This is gonna be lengthy, but bear with me. Some explanation about me is needed first. I'm generally a pretty emotion-deprived person by nature. Not emotionless, but people have pointed out my lack of emotional involvement in things on more than one occasion. I live with my grandma, and my mom lives up the driveway from me. Me and my mom have a good relationship. She's usually very supportive of me and I can talk to her about just about anything. I always say my mom is one of my best friends. My grandma is overbearing and angry all the time and seems to be obsessed with negativity. I love her, but needless to say, we don't get along all the time. This frustrates me, but there seems to be no way around it. The power plant I refer to is across a horse field across the road from me. On the edge of the horse field is a pond, and between the pond and the power plant is all woods. The "cave" near the pond is a three-walled wooden cubby in the side of a hill. It was probably part of a stable or something at some point.

First off, what I experienced is impossible to describe, even for such a light experience. How people describe complex, ego-destroying trips is beyond me. This report, long as it is, still isn't as detailed or comprehensive as I'd like it to be. Anyway, here goes:

I drank my rue tea at 12:50 and set my ipod timer for 30 minutes. I then set off for the power plant, with a smile on my face and optimism on high. I knew that I would be having my very first trip within an hour or so, after studying psychedelics for well over a year. Along the way to the power plant I decided the pond would be the best place for tripping. I took a long route to the pond to kill some time. There were about six minutes left on my timer when I got there, so I listened to some Tool until I felt like drinking the Acacia brew. I stated my intention before drinking: "To learn more about myself and the realm I'm about to enter". The brew tasted absolutely horrendous, like a mix of rotted pecan husk and fermented lemon juice, with a hint of foot sweat. Even now, I shudder every time I think of it. Anyway, after 20 minutes or so I felt altered. My equilibrium was off, my thoughts were racing, and light looked different somehow, though I can't explain exactly how. I laid down on the ground in front of the "cave" on the western side of the pond. Nausea was fully apparent at this point and movement made me uncomfortable. As the effects slowly intensified, I started panicking. I kept moving to different spots on the ground in desperation for comfort. I realized that this was only the very first step of a long journey, and that it would only increase in intensity from that point on. I told myself it would be four hours, and that I would need to get it under control before the trip peaked. At this point I decided that I should go home and relax in the comfort of my familiar bedroom. Easier said than done.

As I stood up to walk home, the nausea and disequilibrium hit me like a wall. I made myself throw up, stumbled for 20ft or so, and sat back down. I stayed there for a few minutes trying to puke, then gave up, changed direction, and walked a little farther than the last time. It was discouraging to not be able to walk correctly. I laid down in the sun and tried to force myself into a good mood. I put on Bob Marley so that I could relax, but only had minimal success. I had a few moments of peace, but was distraught over the fact that I was alone in nature, with no one to confide in. (This is very unusual for me, since I usually love being alone in nature and rarely ever confide in anyone.) I felt like I needed some tangent of normalcy or familiarity to keep me grounded. Naturally, I wanted to explain it to my mom, hoping that she would make me feel better. This gave me the motivation to get up and finally walk home, after what seemed like two hours. Time was distorted at this point, so it's hard to tell how long I actually stayed there. It seemed to take much longer to walk back across the horse field than it did earlier, even though I was walking faster and straighter on the way back. I was disappointed with the trip at this point because of the nausea and negative emotions I felt. Some time during my walk, I thought "That's a horse, that's a barn, and this is a trip". I was feeling pessimistic about the trip at that point.

I finally made it back home, and was relieved to see that my grandma was talking to the neighbors. I was thankful for that, because she always overreacts when I tell her I'm sick. Instead, I told my mom that I was sick, and to come check on me in a few minutes. I went in the house, then quickly proceeded to grab the bottle of water out of the fridge, the trash can out of the bathroom, and everything out of my pockets. I took my pants off and laid in bed for a while before getting up and puking again. Again, I had to force myself to puke. (I never once felt like I absolutely needed to puke, I was just trying to get everything out. Despite my best efforts, barely anything came out. I was glad it didn't later.) As I was doing this my mom came in, followed closely by my grandma. My grandma was overreacting as usual, which I found to be highly irritating. Eventually she left and I was able to explain the situation to my mom. She reacted as I expected her to, and it seemed to calm her down a little. (That might sound ridiculous to anyone but me!) That made me feel much better. By the time she left I had begun to reach the peak.

The outlines of things blurred and multiplied in a mildly fractal fashion. This wasn't a full-blown visual show, but more of a patterning effect. It stayed with me for the duration of the trip. At one point I looked at my shoes on the floor, which turned into a strip of about 6 shoes. That was one of the more dramatic effects. My physical discomfort slowly subsided as I began to settle into this headspace. Before I knew it, all of my discomfort was gone, replaced with complete and total happiness and euphoria. Suddenly, the idea of music hit me like a bolt of lightening. Music! Beautiful, beautiful music! I picked up exactly where I left off at the pond. It sounded like a celebration. At least that's the best way I can describe it. It sounded to me like Bob Marley himself was congratulating me on a job well done. I looked at myself in the mirror and gave myself a thumbs-up. "You did it!", I told myself. I closed my eyes and began to sing along to the music. It wasn't long until my grandma came to the doorway and asked who I was talking to. She had a puzzled look on her face, so I couldn't help but to smile in amusement. I simply told her "music". She felt my forehead and said I had a fever, then felt my hand and said it was blue. She said that she had never seen anything like that before. She looked worried, but I kept insisting that I was fine and that I wanted to just go to sleep. She left without incident. Shortly after, my mom came in and asked if I was alright. I told her I was fine, with a huge grin on my face. She smiled and said "ok", and left me be. This made me happy, seeing that my mom wasn't upset with me for doing something like this. At this point, the dimensions of the room were skewed and warped slightly. The difference between open and closed eyes became harder to discern. I knew when my eyes were open, but I kept visualizing my room and seeing my grandma pop in every once in a while, which made me open my eyes and check every time. I also visualized myself at the pond a few times, but I knew I was at home in my bed, so it didn't worry me too much.

Then the loops started. Infinite loops of thought that seemed to last hours, or even days, before repeating again in a flawlessly fluid manner. Every time I repeated a thought, it seemed like so long ago since the last time I thought of it. The thoughts were also getting more complex with every repetition and eventually formed about three or four intertwined loops. "This is a trip", I told myself, mocking my pessimistic attitude from before. I was in a perfect state of Nirvana. A perfect mix of bliss, ecstasy, excitement, and awe. I eventually came to the realization that I'm perfectly content with the life I'm living. Not necessarily the way it is, but the way I could potentially make it. Although I am happy with myself, even with my flaws. I came to love myself for who I am, not who I percieved myself to be before. (I'm hard on myself, and tend to focus more on my flaws than anything else.) I learned that life is exactly what you make of it. Bad things happen, but the way you react to it makes a huge difference in the way it impacts your life. A positive outlook is the most important thing for leading a life of happiness and fulfillment. I know that as long as I apply myself towards my goal, whatever it may be, I'll be happy. Everything will work out exactly as it should, just as long as I'm not sitting stagnant. Satisfied with my revelation, I just laid in bed in a state of inner peace and utter contentedness until the trip was over. I guess this was something like meditation. I spent some time trying to alter my perception of the room to some success. Corners seemed to have more depth to them, for example. Some other things were going on too that are harder to describe. These visual distortions slowly tapered off as the trip came to an end, but the mental after-effects stayed with me well into the next day.

To summarize this trip, I'd have to say this... It was rough at first, but I believe it was exactly what I needed, exactly when I needed it. It was perfect. I wouldn't change a thing about it, except maybe that horrible taste. I wouldn't even change the panicky parts, because now I know exactly how to deal with it. I'm thankful for that. The total duration of the trip was about six hours, but I couldn't map that time out if I tried.

After the trip, I ate some chicken noodle soup and tried to explain the experience to my mom. I failed miserably, of course. But she seemed to get the jist of what I was saying. She doesn't necessarily approve of psychedelics, but she did seem interested in what wikipedia had to say about ayahuasca. In the days following this, I helped my grandma around the house more than usual, feeling like I owed it to her for worrying her so much. I also explained my experience more to my mom. She now seems to understand it more for what it is.

I'm in the process of cold-brewing another Acacia brew and plan on using it within the next few days, but in a more responsible setting. I don't want to worry my grandma too much.

Anyway, thanks for reading this long report!

Thanks for sharing, good read.

Having a calm setting is important, I would imagine having someone check on you who didn't know what you were doing would add a lot of stress to it. Maybe since your mom knows about it now you can ask her to watch next time in a setting without grandma around? If you feel comfortable with it, alone can work -- but warning on alone: with higher doses you can completely lose reality. I would worry about outdoor tripping near water to drown in, or anything else that could hurt you. Higher doses can completely replace your open eye vision and reality.

friken, good advice, thanks.

Yeah, having my grandma check on me did distract me from going as deep as I feel I could have, and some time was spent wondering what she was thinking. ("Does she know I'm tripping?" And subsequent thoughts.)

I considered my mom as a sitter, but, although she understands why I drank aya and what I gained from it, she has no psychedelic experience of her own. She doesn't know what goes on during a trip, so she might freak out if I start having a bad trip or something. Plus I find it hard to concentrate with someone watching me, which wouldn't be good for introspective purposes.

Because of this, I feel it would be best for me to trip alone most of the time. Most of my fear stemmed from the fact that I didn't know what to expect. Now that I have a general idea of what to expect, I think I should be fine. I know how happy I was during my last trip, so that gives me all the optimism I need to get past that initial fear.

I'm still quite a newbie myself, so grain of salt w/ any advice I have.

In 5 mimosa tea/rue trips so far ranging from high dose to low dose, I can say for me the higher the dose the more intense fears are and for various reasons. Here are some of the things that caused some fear for me in higher dosages:

- completely losing open eye visuals regardless of eyes open/closed

- realizing I have 0 ability to interact with the 'real world'

- worry about lying down and choking on my own vomit

- focusing on breath to verify I was still alive and losing ability to hear that breath anymore

- fear of death as you ride the wave going to ego death.

- fear of a 'presence' with me awaiting right out of sight. waiting for me to relax so it can have it's way with my mind.

- feeling lost in time. time dilation is common and the higher the dose the more severe it is. as doses are higher I lose a sense of 'I' and forget I exist am human etc. I assume this is what other refer to as ego death. when that happens to me I go through waves with complete ego loss at the peaks and vague memory that 'I' am in the valleys. On the comedown, as the periods I recall 'I' exist get longer I feel completely insane. We are talking padded room wearing a straight jacket insane. I really feel like I will never make fully back to an 'I' state of being.

- fear of anything you carry with you in normal life will be amplified if you allow yourself to focus on it during the trip.

All of the above is just my 2 cents on things to consider and to expect so you can relax if they happen to you. Just keep reminding yourself to not fight the experience and let it go where it goes.

I had a touch of points 1 & 4 in my trip, and can definitely see how that would result in fear. All the rest seems more worrying than those two points though.

A mix of some (or all) of these things would be pretty scary, I would imagine.

I completely agree with going along with the trip. I knew I shouldn't have fought it, yet somehow I managed to do it anyway. That's part of what freaked me out at first.