DOSE:

repeated

smoked

Cannabis

(plant material)

BODY WEIGHT:

120 lb

At the time that this occurred, I wasn’t a heavy pot smoker at all. I’d maybe smoked it 3 or 4 times prior, so needless to say I was both very inexperienced and a massive lightweight. I feel that these two aspects of myself were strong factors that played into my experience that afternoon.

It was after school, everyone in my grade had just finished up their ACTs (standardized testing for all high school students.) I didn’t feel too stressed out about how I had done, but of course there was a lot of residual anxiety due to the formality of the whole day. My friend suggested we hang out after school that afternoon, which meant we would definitely be smoking weed. This was exciting to me (Again, I didn’t smoke a lot. I never had the opportunity outside of hanging with this one friend.)

We went over to his place. He lives in a fairly sizable house, three levels and a lot of rooms, perfect for getting stoned and wandering around if you ask me. He grabbed his bong and loaded up the first bowl, packing it very tightly. It was a lot, especially for me at the time. After going into the downstairs bathroom and closing the door, we smoked it pretty quickly, so he loaded up another. The two of us went through around three bowls before we were well on our way to being blazed out of our minds and the whole bathroom was hotboxed.

We talked in the normal stoner fashion for what must have been ten or fifteen minutes before he said he wanted to “show me something cool.” Suddenly, my vision was completely gone, as if I’d somehow closed my eyes without being aware of it. This freaked me out quite a bit for a few moments before I realized that he had simply shut the bathroom light off; I could see a crack of white glaring through the bottom of the door. This settled my nerves a bit, but I was still uneasy. Looking into the darkness, the space around me appeared to stretch on indefinitely, like the bathroom had become a massive, pitch-black arena that I was smack dab in the center of. I wasn’t a major fan of this and I asked him to please turn the lights back on. He did, but I feel as though this was the first in a series of events that triggered what I suppose is the “downfall” of this afternoon, if you’d call it that.

Eventually we exited his bathroom and rounded the corner into his entertainment area. My friend is a musician, so he has tons of instruments lying around and knows how to play them all pretty well. He chose to play the keyboard for a while and I decided to sit back on the couch and appreciate the music.

The melody was very pretty and cinematic, I think he was just improvising something, I’m not sure. I stared off and let my mind wander. The melody was still pretty, but it was changing. Something seemed off, like there were sinister undertones to the entire composition. I was beyond the point of saying anything about it, or really saying anything at all. My mind was somehow simultaneously racing with dozens of thoughts a second and completely blank. I wasn’t attempting to think at all, but thoughts came to me autonomously. That’s when I think I began to see the shapes. Little lines tracing squares and rectangles into my field of vision. At first it was simply layered over everything I looked at, I could see the pictures on the wall, my friend was still playing keyboard, and so on. At a certain point, however, I lost all visual connection to the physical world. All I could see were these shapes, fractal like geometry that seemed to move and twist and change color based on my thought patterns. I recall lots of reds and oranges, not a lot of cool colors like blue or purple. And my thoughts weren’t exactly coherent. I had no control over them at all. One moment, I’m thinking about why I smoked pot in the first place and how bad of a decision this was and how I wanted to be sober, the next moment my brain was constructing these nonsensical words and phrases that were bastardizations and portmanteaus of actual words.

This continued for what seemed like an hour (It was likely only around 15 or 20 minutes, but I have absolutely no idea, I wish I’d been looking at a clock or something.) The shapes began to manifest as a literal map of how my mind functioned, and I “saw” the synapses in my brain making connections and forming genuine ideas right before my eyes, quite literally. It sounds very interesting, but I mostly found it overwhelmingly unpleasant. I wanted to get up, but my body wouldn’t move, I’d lost the ability to really make myself do anything voluntarily. I sometimes hear debate over whether or not marijuana can be an intense psychedelic at all. I know now that it absolutely can. I believe people underestimate the power that THC has under the right circumstances and at the right doses.

Anyway, after what seemed like a very long time, my friend stopped playing and suggested we go upstairs. The change in tone (cessation of the music, actually receiving verbal input, etc.) must have snapped me out of my trance. I agreed, mumbling something about how “I was too stoned now, but after I sober up I’ve GOT to tell you what just happened to me!” Something along those lines.

I don’t recall everything that led up to the next point, but we ended up on the third floor of his house, about to head downstairs, when I noticed my heart was beating extremely, extremely fast. In my perception, it seemed to be 200-ish beats per minute, although it was obviously much slower in reality. Nevertheless, I panicked instantly. Never had I experienced such a high heart rate before, and I had my friend check my pulse. He told me something like “It’s a little higher than normal, but that’s what weed does.” All I heard was “It’s a little higher than normal. . .” and I was done for. I essentially collapsed to my knees at the top of his stairs. All I could do was stare at the carpet and hyperventilate.

I’ve had a history of panic attacks, so I really should have recognized this as one, but I was far too gone to make the connection. I believed I was dying. I thought about how unfortunate it was that I was going to be the first person on earth to overdose on weed. My dad would be so upset! My whole family would be disappointed! Should we call 911? I don’t want anyone finding out I’ve been doing drugs! My friend, as well as my friends brother, observed my pulse several more times, finding time and time again that it was only slightly above average and that there was nothing to be concerned with. I wouldn’t have that, I was certainly having a heart attack or experiencing heart failure or SOMETHING.

I’m very, very lucky to have as good of a friend as he is, he did a great job helping me through the attack, speaking calmly and bringing me water, letting me do things at my own pace. He eventually convinced me to descend the stairs (I thought that any movement I made would increase my heart rate to the point where it would stop. I truly was out of my mind at the time haha.) Once downstairs, I recall pacing around his dining room table probably over a hundred times over the course of twenty minutes, just trying to breathe and get my heart rate to normalize.

[Erowid Note: Driving while intoxicated, tripping, or extremely sleep deprived is dangerous and irresponsible because it endangers other people. Don't do it!]
Probably noticing that it had gotten a little bit out of hand, my friend suggested that we go for a drive I thought this sounded like a bad idea at first, as increasing my visual stimuli was sure to only make things worse, right? At some point I gave in and we settled on going for a drive. He picked up a friend of his and we went to the very mountainous, woodsy location (we live on the base of a mountain.) This is where my trip began to get much better. It was a relaxing ride and when we got out of the car, the air was cool and crisp. It was slightly windy. I looked out into a large valley of trees and nature. The whole world felt and looked absolutely majestic.

We hiked for a bit before we decided to call it an evening. He dropped me off at home. I’m unsure what I did after entering my house, but it probably involved my bed and lots and lots of sleeping.

I learned a whole ton about myself during this experience. I learned my limit and what happens when I cross it. I learned how to handle bad highs (When in distress, change your surroundings! If you’re inside, go outside. If you’re outside, go in. Put on good music. Your surroundings and the vibe that they give off are crucial!) I learned that I have a really awesome friend who I can trust with almost anything. And I learned about the strange, terrifying beauty of a mild psychedelic experience. I’m not sure how things such as LSD or psilocin would affect my brain, but I’m both intrigued and scared at the idea. You won’t catch me doing either anytime soon, though.

Exp Year: 2014	ExpID: 109982
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 17
Published: May 9, 2025	Views: 25
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Cannabis (1) : Difficult Experiences (5), Guides / Sitters (39), Small Group (2-9) (17)