Psilocybe

Is it safe to use psilocybe if you're schizotypal? The main symptoms are superstitiousness, bizarre ideas and unusual perceptions such as strong sense of presence, olfactory hallucinations and hallucinated slight movements.

I've heard psilocybe can induce psychosis, but only if you're already psychotically inclined:

"Some individuals enter transient and sometimes prolonged psychotic states after use of
psychedelics, including psilocybin (Benjamin 1979; Halpern and Pope 1999; Strassman
1984). Because in nearly all cases, psychosis appears after use without evaluation of
psychological state prior to psilocybin use, drawing conclusions about causality is
difficult. After examining the literature, Strassman concluded that hallucinogens,
including psilocybin, might trigger psychotic episodes, but in a non-specific and non-
etiologic manner, and that they did not cause psychosis in people (Strassman 1984).
Researchers examining the prevalence of psychiatric reactions through questionnaires
sent to researchers conducting controlled studies with the related serotonergic
hallucinogen LSD found that 0.08% of 5000 study volunteers experienced psychiatric
symptoms that lasted more than two days (Cohen 1960). The rate of occurrence for
psychiatric symptoms occurred at the slightly higher rate of 0.18% in psychiatric patients.
Another survey of a separate sample of 4300 research volunteers reported a rate of
serious, persistent psychiatric reactions in 0.9% of the sample (Malleson 1971).
Psilocybin and LSD produce similar subjective effects. Hence these findings suggest that
participating in a research study involving the administration of a psychedelic compound
similar to LSD is extremely unlikely to trigger transient or persistent psychosis. Past
research with LSD and other psychedelics did not apply as stringent criteria for
participant selection or screening as are used today, making the low rates of psychosis
especially notable (Halpern and Pope 1999), and likely overestimates the likelihood of
prolonged psychoses or other psychopathological effects in a study wherein participants
are screened for past or present psychotic disorders. The occurrence of transient or
persistent psychosis can be prevented or further reduced by excluding people on the basis
of the presence of past or current psychotic disorders or such disorders in first-degree
relatives, such as biological parent or sibling."
(Bron: http://www.maps.org/research/psilo/psilo_ib.pdf)

So if you're not suffering from some psychotic disease or other, it's safe. What if you're half psychotic? Could it aggravate symptoms? Has anyone else who's schizotypal got any experience with psilocybe?

Oblomov wrote:Is it safe to use psilocybe if you're schizotypal? The main symptoms are superstitiousness, bizarre ideas and unusual perceptions such as strong sense of presence, olfactory hallucinations and hallucinated slight movements.

I've heard psilocybe can induce psychosis, but only if you're already psychotically inclined:

"Some individuals enter transient and sometimes prolonged psychotic states after use of
psychedelics, including psilocybin (Benjamin 1979; Halpern and Pope 1999; Strassman
1984). Because in nearly all cases, psychosis appears after use without evaluation of
psychological state prior to psilocybin use, drawing conclusions about causality is
difficult. After examining the literature, Strassman concluded that hallucinogens,
including psilocybin, might trigger psychotic episodes, but in a non-specific and non-
etiologic manner, and that they did not cause psychosis in people (Strassman 1984).
Researchers examining the prevalence of psychiatric reactions through questionnaires
sent to researchers conducting controlled studies with the related serotonergic
hallucinogen LSD found that 0.08% of 5000 study volunteers experienced psychiatric
symptoms that lasted more than two days (Cohen 1960). The rate of occurrence for
psychiatric symptoms occurred at the slightly higher rate of 0.18% in psychiatric patients.
Another survey of a separate sample of 4300 research volunteers reported a rate of
serious, persistent psychiatric reactions in 0.9% of the sample (Malleson 1971).
Psilocybin and LSD produce similar subjective effects. Hence these findings suggest that
participating in a research study involving the administration of a psychedelic compound
similar to LSD is extremely unlikely to trigger transient or persistent psychosis. Past
research with LSD and other psychedelics did not apply as stringent criteria for
participant selection or screening as are used today, making the low rates of psychosis
especially notable (Halpern and Pope 1999), and likely overestimates the likelihood of
prolonged psychoses or other psychopathological effects in a study wherein participants
are screened for past or present psychotic disorders. The occurrence of transient or
persistent psychosis can be prevented or further reduced by excluding people on the basis
of the presence of past or current psychotic disorders or such disorders in first-degree
relatives, such as biological parent or sibling."
(Bron: http://www.maps.org/research/psilo/psilo_ib.pdf)

So if you're not suffering from some psychotic disease or other, it's safe. What if you're half psychotic? Could it aggravate symptoms? Has anyone else who's schizotypal got any experience with psilocybe?

It is really hard to say.
It is a question that I never thought about before.

If you are in the proper set and setting and don't use it recklessly it will be fine. If used properly, shrooms can be safer than caffeine believe it or not. I've had a low dose of lsd and it did help a bit.

If you have a family history of schizophrenia you should be very careful......but with SPD it doesn't matter as much. Other than that, as as long you use it wisely, you'll be fine.

What is "odd behavior and thinking, and often unconventional beliefs" is really subjective......can shrooms open you up to ideas not normally accepted or discussed in mainstream culture (which is often what defines SPD)? Yes it can.....but it doesn't mean anything. In my opinion odd behavior and thinking and unconventional beliefs are stuff done more by the generally accept religious community than the mystical mushy thinking these little mushrooms can cause. It all depends on you.

"Mushy." Nice pun. ^^

Hm, well, maybe it's not the views that are that strange -- the person in question isn't me, but a friend who's interested. Recently she thought a ghost was following her, and it'd have revealed its presence by causing small movements. At some point it would have clung to her, and it made her feel dead. She could even smell it, as though, in her words, she was rotting inside. I don't think her belief in the paranormal (telekinesis, telepathy, precognition) are beyond the pale -- hell, even I have an open mind to them -- but her experience with this "ghost" sounds worrying.

There's always a chance that she's prodromal schizophrenic, although statistically the chance of SPD is at least about three times greater. Either how I think it'd be better to wait -- the symptoms came in only a few months so if it's prodromal schizophrenia and if it'd continue to progress at this rate we'd probably know within another half year or so.

If someone has been thinking a ghost is following them or has even thought about 'ghosts" as a negative thing,

NO they should not do shrooms.

Shrooms can be wet or dry, put them in the blender w/ ice cream and small about of milk, blend up a shake. It won't make you sick and still has the same affect. My friends shared this information with me also.

Ro

Oblomov, Yeah if she fears the ghost then the shrooms can really feed off that since the shrooms experience is determined on what is in your imagination. It may make her more paranoid and if she is already schizophrenic then as I have stated she should be very careful. If she wants to use it as a schizophrenic then she should go to Mexico for a while and take it with one of the shamans of the Mazatec. They know how to handle people who are in that mindstate because they themselves swim in the same ocean all the time.

Hey Ro, so you've had shroomys before? Does Red know? Hope you aren't doing anything without telling her, hehe.

Yeah that's a good recipe.....I would prefer to just eat the little mushroomys as it is (but dried)......and then smoke pot during the trip to ease the nausea.

It's not that I'd be worried that she couldn't deal with it at the moment itself, but rather that it'd trigger psychosis. Can psychosis be triggered (not produced) in schizotypal personality disorder?

In my experience, Mexican psilocybe causes very little hallucinations, and then only slight movements -- but maybe schizotypal people would be more sensitive to their hallucinogen effect, so that they'd be seeing things -- not only during the effect, but also afterwards, ie, that it'd induce psychosis.