Well, based on what I've seen around these forums, this seems like an incredibly close-knit place, which I suppose goes with the waters. Being stretched out on an interdimensional rack for a while seems to build comradery like nothing else. But I figured I ought to knock this out in preparation for my second dive into extractions. I like the idea of having somewhere like this to post, since frankly, reddit kind of slacks when it comes to advice/feedback. *** As I'm writing this, I'm realizing this has the potential to get long, so I apologize in advance and don't *really* expect anyone to read this whole thing lol. Anyway~

My name is Rory, I'm 24 years of age, and as much as I hate to admit it, my first experience with drugs was with cold medicine around age 8? 9? Came back to cold medicine in middle school, by high school I'd acknowledged it was having detrimental effects on my life and quit using. I hated the disconnectedness I started feeling, floating through a haze. And I felt I was way too young to be experiencing something like that. I went on to smoke weed for the first time during AIT(advanced individual training, learning my job) with the Army National Guard(turned 19 around this time), which was bold, but opened me up to what a positive drug experience could be. Pot felt so much nicer compared to the cold, dissociated state I'd get with DXM. Shortly after that, I was chaptered(wasn't busted or anything, it was for PT failure in all honesty, but that was the easiest way I saw out of my service. I felt like another kid pushed to join without really understanding what I was doing.), came back home, and my real journey began.

Smoking weed the first time opened my eyes to the world of illegal drugs. I'd spent a lot of time researching psychs during my last couple months in AIT as I'd been experiencing intense depression. I'd heard of the glowing/mystical experiences you could have, and the overwhelming feeling of universal love, and it sounded beyond beautiful. One day, I got incredibly lucky and spotted a post on reddit that should have been banned, and likely was shortly after, but it gave me my first source for 1P-LSD. My first trip could have been planned a *little* better, but I was young and reckless.

My friend and I had been discussing the possibility of tripping together for the first time, and we ended up doing so, which I later regretted. He had a day off of work he wasn't expecting so he hit me up to ask about tripping that day. Couple hours later and he was at my house, both of us with a tab in our hand, feeling the nervousness bubble up from somewhere in my stomach. Without going into too much detail, simply for the sake of whoever ends up reading this, it was beautiful, captivating, and everything I could have hoped for. And this trip actually let me take a look at my weed usage(as at that point, I'd started using habitually. It was losing it's magic for me.) from an objective standpoint. I've since cut back to buying once a week, and I haven't looked back. I understand my relationship with marijuana better as a result.

A year or so went by like this, gradually increasing my dosage, working my way up to a strip of 1P eventually. Biggest mistake of my life. I remember very little from that trip, despite what I thought was a safe approach(100ug, 200ug, 300ug, 500ug, etc, building up slowly to 1mg). I took my ten tabs, felt the come up inside of 15 minutes, and knew I was in for something else entirely. I vaguely remember the beginning of the animated film "Coco", and then two hours later I found myself in the living room of my house, SOBBING. Gut wrenching, gasping for air sobbing. I don't remember what led to this, how I got there, much of anything really, but I remember feeling like a conduit or a receptacle for every shred of suffering in this universe. Every single person's pain, fear, worries, doubts, I was experiencing it for them. Maybe not in place of them, but I became aware of universal suffering like nothing else I've experienced. This trip scared me off tripping for a while, and looking back, the blame lies with me in expecting I could "just handle" whatever a heavy trip threw at me, and also my subtle disrespect of the compound by taking so much. Since then, I find that even two tabs is too much for me.

Around this time, I started slipping back into a heavy depression, experiencing more anxiety than normal, and just overall feeling like I'd broken my brain over the course of my life. This is when I discovered ayahuasca. Now, I still have yet to partake in an aya ceremony, but I would absolutely love to. Simply don't have the funds right now. Anyway. This led me to DMT when I realized ayahuasca is made using DMT containing plants. I'm gonna start trying my best to mash this down some as I'm feeling self-conscious about how long this is getting. Did my research, got my materials, extracted. I'd used what I've since realized is essentially a bastardized Q21Q21 tek, or a Gordotek, I'm not totally sure which, but it has components from both. My DMT was gorgeous, white, fluffy crystals. My first trip had two big surprises for me.

The first, and I'm unsure of whether or not this was because I'd used a VG, because my DMT had less "other stuff"(plant fats and whatnot) or what, but the notorious harshness of DMT escaped me for whatever reason. It felt no worse than smoking some bud. And second, this stuff felt FAMILIAR. Like, I'd been here before, I've had this trip, I've seen this place a thousand times before. This familiarity is what led me to what I believe was my first hyperslap, small compared to other people's, but no less intimidating for me.

I'd decided, "That's it, I'm breaking through, I'm tired of all the cool, crazy visuals, I want something deeper, I want to SEE". So my silly little self decided that 2 tabs of 1P and roughly 30mg of DMT would be enough. Keep in mind, during this time, for any of my DMT trips, I didn't have a scale. I have since gotten one that can measure to .01g(which I know still isn't IDEAL, but it's a hell of a lot better than before, so don't judge too much ;P). Immediately after exhaling my first hit, I felt something enter me. It didn't necessarily feel malevolent, but it's power was undeniable. I felt frozen in place, in time even, for what could have been half an hour but was more realistically something like four or five minutes. During this time, I felt this massive pillar of energy blasting down into my skull. Looking back on this, I think the DMT did exactly what I was hoping for, but I was unready for how quickly it would attempt to blast me the hell out of my body, and I FOUGHT. I didn't lay back, didn't close my eyes, I was just terrified of how quickly I went from a two tab, having a nice time trip, to feeling like an interdimensional puppet of some sort. The comedown didn't take it's normal 15-20 minutes to get back to baseline, which I attribute to the LSD. I spent the next forty minutes wandering my room/house attempting to figure out who exactly I was. I knew I was supposed to be "Rory" in "place where I live", but those meant absolutely nothing to me. There was no way to connect this "Rory" to the body I was inhabiting. I was horrified during this time frame, convinced there was no going back, trying to figure out how I was going to explain to people how I broke myself so much when I couldn't even understand what broken really was.

This trip was fortunately my last on DMT for a while, as I believe that trip could have been a warning to not come back for a while, to take it more seriously, any number of things, but I didn't *want* to go back. Three years later, I'm ready to get burned again. Obviously, I don't want anything similar to the experience I received, but I don't plan on mixing DMT with any other psychs, and probably not even weed. I really believe there's something to this molecule, be it lessons, love, just a way to accept your time on this earth, a way to face the fact that you have zero knowledge of what you don't know. Whatever it is, it felt too ancient, sacred, alien, to just walk away from it. I hope to be able to journal about my trips this time, I hope to bring something back I can actually integrate. I don't expect the DMT to do the heavy lifting for me, but I expect it to give me a lifting belt at least, bolster my metaphysical back.

This ended up far longer than I had planned on, but it started feeling more like venting towards the end. A way to put my intentions into the universe and solidify them to myself a little better. I'm eager to dive into these forums, they seem to be a MUCH bigger wealth of info than reddit offered. At least, specifically regarding DMT. Hope you enjoyed the read, and to anyone that actually read the whole thing, wow. Ily.

But anyway, this is me. Hope it suffices

Welcome and please share your future experiences too!

Thank you! And absolutely, my memory of my DMT trips are hazy now, at best, unfortunately. Gonna try my best to record any upcoming visits to hyperspace via either a journal or a voice recorder of some sort. Hadn't occurred to me the first time around, and I think that's one of my biggest regrets regarding how I used my first batch. Much love

Wow! I had the exact same reaction to Coco! JK lol! I think you’re in the right place, a lot of us use these various molecules to shed a little light on the path. You sound like you have a good sense of what a trip to hyperspace can do for you and what you have to work for on your own. Welcome! And safe journeys to you!

It's a touching movie! But thank you for the welcome, and you as well! I definitely feel more prepared coming into this extraction/these future trips. Happy to be here

Yes, I liked Coco too, but couldn’t resist visualizing as a fly on the wall, lol. Anyway I forgot to mention an old Nexian technique for maximizing a scale like yours. If it can indeed measure fairly accurately in 10mg increments, then measuring out a larger amount, say 100mg and eyeballing dividing that into quarters would get you a bit closer to an accurate 25mg or whatever you’re preferred dosage. If you do end up with a disposable twenty bucks, however, you can get a pretty good gemologists scale. There’re multiple threads on decent inexpensive scales. I think there is even an active thread where a member has been manufacturing their own scale from spare parts!

I may have actually seen that one, if it's the ug scale I'm thinking of. But that's neat! I was wondering a little how I'd fiddle with the doses, since eyeballing is risky at best lol. Not totally sure how accurate it is, mostly used it for weighing mushrooms when I was growing. I think if I decide to go for another extraction after this batch of 200g, I might just get a proper scale. It'd be worth the peace of mind. I'll look around for those threads you'd mentioned though!

I hope I’m not beating a dead horse, but I’ve had some rare free time and engaging on the forum this much is a treat for me. Anyway, final point on scales. A few years back I got a bit paranoid about the accuracy of my cheap little gem scale and bought a calibration set. It’s just a little plastic box of various weights from a 50gram cylinder on down to a 2milligram piece of metal foil. There are maybe twenty different weights in the box and they all have their weight clearly stamped into the metal. I paid less than five bucks for the thing. I throw a couple different ones on my scale before needing an accurate measure of anything and get total peace of mind (at least, regarding weight, lol).

Fret not! I'm digging all the advice I've been getting I'd seen people mention the calibration sets, figured they came with the scale haha, so it's good to know now rather than wondering later on why I got ripped off lmao. 100% getting a set whenever I upgrade though, definitely sounds useful

Typically mg precision scales come with one weight to calibrate them. Mine came with 50g weight which is also upper limit of my scale.
I have also memorized the weight of some accessories (tiny plastic measuring cup) and use them as a reference to check if scales need calibration or not.

Maybe your calibration weights are certified - I certainly hope so - but still, it seemed pertinent to mention the following. Once, long ago, I got a set of weights with some old-school balancing scales and decided to weigh them on the microgram-accurate scales to which I had access at the time. Most of them were way off their stated values but I did make sure to write down what their actual values are so they are still useful.

If you have access to very accurate scales (even just the once) it is also possible to make calibration weights by filling small, sealable containers with appropriate amount of sand.

Those are both great ideas DFZ and Exitwound! I think my weights have an m2 and some other four digit certification but I lost the actual certificate long ago. When I first got it I tried most/all the different weights and the weight for each piece correlated with the reading on the scale which was pretty reassuring by any level of precision I’m going to achieve in my kitchen. I use it quite often to weigh dry measured supplements (e.g. about a level quarter teaspoon of the bulk ascorbic acid acid I take is about a gram) for the convenience of not weighing things. It also makes it way easier to do my saponification math when shooting for a particular super fat when making soap.

The precision scale is on a wishlist for my somewhat imminent semiretirement, however