Before I delve into my experience I want to say I’m not condoning datura use, it is a very powerful plant. It has a bad rap (and well earned) because of its physical dangers, reported fatalities, and generally the young do it to have a cheap and legal way to get ‘high’, these actions bring harsh consequences. This plant requires utmost respect and preparation. I used it a few times in psychoactive doses, it is not cool, it is not fun, it is dangerous. I have microdoses of it with all my entheogens, but I do not know if I’ll ever step foot in psychoactive doses again. This was what I can remember from my last experience, it lasted 16 hours. Remember I am by no means recommending datura. The dangerous trip is so real that you forget you’re tripping, you get fully immersed in the experience and you have to remind yourself that you ingested a plant and snap out of the lucidity every now and then. Best comparison is, when you’re in a dream and you don’t know you’re dreaming, but when you do realise there is no waking up.

I fasted for 24 hours before my trip. I had two trip sitters that took non-psychoactive doses of the datura to be on my frequency. I meditated deeply all morning seeking protection for myself and asking to manifest a guardian for my trip sitters (make a note). We smudged the house and we all proceeded to drink the tea I made. Each sitter had about 10% of the brew and I drank 80%. Off memory we used nine flowers, but this was many years ago and I cannot quite recall.

As my trip began I was struck by intense lethargy, I lay in my bed, stretched a little, and noticed things were looking a bit distorted, I didn’t think much. I decided to take a walk downstairs. I first went to walk into the lounge room, where the doorframe should’ve been was a naked very freakishly thin lady smoking a cigarette with bluish skin. Her waist was approximately 20cm in diameter and she had long straight black hair down to her breasts, her hair circled her head completely covering her face. I stood there looking at her in total awe. When I went to walk into the lounge her hand holding the cigarette went towards the (non-existent) door knob. Her hand then morphed into the door knob and she was holding the door shut and wouldn’t let me in. She told me I could not pass, I had a conversation with her but I don’t remember it. When I looked around me I realised these strange women were guarding every door in the house. I was still calm at this point (not freaking out), so I walked into the kitchen (the lady let me pass). I’ll never forget what I saw. There were 10-15 fairies flying around, about 10cm in height with beautiful wings, all different colours, leaving this fairy dust behind them as they moved. They appeared to be laughing, moving kitchen appliances around, opening cupboards, smashing plates, throwing things to each other, being very cheeky. I thought, “this is incredible, I have to tell my housemate (one of my trip sitters)”.

His room was down a hallway from the kitchen. As I walked down the hallway I saw something black in the corner, so I went to inspect. As I approached I heard sobbing, the black thing was actually a hunched over figure. The figure stood up and turned towards me. It was an elf-like creature with green skin, wearing black robes, with a black witch’s hat, I gathered she was an elven witch. She was in tears and said “help me”. With my current mentality I would engage with her, but being young and naïve I freaked out and ran to my housemates room. I started shouting and frantically banging on the door but I realised there was one of the doorframe ladies barring my entrance. I started arguing with her, pleading in panic, eventually she let me in. I threw the door open but my housemate wasn’t there, instead there was a gigantic black figure lumped on his bed, I quickly shut the door in shock. I looked out towards the kitchen, saw the pleading elf and the fairies and very much freaked out, so I opened the door again. The figure stood up on the bed, it was some kind of gigantic hell hound. I shut the door again, looked towards the kitchen, freaked out, opened my housemates door again. This time the hound stepped down from the bed, opened its eyes, they were piercing blue and misty, it growled at me. I then remembered I asked to manifest a guardian to protect my housemate and his girlfriend (my trip sitters), this calmed me a little.

I decided to run down the hallway, through the kitchen, where the lounge room was connected by the dining room, without any doors. When I walked into the lounge room I was taken by a feeling of calmness. We had two single couches and one triple couch, they all had floral designs. There were five (what I perceived as demons) sitting on the coaches. They had pale skin, were bony, no hairs, no eyes, no nose, huge mouths wide open full of razor sharp teeth and a snake tongue, and extremely long, thick, and sharp fingernails that resembled claws. The demons were stuck to the coaches with a sort of glad wrap covering their face and hands, same floral design on the glad wrap as the coach, but transparent. I couldn’t stop staring, I realised what I was looking at, schitzed out, and ran to the front door thinking maybe some fresh air will chill me out. Big mistake. When I opened the door my street was gone, outside was a mystical forest, full of the sounds of magical creatures. Instead of embracing it I thought, “no this isn’t happening”. I immediately closed the door turned around and froze in fear. In front of me was some form of strong entity, almost like a ruler, she made me buckle. She looked as if she had died, being hung, drowned, and set on fire at the same time. She was fucking scary. I went to run up the stairs to get away from her, but halfway up I got this intense vertigo, fell to my knees, and started frantically crawling. I turned my head to look behind me, she was at the bottom of the stairs staring directly at me. Unable to stand, I frantically started crawling up the stairs, I felt her presence moving towards me, I thought, “this is it I’m doomed”, but as her presence came over me I was filled with a bliss and peace I cannot put into words, it was so lovely. I looked into her and she is encountered by others on datura, some build a relationship with her. It’s speculated she represents Atropos the Greek goddess of death, after all the tropane alkaloid Atropine is named after her.

I walked to the top of the stairs and looked in the big mirror we had. My reflection walked out of the mirror and walked into the bathroom, I followed. I can’t remember what transgressed. I went back to my room to lie down in my bed. I looked at the ceiling, it was covered in 100s of strange bugs making an intricate web. The web strands turned into many tiny stars, the stars grew in size and exploded into colourful fractals. I looked over at my desk and my housemate and his girlfriend were there, I thought, “phew the trip is wearing off”, I started conversing with them. I looked over at my wardrobe, thought something doesn’t feel right, then back to my housemate, but he had vanished along with his girlfriend, I then realised it had only been a few hours, the trip was just starting. All I remember is getting naked and just glimpses of the rest of the trip. I don’t remember much.

My housemate said he was with me the whole time, even though I couldn’t see him, I was naked talking to beings that weren’t there, talking to inanimate objects. I was talking in tongues not English, but it was as if I was speaking another language not gibberish. I had blurry vision for a week after. If I ever decide to do a psychoactive dose of datura again I will be a lot more open and involved with creatures and see what they have to offer.

As you can see this is not recreational, should never be done in public, requires at least one trip sitter, if you dare try it then do it very responsibly with preparation and respect for the plant, and this is not for the feint hearted, it is not cool, it is not fun. It can land you in hospital or a psychiatric ward.

hahahahaha DAMN. That's some wild stuff. Fascinating to read! Though I don't have the smallest inclination on following in your footsteps. It reminds me of the first time I saw naked lunch as a young person - I was so warped

How did you feel after the trip? Did you feel poisoned? Hungover? Was there a feeling that persisted, do you think this experience changed you in a way? Do you think you saw something that has some inherent existence, or do you interpret it as mere hallucinations?

Well there was like this blurred vision for a week. No hangover but neither a feeling of any kind of accomplishment. It really opened my mind up significantly and made me question the existential nature of reality. I realised I was very superficial and too quick to judge a book by its cover, DMT helped me solve this problem, datura showed it to me. At the time I was a little self-centred, so I presume the elf was a manifestation representing my selfishness. I was too young and immature to analyse experiences like I do now so I’m unsure about the inherent value of the trip. But I was a scared little boy (I was 22) and that manifested everywhere in my trip.

Datura is interesting.
It is similar in action to large doses of Dramamine.
There is a concern about lesions on the brain from it however alcohol causes similar issues.
I have had a friend who experimented with Datura and he had major personality change reported by his family and friends.

It was traditionally used for rites of passage into adulthood by the Navaho thus exploiting the personality change purposefully, however it's use was discontinued.

I experimented a with Dramamine and marazine at high doses perhaps a dozen times or so and had conversations with things and people who don't exist. It was engaging despite being trivial.I recall having conversations with werewolves, and a friend saw me and told me he had never seen anyone as messed up as that. I was however still able to talk with him and explain that I knew I was messed up, that the people I was talking to didn't exist, but that when I was talking to them I didn't know they didn't exist, it was only when I was informed that they were not there that I knew they weren't. I knew I was experiencing a false reality and I could not do anything to help it. I did however avoid going out in public or endangering myself. It is worth noting that the first time I ever took such a thing I was entirely incapable of knowing that what I thought was there was not. Lucky for me the first time I did it I was videotaped. I was insisting that things were there that were not. It was humbling to watch and it enabled me to understand my delusion later when I tried it again. However if I had used it only once or had not been videotaped things might have been very different.

It taught me a lot about perception.

Yes I’ve heard that Dramamine has similar effects. Good to know first hand.

You are lucky to have such a coherent recollection of the experience. That doesn't always happen. It can realy distort the memory.

The amnesia it can promote is the reason it is known to cause personality change and was used as a rite of passage substance.

However I have heard that such use usually involves large doses over a period of days causing a person to delirious and delusional for many days, after which they remembered very little of their past and would even be given a new name in the traditional use.

It was also used for nefarious purposes. To intoxicate slaves and spouses to make it easy to bury them alive in ritual funerals was a primary use. It is used in cimora, however even the name cimora has negative connotations. It is used to poison people to enable them to be raped and murdered in the Middle East and India, typically by adding the seeds to wine.

I've added a few seeds to brews of cacti, mushrooms and such as an anti nausea component.
I love the plants and have often grown them for their breathtaking beauty, including Brugmansia as well as several Datura species.
If you handle the plant and rub your eyes it can cause a spectacular effect of pupil dilation without causing harm, the effect is temporary but patents of children who have this happen often panic about it.
It is said to be smoked for asthma, I don't have asthma but I have experimented with smoking small amounts and I noticed no effects at the doses I tried, but they would not have been active if ingested either.