I was watching a television show a while back, something like 'World's Toughest Prisons' or the like, that featured a British guy who went around the world staying various prisons as a prisoner and documenting the experiences. During his stay at a prison in Brazil, they had a group of prisoners who regularly engaged in a sanctioned ayahuasca ceremony where they smeared themselves up, head to toe, with what the guy called an ayahuasca mud. I had never heard of it being transdermal, and the idea of using ayahuasca for rehabilitation just blew me away. Thought I'd share the info...

Maybe another media-interpretation of urban legends? It's always difficult to know to which content it is really happening what we can see on the tv. I mean, at least, even if it is real; the idea of transdermal absorption of harmalas and dmt seems maybe quite possible to the prisoners - if it works or not. Autosuggestion WILL do the rest.

As aya is legal in Brazil, I think it's quite possible that the idea to use it in rehabilitation arose one moment or another, but it always seems so far out what they show on the tv-screens. Would be curious about it, if you remember the name.

It's on Netflix, I'll see if I can dig it up...
Got it!
The show is called "Inside the World's Toughest Prisons" The episode in question is titled "Brazil: The Gang Prison". It mentions something called Acuda, as a cleansing ritual with a mud infused with ayahuasca. It's about 45-48 minutes into the episode.

Psychedelics and criminal rehabilitation... if anything would work, it seems like that would certainly have the potential. Can you imagine, as a criminal, the possibility of being confronted by your victim or your victim's family while on a moderate dose of psilocybin? Is there a precedent to this sort of thing in maybe the LSD psychotherapy literature?
Edit: I'd love to see their statistics on recidivism if they are indeed using this mud as a rehab technique!

Edit:
Name that tune...
"Smear my body up with butter, and take me to the Freaker's Ball."

On a serious note though, anointing is a pretty ancient practice, and apparently commonly used oils like Olive for example have MAOI properties, but I had never heard of Ayahuasca being used transdermally like that.

From hear-say, I've heard of alcoholics throwing their bottles away after an aya ceremony.

An accident, a near death experience, a decease, a loss .... these traumatic things can change people's patterns. A serious aya ceremony, this little death, might well fit the row.

But the smearing is new to me. I guess this smearing of "aya infused mud" is not really a full blown aya brew, it could contain easily more constituents. Some aya ceremonies go hand in hand with flower baths in the periods surrounding the ceremony. It makes sense somehow.

It's a relief to hear they weren't using jenkem transdermally

But seriously, perhaps the transdermal route was chosen as a way of avoiding the nausea and vomiting which might prove inconvenient in a prison setting - and of course it's more than likely that the Acuda mud is not suitable for oral ingestion anyhow. An interesting question is how this practice evolved - was it originally devised as a means of smuggling ayahuasca into prisons, disguised as mud??

This reminds me also of flying ointments, so perhaps there are some tropane alkaloids in the mix. Those are definitely active when applied topically.

I got the impression that this was being sanctioned by the prison so not sure if it derived as a means to smuggle it in or not. I'd love to know more about this but information is obscure and the show only mentioned it briefly. It's the only reference I've ever seen to an Aya mud, or a topical application of it. The host of the show did say they didn't include the ayahuasca in the mud that day for his benefit, so I would assume it is active, but that's a complete assumption on my part.

Jesus, was jenkem real?

It probably isn't caapi+DMT, because if you would have found a way to take DMT transdermally, you wouldn't need caapi to activate it.

The title of what you where watchimg makes it sound like a discovery channel or nat-geo program though.

That would explain everything, as they both have earned themselves a reputation of beimg notorious bullshitters.

This was among my thoughts, too. It's not unheard of for the streetwise to put on a show for the gullible journalists, or for journalists to stage some kind of spectacle for the masses.

I appreciate the value of skepticism, but just based on the context of the show, it seems unlikely that it was just for the benefit of the host and there's some mainstream information on this practice as well...
but not much on the 'mud' aspect. Also I think it's relevant to mention that Brazil hasn't privatized their prison system, so they likely still have a legitimate interest in reform and apparently they are having some success in reducing recidivism there with this practice, according to some of the articles floating around.

https://www.nytimes.com/...brazilian-prisoners.html seems like an interesting piece for example. I was hoping maybe someone could comment on the bioavailability of using ayahuasca transdermally. Anointing is a pretty well known and ancient practice, and I think there's more to it than just rubbing oil on someone's forehead or feet for fun. Some of the oils they used in ancient times apparently have some MAOI properties, olive oil, for example, being amungst them (this was discussed briefly on a passiflora thread here recently). It would be really awesome if this was a viable ROA as it bypasses the gut entirely.

What about mixing the actives with something like DMSO (dimethyl Sulfoxide)?

Only problem with dmso is that it gives you a garlic smell for days, why I prefer MSM for pain problems. The good part of dmso without the stink. At your local walmart. Even good for migraines. But especially true of muscle aches. RE-methylates the cells for fast curing. Even have the book on DMSO natures pain killer. I take 2.5g of betaine (TMG) daily for it's muscle building and fat burning properties.

No way MAOI's and DMT would absorb topically.

What makes you think that? The practice of anointing has been around for a pretty good stretch.

Just an educated guess based on what I know of their pharmacology. I would bet it is either done as a practice that is either not meant to be psychoactive or that it contains other plants other than just the Caapi and Viridis.

I think it was Dennis McKenna that said tryptamines were small and narrow enough to slip into DNA, and many larger molecules than harmalas can definitely be absorbed transdermally. Not sure why folks are skeptical about this, it's a common and widely practiced method for dosing any number of substances, 'flying on broom sticks' comes to mind...

For one, DMT is not absorbed sublingually (freebase or salt), so I would be surprised if it absorbed through the skin.

I just have a hard time believing these folks are smearing their bodies up with ayahuasca infused mud for no particular reason, that said they consider just the cappi vine to be ayahuasca with the viridis component to be an optional admixture. I'm planning on going to Peru eventually, which isn't Brazil obviously, but will ask around and see what I can find out.

I figured I would link these two threads together...
"transdermal dmt research..."
https://www.dmt-nexus.me...1121535&#post1121535