Hi there. I am posting this here so that more people can read it. If the moderators want to move it somewhere else, please do so.

It will be a long read but it is worth it. Read on.

Yesterday I had the most unusual, perplexing and dangerous experience with psychedelics so far and I have to share it for the common good. Also, I am very interested in your opinions, as basically nothing adds up at this point.

Some background. I am 46 years old, I have had very extensive experience with psychedelics for more than three decades, mostly Psylocibyn, Amanitas, Salvia, LSA, Peyote, and in the past couple of years with Aya, Pharma and DMT. I never use these substances in a party setting, it is always a spiritual thing. Interestingly in all those years I had never had the chance to try LSD and MDMA. I have also more than two decades of very serious meditation experience in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. So... I am currently in South America and a friend of mine started a trial PTSD therapy with MDMA (in a medical institution). He made me a gift of 140mg medical grade MDMA and I took it for the first time 4 weeks ago. Needless to say, it was amazing and I found it incredibly useful. Then I decided that I must find this thing to give to a relative of mine, who is very much in need of something like this. I found about 250mg from another source, which looked a little bit different - somehow too snow white, small transparent crystals. The medical thing had a very subtle color to it. This one does not. But there were strong indications that it should be real and pure and I had no other choice than to test it on myself first before offering it to the intended recipient. And that's, as they say, where the fun began.

Fast forward to yesterday, my designated trial day. Perfect set and setting, no disturbances whatsoever. The day before I had eaten only a home made hamburger, and had taken one pain killer pill for slight headache which contains a little phenobarbital and codeine, together with some flavonoids. In my mind, nothing which can cause any interactions. I had not taken MAOI's and RIMA's for months. Yesterday morning however, 2 hours before taking the pill I took R-ALA, Magnesium, Green Tea Extract, L-Carnitine, Grape Seed Extract and CoQ10, because I was worried that I was taking MDMA too soon for the second time. This whole bunch of pills didn't feel right, but well... Then I ate half a pancake with a tiny bit of strawberry jam and 40 minutes later, at exactly 11AM (T=0) I took 100mg of the crystals in a capsule, feeling great.

At 11:30 (T +0:30) I felt it starting, very gently and pleasantly. At 11:37 (+0:37) there was already a very strong body high, clear head and great feeling. At (T +0:42) I felt the need to go and lay down on the bed, feeling amazing clarity and unspeakable body bliss. I made the mental note that the universal empathy and compassion I felt on my first trip was strangely absent, but the overall bliss was so overwhelming, and I found the state useful at this stage, so it was all fine. My head was totally clear and spacious, but my thinking process was unaltered. At 12:04 (T +1:04) I felt a very strong urge to prepare a redose of 50mg. I felt that in an hour I may need to get just a little higher. At the same time however I felt a slight chest pressure, not acute pain or real discomfort, just something I noticed. I went to the bathroom to pee and noticed that it was difficult to do (an MDMA tell sign), and then right before preparing the redose a very strong premonition hit me that I should not do that. I listened and went to the bed instead.

At (T +1:14) it started to become apparent that something was not right. The head buzz and the tingling vibrations of the limbs were very strong and pleasant, but I started noticing the chest feeling more and anxiety thoughts started creeping in, which completely surprised me. I dealt with that easily but a few minutes later decided on a whim to get out a small electronic Blood Pressure meter I carry in my first aid kit in my backpack. I measured my blood pressure and couldn't believe what I saw, then I re-measured it 3 more times with the same results. I had a Pulse rate of 60 and BP of 199/127 ! Now it dawned on me that something totally unwanted was starting to happen, and of course I realized that I am seeing a reading which basically means that a heart failure or stroke may be imminent. I didn't freak out at all, I am not afraid of dying, but I figured out that this was probably not the best time for it, having in mind some close friends who would not be able to take it very lightly. But I knew that I had not even reached the peak yet and this body was clearly dying, possibly of Serotonin Syndrome complications. It didn't make sense but it was nevertheless happening. Being in a very remote village in Brazil at the moment and having seen the local "hospital," I knew that no matter what, I didn't want to spend the last hours of my life there, trying to explain them what MDMA was, while having a heart attack. So I had only one other option - to try to make it through.

At this point, about T+1:20, I was still feeling the very strong overall buzz as a background and the chest pressure, but no acute pain. My head was clear, I was very calm and decided to invoke my meditation experience to try to control what was happening. I tried for about 20 minutes and all I managed to do was to lower my BP to 187/117. This body was trying desperately to survive from something, and wouldn't listen to me. In fact, my blood pressure gadget started to struggle with the readings, trying to inflate itself again and again to it's limit, and I started to have the suspicion that my BP may be even higher, beyond the range of this thing. I called a friend, and asked him in my most happy and casual voice to bring me a manual blood pressure meter "for an experiment". The last thing I wanted was for someone to drive wildly through the mountains in an attempt to save my life. Then for the next 30-ish minutes I resumed my meditation without much effect. I even tried putting my feet in hot water and drinking a lot of water - instant remedies for high blood pressure, but not for deadly high blood pressure. I got it down to 176/115.

Then, out of the blue and without any warning, at 14:20 (T +3:20) while still calmly dying, I felt a sudden urge to throw up. There was no nausea, no discomfort, nothing - I just knew that in about 3 seconds I will throw up. The bathroom is about 4 steps from the bed, so I jumped up in a desperate attempt to reach the bowl. I didn't make it, but I threw up so hard, and in such a high volume that I managed to aim for it from a meter and a half away. At this point I was watching it as a spectacle, nothing was making sense. And then, 1 (one!) second after I threw up, all the discomfort was gone. Everything - no chest pain, no dying, nothing. And THEN, 3 seconds after I threw up, the MDMA or whatever this shit was, hit me like a freight train, so hard, that I couldn't stay on my feet. It was totally unreal! I crawled to my bed and lay down in disbelief with an overwhelming 100% body load which left my mental state completely intact. The tingling/bliss sensation was incredibly strong, I could barely feel or move my actual limbs, they were just vibration, colors were enhanced quite a bit, but there was no empathy and despite all my attempts I couldn't use this experience in any meaningful way, even to heal my body. It was not spiritual, it was just pleasure.

Then my friend came with the BP meter. I briefed him and we measured my BP. It was the same 175/112, pulse rate still 61 (very low for me). Still no acute pains. Then I just lay there for hours, unable to do much else. I was very, very high, totally calm, observing and waiting to live or die.

At 18:30 (T+ 7:30 !! ) after a lot of fluctuations reaching as low as 95/45 at times, my blood pressure finally normalized and settled at 115/75. Simultaneously however, my pulse rate climbed from 60 to 130 and refused to move from there. I was still very high, as I have been since the strongest peak after my bathroom experience. There was no hint of this thing going away, and now I had a new task - to lower my pulse! This is something that I can do very easily and I was certain that it would be a piece of cake. Nope. It refused to move. I tried for hours, the best result I got was 110.

Then, at 23:30, T +12:30, I finally felt that the thing was starting to subside. I was still very high, but there was a hint. My pulse rate however was 110-ish still.

I took 5mg of Melatonin and tried to sleep. No luck. Although my body was quite relaxed during most of the night, I couldn't sleep even for a minute. Many times during the night I felt my pulse suddenly rising quite a lot, it may have easily reached 150, and then subside. A mild chest pain was there the whole time and is still present. (However, this "chest pressure" may actually be due to a compulsive swallowing of air I noticed throughout the whole experience (and which is still ongoing), which I couldn't control.)

Now, 9:00AM the next morning, at T +22:00 I still feel a little high. My blood pressure is 100/70 and my pulse rate is 116 and still refusing to come down. I took 100mg of 5-HTP, and started writing this. It seems that I may after all live, but I will try to find an EKG the following week to see is anything went really bad.

In conclusion - a hypertensive crisis lasting for nearly 10 hours and resembling a Serotonin Syndrome, with no logical explanation, on something which was 'supposed' to be MDMA, at a very moderate dose.

Now, the detective work. It may be weeks before I have the chance to get some Marquis reagent and test this stuff, but in the meantime I HAVE to try to find out what happened.

Here is what we know so far:

Symptoms suggestive of MDMA

1. The first 35 minutes were magnificent (although no clearly present empathy) Empathy may have appeared at one point if it continued like that.
2. Clear head throughout
3. Difficulty concentrating after the peak
4. Pronounced difficulty urinating
5. Erection - impossible
6. Heightened sense of touch at one time bringing very pleasurable feelings and tingling

Case against MDMA

1. No empathy. None.
2. The high was not useful in any spiritual way. 100% body high, leaving the ordinary mind intact. No depth to thoughts.
3. Clearly enhanced colors
4. Very long duration - more than 12 hours
5. Triggered a hypertension crisis with no known MAOI presence
6. Clear potential for anxiety at one point.
7. No hangover after 22 hours, just slight disorientation, strong exhaustion and the head buzz is still present.
8. Total lack of incentive to move. Getting out of bed took considerable effort and will power.

Symptoms suggestive of a Serotonin syndrome

1. A sudden hypertension crisis exactly before the peak.

Case against a Serotonin syndrome event

1. No dilated pupils. My pupils were normal all the time.
2. No heat waves, cold waves, etc.
3. No known presence of either MAOI's or RIMA's

Strong symptoms I don't know what to make of:

1. A very strong and distinct feeling in the head every single time I stood up. Like the head was filled with liquid and it flowed down suddenly through the neck when I stood up. Very strong, very distinct, totally new to me.

2. Whenever I turned my head to the sides there was a slight delay in the imagery/feeling. Not tracers, just something out of sync.

3. Total inability to sleep.

One more thing. During the night I did a serious divination practice to find out what went wrong. No less than three substances were clearly communicated as culprits - the Green Tea Extract, the Vitamin C, and the Grapefruit juice. I still don't know what to make of this, as they are supposed to be safe, apart from noticing that the Green Tea Extract contains 14% of Polyphenol catechins, which is a MAO-B inhibitor, but which is supposed to not have interaction with MDMA. Also, it was stressed to me numerous times that Vitamin C was not compatible for some reason with this MDMA substance. Doesn't make much sense, just reporting.

Also, I must say that I do not know of any heart condition I may have, I feel quite healthy, and this is the first time I experience anything like this, out of the blue. It was very easy for me to cope with this psychologically, but my body is clearly still trying to stay alive and overcome something, which seems like a total mystery.

What is especially alarming, and I want to stress it to you all, is that I had an extremely severe hypertension with 100% stroke/heart failure values, and while on this psychedelic it didn't feel bad at all, just slightly uncomfortable. Food for thought.

So... there you have it. There is a saying "The fool learns from his own mistakes, the wise one learns from the mistakes of others." It is very clear where I stand in this particular case, but I at least hope that those who read this will have the chance to play the wise man this time

Any suggestions, opinions, guesses are more than welcome! I need all the input I can get. I will be moving further South the next days but have my sat phone with me and will be checking the thread. Don't bash me on what happened though, it is obvious that I will not touch anything but home-made substances from now on, but my initial judgement that this may indeed be MDMA may still prove right, and the set, setting and preparation were all perfect. I am at a loss for an explanation right now.

Take care!

Geko, could these snow white crystals not be methamphetamine and not MDMA ?

Of course. From what I experienced they could be really anything. I have absolutely no experience with methamphetamines though, I have never taken such crap. Does it sound like it?.

How could your BP be 127/199? Are you following the normal systolic/diastolic convention?

I've been working in emergency medicine for a while now and I've never come across a BP that looked like that. 199/127, yes, but never the other way around.

It really could be any compound - there are so many strange RCs available at the moment that, unless you have access to lab-quality analytical equipment, I don't think you'll ever know what it is. Maybe run some reagent tests to get a sense of what might be possible?

Blessings
~ND

We cannot really speculate too much about what it COULD have been.
There are litterally thousands of new & emerging psychoactive drugs that occur in white powder/crystal form & are active at dosages similar to MDMA. It could have been another drug or combination or drugs entirely or it could have been MDMA cut with an RC or other substance.


The only way you will know what you took is to do some reagent testing or if you can afford it, have a sample analyzed by a drug checking service.

Glad you came out of this okay. It is becoming a very dangerous game dealing with street drugs these days & unfortunately reagent testing is becoming more & more of a necessity if you want to remain safe & know what you actually have.

Oh, no, I am not following the convention, just assuming that the smaller number is the diastolic reading. Sorry about that. I will correct the initial post right now, if I can.

Systolic is the BP when your heart is contracting, diastolic is the pressure when your heart is relaxed - I can't imagine a circumstance in which the diastolic could be higher than the systolic. It might be possible, but again, I've never seen it in the field and it was never mentioned as a possibility in training or con ed courses.

Blessings
~ND

Yes, of course. I had just written them the other way around. It is corrected now.

Thanks concombres,

You are right. From the info I got from yesterday from various friends, some kind of Meth seems to be a strong candidate, as these snow white and transparent crystals do not seem to indicate real MDMA. Which means also that my "moderate" dose might have been a severe overdose. A chemist friend has also sent me an extensive testing kit to one of my next stops, so I will have some test results sooner than I thought. However the green tea extract also starts to look highly suspect. It is not clear whether MAO-B inhibitors are really safe with MDMA, and it seems that there could have been interaction with that. I keep receiving very interesting info, and I will post here any conclusive results I get. Thanks for the input.

Applying Occam's razor, that wasn't MDMA. The grapefruit juice had nothing to do with this.

Know that MDMA is the most routinely adulterated and counterfeited drug on the market. At this time I wouldn't put any amphetamine derivative in my body without at least checking it with a three-point test kit. Either get your MDMA from medical sources, or get a three-point test kit (google "Bunk police").

An overdose of meth is a possibility, but it could have been anything, really, including a mixture of multiple "anythings".

Sorry you had some difficult experience. Its hard to speculate on what it was when consuming unknown substances..

Please next time test your own, nowadays there are options at anybody's reach. Please click my signature to get a TLC kit and test your own, or check this international testing service to submit to a lab and get it tested.

I'm not an expert on enzymes, by any means, but there's more than just MAO to worry about. Grapefruit juice is a potent CYP2D6 inhibitor, which will disrupt the safe elimination of many compounds, including MDMA & amphetamines, and so should never be combined. And green tea is capable of inhibiting an enzyme that breaks down catecholamines, such as norepinephrine (increased by amphetamines), which on its own can lead to hypertensive crisis.

My first and last serotonin crisis occurred taking MDMA 6 hours after a vegetable curry, containing chili, ginger, black pepper and turmeric among other ingredients...all happily potentiating each other, no doubt!

Having learned the hard way, other than known combos (eg. aya), don't fuck with your enzymes before consuming RC's. It's a very complex, powerful system, which you rely on to get safely home again...!

This is an area I feel is frequently overlooked, but which is potentially rich in possibilities, if explored systematically and cautiously...

POTENT CYP2D6 INHIBITORS
Cannabidiol (from Cannabis)
Echinacea purpurea
Goldenseal
Pomegranate juice (Punica granatum)
Pummelo
Saint John’s Wort (high dose)
Starfruit juice
White grapefruit juice

MODERATE CYP2D6 INHIBITORS
Black pepper
Calamus EO
Kava
Piper cubeba
Quercetin
Zingiber aromaticum

WEAK CYP2D6 INHIBITORS
Alpha-asarone (found in Calamus EO)
Black cohosh
Capsaicin (found in cayenne pepper, habanero peppers, etc.)
Cayenne pepper
Common sage
Cryptotanshinone
Curcuma heyneana
Curcumin
German chamomile EO
Ginkgo biloba
Habanero pepper
Milk Thistle
Safrole
Tanshinone I
Turmeric

Also, I have never encountered pure white MDMA, it's always been tinted golden, and noticeably dense compared to other powders...so a little weighs a lot.

^ color doesn't indicate much. I have not personally encountered any white MDMA, butbi have seen some pure white stuff that tested clean on ecstasydata a few times & have a few friends who have had white MDMA that passed a full battery of reagent tests.
I have also had some small, very nicely shaped, translucent crystals that tested perfectly with reagents & TLC a month or so ago.

Gecko, you are deffinately lucky you made I through this, there has been deaths recently due to mmb-chmnaca or something similar being misrepresented as MDMA.
I can not even imagine what those poor souls endured. The drug they were mislead to be MDMA was a synthetic cannibinoid potent in the submilligram range, meaning a single mdma sized dose was an insanely massive overdose.
When you get some testing done would you mind reporting what you find back here?

Of course, I will surely report back. A chemist friend has sent me by Fedex a full box of reagents to one of my next stops, together with instructions. I should get there by Wednesday. I don't think I will be able to test for purity, but will at least try to identify the main substance.

What happened does seem like a massive overdose. I am still recovering, with occasional lapses. From time to time I still get very high for a minute or two. The BP and pulse are back to normal, and I managed to get some sleep this night for the first time since the event. There are occasional muscle cramps. The major problem - the chest pain, is still present and very unpleasant, and I have positively identified it as Acid Reflux. My esophagus is inflamed and causing problems, and I can attribute this 100% to the substance. But I am slowly recovering. Everything I find I will post here.

Thanks also to Man From Chan Chan for the useful info!

Sports drinks, lots of, should help to flush your system and get your mineral levels (ion channels) back to normal, which ought to help with cramps and chest-muscle pains.

Yoghurt and milk might help soothe your throat too.

And coconut water is also good.

Don't know what's available where you are...

Good luck!

Sounds to me like you ODd on a synthetic stimulant ala meth. Although the dose doesn't sound that big for it, maybe if you're not used to it?

Scary. Glad you made it thru.

Another example of why we should all have test kits.

Man from Chan hit the nail on the head. You consumed MAOs in large quantity before dosing - what did you expect to happen? Green tea and grapefruit juice should NEVER be taken with amphetamines. I hope you are ok. Please be careful in the future. The devil is in the details, the unknown unknowns are the ones that get you.

Probably that's true... the problem is that Green tea and Grapefruit juice are widely recommended supplements for MDMA. I basically followed the regimen from rollsafe.org, which is very popular.

null24 and Man From Chan Chan - thanks!

That is why it is important to do your own research. I don't mean to be harsh, but this was easily avoidable and horribly reckless. You're lucky not to have permanent brain or cardiac damage (which you might, you don't know until it's too late often times).

https://en.wikipedia.org...2%80%93drug_interactions
https://en.wikipedia.org...ki/MDMA#Pharmacokinetics





Seriously, a simple Google search takes less than 10 seconds. And mixing caffeine (the Green Tea extract) with MDMA is just asking for a stroke.

You're welcome, Geko, hope you're feeling better.

I had a look at the Rollsafe regimen. The GF tip appears to originate on a Subreddit:



But that sounds like somebody's ill-informed hunch, nothing more.

I know some supplements probably have their place, but I think before or after is probably better, rather than during. Directing people to polydose a range of supplements alongside an illicit substance of unknown purity, in the absence of trial data for said combo, is pretty questionable IMO.