Valley of the Shadow of Death

Diphenhydramine

Citation: Bena. "Valley of the Shadow of Death: An Experience with Diphenhydramine (exp86374)". Erowid.org . Jan 8, 2014. erowid.org/exp/86374

DOSE:

oral Diphenhydramine (pill / tablet)

BODY WEIGHT: 40 lb

After a week of sobriety, due to the fact that I was in Kansas for a school sponsored event, I came back home with a craving. I was thinking that perhaps I would drink, smoke or robotrip. Anything to take a break from my mind. My best friends and I met up and as night fell my friend offered me a chance to try a large dosage of Benadryl. I know some of you may think this sounds like somewhat of a ghetto drug but when it comes down to it, a chemical is a chemical, no matter where you get it.Usually I thoroughly investigate every drug I take on line before I try it but this time I decided to put full trust into my friend. I looked him in the eyes and told him I have no idea what this may do to me but I am fully trusting you.One glass of water, a few handfuls of pills and a couple gulps later, I said my farewells. Next stop, the other side. It didn't hit me for a while. The first thing I noticed was an odd high, unlike one I've ever felt before. It's hard for me to remember it or put it into words. I felt a difference in how the air felt inside my lungs and the weight of my body against the ground. It's hard for me to explain. Sorry. Unlike most drugs, I didn't trip out right away. My trip gradually increased and was still slightly present the next day, kind of like Dxm.This is when things started to get weird. About forty minutes into my trip, I looked down at my arm to see spiders crawling across it. This didn't scare me. I understood this was only in my head and it could not hurt me. I do believe that for the most part, all we have to fear is fear itself, especially when it comes to drugs. Just in case, I asked my friends to confirm that there was in fact no spiders on my arm. How funny would it have been if there really was? But they confirmed that there was indeed, no spiders. I walked around a bit. I felt very heavy. It was hard for me to keep my balance. I would start talking to my friends, only to completely lose my train of thought after the first few words left my mouth. The same would happen when they talked to me. I would lose sight of what they were trying to tell me immediately. They would look at me like I was retarded. I got a little frustrated but I tried not to let it bug me. Later on one of them told me one of our conversations went like this.Me: Um...never mind...Wait, what was I just saying?Them: You just said 'never mind'.Me: No, before that...Then once again one of my friends opened their mouth to tell me something. This was an odd experience. Of course, I lost track of what he was saying instantly but I kept looking at his face anyway. He was in the dark with the exception of the glare from the T.V. screen. I stared into his eyes and his pupils grew until they ate away his entire eyes. Then his long messy hair started to form a mane and then instantly, BAM! He had the face of a deranged lion. It was like a demonic version of the lion from the wizard of Oz, a half human, half lion with a touch of Satan. BAM! His face rearranges to form my own face. For a brief moment I see me talking directly to me! ZIP! His face is back to normal. In a way this scared me but it wasn't in the sense one would think it should. I felt a sick, corrupt enjoyment from this like from watching a scary movie. It's like I know it's not real so I'm okay but holy shit man that was scary and crazy awesome! It's interesting. For some odd reason, this friend always reminds me of myself when I'm high and he's said the same about me. This was just another occurrence where I saw myself in him, although very literal on this occasion.I looked around the room some more, wanting to trip out. I walked around a bit. I looked in the mirror. I can't remember what I saw. I just remember thinking, it wasn't quite right. I remember thinking I looked human, but not really human. Something was missing. A soul perhaps? I walked around a bit more. Something moved to my left. I turned to see a shadowy figure darting across the room. The way he moved was really strange. It was like this fast, jerky, animated, almost teleporting movement. Anxious to sink into my trip, I followed him only to find nothing. A dead end. I sat back down. For a while nothing happened. I was very anxious to trip but I still felt so sober. I almost wondered if the Benadryl was wearing off early.One of my friends felt tired and wanted to go to sleep. My other friend (remember lion face?) offered him his own bed upstairs. He also suggested I go with him because he said it was better to trip in the dark. I followed my friend upstairs. We'll call him Ron. I followed Ron upstairs to my friend's bedroom. We sat there in the dark for a while and talked. Strangely, I think I was able to hold up a few sentences here and there. I felt like I still thought in complete thoughts, I just couldn't always express them. I anxiously looked around the room, ready to take on whatever came at me but time passed and nothing was happening so I figured I would go back downstairs to the basement where I originally tripped and hope I could get back into the zone. I told my friend I was leaving. He said 'Are you sure you're okay? You can make it back downstairs, fine and everything?' I felt completely normal. I told him, 'Yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry about me.' He said 'Alright, I trust you.' I got up to leave. -FLASH- I'm talking to someone in the kitchen. -FLASH- I'm asking myself why am I in the kitchen? -FLASH- I'm back downstairs. I reflect for a minute and laugh at what just happened.I'm sitting with my friends but every time I turn I feel like I just saw someone in the corner of my eye and jump. It felt like a shadowy person was right behind me. Then I look to my left and see a lizard cage. There are two lizards and one just crawled out the top of the cage and scurried underneath the dresser. This looked extremely realistic. I was sure a lizard just ran out, but I decided to excuse it as a hallucination.I started to hear noises. Creepy ambiance in the distance. Voices whispering in the other room. I start talking to people who aren't there.I looked back to the lizard cage to find that there was now no lizards but instead a giant iguana. An extremely detailed iguana. I've hallucinated before but I've only seen things distorted. I've never seen things that weren't actually there to begin with, especially things like this that were so immensely detailed. If two people stood side by side and one was a hallucination, I could walk around them, inspect them completely and not be able to tell the difference. Even asking questions wouldn't help because at this point, I was so delirious, I couldn't completely tell right from wrong. This showed a flaw in my rules of drug technique. I always like to have a sitter but what is the good in having a sitter if there's a duplicate of them telling you the opposite of what you should do? I wanted to touch the iguana to see if it was real but I decided against it. I thought I may hallucinate it biting me or running off and that might scare me. I decided to leave it. It was just fine where it was.By now, I've given up on trying to communicate with my friends. Half the time they aren't real and when they are I can't remember what I was saying. I decide it's too much work. I guess we must have been making quite a bit of noise because my friend's mom came down to check on us. She must have sensed something was up because she decided to sit down on the couch for a while and keep a bit an eye on us. I stayed quiet while she was there, careful not to do anything weird that may get my friend in trouble. I almost wondered is she really there? Then I would look over at her and she would glance over at me. We would make eye contact. Yup, definitely real.Some time has passed. All of my friends are now asleep. This is where things started to piece off and I can't remember what exactly I did or what order things exactly went in. I know at some point I was coloring. I reached down to grab a marker and couldn't grip it. It looked like there was a perfect picture of that marker plastered right into the carpet. I did this a lot. I would try to pick something up, only to find that I was scraping a desk, trying to peel off a flattened three dimensional object that wasn't really there. It was a little frustrating. I would forget where I was and why I was feeling this way. What had I taken? I would hear more noises. I would think one of my friends said something to me, so I would ask them, 'What?' only to have them wake up and give me a look like, what the hell? Why are you waking me up?I started talking to people who weren't there more. I did this quite a bit. I don't know who they were, only that there was someone there I was talking to. Just like in the kitchen. -FLASH- I'm talking to someone. -FLASH- Who the hell was I talking to? I recall one specific instance where I was talking to a friend of mine from the vacation I had just taken in Kansas. I guess that group of people was still fresh on my mind. I was having a conversation with her about who knows what when I see someone out of the corner of my eye. I turn my head to see it's her, a duplicate walking by. Even now I'm still not afraid. I turn back to hallucination #1 and smile. I ask her, 'You're a hallucination aren't you?' She looks stunned like she doesn't know what to say. She locks up. I say 'Ha! I caught you, you joker! you silly fucker!' She then wisps away and disappears.I gradually stopped talking to people who weren't there. I felt sober once again but then again I may have felt sober the the whole time. I came to the conclusion that my trip was pretty much over so I found a spot on the floor and fell asleep.The next day I found out that there was indeed no lizards in that cage, no iguana or oddly enough, no cage to begin with. My friend's mom never came downstairs to check on us. For some reason I drew scribbles all over my friend's shirt and he also got a text from his mom asking, 'Who was in the kitchen last night?'This was an experience not a fun one but an interesting one. I would recommend it as a one time deal, an experience if you have the strength to deal with it. I think one of the best ways to describe it would be walking through the valley of the shadow of death. You can make it if you understand that this is all in your head and all you have to fear is fear itself.