DOSE:

oral

4-HO-MET

(powder / crystals)

BODY WEIGHT:

70 kg

“Custom Designed”
4-HO-MET – (10mg, 15mg, 20mg, 25mg, 33mg, 50mg, …, …)
Text:
My friends, the wild birds, have been at it again. This time they’ve really hit on a good thing – the lovely Shulgin Chemical known as metocin. This excellent substance is perhaps the quintessential example of the term ‘Designer Drug’. It is extremely close to psilocin, the natural psychedelic principle of mushrooms – just one extra carbon atom is responsible for a quite different, and in my humble opinion significantly better, experience. The very idea behind Shulgin’s raison d'être was the discovery of drugs – interesting that Shulgin and others chose to use the term ‘discovery’, rather than ‘invention’ – which have been custom designed for specific effects. In the case of metocin, the nausea, body load, and mindfuckery of magic mushrooms have been very effectively engineered out of the equation. In their stead we have stronger visuals, a light-hearted mood lift, along with a more analytical and less emotional headspace.

One of the major benefits of the isolating from plants and synthesizing in labs of chemicals in the first place is the ability to more accurately measure dosage and predict consistent effects. A compact powder or pill form of a drug is usually easier to ingest and frequently less toxic compared to a large amount of plant matter. In my assays of metocin, I found these points to be very important to the overall improvement of the psychedelic experience. There is no guesswork in dosing with metocin like there is with the varying levels of psilocybin and psilocin in mushrooms. There is also much less stomach discomfort – surprisingly though, with metocin the minor, transient cramping that does occur will usually come about three hours into the experience, rather than at the beginning (as the material is being absorbed in the stomach). This probably indicates that the metocin is annoying the G.I. tract further down, in the intestines rather than the stomach lining. Fortunately the discomfort always seems to go away after just a few minutes.

I personally have no real desire to “meet God”, “face my demons”, or “voyage through the cosmos” on drugs. I’ve already had a decently strong ‘mystical experience’ on mushrooms, when I was in my early 20’s. That type of “we are all one” wake-up-call is probably only needed once in a lifetime, as I’ve never really forgotten about it and it was definitely a life-improving experience. I don’t see the appeal in repeatedly chasing a plus-four like that. Also, the body load of mushrooms can be downright taxing sometimes, and I find that it can really detract from the positive aspects of the experience. More emotional drugs like psilocin are definitely amazing and important medicines, but they just don’t serve any specific goal in my personal interactions with these substances. I’m much more into the intellectual ‘Thinking Sessions’ which I can get into for usually a good few hours at a time on a quality psychedelic. These sessions are just what they appear to be – a chance to really sit down with one’s thoughts. It’s not meditation – believe me, I’ve tried ad nauseum to “clear my mind” and meditate (including at legit Buddhist temples in Asia) but it just ain’t working. I don’t doubt that meditation is valuable both on and off psychedelics, but what I’m referring to here is more about introspection. During these times I find myself thinking about all sorts of things, and almost always gaining a lot of insight. It is very important to take an adequate amount of time to integrate these sorts of experiences before taking another trip. This is about more than just avoiding tolerance buildup, and is really a major part of the psychedelic experience in general, one with which I am only lately growing accustomed to navigating. Another interesting drug which absolutely shines in the facilitating of ‘Thinking Sessions’ is 2-cb-fly, which I’ll write about in another report.

The visual aspects of metocin are playful, very highly controllable and malleable by the mind of the user, and tend to be extremely vivid without ever “getting in the way”. One of my most memorable trips was at the summit of Doi Pha Hom Pok – the second tallest mountain in Thailand. I drove my motorcycle up there for a night of camping, took 50mg of the material in the afternoon, and enjoyed a stunningly beautiful six-hour visual feast, including bright blue sky juxtaposed with moments of heavy clouds, intense winds alternating with serene stillness, shit moving all over the place in custom-made patterns and undulations which were endlessly unique and satisfying. The slow sunset attracted a crowd of viewers to my perch on the observation platform. By this time I was a few hours into the trip and didn’t feel uncomfortable around people at all – anyway, we were all there for the same reason, only one of us was maybe a bit more into it than the rest. Later that night, I got choppy sleep which was definitely influenced by the residual effects of the drug. I should have brought along some sort of sleep-aid. The next morning I was tired and cranky, which put a slight damper on the return drive, but all-in-all it was an overwhelmingly positive experience.

I’ve read reports of people taking much higher doses, and when I was on the 50mg dose I remember thinking “I could probably handle 75mg…” With that said though, part of the secret to enjoying psychedelics is the idea of getting the most milage out of the least amount of material possible. These substances are truly special and there is no benefit in abusing or wasting them. My early experiments with a new substance ALWAYS start out at very low doses. In the specific case of the metocin: The birds put roughly 25mg in each capsule. I promptly emptied one capsule and dissolved the powder into fresh water for volumetric dosing. 10mg is a good plus-one dose, 15mg is getting into a low plus-two, and 25-30mg doses are fully psychedelic in every sense of the term. For a while there, I was taking psychedelics too frequently, and the experiences not only lacked ‘magic’ but they were also a waste of drugs. I’m not convinced that there is a hard and fast length of time for diminishing of the tolerance which psychedelic tryptamines immediately build up. I also don’t know for sure if the ‘phenethylamines before tryptamines’ one-way-cross-tolerance thing is a good rule of thumb to follow either [see my combo experiments report for more on this topic]. Really, the best way to go is small doses, single substances, long wait times in between trips, commitment to initial dose (no redosing unless a specific drug requires it), decent note-taking, and a positive set n’ setting…

The asymmetrical tryptamines are not found in nature. I am very grateful for the life and work of Alexander Shulgin, which resulted in the creation of such incredibly valuable medicines. While the term ‘Designer Drug’ has negative connotations in the media, the fact is that all sorts of technologies are custom-designed to be better than (or even just different from) their naturally occurring inspirations. The cornucopia of chemical variety in this class of substances is a huge part of what makes psychedelics so appealing. As I’ve matured in my relationship towards drugs in general, and psychedelics in particular, it has become apparent to me that the stubborn, stale clinging to the baseless idea of “natural good / synthetic bad” is simply obsolete – or perhaps more properly stated, it was a non-issue from the start. As Shulgin himself said “Just as people praise so-called ‘Plant Teachers’, I believe that there is also a great deal to be learned from ‘Chemical Teachers’. In TIHKAL, Shulgin mentions an experiment in which mushroom mycelium was injected with DET (Di-Ethyl-Tryptamine), which is not found in nature. The fungal lifeform took this slightly altered substance, this ‘Designer Drug’, and converted it into a psilocybin-like analog with two ethyl groups – via just the same process it would use to create psilocybin itself out of DMT (Di-Methyl-Tryptamine), which most certainly is found, in abundance, in nature. That classic example, along with the more recent discovery of natural tramadol & synthetic ibogaine in Gabon, West Africa, as depicted in Hamilton Morris’s excellent show, constitute two very good arguments in favor of dropping the preconceived notions that either a natural molecule or a synthetic molecule inherently has some sort of superiority over the other. In summary, I’ll paraphrase the character in Irvine Welsh’s classic drug novel ‘Trainspotting’: “This stuff is custom-fucking-designed for your needs!!”

Exp Year: 2023	ExpID: 117198
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 38
Published: Nov 24, 2024	Views: Not Supported
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
4-HO-MET (436) : Retrospective / Summary (11), Glowing Experiences (4), Mystical Experiences (9), Not Applicable (38)