cooking longer does not increase potency; cooking for less than 9 hours decreases potency. The 3x3 really seems to work magic. It also allows space for a break if life ever gets demanding.

Finally, some people also like to freeze botanicals before cooking, to break down the cell walls. I have not tried this, personally.

The experience sounds like a SUCCESS! Work with Caapi is something that builds over time, something that takes lots of dedication, but rewards you for that dedication fully. =)

Also, certain varieties of vine may produce different reactions in different people. I never purge with white vine, and it is quite psychdelic. Yellow brings moderate purging. A few times I was lucky to try some fresh Cielo... well, if you can get it down and keep it down, Cielo is FIERCE magic. :O

Also, very great ideas, surrounding yourself with plants and a bucket. Flowers, if you can get your hands on any (potted in soil - not cut!) are particularly beautiful.

Happy travels, happy brewing!

Thank you Ms. M. Minnx for the very nice reply!

It was indeed bottled water, which type I know not.

I have heard much of your 3-boil method. i had considered it myself but THP method hinted that it might not be totally necessary. I do agree it would be more potent! Though I found two 30min boils rather violently potent for my physiology.



truly the best,


a.

ahh the feeling of nauseated dry heaing that never seems to end when what you were expecting was some sort of visual experience ..always fun..

Seriousily caapi is real good to me even though she can make me feel like crap..I never puke..but I always dry heave alot..

I drank ayahuasca 2 nights ago while comming out of a heavy vilca experience and it was pleasant at the beginning but got sort of unpleasant after a bit..and it was a small dose..like 10 grams cielo and 1 gram chaliponga..I think the vilca seeds potentiated it a bit..I even had some really weird and in-deciferable vision like flashes.

When I woke up yesterday my sinus cavities were clogged as if the caapi brough all this mucus and toxins to the surface and I was sooo damn hungry..but it felt good as well. I love aya..and I am getting addicted to icaros..seriouslly I listened online once after drinking and I cant stop now.

For me personally 40 grams is a HUGE dose..I dont know why caapi effects me that way but 40 grams will give me full on visions that are very absorbing with lots of physical effects..I do extensive cold water extractions as well as boils though..and always water that I collect from a spring with no acid at all.

10-20 grams is my usual dose.

Thank you Fractal, i'm glad there are other members in my club.
I'm glad to hear you had the potential to keep going. This motivates me.

Your 10-20g dose is very much noted.
My intuition played a rather fine joke on me, 40g is INDEED HUGE.

Wow, either you are quite sensitive to Caapi or you've got some damn fine vine there my friend.

40g is a solid dose for me...without the hellish night.

100g = the night you had

Yeah, without the light a lot can be learened, but a little spice sure does go a long way to make the experience less horrible.

I think everyone MAO profile might varry quite a bit..
I know that for me I seem to need a lower dose of caapi than alot of other people..but I dont eat any dairy products at all, or cultured foods...things like cheese, milk, butter etc all have lots of amines like tyramine etc..so it would make sense that the more amine rich foods one eats the higher the mao levels would be.

Thank you both again for the support! The context you two provide makes me feel much better.

I'm from the Midwest so I eat plenty of yogurt, milk and cheese... Though i don't know if this is enough to have a high MAO? hm. How Mao's work are still a mystery to me.

I've heard (perhaps it was from 69ron?) that phosphoric acid specifically is an excellent "binder" to THH and the other caapi compounds. Did that make my brew more potent?

I've moved on to simple 2g caapi tea with with 15-20 min boils, in .5 liter of lemon juice water. Very smooth, nice and wholesome. After the holiday's, I will try my next batch of tea with phosphoric acid to see if the potency raises...

::investigative mood::

god i love this forum.

thx!

a.

Acolyte,

I spent quite a while assembling materials for a ayahuasca brew, then a couple of days slowly, mindfully preparing it. I prayed to the vine in my kitchen before I started and actually cried a little (I rarely cry). But my experience was quite a bit like yours although I used B caapi and MHRB. Yes, expectations.

I actually have a second batch brewing as we speak (the smell now makes my heart beat faster) but I just had a breakthrough with crystals so I don't think I'll be using the brew.

My first experience was pretty rough but then I read Bittersweet's essay on Sweet Flag in the Erowid Experience Vaults and knew she spoke the truth:

"This process, which involves slowly and diligently working with a plant and getting to know it (rather than bursting in its door saying 'show me something profound!'; which is the way most so-called 'psychonauts' [what a stupid word] do it) is imperitive to building a relationship with a plant that could be deemed as 'having an Ally'. Most plants dislike that people come to them wanting something, without taking the time to give of themselves. People solely seeking a strong 'psychedelic' trip will never be able to experience the magic in a plant like Calamus in the same way a capitalistic land developer will never appreciate the field for the flowers - they just aren't focused in the right place. And that's fine, because those people aren't ready to learn what Sweet Flag has to teach, anyways."

It's all about relationships. Relationships with the plant, and relationships with one another here at the Nexus.

peace
Phaedris

I thought 40g WAS a small/medium dose.

Directly experiencing reality is indeed the only means to tame an expectation, no matter what it is.


I now feel she gave me a playful hard go, just to show me how tall she truly is. Perhaps you did too Phaedris?

Also, I see I/They needed to perhaps test my attitude, perhaps even to see how much I'm REALLY willing to endure? Or maybe we're both just abnormally sensitive? or maybe we both DID ask too much on a first date!?

ah... being young.

I also see clearly that all my "extra perpetrations" were round-about-attempts to control the experience. Since then, I've in fact become MORE casual with my efforts and intentions, not as an act of disrespect, but an acknowledgement that life "just is" and that my efforts to control or "worship" these amazing entities and chemicals beyond simple respect is kinda silly (and perhaps unwanted).

but we'll see how this new attitude of mine pans out, i'm still walking it out.

It's hard to quell an expectation, especially when there's so many theories on how to approach a "safe" substance like caapi:
"go very very slow. one milligram at a time"
or
"you haven't taken enough until you feel you've taken too much!"


We truly make the path by walking it, and of course trip as we go.


a.