A Trip to Hell and Beyond.

First of all, let's make one thing clear - I am new to this website and  have only come on here to share what I saw when tripping two nights ago at Amsterdam. I hope that some of you guys have seen what I saw, so that I know that I'm not alone.  And that you guys can help make sense of why I experienced such a bad trip.

I have read a few posts on this forum but not really seen any one state a similar experience to me.

It all started with me and a friend buying shrooms from a shop in a dark Amsterdam alley -your usual scenario aye, the shopkeeper asked if I had tried shrooms before and I said yes, just once and it was a good trip. Despite saying that she said the box of shrooms I wanted were too strong - of course I brushed her off and bought them anyway.

I had broken a few rules prior to taking the shrooms that fateful night - I had smoked a bit of weed, and was with a big group of friends at a busy coffee shop - only one friend was taking shrooms with me. I felt confident that  I would cope as my first trip two years ago had been fantastic -  I think I reached level 4 by seeing fantastic visual hallucinations and losing sense of time - only experienced some minor anxious moments which were soon  dispelled.

We proceeded to both eat half the shrooms and after 40 minutes, the visual hallucinations begun - my friends' faces started to morph, they seemed to have four eyes, walls started to bend, and some images started to loop a bit. As I am myself Deaf and all my friends are too - we use sign language in our communication and since its a visual language, the signs became distorted and blurry. I became very aware of everything in the room and my tripping friend said he was seeing similar things - all  good I thought.  That was just about the level that I reached on my first shroom experience

Then it started to go all wrong.

My non-shroom eating friends wanted to leave the coffee shop for food. I agreed and ate a waffle with cream on it - I started to notice at this point that I felt my mind trying to leave my body. It was quite bright in the food shop plus some lights were flashing from outside which were starting to annoy me. I started to look around the room rapidly to focus myself and stop this "out of the body" perspective that was starting to freak me out.  We soon moved to a different coffee shop and when walking there, I started to notice the people walking past me in the alleys - I started to get paranoid of being attacked as the people looked rough and a lot of them were walking with their gangs.

Once in the coffee shop I tried to order a Coca Cola but the shop keeper suddenly looked very menacing - in reality he was actually  nice and friendly but my mind was telling me otherwise. I struggled to get the change out and avoided looking at his face.
I saw down and started chatting to my friends - I could feel myself floating out and in of my body, like I was looking down at myself with my friends. I kept thinking "If I cant get back in myself I will freak out!". As I fought to stay calm, My friend said I had forgotten something, and I noticed her face had monster like features, I told myself that I am just tripping and its all OK. She handed me my scarf that I had left behind - I put it around my neck then I noticed that I couldn't feel my scarf on my neck. I couldn't feel anything, then I noticed that a girl sitting next to me had a shrunken head. That was when I felt my heart absolutely pounding! PANIC ATTACK TIME! I couldn't focus on myself any more and was now totally having an out of the body experience. I tried and tried to get my senses back together but I just couldn't. I managed to stand up and shout to my friends "I'm freaking out! I need to go back to the hotel to sleep!". However as they were all stoned from smoking hash, and the shroom friend was having the giggles - they just laughed and pointed at me. I was experiencing sheer terror, felt like my heart was going to burst and was on the point of absconding, when one of them finally agreed to get me a bottle of Coke to help calm me down. The drink didn't work - I had become so agitated my friends had to leave the coffee shop to take me back to the hotel.  I was clutching on my friend for sheer life as I was so paranoid that I'll get lost in Amsterdam with so many strangers watching me.  I also felt that that if I let go, I would be sucked away and lose myself to madness forever.

When walking back to the hotel - it was only 10 minutes walk in reality but it felt like hours of panic. Once I got to the hotel - my friend bought me another Coke, I tried to drink it but I felt a sensation of myself choking on the Coke, as I was breathing rapidly at the same time. I couldn't feel the Coke going down my throat.  I honestly thought I was going to die.

When going up the hotel lift, there was a mirror inside it, so I looked at it, and could see myself pure white with terror. I remember I kept thinking that my friends could read my thoughts and as a consequence they would know all of my dark secrets and tell everyone. Finally I got to my bed and prayed that sleep would come fast and end this never-ending nightmare. it did not come - instead in the blackness that came with shutting my eyes - I started to see the most weird and surreal visual experience I have ever seen. It is so hard to explain in words but I will try.

It started with a series of coloured unidentified symbols moving upwards like Space Invaders, but then the symbols started to resemble letters from the alphabet, like A B C D all in the correct alphabetical order, moving up one by one. Thenafter the alphabet was completed, I started to see important events and people in my life crop up, in this very specific order that made no sense. I felt like I was on a visual path, a pattern, a system of order, then I started to see the elements of what makes up this world like atoms, materials etc.  I could feel myself falling and it was like that I was dying. I remember the thoughts "You cant die on shrooms" coming up but  at the same time it was such a cruel contradiction as I felt myself fading away.  The letters, symbols and people then got smaller and more distant then it vanished completely and I felt myself reaching the end of the path - this overwhelming sense of peace came over me, then this indescribable glow of joy and warmth came over my body.  It was such a spiritual moment and I am not a religious person. It was so physical as well - it wasn't just in the mind as it enveloped my whole body.

With this surge of intense joy come over me - all my terror and panic started to fade away.  It was like being reborn - just this massive inner peace then this is where the weirdest moment comes.

Everything started to happen backwards - I felt myself floating up, visual symbols and letters were reoccurring but this time backwards like Z Y X, it was absolutely precise, there is no way that in reality I could have remembered  the order, it was literally hundreds of symbols and images, but I knew the order was absolutely correct.  I could see my family and friends smiling and looking relieved that I was coming back and I hadnt been lost to the shrooms forever. Slowly the alphabet reached the last letter -  the letter A. Then this name in text came up saying "Mark" - my name, and the number 16 - the day I was born - then an audio message (Remember I'm Deaf so I cant hear in reality) just spoke to me gently "Wake up." I had tried in this weird dreamlike sequence to "wake myself up" a few times without any success so with all my mental strength I willed myself to wake this time around as it was my only chance!!

I awoke!

I was back in my darkened bedroom and could see my friends sleeping in the beds next to me. I wasn't sure if I was actually still tripping so I ran to the bathroom and could see that I had truly returned - I also checked the time on my mobile - it was 4am. I took the shrooms at 10pm, so 6 hours had passed.   It was so reassuring seeing the time and knowing that things made sense again.

I will never take shrroms again due to this truly terrifying experience but I saw things that I know have changed my life for the better. It was just so spiritual - I feel like that I can see and understand the world better.  I tried explaining this to my friends but they don't really understand what I mean as they haven't tripped on shrooms before.  And I probably sounded crazy too.

I have a few questions to resolve a few issues I have about this whole experience:

Have any of you experienced this sequence of your life unfolding in your eyes, then everything happening again but backwards? Also with letters and symbols like what I have tried to describe? If so, what do you think this means?

Did I reach Level 5? I'll like to think that I did but I'll like to know what you think.

Thank you for reading this - it was probably boring!   :)

Mark