'The scary thing about the Destroying Angel is that it tricks you into thinking you are making a recovery – then it destroys your liver'

Four years ago, a few days before my 56th birthday, I went to one of my favourite spots – a park about a quarter of a mile from my home in Ithaca, New York.

That summer had been hot and humid, and there were mushrooms everywhere. I saw some on the ground I thought were edible ink caps – white, with their caps down. I also spotted a bigger mushroom nearby with its cap open – it looked poisonous to me. I should have remembered that mushrooms grow in colonies: it was likely that the lone bigger mushroom and the smaller versions were the same. But I didn't think. It was a glorious day and I felt invincible. I picked three or four of the small ones and took them home.

As a young man, I used to look for morels and meadow mushrooms. At college, I'd taken a course in mushroom hunting. I didn't consider myself an expert, but I did know that there was a very toxic mushroom called the destroying angel, one of the most deadly mushrooms in the world.

At home, I spent some time looking for my mushroom book to identify what I'd picked, but couldn't find it. I was in a rush because I was going out, so I thought, "It's OK, I know what I'm doing. These are definitely ink caps." I fried them with butter and ate them as a side dish. Ink caps usually give out a residue when you cook them. These didn't, which should have been my first clue that they weren't what I thought they were. They didn't taste great – in fact, there was something quite bland about them. "I won't bother eating these again," I thought.

That night, I told friends I'd just eaten wild mushrooms. One asked if they'd had white caps and gills, and I said, yes. She told me her mother said never eat mushrooms that are white all over. I shrugged it off and said I knew what I was doing. But she planted the first seed of doubt.

The next morning, I woke up about 4am, ran to the bathroom and started throwing up. Then the diarrhoea began. I thought, perhaps my friend was right; maybe I've eaten poisonous mushrooms.

I went again to look for my mushroom book, which I now found. I looked up the destroying angel – and there were my exact symptoms: eight hours after eating, it will cause vomiting and diarrhoea. And then it destroys your liver – there's no antidote and 60-80% of people don't survive. I realised I'd made the biggest mistake of my life.

The scary thing about the destroying angel is that it tricks you into thinking you are making a recovery. After the vomiting and diarrhoea, you start to feel better. Knowing this, I acted quickly and called the hospital. They recommended going back to where I picked the mushrooms to see if I could find another so they could identify it – which is what I did. Then I drove myself to the emergency room. As I left my house, I thought, "Look around, you may never be back here."

At that point, I hadn't told anyone else that I suspected I'd poisoned myself. I called work, because I had a shift that night. Eventually, I called my girlfriend. I felt embarrassed that all my friends and family would know I'd made such a terrible mistake.

The doctors ran some tests and confirmed I'd eaten the destroying angel. I was the third person that year to be admitted after eating one. The two before me hadn't survived. I was sent to another hospital a few hours away; it was the best place to be if my liver failed and I needed a transplant.

I was still vomiting and the diarrhoea was constant. I had tubes down my throat, and the doctors took blood samples every hour to monitor my liver. They asked me questions to check I was lucid. The critical night was on Friday, three days after I'd eaten the mushrooms, when I went into intensive care. I was given high doses of penicillin and the next morning my liver began to recover. I didn't need a transplant, but my kidneys were badly damaged. I was kept in for another week. All I know is that I survived – one doctor said it was a miracle.

I haven't had the courage to pick wild mushrooms since – I don't trust myself – but my experience shouldn't deter others. The mistake I made was assuming I knew what I was eating. I wasn't paying attention and I'm lucky to be alive.

• As told to Sophie Haydock.



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