INDIVIDUAL HALLUCINOGENS

INDIVIDUAL HALLUCINOGENS

Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) is probably the best known and most commonly used hallucinogen in the United States. It is also the most potent of commonly used hallucinogens. The effects of LSD depend upon the dose. Typical doses today are between 50 and 150 micrograms (typical doses of the sixties were 100 to 200 micrograms). These levels are enough to produce full-blown hallucinations in nontolerant individuals, although some experienced users take multiple "hits."

Because LSD is so potent and so easily dissolved, it is most often diluted and dissolved in liquid and then absorbed into a piece of blotter paper. No other drug is potent enough to be used in this form. Most of the LSD sold in this format is synthesized in just a few laboratories in northern Cali­fornia, and the product is almost invariably pure LSD. However, enter­prising drug dealers sometimes sell other compounds as LSD. I.SD is also sold in gelatin squares (window pane) and in tiny pills (microdots).

Although LSD itself was originally synthesized in a laboratory in the 1940s, the hallucinogenic and toxic effects of lysergic acid derivatives (the ergot alkaloids) have been recognized for thousands of years. Certain spe­cies of morning glory seeds that provided a drug called ololiuqui (the exact species are not clear but may include Turbina corymbosa) or tlitlitzin (Ipo­moea violacea) in ancient Mexico contain a related chemical, lysergic acid amide. A tea made from the seeds, an alcoholic beverage made by extraction of the seeds with a favorite form of alcohol, and chemically extracted hallu­cinogens all cause an LSD-like hallucinatory experience. As with most plant hallucinogens, the seeds contain other chemicals, and the combina­tion can cause nausea, vomiting, and other unpleasant side effects. Lysergic acid compounds were recognized in the Middle East several thousand years ago through the poisonings that resulted when a fungus (Claviceps pur­purea) infected rye that was used to prepare bread. This fungus produced a number of LSD-related ergot alkaloids and amino acids that caused halluci­nations and constriction of the blood vessels that could lead to gangrene, loss of limbs, spontaneous abortion, and sometimes death. The disease caused by eating ergot-infected rye became known as St. Anthony's fire, after the patron saint of the order of monks founded to care for the victims of these poisonings and the burning sensation caused by the intense con­striction of blood vessels. This plant product was well understood in medie­val Europe, and midwives used its ability to cause uterine contractions to accelerate labor.

As the LSD experience begins, many people report unusual sensations, including numbness, muscle weakness, or trembling. A mild fight-or-flight response occurs: heart rate and blood pressure increase a little, and pupils dilate. Nausea is quite common. These changes are rarely large enough to be dangerous, although they can be in individuals with underlying heart disease. Some users report phantom pains. Internet discussions of halluci­nogen experiences usually reveal several conversation threads about partic­ular pains. A recent look at these found complaints ranging from chest pain to testicular pain. Rapid tolerance develops to LSD. Probably this effect, as well as the lin­gering exhaustion from a drug experience that lasts so long, is the reason why most users take LSD at fairly widely spaced intervals (once a week to once a month). The tolerance diminishes quickly, so that a week's absti­nence is usually enough to restore sensitivity to the drug.Hallucinogenic mushrooms are probably the second most frequently used hallucinogen in the United States. The popular cottage industry that has arisen promoting sales of home-growing kits has increased public aware­ness of these agents. However, there is probably almost as much misinfor­mation about "shrooms” as there is about LSD.

The shrooms to which most users refer belong to several genera of mushroom (Psthicybe, Panaeolus, and Conocybe). The most commonly used species in the United States are Psilocybe mexicana and Psilocybe cya­nescens. These mushrooms contain two related compounds: psilocin (4-hydroxy-N, N-dimethyltryptamine) and psilocybin (4-phosphory­loxy-N, N-dimethyltryptamine). Although many people think that psilo­cybin is the active agent, this is probably not the case. Only after the liver has removed the extra chemical group (a phosphate group) can the remainder of the molecule (psilocin) enter the brain. Although there are rumors that phosphorylated serotonin or phosphorylated DMT are alter­native hallucinogens that provide a unique new high, these molecules have an additional piece that slows entry into the brain and actually prevents rather than promotes psychoactivity. Psilocybin is distributed both in the dried mushroom form and as a white powder of purified crystalline com­pound. A typical dose is four to ten milligrams (two to four mushrooms of the genus Psilocybe cyanescens).

Use of these mushrooms is ancient. Statues of mushrooms dating from AO 100 to 1400 appear throughout Mexico and Central America, and a group of statues from central Guatemala that are even older (about 500 fig) are widely interpreted as mushroom stalks associated with mushroom wor­ship. Use of teonanactl, or "flesh of the gods," persisted in Mexico until the arrival of the Spanish, who attempted to extinguish its use. Ethnobotanists, including R. Gordon Wasson, Richard Schultes, and others, worked in cen­tral Mexico in the 1930s to identify almost twenty species of mushrooms belonging to the genera Psilocybe (the majority), Conocybe, Panaeolus, and Stropharia that were used for healing and religious purposes.

Psilocybin has come full circle in some ways, from careful ritualistic use by native peoples to college students' recreational shroom use during spring break and at weekend parties to the object of current research and religious interest regarding its ability to cause persevering beneficial psy­chological effects. This experience is generally viewed as a milder and shorter LSD-like experience. At low doses, psilocybin causes simple feel‑ings of relaxation, physical heaviness or lightness, and some perceptual distortions (especially visual). At higher doses, more physical sensations occur, including lightheadedness; numbness of the tongue, lips, or mouth; shivering or sweating; nausea; and anxiety.

The psychological effects mirror those of LSD. The records of a group of scientists who gave LSD, psilocybin, and PCP to college students during the mid-1960s provide a good description of the effects in contemporary terms. They published the verbatim transcripts of the experiences of three students. The following is an excerpt from a transcript of a female college senior (who previously had never taken hallucinogens) that was recorded during a psilocybin experiment.

About an hour after the drug: "When I close my eyes, then I have all these funny sensations. Funny pictures, they're all in beautiful colors. Greens and reds and browns and they all look like Picasso's pictures. Doors opening up at triangular angles and there are all these colors ... an unreal world. It must be my subconscious or something. If I open my eyes, now the screen is, the dome gets darker. Looks like something is moving on the outside. Right along the edge. Some writhing. There's a figure—isn't exactly a figure, huge wings like a hawk, head of a hawk, but legs of a man beneath a bed. Now it's gone."

About two hours after the drug: "Ho, ho, I wonder if, I know I can sing as I sang before, but there's some flower vines running up. They start at one point, like at the bulb, and then they go up over an archway or something. And they have flowers on them: the vines are green ... I have the feeling that someone is sticking their high-heeled shoe into the cotton in my right hand. But I can't feel it, it's not there. When I move my hand, my hands are very wet. And the lower part of my body, body, well, my body's bent. Freud. I think he went too far. Ohh. I'm moving. I look like I'm just moving. I just looked down at my body I wish I had a mirror. I suppose that wouldn't help my seeing.... Now I can see a fire. It looks like a key and there's the crackling again. There's a cage and someone is opening the door of the cage. And there's a spider inside. But I'm not going in. I could stay here forever. It's so pleasant. Move slowly up and down, up and down, back and forth, ripple and wave. I keep my eyes closed now and I see a purple flower."Trips are not always as benign as this one, and in some cases they can be terribly frightening. The following is a description of a very unpleasant trip experienced by a friend of ours.

"It was late in the evening and I had been hanging out with two friends since the afternoon. We were all pretty tired, but decided to take some mushrooms. I remember as the trip began that every time I closed my eyes huge, vividly colored plants would seem to grow really rapidly in the darkness behind my eyelids. I found this pretty interesting and entertaining. It happened every time I closed my eyes—as though the process and the images were completely beyond my control." Later that night, after a botched attempt to go to a party and a brief spell of uncon­sciousness, our friend "lay there looking up into the darkness and per­ceived the darkness to begin to move ever so slightly in a circular motion. It was not a dizzy feeling that happens sometimes to people who are really drunk and think that the room is moving. I had not been drinking heavily at all. In my mind it was the darkness that was moving. I already felt pretty unsettled because of having passed out, and the sense of moving darkness was quite frightening. As I stared into the darkness it began to swirl slightly faster, and I had the feeling that it was moving toward ne—bearing down on me. Lightly at first, but the force seemed to increase as the swirling gained speed. Before long I was consciously fighting with that swirling dark force, having to push hard against it with my mind to keep it at bay. the process continued. The swirling got faster, and the darkness now seemed bent on overtaking me. I was overcome with the thought that if I let it get all the way to me I would he dead. So, I mustered all the concentra­tion and focus I could to continue holding it off. I struggled for some time, but very slowly it seemed to wear me down.

"I remember thinking that it was going to win, and! was going to die. I held it off with all the will I could muster, and finally, feeling quite exhausted, gave up with the thought that fighting that force was useless and I should just let it take me. So I did. I relaxed and felt that at least I was facing my death calmly The swirling malevolence seemed to enter my body in the middle of my belly. Then everything was calm and quiet again. I really thought I was dead. After a brief moment, I remember sud­denly feeling that an intense white light was bursting from within me, moving outward. It was as if single, white laser beams were shining out through each and every pore of my skin. Later I remember interpreting the experience in terms of my fear of, and struggle with, my image of my own death. But while it was going on, I was more afraid than I can ever remember having been."

A Cautionary Note on Mushrooms: Psilocybin mushrooms are not the only ones that produce discernible mental effects. However, they are the only mushrooms in wide use in North America. The other well-described hallucinogenic mushrooms can be dangerous. Amanita muscaria, which we discussed at the beginning of this chapter, contains a number of com­pounds that produce hallucinations, including muscimol and ibotenic acid. These compounds can cause a marked intoxication in which speech is slurred, coordination is impaired, and users experience nausea and often vomit. After this phase, a dreamy/sleepy state ensues followed by an intense hallucinogenic experience. However, this mushroom also con­tains muscarine, which stimulates acetylcholine receptors in the body. This compound mimics stimulation of the parasympathetic nervous sys­tem, causing intense salivation, nausea, vomiting, spasm of the bronchi­oles (breathing tubes), slowed heart rate, and extremely low blood pressure. These last two effects can theoretically lead to shock and death, although muscarinic effects are usually mild. Recreational use of amanita is rare, because the experience is often unpleasant and the mushrooms are not widely available.

Scientists are currently exploring both the basis of the hallucinogenic properties of psilocybin and its therapeutic potential. Studies in Switzer­land by Franz Vollenweider have provided a quantifiable rating scale for its behavioral effects, confirmed the role of 5-HT2 receptors in its actions (see the following), and produced brain scans conducted in people who were experiencing drug effects. Studies by Roland Griffiths in the United States have investigated its effects in certain clinical situations like end­of-life care and in the treatment of migraines, and laboratory studies are underway. These studies have established dosage ranges that cause signif­icant effects (twenty to thirty milligrams), and participants report perse­vering insight as a result of the experience. These studies, among the first in the United States in decades, used careful experimental controls, recruited both hallucinogen users and nonusers, and were reported in the peer-reviewed scientific literature.