DOSE: T+ 0:00	100 mg	oral	L-DOPA
T+ 0:00	100 mg	oral	Tryptophan - 5-HTP
T+ 0:00	25 mg	oral	Carbidopa
T+ 8:10		vaporized	Nicotine

BODY WEIGHT:

155 lb

An Experiment in L-DOPA, 5-HTP, and Carbidopa

Mindset and Setting: Positive general mood, feeling positive. The location where this took place was my university campus, overall a positive location with people. Considering this low dose I shouldn't need to leave early and I should look sober.

My dose was 100/100/25 respectively, one OTC suppliment for 5-HTP, and the rest in a Rx pill.

Log listed below, you may skip right to the end for a rough effect analysis and a time breakdown with my opinion on this combination.

9:00: Finished my breakfast, a homemade cinnamon bun. High in calories and low in protein, this should help DOPA absorbtion (absorbtion is competitive with other proteins).

9:20: Ingested the 5-HTP, Carbidopa, and L-Dopa all at once. No other drugs in my system.

9:30: Left house to go wait for bus, a slight bit of nausea and I'm getting spontaneous and forced burps that taste vaguely like my breakfast. While the former may be a bit of a placebo, the weird burps indicate that there is a fast onset for any GI effects. I have this quite often when I consume too much nicotine, vomiting is right around the corner. My heart rate feels fast, perhaps in the 90s. My resting heart rate is about 70. Blood pressure feels stronger than normal. Body temperature feels slightly warmer than normal yet I feel colder than I should.

9:40: Riding on the bus, feeling slightly more nauseated but overall I'm feeling very neutral, no noticeable psychoactive effects. I do not have restless leg syndrome, however I notice I have a very strong desire to keep my legs still. Tapping them to the beat of music becomes super uncomfortable after about 10 beats. My sex desire also seems to have increased.

10:00: My blood pressure has dropped to baseline, along with my heart rate. Perhaps it was a bit of onset anxiety.

10:20: Arrive at my university, same level of nausea as before.

10:40: It was like a switch got flipped, extreme nausea. I plan out a quick route out of the room if I need to puke. Overall it is very unpleasant. At this point the 5-HTP probably kicked in and my 5-HT3 receptors are lit up like a Christmas tree.

10:50: it is extremely difficult to concentrate with this nausea, however some parts of the calculus lecture make more sense than usual, and I'm finding a complicated topic more understandable. Perhaps this is the 5-HTP modulating complex thinking, or maybe it's the L-Dopa increasing concentration. Hard to say. I felt a possible muscle twitch, more evidence that the 5-HTP kicked in, however considering the carbidopa preventing peripheral serotonin, the twitch would have to originate from the brain or the spinal cord (which is plausible). I should also point out that my brain had become wired to focus on short term gains, I had an urge to run out of calculus and go home to play video games, in the middle of the lecture. I can control it very easily, but it was itching at the back of my head for a couple minutes.

11:20: Class ends, nausea has died down a little bit (Thank god for the small biological halflife of all these drugs). Still relatively high nausea, I go to find a chair and sit down. I'm feeling paradoxically hungry, like I haven't eaten anything for a day. This appears to increase appetite in an aggressive manner, different to that of cannabis as it feels like I'm starving. My breathing also seems extremely relaxed, slightly faster speed but I can control it much easier and it flows better.

11:40: Feeling a lot less nauseated, I decide to have a banana to help with the nausea. It helped a lot, after 5 minutes I felt almost completely better.

12:00: Without extreme nausea, and with no class, I have time to write this up and explore effects. I'm feeling hungrier again. I've had about 700 calories in 4 hours, quite unusual for me. Time seems to be a little slower than I predict, not by a lot, less than that of cannabis. My mouth feels slightly more salivated, likely due to perceived hunger. My stomach is no longer nauseated, but I have the weird burps akin to 9am that represent the subtle urge to vomit. I'm feeling much colder than usual. I still have trouble tapping my feet to the beat of music.

12:10: After a bit of googling, I remember the original purpose for the medication: Parkinson's. I have naturally shaky hands, however I can confirm that they appear a lot more steady. They still shake, but it's more of a slight twitch in the finger near the middle, instead of the whole finger. A definite improvement. I also get occasional spontaneous bodily sensations, possibly related to the 5-HTP but they feel all encompassing and pleasant, but unfortunately fleeting.

12:15: I just noticed I spaced out writing this while listening to music, I believe at this point there is some concentration enhancement. Also, music sounds better, a bit higher than the level that cannabis creates (which isn't a lot for me). I have noticed that music gives me minor physical sensations, especially when heavier in bass (though this is more likely due to the fact that its electronic music). I am experiencing synesthesia, and it is likely the cause of spontaneous bodily sensations. Emotionally I'm a little bit anxious about a personal event, but I'm also feeling very neutral and calm. Definitely feels good. It feels like I took 5mg of Oxycodone and only got the mood altering effects without any of the high.

Timeline of effects:

Onset: 10-30 minutes
Comeup: 15-60 minutes
Peak: 2-4 hours
Comedown: 2-3 hours
Afterglow: 4-8 hours
After effects: 8-24 hours (estimated)

Total: 4:30-8:30 + 4:00-8:00 afterglow

There were some fun effects, but unfortunately the nausea really killed it for me. Increasing the dosage would likely cause me to throw up.

One of the most annoying issues was the appetite enhancement, it was extremely prevelant throughout the peak and comedown. Because taste was not enhanced and food became unappetizing when I was physically full, it created a state of hunger akin being starved, and the feeling that food in front of me will be unpleasant to eat. I physically had to force myself to eat, next time I'll try having some gum to hopefully convince my brain that I'm eating.

There were some opioid-like effects observed. They obviously have different effects and it would be a stretch to call the effects that of an opioid, but there were many similarities to what I've experienced with opioids. They were pleasant and subtle, overall quite an enjoyable feeling.

The afterglow was nice and the aftereffects are not as bad as other drugs, but they are noticeable. Overall it's not too unpleasant, but definitely not enjoyable. The pervious experiences make it worthwhile but knowing I'd feel like this would have been beneficial.

Consuming this with marijuana would very likely increase the effects while lowering nausea, I have yet to confirm this.

Overall rating of my experience: 6/10 (Could go up to a 9 with an antinausea drug, unfortunately I do not believe Diphenhydramine would help with this type of nausea).

Next time I try this I will definitely double the dose of 5-HTP and add marijuana to the mix.

Exp Year: 2020	ExpID: 114189
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 19
Published: Apr 4, 2020	Views: 3,764
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L-DOPA (604), Tryptophan - 5-HTP (196), Carbidopa (605) : Combinations (3), Various (28)