I have a history of seizures, and from what I understand, it's theorized that DMT is potentially released from the pineal gland during temporal lobe seizures. My seizures have all followed the same exact course, and they appear to me to be precisely the same as DMT trips- they always start out as auras- where I suddenly begin to experience a heightened emotional state that is something that is too much for my body to contain- i don't really enjoy writing about it b/c let's just say the trip that ensues is so personal and life changing (and it proceeds into an altered state of consciousness)into which people tell me I am talking outloud and even sometimes walking, but often "out of body" from within, time has no meaning, often I am in a place removed from time, and they are intensely religious, the rest of which is so intensely personal yet at the same time so all encompassing that any attempt to explain it while I'm rationally conscious would fail. I lose all consciousness before I come back to reality. There all emotions within, both bad and good, are of such an exponential factor that they fail to be described. Does anybody believe that this could be the release of DMT from the pineal gland during my seizures that produces this?
I'd appreciate any feedback! Thank you!

Hi nastasyafilippovna,

Welcome to the Nexus.

Last I heard it was found that the Pineal does not release any DMT, nor contain any. Instead it's full of melatonin and small amounts of pinoline.

I look forward to reading people's replies to your OP. Personally your experience though very psychedelic and mystical sounding to me does not really resonate with the way my DMT trips go down. Mine is more like everything looks weird/alien with a bluish-golden enhancement. The room feels and looks almost like I'm underwater.

Focus (for example on taking another hit) is very very difficult to maintain as there are many things pulling for my attention. From the feeling of a heavy weight on my chest leading to feeling my heart and lungs have stopped and I've left my body to visions of "elves" and other entities in my room peaking out from behind objects.

As my eyes close the heaviness increases and I loose all touch with my body. Even if I remembered I smoked DMT I sometimes authentically think something has gone terribly wrong (heart attack?) and I've died this time. The visions are fantastically beautiful and incredibly synaesthetic with any environmental sound or music. I see lots of spinning 3D+ hyperdimensional objects. I see entities that crowd around me - they are curious and pushy and back and forth in my face.

I surrender and frequently I float up or the piece of floor I'm on detaches and flies away, or a door opens into an entirely new realm filled with gorgeous, huge hyperdimensional cityscapes filled with infinite dwellings and entities. I frequently feel this is the realm of dead souls.

Often I hear a high pitched synaesthetic sound. It is a screech higher than any tinntinitis or producible tone in reality. I imagine it's what a dog hears from a dog whistle. I see this sound as a line crossing my vision. If I'm am near this line I realize that a single point on it encompasses all of history, not just my personal timeline. . . . things are diffused with a palpable sense of the infinite as well as the entangled/All-One. My visions are hyper clear/sharp with edge detection being fantastic - clearer and better than anything I get in reality, "more real than real," . . . . .

I could rant on but perhaps you get the sense. . .

I really appreciate your response! I'm trying to figure out what's going on bec. neurologists have no grasp of what appears to be the "psychodelic" element that's going on here, and frankly, being into metaphysics, lol, it's the part of my seizures that interests me most lol! The part of your trip that really resonates with me it the time/space element- how there is no such thing but infinity somewhat, and how you described everything being realer than real....I've read NDE reports that are incredibly consistent to with what I experience during my seizures. The part they consistenly lack, however, are the geometric visuals....the learning experience from a few of them has been just profound, and that's why, when doctor's have called them a "psychotic state", I scoff, because it is clearly not. The reason I have focused on DMT is that I figure, if these states are coming from seizures, and the only hallucinogenic state that could be organically produced in the brain could be one from DMT, could it be an organic type of DMT trip that is occuring? Your insight was appreciated!!
So nice to chat with insightful folks who have respect for the metaphysical world btw- my seizures are very depressing- because of my threshold, I can not take psychodelics such as mescaline, pscylibin, lsd, etc, because they would induce seizures for me, and I believe they are all such great teachers. Love hearing the stories and insights shared by others!

I do kind of doubt an organic DMT trip is occurring but who knows? There's so many neurotransmitters including an important one (serotonin) of similar structure . . . .

Sorry to hear about your seizure problems and low threshold. I imagine dosing is terrifying as well as dangerous in those situations. Are you able to take cannabis, either smoked or orally? If so, does it, especially high CBD strains or tinctures help control your problem at all?

Are you under the care of a doctor? Do you take medication for this? If so, does it help?


You are not alone here. There are many others who either do not or cannot take psychedelics currently. It does not stop them from actively participating in this community, nor should it stop you.

You know, the "medical" part is the most horrible part about it- my eeg's always come back normal, so the doctors actually say that they don't even know if they are seizures (although all the symptoms seem to point that way, especially since several of them have been grand mal), and if they weren't I don't know why that (THANKFULLY) my anti-epileptic medications they put me on anyway have worked like a charm! (knock on wood!) However, funny you have mentioned cannabis- for years i smoked habitually, and then when seizures became a problem (it did so because a doctor put me on the notorious seizure inducing drug Wellbutrin which began the whole mess), cannabis was what I relied upon to control seizure activity. Finally, when I got anti-epileptic meds, I cut back my cannabis use, but as of recently, I had to stop using it altogether, because it begain triggering seizures. Now I know this can happen if a strain has more THC than CBD, but it was rather unnerving and dissappionting regardless. The medical community has basically been no good, however I find that if I stick to my anti-epileptic drugs and live like a nun when it comes to everything else lol, things seem stable. I just get perplexed! And terribly frustrated I no longer have my beloved cannabis to enjoy on occasion lol!

Strassman just recently released a statement regarding some new research he's going to be doing using much more sensitive detection equipment than has been used before, and he also mentioned work by another researcher who has found "that the enzyme responsible for synthesis of the endogenous hallucinogens is present in pineal gland, brain, spinal cord and retinal tissues of primates and appears to be an inducible enzyme, an enzyme that responds to specific signals."

So even though it was rejected by some for awhile, the pineal seems to be back in the picture and soon there should be more detailed info available than ever before. I think it's very plausible that these could be natural DMT experiences, I have a friend with epilepsy who says basically the same thing. If a "misfire" in the signals that cause DMT to be released is possible, this would also be a way to explain religious visions, alien abductions, NDE and other strangeness throughout history.

More info here: http://www.cottonwoodresearch.org/dmt-update/

Thanks very much for the link and the information!!

All my DMT experiences have been intensely visual, as Pandora describes, with one exception. I made an oral brew from a grass containing 5-MEO DMT, which is considered stronger than normal N-N DMT but lacks the visual content. And I had a number of the experiences you described, the total annihilation, loss of time, tunneling away from everyday reality to the extent that it was a lost speck in the distance. You may want to do a search here for descriptions of 5-MEO experiences, see if any of it resonates with you.

I think it's possible that our endogenous DMT is present at various levels throughout the day, with peaks at key times while falling asleep (a highly visual moment), certain stresses, etc... If this is the case, a release during a seizure would certainly be possible.

Welcome to the Nexus; I hope you find the insights that you need here.

It sounds like the OP has temporal lobe epilepsy and its not unusual to have 'cosmic' or spiritual dimensions to the symptomatolgy.The response to medication supports a diagnosis of a seizure disorder.

Its important to note a normal EEG when not having a seizure doesnt exclude the diagnosis although a reading taken during the episodes would be abnormal.

If someones seizures are frequent and hard to control then theres a few techniques used to try and provoke abnormal EEG activity, such as hyperventilation and sleep deprivation.Other methods used include prolonged monitoring of the EEG with video-monitoring; sticking electrodes in the nasopharynx or into the jaw muscles can also give additional evidence.Lastly sticking electrodes deep into the brain can also aid diagnosis- but this approach is reserved for those in whom surgery/other invasive treatments are considered.

I've certainly heard that temporal lobe epilepsy is known for producing "spiritual interests" in sufferers. Isn't that what Dostoyevsky had, IIRC?

EDIT: Wikipedia has a pretty interesting list of sufferers: "They include Vincent Van Gogh, Charles Dodgson (a.k.a. Lewis Carroll), Edgar Allan Poe, Fyodor Dostoevsky (whose novel The Idiot features a protagonist with epilepsy, Prince Myshkin), Gustave Flaubert, Philip K. Dick, Sylvia Plath and contemporary author Thom Jones."

you know it's wild you brought up dostoevsky- I've been consumed- obsessed with him for years prior to even having these seizures, and it was eerie that it was at that point I then started researching TLE and discovered that he actually had that disorder- I started to wonder if that was one of the reasons I related so much to his work, and why I was always so consumed with metaphysics as a study in general!

^ Yes. I've always been very moved by him, too; and I don't doubt it's because we have sympathies...