Anti-Depressants & Psychedelics

[Symphonette]

Hello fellow psychonauts!

Throughout my journeys, I have learned much. And I'm eager to share with others. After a lot of time and effort, I have successfully de-stigmatized drugs for my mother; I even have gotten to the point where she's intrigued and ready to try DMT. But here's the catch, she has been taking anti-depressants for over a decade. Do these pharmaceuticals affect ones experience greatly? Tips on easing off anti-depressants? And what psychedelic do you feel has the greatest potential to work as a natural anti-depressant? It's very important for her not to slide down into a "hole." I'm edging towards psilocybin.

Namaste.

 

[DreaMTripper]

To ease off medication she needs to speak to her Dr its as simple as that. They do effect the mechanism of action yes.
Once shes off them you could look at mushrooms or ayahuasca/acacia concoctions.
Syrian rue extract has worked well for me as a holistic anti-depressant in the past, it is holistic as it produces introspective thoughts and heightened awareness, dream visons and has biological MAOI action. Possibly a better one for someone that doesnt smoke is sublingual harmalas.

 

[Synkromystic]

she has been taking anti-depressants for over a decade. Do these pharmaceuticals affect ones experience greatly?

They certainly do, but i'm not qualified to give an answer as to exactly how they effect it physically. I will however try to offer some other insight.

Participating in the psychedelic experience can and will at some point bring about a wide variety of thoughts and emotions and images. A lot of them are not pleasant to confront.

If one has been taking anti depressants for many years, I would start with very very low doses of psychedelics (and no maoi's depending on the medicine as there is a potentially dangerous interaction with maois) Generally people who go onto anti-depressants are ones that have a difficult time coping with errant thoughts, have self esteem issues, life and death issues, and have difficulty controlling emotions. Psychedelics, especially dmt will usually bring these problems to the surface, where as anti depressants will usually just try to mask the problem and hide it. I look at it kind of a like a bullet wound. There is a bullet deep inside and Anti depressants just put a bandage over the wound and the doctors say..its fixed...oh and pay me..:surprised Doing the real work of healing, one must remove the bullet (the source of the wound), and psychedelics can facilitate this greatly.

I have had many emotional disturbances in the past, and have been through a serious depression. Dmt made these worse for me for a while, but it also helped greatly in the long run. I was able to confront my fears, my self esteem issues, my addiction issues, my emotional problems, and through my intention and will power, I was able to heal tremendously. It was a truly amazing transition, which in reality has taking many many years, and is still going, but I have moved onto refining myself in much more subtle ways...as I have dealt with the major problems and live a peaceful clean sober life now ...but there is always work to be done to improve myself and to learn how to live more in harmony with everyone and everything around me.

Dmt will help to show you where the disharmony is, and will help YOU find the strength inside yourself to change it.

So, I guess in summarizing. Psychedelics could be just what that person on anti depressants needs, but one must be prepared to confront, and work through the dark side of the self, and that is usually not an easy process, and can take years....BUT it is incredibly rewarding to be free from so many internal struggles This is the most important!

 

[Symphonette]

Thank you both very much. I'll try to make her see that. Tell her to give psychedelics a try to cope with depression rather than just masking it as you said.

 

[Nathanial.Dread]

It largely depends on the antidepressant in question. Synkromystic makes some good points, however, there is a more fundamental one which is: will serotonergic psychedelics have any effects at all if you are also on antidepressants?

The answer varies, and most of my knowledge relates to psilocybin, not DMT.

SSRIs (which are some of the most prescribed antidepressants in the world, so that's what I'll assume she's on) increase synaptic serotonin concentrations, which means that, at any given time, a greater percentage of serotonin receptors are bound to a serotonin molecule. Since psychedelics like psilocybin are competitive agonists, the greater the concentration of serotonin, the fewer receptors are available to bind to the drug. This means that less of the drug binds, and so you need a higher dose.

Some people, who are on high doses of SSRIs may find that they get no effect from taking psychedelics at all - I have a friend on an extremely high dose of Zoloft for OCD and he needs to eat 3.5g of mushrooms before he gets even threshold effects.

Blessings
~ND

 

[Sandgrease]

I have taken Zoloft, Lexapro (SSRIs) and Welbutrin (sp?) (a dopamine and nonorepinephrine reuptake inhibitor) and Zoloft and Welbutrin at the same time daily for a few years.

You can trip on psychedelics while on SSRIs but the ssri will soften the experience, so you need to take more of said psychedelic. MDMA doesn't have the same psychedelic feel but will have all of the stimulating properties.

On Welbutrin (D/NERI) the stimulating properties of certain psychs (phens and Lysergamides because of the domdopamine structure) will last a lot longer making sleep almost impossible.

I began my psychedelic experimentation while on Zoloft alone and the experiences were qualitatively different than now since I'm off the SSRIs and the D/NERIs. I get way more anxious now because there's no antianxiety pharms blocking the anxiety caused by psychs. I used to eat higher doses and rarely freak out but now I am forced to take lower doses because of how intense the experience feels.


Tripping while on an SSRI is calmer, shorter duration but not necessarily less visual (visual aren't that important to me though).