Disturbed Reality
Datura
Citation:   Entropy. "Disturbed Reality: An Experience with Datura (exp107663)". Erowid.org. Jan 15, 2016. erowid.org/exp/107663

 
DOSE:
    Datura (tea)
BODY WEIGHT: 190 lb
Disturbed Reality Not Recommended At All

Back when I was young, impressionable, and absolutely hooked on psychedelics, I was given the opportunity to try some datura that a friend had picked up from who knows where.

He and I diced up and boiled several of the spiky pods and ate a handful of red and black seeds. I distinctly remember my pupils dilating and vision becoming extraordinarily blurry for several days, but that was about it for both of us. No feelings of euphoria or any kind of high. Just a bland experience and a bad taste in my mouth from the tea. We chalked it up to overblown accounts of 'tripping' and exaggerated stories. I'd later find out that we couldn't have been more wrong.

Fast forward a few weeks and my wife (then my girlfriend) and I were at my parents' house, looking to pass some time on a Saturday evening. I remember that I still had a few datura pods in the freezer that I kept from my previous experience and asked my wife if she wanted to try them. I told her of my experience and that I felt it more a benign experience than anything, not expecting her to get any more than a buzz from it. She agreed and we boiled up another pot of 'tea' in my parents' kitchen. I even offered my mother some, who has never been a recreation drug user, because I figured the stuff was literally harmless. I'd later find out that it affects people differently and was VERY glad my mother opted not to try it.

About an hour after my wife drank her tea, she started getting mightily fidgety and was unable to sit still at all. We were trying to watch a movie, but she'd keep jumping up, stretching, and wandering in and out of the room. She did this several times and would come back and sit down again. Then she left the movie room for about 20 minutes and wandered into our living room where I could hear her talking and laughing. I walked upstairs and found her standing in a dark room, giggling, with her hand to the side of her face. I asked what she was doing and she said she was chatting with a friend. She had no phone in her hand. Just an empty palm. Yet she was having what seemed like a legitimate conversation with someone who wasn't there.

I was dumbfounded, as this was similar to reports that I'd read people experiencing on datura. I'd taken probably four times more than she did when I tried it, plus ate the seeds, and got off nothing like this. I probed her a little bit and she swore that she was not tripping, or even feeling euphoric. She genuinely thought she was sober.
She genuinely thought she was sober.
I was curious if maybe it was a placebo effect and was all in her mind.

I realized she wasn't when she started chasing my family's black and white cat around the house, giggling, and saying 'C'mere you fluffy little penguin.' She asked when my family bought a pet penguin, with a dead seriousness in her eyes, and that's when I realized that her pupils were the size of dinner plates. I knew she was tripping... hard.

She also started getting a little hysterical and noisy at this point, so I figured I needed to work on calming her down a bit. This was about 2-3 hours after ingestion. We went outside and smoked a bowl of some high grade cannabis that I had, hoping this might calm her down a bit. It didn't have any effect. Another hour or so went by and she was still fidgety and talking absolute nonsense. I managed to get her to eat something and got her in the shower, still trying to calm her down. This seemed to work, or so I thought, as she finally started to relax and settled down. We managed to finish a movie and she was starting to get lethargic. It was around 2 o'clock in the morning.

We were both living with parents at the time, and she would need to go back to her parents' house. I wanted to be sure she wasn't going to freak out and she reassured me that she was fine and just wanted to go to sleep. She had finally stopped talking to imaginary objects, so I took her home thinking little else of it.

About 7AM the next morning, I'm awoken by a call from her mother, demanding to know what in the *expletive* I gave her daughter.
I'm awoken by a call from her mother, demanding to know what in the *expletive* I gave her daughter.
Still a bit groggy, I wasn't sure if I was dreaming or actually on the phone. Then she told me that she was at the hospital with my wife, and the doctors needed to know what she was on. I came to my senses real quick at that point and started to freak out a bit. I explained what I gave her and then headed straight to the hospital.

When I arrived, she had just finished drinking a 'charcoal slurpee' as she described it, and she said she wanted her money back because of how horrible it tasted. She still didn't realize she was in a hospital being treated for a potential drug overdose.

I was pulled aside by her mother and an attending physician and asked about the previous night. I didn't hide anything and told them that I seriously thought it was harmless based on my own experience with it and its legality. Her mother explained that she tried to get in her dad's truck at about 5:30 that morning to 'go grocery shopping' and got visibly agitated when told she needed to come back inside. Luckily she didn't have the keys, because I have no doubt that she'd have killed herself or someone else if she managed to get out of her driveway.

I could hear her talking again and, knowing nobody was in the room with her, went in and tried talking to her. She said she was talking to a new nurse who hid behind the trashcan once I came in the room. The trashcan was about three feet tall. I couldn't believe she was still tripping this hard, but here we were.

Other absurd things were said between the hospital visit and when she finally sobered up, but I've gotten most of the point across. This was many years ago, before information was so readily available on the internet. Had I known that these reactions were even possible, I never would have given it to her. That was her first, and last, experience with a hallucinogen.

I absolutely would not recommend anyone using this. It seems that it either will have a negligible effect on a person or will completely make them lose their mind for a day or two. Very little recreational value in my eyes. I'm not a recreational drug user anymore, but even I know that there are many other psychedelics out there that are enjoyable and worth trying at least once. Datura isn't one of them.

Exp Year: 2000ExpID: 107663
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: 20
Published: Jan 15, 2016Views: 7,635
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Datura (15) : Various (28), Overdose (29), General (1)

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