Two nights ago I had a very intense experience with San Pedro dominated by fear and loops which I could not get out of. It was the first time I had tried any phenethylamine and it was prepared by using this tek as a guideline with almost three feet of cactus, including all of the parts. I am not too sure whether my San Pedro is PC or not (it contains the V shape above the areoles which I thought was characteristic of non-PC), and I think this heavily affected the trip.

I dosed up at around 20:00, eating 15-20 one cm diameter resin balls in about 10 minutes. Around 20-30 min, I noticed some subtle effects but I was not sure if this was placebo. I was planning on having a relatively intense trip and had read in many places that mescaline is very forgiving and not many people have bad trips. I proceeded to eat a few more of these resin balls. A few minutes later, I ate more again, until I finished almost all of the resin that I had within 50 minutes. The effects started to come in stronger at an hour, I felt slightly stoned, tired, and started yawning a lot. I took a toke of DMT about 2 hours in to see the synergy, but what I found was that the San Pedro trip became dominated by the DMT and I merely felt the same nostalgia and slightly eerie feeling that DMT has. I listened to some music and just enjoyed the body load which was often described with mescaline.

From this point, my memory is a bit fuzzy. I began hearing things, my eyes became very dry, sounds became mixed. At a time one of my old dogs (18 years old!) came walking down the hallway to where my room is and I could not make out how far she was. I would hear a faint noise which could have been anything and my mind would race to figure out what it was and where it came from. I took my dog out of the hallway into the kitchen with me and eventually I went outside to look at the stars. They were quite beautiful, but standing outside was very eerie, again the sounds got to me and I returned to my living room. I sat down in a chair and tried to rest my eyes. I heard a sound, a couple of seconds later registered it as someone trying to get a glass out of the kitchen, and then a couple of seconds later I heard the sound of footsteps coming very close to me right before the room where I was sitting. I sat extremely still, nearly paralyzed, and began thinking about what to do about this. Eventually, I got up and went back to my room. Still feeling very stoned and slow.

I began to panic a bit, and tried to call a good friend. They did not answer and I slipped another step further. I moved back to the kitchen and began pacing around, downed a glass of milk, tried everything. I became very shaky, cold, my muscles began contracting a lot. I called my sister, and this helped to stop my panic from elevating. Time was so slow, I could not wait for things to pass.

At around 03:00 I told my sister that I was going to try and sleep a bit as I was feeling very tired. Normally, I am a person who cannot sleep on any substance and attempting to sleep intensifies any experience for me. In this case, I could close my eyes and drift into a very dreamy state, awake yet almost feeling like I was sleeping. I drifted into a San Pedro hyperspace, very small patterns unfolded in the darkness, and as they unfolded I would hear a weird slingy sound. The best way to describe the sound would be that it was similar to the sound that the lightsabers make in star wars. I was calmer.

Unfortunately, when the effects began to die down and morning came, I was so exhausted and simply wanted to sleep, which would keep me at a sort of elevated panic. All of yesterday I still felt like I was tripping a bit and today I am so glad that I got a good nights sleep. I am quite the insomniac and was so worried that I would not get to sleep.

Writing down a trip chronologically is very difficult for me as things become quite blurry. A few important thoughts that I would like to mention are here:

I am very curious as to why the trip was dominated by such a stoney feeling when people say mescaline is such a vibrant sort of drug. Was my cactus actually PC, containing small amounts of mescaline and more of the other Alkaloids which may have caused this effect?

Why was my trip so low on the visuals? It seems that many people say mescaline is very visual for them, yet I only saw faint patterns and things pulsating a little bit. It felt like my brain was blocking the visuals and instead of transferring it all into my state of mind.

The trip made me like a child again. I felt so helpless and just wanted to have someone there to comfort me. It was quite a nostalgic feeling. As a child, I would become so obsessed with my sleep and then not be able to sleep which would freak me out completely. I was so afraid that this would happen

Last year, my sister fell into a psychotic episode which lasted for months and eventually she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. I became frightened that I was slipping into such a state, which made me obsessed with analyzing the way I was talking to people to make sure I would sound sane.

I feel as though I should have submitted to the experience, but at the same time I was scared that this would lead me into psychosis.

I think the fact that I fasted heavily impacted me. The reasons I became so shaky might be tied to a drop in blood sugar levels. When I get hungry I become so strangely frustrated with people but have recently begun to control this more.

Losing sleep is terrible for me. I become depressed after just a nights of bad sleep in some cases. I think I will never trip during the night again. I will never take high doses of a long-lasting drug again. For now, I am just going to stick to vaporized DMT.

Although some refer to any weak Pachanoi as "PC", it's not likely your Cactus is "PC" Pachanoi. PC = Predominant Cultivar and seems to have been developed in the U.S. as landscaping cactus and has very little mescaline. Outside the U.S. you are less likely to encounter PC Pach. That being said Pachanoi in general seems to have a very wide range of mescaline content in different strains, from almost none to very potent, and also has a high which is described as "dreamier". Weak experiences with Pachanoi are common. Post a pic of what you have and someone here can ID it.

Any time you are ingesting full spectrum cactus product you are getting a mix of alkaloids which can greatly affect the experience. Bridgesii is my go-to and I generally like the alkaloid mixes it offers. I have only had weaker experiences on Pachanoi. Peruvianus has a reputation for having more mescaline relative to other alks and my subjective experiences with Peruvianus Tea seem consistent with that. I tried Terscheckii Tea once and, while it had mescaline it also had something extremely stimulating which had me pacing the floor and peering out windows. I probably would not do it again.

While mescaline is relatively gentle and forgiving compared to, say LSD it is a powerful psychedelic. I have never had anything remotely resembling a difficult experience on cactus, but my wife has had two oddly atypical experiences in which she was immobilized for hours, nauseated for the duration and never saw the pretty circus show that I was seeing. She was simply immobilized, high and uncomfortable. I have heard of at least one other person who had a similar reaction. Certain medications, especially psychotropic ones might also affect your experience.

What were you seeing when you closed your eyes? There is always a kind of liquid neon Cirque du Soleil going on in my Closed Eye Visuals (CEV's). As far as Open Eye Visuals (OEV's) they seem to be limited to the standard tracers, shifting, flowing type on low to mid doses but ramping up nicely on mid to higher doses to include objects stretching, pulsing and breathing.

I cannot do without sleep either so I always dose cactus before noon so I might be able to get a few hours sleep that night. I suspect the muscle contractions are caused by vasoconstriction and possibly by the stimulant effects of the mescaline and other alks. One way to minimize them is to exercise hard before tripping. Going into a trip physically exhausted, oxygenated and endorphined is optimum, in my experience.

Thanks for the reply

My CEV's were not that strong but still nice to watch. It would be these fine triangular shapes expanding out of the darkness almost like how ripples expand when a rock is dropped in water, except less organized. They were also accompanied by this abrupt zooming sound as they expanded.

Do you think some of the other alkaloids might be more sedating? I often had an urge to sleep for some reason.

I will upload a pic when I get the chance a bit later.

Woolmer thanks for sharing your experience with us. Sorry to hear that it was a challenging trip. 3 feet of cactus is a huge dose. Like Wolf said, if you can post photos then maybe you can get an i.d. on that cactus. PC can sometimes have the V-notch, though it is usually not as prominent as on other Pachanois.

The effects of cactus can vary based on dose. Low to moderate doses are often characterized by an increase in energy and an uplifting effect. But at high doses it is common to get dazed and heavy and to have muscle tension. At least that has been my experience.

Every trip is different. Dont give up on the possibility of experiencing strong visuals or a more positive time on future San Pedro trips. These cacti can be very strong and they deserve a lot of respect. Maybe that was a lesson to take away from your trip? If you ever try again, at a more moderate dose, you may find that the experience is more to your liking.

All the best.

I’ve never taken cactus, which should change soon, but I read that ayahuasca is for the night and cactus is for the day. Not that I followed the advice with pharma but maybe you want the cactus in daylight.

Indeed 3ft is likely to be a whopping dose. I'm not entirely surprised you found the experience challenging.
Also your administration method was maybe less than optimal. What weight of resin did you eat?

Slowly sipping on cactus tea over the course of a few hours provides a gentler introduction to the space, if you're comfortable with the bitter taste.

You will benefit, too, by paying attention to your mindspace - from what you describe it sounds as though you set yourself up for anxiety to a certain extent. But in fairness, some experienced cactus users have had harsh trips too even when they though it was a dose the same as something they'd previously found quite manageable.

Mescaline has a wide dose-response range - it can go from plain but commendable euphoria to pretty colours to disintegration of space and time depending on the dose, and occasionally may turn up surprises depending on the position of the planets/your biomolecules.


And a final question: how was your cactus stored prior to consumption?

Below I have posted a few pictures of my cuttings. The V-notch is not very prominent and is not above all of the areoles. The spines generally face straight out or downwards (also more characteristic of non-PC?) and are very small. Also, I am not located in the U.S.



Yes, I definitely think I was too reckless with this dose. I will try a smaller dose in the following few days and see if I can get a better experience.

The after-effects of this trip are still felt a bit today. Since the day I had dosed, I would have periods of slightly uncomfortable anxiety where I go into a loop and start worrying about sleep and the thought of going insane would still be in the back of my mind. I would then worry about why I am still feeling anxious (it could not really be that hard to control).

I am a person who usually has his mind racing over lots of things and I am very self-conscious, so when I notice something is slightly off I may worry a bit as I wish to operate at my fullest. This trip has brought lots of things to light, especially in the after-hours/days. At times I would feel so detached from the world, my motivation would be all gone. I believe that I might as well manipulate my mind to live the fullest, so it is important that I control any feelings of anxiety.



I ate anywhere from 10-15 grams of resin (I do not trust my scale). Why do you say this was not an optimal administration method?



Yes, I definitely hyped myself up too much. I did this as a kid a lot, and the anxiety that I experienced these past few days is exactly the same as when I was a kid. When the sun starts to go down, I begin to worry about stuff a lot. Once I go to sleep and wake up in the morning, everything is back to normal until the process repeats again at dusk. It felt like this was what I had worked on my whole life to diminish, and now the trip opened up that pathway for a brief period (my feelings of angst are fast going away).

I think one of my main issues was the fact that I felt so sedated and dazed. I hate feeling slow and lethargic. A reason I like DMT so much is that my thoughts stop being so hyper and are replaced by a hyper show which I don't control and don't have to worry about.



What do you mean by this?



They were basically fresh cuts stored in a box for a day. Why are you asking?

That does not look like PC. It looks like non-PC Pachanoi. It is so dark green and glossy looking, almost like a cucumber lol. Do you know what kind of conditions it was grown under?

All the best with your next journey.

The climate is very dry during summer, and the past few years (especially this year and last) there has been a drought so not much rain during winter. It received quite a bit of sun for a lot of the day too. Temperatures are generally around 28C in summer and very seldom fall below 0 during winter.

Edit: Also, another interesting thing I have noticed is that the core is very much fleshy compared to the PC's that I have which have more fibre and are more wood-like.

Yeah buddy, that ain't PC-- you can usually tell by an upward-facing areole on the rib, which kinda looks like a saw-tooth from the side. This is a page that does a fine job of covering the basics, written by a fellow that put a lot of time into the study--
https://trichoseriouseth...ncy-basic-guide-for.html

I join the others in my gratitude for your sharing your experience-- I just had on e of my own this weekend that was pretty powerful (to me).

These plants are amazing gifts-- but as we both know from experience, they are not guaranteed to be easy-- my journey was a mix of good and bad-- but I am still a true believer in their sanctity-- I'm glad you have learned from your experience, and I know you will adjust and optimize your choices in future trips.

I love cactus-- but lord, sometimes what it gives back is "tough love" in return

Its a beautiful color Woolmer. I'm in a hot desert. High temps stay over 100F for months at a time in the summer. Humidity is quite low for most of the year. I dont think my cactus could ever be that dark green, even when grown with lots of shade. Its cool to see that super dark green color on your Pachanoi.

I've noticed that the core gets more woody and tough as the column ages. Those PC cuttings you had with real woody cores may have come from an older plant.

Interestingly, this morning I sipped around 250 ml of a 1.5-litre tea made from a thin 22cm PC (or so I thought) cutting that had been sitting in a flask for over a week. About 4 hours in I actually started to notice a change in headspace along with slight pattern recognition. I had forgotten that I had drunk some of the tea and was surprised at the effects. Is this a reverse-tolerance effect from my trip a few days ago? Or may I have lucked out on some good cuttings?

I would appreciate if someone could help me identify these cuttings below

That is not PC. Those look like non-PC Pachanoi.