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Reality Gone Out to Lunch
Memantine & DXM
Citation:   Sophia R.. "Reality Gone Out to Lunch: An Experience with Memantine & DXM (exp112948)". Erowid.org. Jan 27, 2021. erowid.org/exp/112948

 
DOSE:
T+ 0:00
100 mg oral Pharms - Memantine
  T+ 1:30 100 mg oral Pharms - Memantine
  T+ 1:30 600 mg oral DXM
  T+ 0:00 100 mg oral Pharms - Memantine
BODY WEIGHT: 120 lb
I had recently ordered some memantine from an online pharmacy, and being fairly experienced with the dissociative effects of DXM decided it would be fun to try tripping on it. I had read about the approximate dosage and effects, so I had a basic idea of what to expect. I had the week ahead free with no plans, staying by myself at my apartment, so I was prepared for the very long trip as reported by others.

At 1pm I took 100mg of memantine. It took effect slowly, but after about an hour I was feeling mildly distant from reality, and kind of floaty. Still firmly attached to my faculties and no hallucinations or visuals at this point. My mood was somewhat elevated and I felt pleasant and airy, but no perceptual changes.

Time continued to pass and the effects were remaining pretty mild, which I was disappointed with. About an hour and a half later I took another 100mg of memantine. Space was beginning to get a bit wavy and wobby at this point, but I was still for the most part grounded and able to function normally. I figured the memantine just didn't affect me very much (although I'd later realize I was merely impatient and hadn't given it long enough to take full effect). This is where I recklessly decided to take 600mg of DXM alongside the memantine, because I knew I'd have effects from that. This is about where my memories of being grounded and normally functioning cut off.

(Side note: at some point after this I took yet a further 100mg of memantine, which I know because I found it was missing after the fact, but I don't actively recall taking it
at some point after this I took yet a further 100mg of memantine, which I know because I found it was missing after the fact, but I don't actively recall taking it
)

Next thing I'm aware, my perception of reality is fully overrided with hallucinations and I can't recall my sense of self or identity. A bit like a dream, but fully manifested on top of the real world. Frankly it was pretty terrifying and I had no idea what was happening. This goes on for an indefinitely long time, what felt like hours but I have no way of knowing for sure. Eventually I come to awareness of the physical space I'm in after I don't know how long, but my visual field is incredibly distorted and the background noise is amplified to where its deafening. My cognition is warped to the point where I'm fully unable to make sense of the sensory input coming in from my surroundings and I'm basically incapacitated. Luckily I was in a safe environment and didn't have to respond to anything happening around me, but that could have gone very badly.

The next reference in time I have is 7am the next day, 18 hours after the first dose. I've just reached a level of awareness where I can intermittently operate my phone to send text messages to my friend (who was aware I was tripping). All I said was "Please save me. I can't make sense. Don't drugs" and then most likely fell asleep.

About 1pm, 24 hours in I was awakened by a terrifying bleeping alarm like sound, that I'm not sure if it was a normal sound misinterpreted by my confused brain or something out of the ordinary, but in any case I was incredibly frightened until it stopped a few minutes later. The background noise was still overwhelmingly loud and my visual environment was still distorted to an unrecognizable degree.

At 11pm that night, there's a chat message from me reading "32 hours into trip and I still can't make sense of my perceptions. everything is still wildly distorted. I can at least vaguely read and write text now" (thank god for autocorrect, because my typo rate was phenomenally high at that that point still).

Over the next while up until about 6am the next morning (41 hours from the initial dose) there are a few more text snippets: "When did I do this", "aaaaaaaaaaaaaa", "realm of eldritch perceptions", "I can only read text with one eye closed". According to my description at the time nothing in my brain made sense for 36 hours.
According to my description at the time nothing in my brain made sense for 36 hours.
"It was all abstract colors, forms, words, shapes, etc. that I couldn't interpret". I then went on to describe it as being "scarier than dying, because if you die you don't know you're dead whereas in this state you're constantly aware of how much just makes no sense at all.". I was utterly terrified that I'd never regain my senses.

A few more hours passed and I was finally capable of making sense of external reality, albeit in a heavily distorted way. I compared my mental state to the song "Cars" by Gary Numan, in that it's "all over the place and doesn't seem to make much sense". Also around this time I was able to interact with my environment well enough to try to make some food (I hadn't eaten anything in 2 days), so I put on some pasta... or tried to anyway. First attempt I put a pot of water on the stove but forgot to turn the stove on, and second attempt I forgot to put pasta in the water when I heated it, so it took 3 attempts to finally make pasta. After getting that completed I was glad to have something to eat though. I then went to sleep again (I have no clue how much of the 48 hours up until then was asleep because my memory is mostly missing from that time period).

The next morning (3rd day after initial dose) I was able to walk down to the store and buy some food while acting normally, but my vision and sense of the world were still moderately distorted and the background noise was still super loud and impossible to ignore. At this point I was still low-key scared I'd never return to normal, but getting a bit less scared as the effects of the trip slowly began to wore off.

Was about 96-120 hours from the initial dose before the effects had fully returned to baseline and I was able to function normally again.

Exp Year: 2019ExpID: 112948
Gender: Female 
Age at time of experience: 20
Published: Jan 27, 2021Views: 1,487
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DXM (22), Pharms - Memantine (309) : Alone (16), Multi-Day Experience (13), Combinations (3)

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