Reality deconstructed Ego Obliterated

Cliff notes:  This is incredibly long so I have broken it into sections so you can read as little or as much as you see fit.

For those who want some cliffs:  Basically inexperienced tripper, 5 grams solo, strong visuals and nonsensical thoughts, confrontation with inanimate objects, micro voyages into space, total darkness voyage with a friendly blanket, Paranoia after looking out the window, eventual ego death, becoming me again, final thoughts.

Foreword: To all that have lived thru true ego death.

Let me just first say to those of you out there that have truly reached a level 5 ego destroying trip. I have a respect and admiration for you whether you liked your trip or not because brother or sister you and I have been to the edge of reality, been shoved off, and clawed our way back.  You know as well as I that it is not something that can efficiently be described with words.  Even days after my trip I am unsure what to feel about my experience and I am very uncertain whether or not I will ever have the guts to do it again. 

Quick Background:

I don’t do other drugs besides alcohol on occasion. I am not an experienced tripper. This was my second trip ever, my first being 2.5 grams on the beach in Mexico with my wife on our 10th anniversary (One of the most awesome days of my life by the way).  I became interested in psilocybin as more of a self-exploratory gateway than just a way to get high.  I wanted to explore myself, my mind, reality, etc.  I researched for months, listening to Terrence McKenna, Joe Rogan podcasts, trip reports from the shroomery. In fact, I devoured all the info I could from the shroomery. I certainly did not have any kind of disrespect for the mushrooms. I knew I was getting into some deep territory, however I know now that reading a trip report about ego death compared to actually experiencing one is like being blind and having a seeing person describe the sunset to you.  You just will not completely get it.

The time has come:

Finally my wife and kids were away for a few days so I had the house to myself.  I did not eat after 12:00pm so that I could dose by 6pm with an empty stomach and hopefully be back to reality by midnight.  I listened to Terrence McKenna’s how to take mushrooms and began my journey. I ground up the 5 grams to a fine powder and mixed in orange juice and downed it.  The anticipation was growing but there is no turning back now.  I mentally prepared in my head that I wanted to find answers, I wanted to regain a passion in all that I do in life. I wanted to have more love and compassion for my family and others in general.  I want to regain a solid and lasting drive for all that I do.  

Down the rabbit hole:

I can only put this in loose chronological order because after about the 1 hour mark I completely lost track of time.  The remainder of the trip was comprised of many many waves of confusion and chaos interspersed with fleeting moments of consciousness, some clarity, understanding, and sometimes just plain awe and blissful feelings.
  
30 mins – already getting visuals

45 mins - 1 hour:
very strong visuals, uncontrollable laughter, complete awe at the tiles on the kitchen floor. They looked like flowing water.  I remember only feeling comfortable walking in backward circles at one point.  I remember thinking “I forgot how to backwards, I forgot how to right angle” and then saying “what did I just say, why did I say that? That doesn’t make sense”.  Followed by uncontrollable laughter while repeating “that doesn’t make sense.” I went to lay down on my bed with some music playing in the background with the x-box 360 visualizer on. Not long after this I lost track of time.

The Rest up to ego death:

Confrontation with the Ceiling fan and a water bottle:

As I lay in bed looking at the ceiling fan 2 of the bulbs became eyes and started blinking at me. The blades of the fan flowed around the eyes creating a face.  It was looking at me with a very condescending look.  I said “Why are you looking at me like that? You are just a ceiling fan?”  I remember thinking “that is one very smug ceiling fan”. 
I then felt like I was wet all over my legs and back.  I got up and searched the bed and my crotch to make sure I had not urinated on myself.  I hadn’t luckily so I lay back on the bed and saw the water bottle that I had set down to drink along the way.  I said “you! you are water! You are wet! you had something to do with this didn’t you?”.  The cap of the water bottle looked like a head and it started shaking its head back and forth like a little child would do.  I said “yes you did” it shook its head again.  I argued with it for a few moments and then began laughing uncontrollably because I somehow realized I was arguing with a water bottle.

General confusion and Micro voyages:

I rolled around on the bed for an indeterminate amount of time laughing and making strange noises just being overall very confused.  I finally settled in and laid back down and closed my eyes.  I had several of what I guess you would call micro voyages.  For example I once closed my eyes and it felt like I slid off of the back of my bed and was floating outside my body in the middle of the universe, space raced out from me in every direction into infinity which I was flying through at very high speed.  I then opened my eyes and screeched back to my body.  Another time I closed my eyes and I was in the middle of a small geometric pattern that started pulsing and expanding by orders of magnitude at a time until I was in the middle of an impossibly big flowing geometric light show (completely awe inspiring).  
I then remember crawling on the floor and rolling around at the foot of my bed for some time being generally caught up in the awe of the music that was playing. It felt like distances were way off.  My foot touched the foot of the bed and it felt like it was 20 feet away from me.  I got up on my hands and knees and it looked like my arms and legs were transforming. I thought “I’m turning into an animal”. I was not too fond of that idea so I stood up and it stopped. I could barely control my body enough to walk at this point.

My journey with the Squatch:

I remembered that total darkness was recommended for the visuals on these high level trips so I decided to go to the bathtub and turn off the lights.  We have a long haired cover up blanket that we all call the sasquatch blanket.  I remember saying to the blanket “ I will go on this voyage but only if you come with me. I can’t do it alone”.  I moved over and picked up the sasquatch blanket and wrapped it around my shoulders.  I said “hello old friend” It felt like the embrace from the most loving arms of the most beloved friend that I had ever had.  Feelings of love and comfort and well-being completely covered me from head to toe.  We then began our journey to the bathtub together.
As I entered the bathroom I turned on the light and looked in the mirror.  I asked my reflection  “why is there so much chaos, I am supposed to learn something, this is supposed to be meaningful, it should be more structured, why am I so confused?”  My reflection which by the way seemed to be another person altogether shook its head and did not have any answers for the questions I had given it so I turned off the lights and climbed into the bathtub.
This was amazing there was only a sliver of light coming in from under the door so in the bathtub I could only vaguely see the outlines of my legs and the faucet.  Almost immediately my legs became ribbons that shot off into infinity and the outline of the faucet became the center of a geometric fortress that seemed to be what my destination was supposed to be.  I was moving through this space at what seemed like light speed.  I could not feel my body at all, I forgot that I even had a body.  My arms must have been moving around involuntarily because I would sometimes bump the edge of the wall and it would jar me back into my body for a few moments.  Overall this was one of the most awesome visual and spacial experiences that I felt thru the whole experience. Beyond awesome!  Not sure how long I stayed in this state but I finally got up and went into the living room.

Paranoia? Yeah I had that to:

As I came into my living room I heard a car pull up outside.  I peeked out of my blinds and there were what seemed like 20 cars parked in my cul-de-sac. I also saw people standing out in the middle of the road smoking.  I am unsure if the cars or the people were really there or not but It made me feel certain that they had heard me laughing or crying or screaming while in the house because I knew I was seriously twisted and I really couldn’t be sure that I had not been screaming at the top of my lungs at any point during my trip.  I just knew they would think something was wrong and call the police.  I paced around for a while unsure what to do so I just went to lay down again.

Ego dissolved:

This is where this voyage becomes hard to describe with words because up to this point I could say something felt or looked like this or that.  But ego death is something that I have no familiar frame of reference to compare to.  It is a state that you enter that is void of any kind of reason, reality, emotion, or of even being. But anyway here it goes.
I lay down from my paranoid episode still feeling like I was going to be discovered. As my body spread out on the bed again I immediately started to lose touch with reality.  I began to think where am I, what am I doing, nothing makes sense anymore, none of this is real, there is no reality there is nothing here.  I thought who cares if they send the police, I don’t exist anymore, I am not real, I am not human so it is irrelevant. That was the last coherent though that I had for what felt like 8 to 10 hours but there is no way to tell because time didn’t exist.  I could no longer see or move, it felt like my mind and my existence was being stretched out into infinity becoming less and less substantial as it went until finally I had been completely dispersed into the ether to be reused in the construction of everything else that would be created in the universe.  This sounds as if it would be absolutely terrifying it was not really because I was not me, not human, not anything, emotions were foreign, unknown, and irrelevant. 
After laying there for what felt like forever unable to even form a coherent thought I was finally able to think this is what you are here for, this is your chance.  While you are out here you can remove  the bad things, take back only the positive leave the rest in the ether.  I began to see visions of my life my childhood, wife, children.  “I want to be the best father, best husband, best worker, best person in the world” It felt so easy to make it happen.

Becoming me again very slowly:

All of a sudden I could see again but I still was not real.  My mind was completely disassociated from my body. I could see it laying out below me but didn’t feel it.  I could feel the sensation of my body moving but didn’t know what it was and visually it didn’t show up until about 5 seconds later and I certainly didn’t initiate the movement with my thoughts. This was one of the most intense portions of the trip because I was in a sort of limbo so to speak.  I still wasn’t human so I wouldn’t say I was scared.  I probed and asked myself if I was afraid, no.  was I sad, no.  Being in this state felt more like a vast emptiness.  This lasted for far too long. 
I was physically uncomfortable and finally puzzled out that I was cold.  It took me a while longer to realize that I needed to cover up that body but then I could not figure out how to will my mind to make it happen. Still awhile longer and I was finally able with great effort to grab the covers and put them over my body.  It didn’t help the discomfort much so I waited awhile longer and I slowly was able to regain the movement of my body.  All the while my mind still refused to believe that I was me.  I kept thinking in the third person like “ when I am me again I am going to do this or that.” I kept thinking that my mind and my essence was being gathered from infinity and being reconstructed so I had to wait awhile longer.  I saw my dog Hemey and knew that I was supposed to love her but I was still unable to tie that emotion back to myself so I told her “the new me is going to be awesome and I will remember how to love you.”
I continued to get more of my consciousness back and my ability to think but I was still not getting my sense of being myself back.  I was beginning to get concerned that I would be stuck in this state and not remember how to feel or love or have emotions. Finally I thought I want a sandwich and realized that I was me again and that I was human because humans need food to live.  I looked at the clock and it was 10:13. I actually yelled out “woohoo, I am me again”

Coming down:

I went to the kitchen to make myself a roast beef sandwich but could not remember what the ingredients were.  I was still having strong fractal pattern visuals but felt almost sober compared to where I had just come from.  I finally settled on some chips and a slim jim since I could not figure out how to make a sandwich.  I finally went to bed at 11:27 pm not quite sober but fully exhausted.

Final thoughts:

This has been an incredibly long trip report and it is only some of what happened and the description of the experience pales in comparison to the actual events.  I was curious to see what this type of trip was like and although I am glad I did it and I am proud that I made it through it I still do not know if I will ever attempt it again.  I am not exactly afraid, but it felt like completing an incredibly monumental journey with trials and tribulations all along the way all wrapped up into about 6 hours. Having my reality come completely unhinged is something that I will have to ponder for a while. Even when I woke up the next morning I was questioning if all of “me” made back to reality or not.  If I take another journey like that I will not take it lightly.  I can’t really say that there are answers to all of life’s questions in the midst of a psilocybin trip but I can say that you will learn something about yourself along the way and even come out potentially better at the end of it.

Please comment on my experience in general or as compared to yours.  I have all these thoughts and questions but nobody that I know that I can discuss it with