PsyloCiBeen
In Silence I Been
Dear Nexians,
This is a tale long overdue. I guess I was severely traumatized and I needed the space and time to completely understand and reevaluate my relationship with the plants and the experience. It lead to me taking a long break from everything. Although in the end it was the Nexus that saved me, but the pain was excruciating and I thought it would never end. It is a reminder of how useful the chat is when experienced and empathetic members are online and how useful the search function is on this site. This is also a lesson in preparation technique regarding the mighty Grandfather cactus and what not to do.
Preparation: My friend who has a whole host of Peruvian torches on his property told me how a couple of them had fallen during the storm the previous night. I am growing a few but I was not yet ready to cut some for a brew yet. His were lying on the ground and since he knows my penchant for brewing the sacred Huachuma he wanted to know if I would like to have to take the fallen cactus and make one of my brews with it. I tell you dear friends I needed no further encouragement. But with the demands of day to day life and he was away I eventually made it to his place on a Sunday. By then the pieces were laying for about a week on the ground. I picked up two long sections about a meter each and proceeded to stow them in my wagon. I thanked him profusely as I drove off. Wandering when will be the opportune time to do my brew. It would have to be next weekend it already being late in the day and I do not have the time at present. The problem was I was going away till the next weekend. Well I said maybe I can start the brew and then freeze it and re-brew when I get back. Seemed like a good idea at the time. I have some ideas where I went wrong with this brew. I am sure this was one of them but not the main reason.
I returned home the following week and started rebrewing from Friday night through it Saturday. I often used to make a brew that was about 750ml from a meter of cactus. I had chopped up pieces of the other cactus and left it to dry for 3 weeks to replant. This time I had almost 2 meters of cactus and I wanted to boil it down to a more concentrated dose as I was trying to experiment with making resin and also because I believed less liquid would be kinder on my stomach. Normally I would sit around and watch the brew, light incense and meditate on the shapes I see arising in the foam. Scooping out the foam, adding the limes or lemon and blowing incense over it (shamans use scared tobacco but I have given up smoking and this is the closest analog to it so blowing and wafting incense over my brew is what I do). This time around I was more cavalier. I lit the incense next to the stove and left it simmering occasionally coming to check on the batch. Biggest mistake. After almost 7 hours of brewing I miscalculated how long it would take to reduce to a cup at the last stage when I returned to the stove it was a blackish brown liquid with only half a cup left. The foam turned to white streaks within the liquid I simply stirred it in (another misstep) and bottled it. I planned to use it the next morning so I kept it in the fridge.
The Experience: The next morning I went across to the cottage and locked the door at 5am in the morning. Again I burnt some paolo santo and played some of Ayahuascheros from my playlist. I had my guitar and tambourin with me and tried a rhythm but nothing really felt in synch. I then proceeded to drink the brew a shot glass at a time. It didn't taste bad at all and after an hour it appeared that I drunk the entire half cup. Probably my third mistake.
It did not take long before the Huachama took hold of me. I felt it straight in my stomach furst and staggered back to my house. It was morning and my partner and son were awake. I felt the cactus coming on but the pain in my stomach was getting intense. However soon I was feeling very blissful and the clouds and grass was breathing beneath me. My partner looked at me and asked me what did I take. I told her. And then we sat together on the couch on the porch the three of us and enjoyed the Sunday morning. I was feeling wonderful then. Images of deserts and chameleons flashed behind my eyes and the sky was alive. When I managed to meditate under a tree alone I almost felt as if I was moving with the earth. We truly enjoyed the morning but then the vomiting started in the afternoon and it was unrelenting. I could keep nothing down no limes no water I felt as if I was purging continuously. I was following a very bad diet at the time lots of meat etc and it was almost as if i was being purged of it all though it was mostly clear. This continued till the evening, I could not relax and my stomach turned into a hard ball extending out from me. I began to feel afraid I logged onto the nexus chat and asked for help immediately @Pandora was there thankfully and helped me with some helpful advice on downward dog yoga poses and identified the problem as gas, which was extremely helpful and oddly comforting at the same time because now I knew what it was I was dealing with. @CosmicLion was also online and it was good to have some support from him too. Just knowing I wasn't suffering alone was reassuring. My partner was also physically with me with a worried look but trying to assist so I was in good hands. But nothing truly helped and I couldn't sleep the whole night, by the morning I been up for more than 24 hours and had still not eaten or couldn't keep anything down. I was searching the nexus the whole night and found out that someone had a similar problem to mine. By @explorer7 titled severe bloating with san pedro from 2016. @Poekus provided extremely valuable advice when he suggested Rennies or calcium carbonate to reduce the bloating. As soon as the shops opened we went yo get some. I chewed two of them. Immediately within half hour the pain in my stomach stopped and I was able to eat some toast. I kept my diet bland and went back to being vegetarian for a while. The experience was quite sobering. Normally San Pedro is very gentle with me and the transcendental state was magnificent but the body load was heavy and I cautiously stayed of the psychedelics for a while afterwards. I have returned but it took quite a while and the experience left me doubting my abilities of working with these medicines and started some real sober soul searching within. But that's a tale for another day. I hope from this negative experience at least a few lessons can be learnt. Lord knows I certainly have a learnt alot about harvesting, intention, respect, pacing and dosage and especially praises are sung to the glorious calcium carbonate, I will always make sure I have some on hand too before a travelling I go .. but I wouldn't wish for that experience again or for it to happen to anyone and this is why I have decided to share my tale so that others will learn from my mistakes and here also I must express my gratitude to the wonderful members on the Nexus especially those with me on the chat that day and the members posts I mentioned above. I am extremely grateful for your kind and help and practical advice, I wouldn't know what would have happened without you guys or if I didn't have the information on this amazing site.
This is a tale long overdue. I guess I was severely traumatized and I needed the space and time to completely understand and reevaluate my relationship with the plants and the experience. It lead to me taking a long break from everything. Although in the end it was the Nexus that saved me, but the pain was excruciating and I thought it would never end. It is a reminder of how useful the chat is when experienced and empathetic members are online and how useful the search function is on this site. This is also a lesson in preparation technique regarding the mighty Grandfather cactus and what not to do.
Preparation: My friend who has a whole host of Peruvian torches on his property told me how a couple of them had fallen during the storm the previous night. I am growing a few but I was not yet ready to cut some for a brew yet. His were lying on the ground and since he knows my penchant for brewing the sacred Huachuma he wanted to know if I would like to have to take the fallen cactus and make one of my brews with it. I tell you dear friends I needed no further encouragement. But with the demands of day to day life and he was away I eventually made it to his place on a Sunday. By then the pieces were laying for about a week on the ground. I picked up two long sections about a meter each and proceeded to stow them in my wagon. I thanked him profusely as I drove off. Wandering when will be the opportune time to do my brew. It would have to be next weekend it already being late in the day and I do not have the time at present. The problem was I was going away till the next weekend. Well I said maybe I can start the brew and then freeze it and re-brew when I get back. Seemed like a good idea at the time. I have some ideas where I went wrong with this brew. I am sure this was one of them but not the main reason.
I returned home the following week and started rebrewing from Friday night through it Saturday. I often used to make a brew that was about 750ml from a meter of cactus. I had chopped up pieces of the other cactus and left it to dry for 3 weeks to replant. This time I had almost 2 meters of cactus and I wanted to boil it down to a more concentrated dose as I was trying to experiment with making resin and also because I believed less liquid would be kinder on my stomach. Normally I would sit around and watch the brew, light incense and meditate on the shapes I see arising in the foam. Scooping out the foam, adding the limes or lemon and blowing incense over it (shamans use scared tobacco but I have given up smoking and this is the closest analog to it so blowing and wafting incense over my brew is what I do). This time around I was more cavalier. I lit the incense next to the stove and left it simmering occasionally coming to check on the batch. Biggest mistake. After almost 7 hours of brewing I miscalculated how long it would take to reduce to a cup at the last stage when I returned to the stove it was a blackish brown liquid with only half a cup left. The foam turned to white streaks within the liquid I simply stirred it in (another misstep) and bottled it. I planned to use it the next morning so I kept it in the fridge.
The Experience: The next morning I went across to the cottage and locked the door at 5am in the morning. Again I burnt some paolo santo and played some of Ayahuascheros from my playlist. I had my guitar and tambourin with me and tried a rhythm but nothing really felt in synch. I then proceeded to drink the brew a shot glass at a time. It didn't taste bad at all and after an hour it appeared that I drunk the entire half cup. Probably my third mistake.
It did not take long before the Huachama took hold of me. I felt it straight in my stomach furst and staggered back to my house. It was morning and my partner and son were awake. I felt the cactus coming on but the pain in my stomach was getting intense. However soon I was feeling very blissful and the clouds and grass was breathing beneath me. My partner looked at me and asked me what did I take. I told her. And then we sat together on the couch on the porch the three of us and enjoyed the Sunday morning. I was feeling wonderful then. Images of deserts and chameleons flashed behind my eyes and the sky was alive. When I managed to meditate under a tree alone I almost felt as if I was moving with the earth. We truly enjoyed the morning but then the vomiting started in the afternoon and it was unrelenting. I could keep nothing down no limes no water I felt as if I was purging continuously. I was following a very bad diet at the time lots of meat etc and it was almost as if i was being purged of it all though it was mostly clear. This continued till the evening, I could not relax and my stomach turned into a hard ball extending out from me. I began to feel afraid I logged onto the nexus chat and asked for help immediately @Pandora was there thankfully and helped me with some helpful advice on downward dog yoga poses and identified the problem as gas, which was extremely helpful and oddly comforting at the same time because now I knew what it was I was dealing with. @CosmicLion was also online and it was good to have some support from him too. Just knowing I wasn't suffering alone was reassuring. My partner was also physically with me with a worried look but trying to assist so I was in good hands. But nothing truly helped and I couldn't sleep the whole night, by the morning I been up for more than 24 hours and had still not eaten or couldn't keep anything down. I was searching the nexus the whole night and found out that someone had a similar problem to mine. By @explorer7 titled severe bloating with san pedro from 2016. @Poekus provided extremely valuable advice when he suggested Rennies or calcium carbonate to reduce the bloating. As soon as the shops opened we went yo get some. I chewed two of them. Immediately within half hour the pain in my stomach stopped and I was able to eat some toast. I kept my diet bland and went back to being vegetarian for a while. The experience was quite sobering. Normally San Pedro is very gentle with me and the transcendental state was magnificent but the body load was heavy and I cautiously stayed of the psychedelics for a while afterwards. I have returned but it took quite a while and the experience left me doubting my abilities of working with these medicines and started some real sober soul searching within. But that's a tale for another day. I hope from this negative experience at least a few lessons can be learnt. Lord knows I certainly have a learnt alot about harvesting, intention, respect, pacing and dosage and especially praises are sung to the glorious calcium carbonate, I will always make sure I have some on hand too before a travelling I go .. but I wouldn't wish for that experience again or for it to happen to anyone and this is why I have decided to share my tale so that others will learn from my mistakes and here also I must express my gratitude to the wonderful members on the Nexus especially those with me on the chat that day and the members posts I mentioned above. I am extremely grateful for your kind and help and practical advice, I wouldn't know what would have happened without you guys or if I didn't have the information on this amazing site.
Last edited: