As a Sleep Aid?
Chamomile & Cigarettes
Citation:   abidagus. "As a Sleep Aid?: An Experience with Chamomile & Cigarettes (exp72757)". Erowid.org. Aug 20, 2019. erowid.org/exp/72757

 
DOSE:
  oral Pharms - Lamotrigine (daily)
    smoked Tobacco - Cigarettes (daily)
  5 - 7 tsp oral Chamomile (tea)
BODY WEIGHT: 150 lb
A little background: I am a 21 year old healthy male college student. I am fairly experienced in the use of psychoactives, having extensive experience with cannabis, kava, dextromethorphan, music, and benzos, and some experience with psychedelics, opiates, stimulants, and several other drugs. In the last 2 months I have smoked marijuana once or twice, in small doses. I take 60mg (low dose) of lamotragine (a mood stabilizer) every morning and night, and most nights I take 25-50 mg (low dose) of quetiapine as a sleep aid. I did not take quetiapine the night of this experiment.
I did not take quetiapine the night of this experiment.


I've drunk chamomile tea several times and also smoked it once (yielding a mildly pleasant effect and a very tasty smoke), and three days prior to this experience I drank it for the first time in several months.

Tonight, I am totally sober. I'm moderately tired, not particularly stressed or upset, feeling pretty normal. I was planning on drinking chamomile tonight and decided to do a little experiment. I smoked several cigarettes during the day (I'm a long-time half-pack a day smoker), and had a cup of coffee in the morning. I have not smoked marijuana in three weeks at least, and haven't done any other drugs in the last 2 days. My stomach was not full, but not empty. On to the chamomile:

5 to 7 heaping teaspoons of whole dried chamomile flowers (not packed down) were placed in a cup of boiling water, mixed for a few seconds, and let to sit for 20 minutes.

At 9:45pm I began to drink the resulting tea, which was mild to moderately strong in flavor and color, for chamomile tea. It tastes kind of like apples, but slightly bitter. Very pleasant.

0:00 At 9:50 I finished the tea.

0:10 I feel that something is off. Effect is subtle, seems to be sedative.
0:10 I feel that something is off. Effect is subtle, seems to be sedative.


0:11 Sedative effect is rapidly growing, accompanied by a subtle body high.

0:13 It's stronger than I thought it would be. I feel rather heavy/sleepy. Effect continues to rise, but more slowly.

0:30 I seem to have reached the peak. I'm sleepy in a fairly natural way, but not too sleepy to go out for a cigarette, which I do now.

0:45 Effects are about the same, although the cigarette/walk seem to have reduced them somewhat. Natural tired feeling, heavy feeling, very mild but pleasant buzz. After sitting for a few minutes the effects returned to their previous level of intensity.

1:15 Effects are coming down, already they are fairly weak. Thus I conclude my report.

From my experiences with chamomile, I have found it to have mild relaxing and sedating effects, generating a mild pleasant body feeling and natural feeling of sleepiness. In high doses it can compete with mainstream sleep aids, however, in these doses there is a strong sedative after-affect the next day, similar to the after-effect of high benzo (Xanax, Klonopin, etc) doses. Therefore, I feel it is not an adequate replacement for mainstream sleep-inducing drugs.

Also, there are some other, more subtle effects that I experienced that are harder to put into words. Subtle changes in consciousness, thought patterns, experience of emotions, concentration...it is hard to put into words. There is a chance these effects are not even related to chamomile.



Exp Year: 2008ExpID: 72757
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: 21
Published: Aug 20, 2019Views: 3,273
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Chamomile (428) : Combinations (3), General (1), Alone (16)

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