More than one in 10 people undergoing trendy psychedelic mushroom therapy – endorsed by celebrities such as Prince Harry – experience ‘significant psychological distress’, data revealed today.
Experts in the US, who tracked the self-reported behavior of nearly 10,000 psilocybin users, found hundreds of reports of paranoia, intense fear and even vivid hallucinations.
One claimed to experience “feelings of dying, impending doom, torture” with psilocybin – the active ingredient in magic mushrooms used in therapy – adding that it felt like “being thrown into hell”.
Another warned that they saw “demons, skeletons, snails, cockroaches, ghosts… I disappointed my parents.”
Experts today acknowledged that the findings were purely observational, but warned that they “warrant serious consideration and should not be overlooked.”
Experts in the US, who tracked the self-reported behavior of nearly 10,000 psilocybin users, discovered hundreds of reports of paranoia, intense anxiety and even vivid hallucinations. One claimed to experience ‘feelings of dying, impending doom, torture’ on the psychedelic drug – the active ingredient in magic mushrooms – adding that it felt like being ‘thrown into hell’
Last year, Prince Harry also admitted to using psilocybin and ayahuasca, a plant-based psychedelic drug extracted from the leaves of a shrub
He said he took the drugs in an attempt to help him heal the “grief” and “trauma” he felt after his mother’s death. Harry is pictured with Princess Diana in 1987
Psychedelic drugs such as LSD, magic mushrooms, ketamine and ecstasy (or MDMA) have long been touted by some British psychiatrists as a respectable new therapeutic answer to mental health conditions such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and substance abuse or addiction. .
Psilocybin itself has been promoted as a promising therapy for depression and relief social anxiety in people with autism.
Last year, Prince Harry also admitted he used it along with ayahuasca – a plant-based psychedelic substance from the leaves of a shrub – in an attempt to help him heal the ‘grief’ and ‘trauma’ he felt after the death of his mother.
When someone uses magic mushrooms, the psilocybin in the body is converted into psilocin, which binds to serotonin receptors in the brain, causing a hallucinatory effect.
Psilocin can also cause overactivity in the brain’s frontal cortex, the region responsible for helping you perform motor tasks and high-level cognitive functions such as judgment, abstract thinking and creativity.
This overactive frontal cortex leads to changes in consciousness, altered perceptions and shifts in thinking patterns.
The researchers, from Health newstracked user experiences of Shroomery, a popular online forum similar to Reddit, where people share advice and their own psychedelic tripping behavior.
They then ran it through the AI chatbot ChatGPT to analyze the language used.
“Sentiment analysis categorizes the messages into positive, negative or neutral based on emotional tone,” the experts claimed.
No other details were shared about how the study was conducted.
Experts found that almost half (42.4 percent) of the reports were positive and 13.57 percent were negative.
Common negative keywords used to describe experiences include anxiety (1,260), fear (1,000), panic (980), nausea (690), and paranoia (260).
One anonymous user claimed he was forced to ‘turn off every light’ after taking psilocybin.
‘Every minute that passed during the journey only got stronger. I couldn’t stand it. “I couldn’t bear to look at anything, so I closed my room, turned off all the lights and lay in bed, only leaving to vomit outside every now and then,” they said.
Another reported existential anxiety that questioned their reality and existence.
“My mind couldn’t identify with anything. The whole social life seemed strange to me. (…) I felt like I had gone crazy and had to go to a psychiatric hospital. I cannot define this condition. It was like nothing mattered,” they wrote.
Common triggers for “bad trips” included high dosages, pre-existing mental health problems such as anxiety or depression and a lack of preparation before taking the drug, experts said.
The findings add to a growing body of research raising the alarm about the side effects of psilocybin.
One 2023 study in the journal PLOS One has collected data from the experiences of more than 600 people after using psilocybin, LSD, ayahuasca, cannabis, MDMA, DMT, ketamine, mescaline and salvia.
Common triggers for “bad trips” included high dosages, pre-existing mental health problems such as anxiety or depression and a lack of preparation before taking the drug, experts said. The findings add to a growing body of research raising the alarm about the side effects of psilocybin
Recalling their experiences, one anonymous user interviewed by the British researchers said: ‘I stayed awake for three days after dosing and went into psychosis.
‘I believed all my friends were ‘spies’ talking to me to fool me. I also threw stuff at the wall and talked about wanting to kill myself on day three. This belief persisted until I took an antipsychotic drug for months.”
However, proponents of psychedelic therapy argue that bad trips are rare, and even when they do occur, they often provide challenging personal insights that encourage healthy psychological growth.
Proponents also point to the presence of a therapist during examinations during the entire time the patient is under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs.
In February 2022, David Nutt, professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, co-authored a review of research in the Journal of Psychopharmacology.
It claimed that psychedelic drugs have an undue bad reputation and argued that ‘many – although not all – of the persistent negative perceptions of psychological risk are not supported by the currently available scientific evidence’.
Professor Nutt was sacked as chairman of the independent Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) in 2009 by Labor Home Secretary Alan Johnson after drafting a paper for the Home Office claiming that Class A ecstasy is safer then equestrian.
He also recommended that cannabis, ecstasy and LSD should be considered less harmful than alcohol and cigarettes.
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