Okay, so I joined this site a few years ago when I was especially young and irresponsible. I had every intention of using psychedelics to their full potential and learning something about the nature of my own mind. The only problem was I had friends that influenced me in negative ways and I tripped at some inopportune times and places. One particular time was a mushroom trip that rocked me to my core and sent me into a full blown psychotic episode.

It was night time. I had only eaten about 2.5 grams of my p. cubensis, and my friend had about the same. I know that isn't much, and I've done stronger doses before, but man did it rock me. It started off ok. Me and my friend were in his room just enjoying the effects and talking about who knows what. Then I had to pee. I went downstairs walked into the bathroom to find it gutted. I had no idea they were doing work to it and for some reason it scared the living sh*t out of me. Then I look around the corner and his mom gives me the meanest stare I've ever seen in my life(or that's how it seemed).

She was like, " Hey I think Lenny(my friends stepdad) has your skateboard." So i turned around and Lenny was standing right outside the door. I go to walk out there and it seems to me like theres enough room to walk past him, but I accidentally bump him. That's when everything went to hell in a hand basket. Everyone sitting out there on the front porch was drunk and this one guy straight cusses me out in the meanest way possible for bumping into Lenny. I'm in this hypersensitive state so it just penetrates into my soul. I feel like everyone is yelling at me and then they point behind me and theres a cop car right behind me.

This is what sent me into a psychotic frenzy. I'll spare you all the details of why I thought this, but I thought his Mom had called the cops on me and told them I was growing mushrooms. As soon as I saw the cop car I ran into the woods in the dark and didn't stop running.( I knew those woods pretty well, they cut through to another neighborhood)

Let me cut this down. Long story short, I ran around like a maniac living out a sick paranoid delusion and thinking nothing but horrible thoughts about my self and my life. I lost my skateboard, ended up on the roof of some trailer somehow and had no idea how I got there. I ended up running all the way to my girlfriends house thinking the cops are after me the whole time. I accidentally woke her father up who had no idea i did this stuff and he gave me a ride home and I told him everything. He actually drove me back around by my friends house where we saw that there a bunch of cops and there was clearly a party being broken up. But I was still convinced of my fantasy!

I faced my demons that night, and it has taken me a long time to be able to do any psychedelic again. I know it was all because I was in a terrible setting and just went about everything in the wrong way, but I felt that I wasn't ready for them after that and I had plenty of time in my life to explore consciousness.

So here I am. I have a decent job and a good situation in life. I still have the same girlfriend but no other friends that I see regularly. I'm a loner, and it's really not that bad.

Ahh, don't hate yourself for that incident lol, same thing happened to one of my buddies while we were all tripping together, except there was nothing that triggered him he just lost it, took off his clothes, asked a random girl if she wanted to have sex, ran away from us and did laps around the huge park for 3 hours until we found him sobered hahaha. It's gonna be a while before he does psychedelics I'm guessing. It's kinda scary how much you can convince yourself, on psychedelics, of things that you wouldn't even have to think about twice when ur sober. I've come close to losing it, but I always manage to tell myself I'm just tripping and slowly calm down.

Anyways, that kind of stuff happens to people all the time, you were just in a bad setting and I guess you learned your lesson lol. Don't let one bad trip take away from all other great ones. If you feel you've grown past the issues you faced in that last one then I would say you're ready to explore again.

Another tip, if I start thinking about any problems in my life, insecurities, relationships etc. I always make sure I handle those first before even thinking about going on another trip. Because then the next trip will just be based around things I've already been shown, what's the point?

Good luck and safe tripping

Good point. It is very easy to get lost in terror or paranoia if one doesn't have a good grounding on one's own mind. Meditation helps a lot with this. I find when I meditate I can go harder at the sports I love in the face of fear because fear doesn't seem so apparant. It is when I am in my normal every day ego mind thinking thinking thinking that I am out of control and simple things become big when they don't need to be. Like a disagreement will turn in to argument only because both people are trapped in to a certain frame of mind that makes it worse because of it's ignorance...

Once mind control or at least maturity of experience has been established it is easier stand back from dominating thoughts, psychosis or fears and just be passive towards everything.

Also OP, there is nothing wrong with having no friends. I would prefer no company than bad company. At least you have a human female to play around with Perhaps now your gf's dad respects you more for being honest with him

Only 2 years ago you were young and irresponsible? lol, just noticing the date your profile was made

Not everyone needs psychedelics and sometimes you need a break. I took a 3 year break from all mind altering substances at one point so I could focus on meditation only - when I started working with psychedelics again my relationship to them had totally changed in the best way.

BTW - once I freaked out so bad on LSD that I woke up in a hospital in a padded room 8 hours later.... I was altered for something like 20 hours straight in total, so I was feeling it hard when I woke up in the hospital.... Yet even after this experience I found out eventually how to respect the substances I work with and found a much better balance.

I have friends who do psychedelics at parties and I dont indulge with them anymore. Havent done anything at a party in years.... But I do ceremonies on my own at home, or in nature, or in Peru.... More then anything they have taught me how to find more joy in my life, how to be a more caring person, and how to follow my dreams. I wouldnt have as many blessings in my life without these plants. I'd be fine, but right now I am better then fine

Describing your life as "not that bad" sounds not that good to me either.... Maybe you didnt mean it that way, but maybe one day you will describe things as "the most awesome ever" - I think that would be great!

Stay well! And dont grow up too fast

If you look at it from a different perspective, that horrible experience led you to rethink your behavior and grow up...

Probably that was the point of the whole trip

Don't feel bad, this kind of thing has happened to many of us. I never thought it would, having already tripped countless times, but neglecting my set/setting (and especially smoking weed on the come up, which for me is already very psychedelic on it's own and anxiety producing at times) has led to two similar experiences.

Hyper-suggestibility + hyper-active imagination can lead to some serious delusions when we let fear take the wheel.

It's very hard to get back on the horse after these experiences but ample recovery time, meditation, and productive/healthy living in general are the biggest menders as you probably know. Easing back into it slowly is very helpful.

Thanks for having the courage to overcome this, and to share this experience with us

People never think it will happen to them until it does

Once several years ago on a mushroom trip I was convinced that I was in a lucid dream and acted out the idea of burning down my house with alcohol (it was below the proof to catch fire, I do think my subconscious saved me on that) also I suppose it was significant in the metaphorical sense. So after throwing a candle to whiskey, I ran half naked up my street and almost broke into a Walgreens (the only reason I did not is from my techniques in lucid dreaming, I preformed a reality check which told me that I was in reality, so I did not proceed further). I then walked up to a school hoped a fence, pissed on a playground swing, climbed through the woods, then I wound up at a church knocking on the door in the hopes of talking to an angel. I was instead greeted by the most psychedelic house gecko I have ever seen who sent me the message to go home. Which I did and was relieved to find, aside from the stain on my carpet that my house was in perfect shape.

This experience both terrified me and changed my life, for the better. It took a long time to integrate as I in every drug setting have been in have been seen as the "responsible" one. This shattered my sense of self and my ego. And thank goodness, upon reflecting on all that I had done it was cathartic to me, though I did feel some shame for a bit of time.

I have never had the courage to tell that much of the story, and believe me it is much deeper and much more personal, but upon reading your story, I felt compelled. You are not alone. These chemicals are tools for teaching us about ourselves and about our souls, sometimes the lessons are harsh but necessary. I feel like I am a much wiser and better person today because of that experience, it quashed my arrogance, and gave me empathy towards those who feel out of control.

I had a pretty bad experience one time with mushrooms...so like others have said, I wouldn't beat yourself up too much.

I had eaten 3.5 of some potent homegrown golden teachers and went out for a walk at the nearest park (as per usual...this park has trails that go throughout the city so it was a favorite place to go while tripping). During this particular trip, my girlfriend (now ex-girlfriend) called me on the phone and broke up with me...WTF?...A girl I had been with for 6 years!

Naturally, I was horrified/heartbroken/crushed and couldn't make sense of anything and I started to panic. I sprinted all the way back to my apartment, crying like a damn baby the whole way there. All sorts of people staring at me as I raced down the street...or so it seemed, I mean I was tripping hard after all...

When I finally got back to my apartment, my soon to be ex-girlfriend was nowhere to be found so I straight freaked out! I couldn't control myself at that point. I was overcome with grief and was acting like a madman...The neighbor below called security of course because I was being very loud so that only added to my distress...Eventually I called my mom and had her talk me down while the concerned security officer had 911 ready to dial (I did not tell him I was tripping...I was apparently coherent enough to tell him my GF had just broken up with me and that was why I was acting irrational...I don't know if he bought the whole story but he never had to call the cops or an ambulance so theres that...).

I'm telling you what, that trip felt like the end of the world. I swore off mushrooms for about 6 months after that...I had ounces and ounces of homegrown just sitting in the freezer until I was ready to face them again.

So even with proper set and setting (that day had originally been a great day up until that phone call) things can go surprisingly wrong. It is good that you were able to face your demons man. And when you are ready to go deep again, you'll know. Psychedelics have a funny way of telling you when you're ready and they slap you silly if you were ill prepared...

Thanks for sharing and good luck with any and all future psychedelic adventures/endeavors!

Hey thanks for all the positive feedback guys. It's nice to hear that I'm not the only crazy one.

Holy crap, i couldn't get past this line... You lucky soul. Only a few years. I can't tell if I'm crying or laughing.

Oh man, I'll get back to you.

I didn't say I wasn't still young and irresponsible, but I've seriously gotten a lot better at resisting negative influences and making responsible decisions.

And yeah I'm a youngin' . I'll be 21 in November.

I'm just saying I'm nearly a half century wandering this rock, being terribly immature and irresponsible. I'm just jealous man, that's all. Reading your whole post now, maybe post something constructive....

EDIT: SMART ASSERY ABOVE,CONSTRUCTIVE CONTRIBUTION BELOW

okay, okay, yeah don't be so hard on you. I've been there. Mushrooms have a way of getting weird on me in a way other psychedelics I'm familiar with don't. It sounds like your setting here was very sub par.

I don't have to go over the basics of set and setting, i know. You're a little put off by that experience and don't want it repeated. Here's how to knock that karma out of your life. Plan better.

Taking psychedelics in a more controlled setting, with supportive and beneficial people will inspire hopefully many posts in the future in your part telling us all how you're moving into the future with deliberation with their help. I'm pretty sure we've all had one crap mushroom trip.

And man, really, i was teasing earlier....

Kids, i swear...