Drugs – people die every single waking hour from drug use. In fact, the numbers are staggering with hundreds of thousands succumbing to their addictions every year. If you know anyone hooked on anything, you’ll know – this doesn’t stop them from indulging.
Many substances are used for mild alteration, some legal, some illegal, and some decriminalized. You can easily find some in your baking aisle at any grocery store. Think of cocoa powder and nutmeg as examples. The problem is, unlike alcohol and medications, there are no dosage instructions and definitely no guidelines on when someone should pull back from taking them. This is where Dominic Trott came in.
Dominic Trott decided to write a book
Dominic Trott is a 64-year-old author who has some pretty valid reasoning for writing The Drug Users Bible — a book, that amongst other things, advises people on how to use drugs as safely as possible. He says that if we cannot stop people from using drugs, we should, at the very least, ensure access to user information. This could potentially save thousands of lives.
It’s been over a decade since Trott started his journey of discovery, trying 182 different drugs in the name of research. He has tried weed, ecstasy, mushrooms, LSD, Ketamine, and even nutmeg – a common baking ingredient. He meticulously recorded every experience in detail, from the dosage to the procedure to administer the drug to his experience with it.
“The Drug Users Bible” was born
“Education saves lives,” Trott said following the publication of his book. “I felt that the government should have really written something like this. They should provide this information; it should be taught somehow through the system to people who are going to take drugs or might take drugs. And it isn’t. And, you know… I thought, I really have got to do this. And I’ve got to do this because nobody else is doing it.”
Believe it or not, Trott was not a big drug user before this project started. He had tried a few substances when residing in Liverpool, including weed and LSD. But it was only in his 40s that he decided to reach further. The seed was planted when Trott met people wrongly imprisoned for drugs.
As someone interested in humanitarian projects, he realized that the people he was meeting and talking to on public forums were disappearing – primarily due to drug use issues. “There was always some reason something behind [their deaths or health issues], there was a mistake or error, lack of information, lack of clarity, like of basic procedure and self-care, really,” Trott explained.
Right in the beginning
In the early stages of his research, he discovered a powerful psychedelic that offered a transformative experience. The drug was best taken with a shaman present, right in the heart of the Amazon. He traveled to Peru to try it and soon realized that a simple spreadsheet detailing his experience was not enough. “I could publish the spreadsheet, but it will just be lost. Or I could embark on this 10-year mission,” he said. So that’s what he did.
Trott wisely traveled to areas where the drugs he chose to study were easily accessible to minimize his chances of being detained. The categories were stimulants, psychedelics, and sedatives, among others. This helped Trott avoid addiction. He also did as much online research as he possibly could regarding dosages for each new experience.
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You can always have more, but you can’t have less
His book is laid out so that if you choose to try any of the 182 drugs, you have a recommended dosage chart at your fingertips. He warns that each person handles substances differently, so an allergy test is necessary before actually dosing with anything. It’s also important to note that when unsure, to rather start with a smaller dose. You can always take more if the effects aren’t desirable, but you cant redact what you’ve already taken.
The author learned this the hard way himself when sometimes unsure of doses. He made sure to try stronger doses to better note his findings. There were occasions when he did take too much, describing Heroin as a ‘mistake.’ The prescription drug pregabalin also left him feeling ‘really ill.’
The worst by far was more commonly accessible than you think – Nutmeg
His worst experience, hands down, was when he rook nutmeg. A common baking ingredient available almost anywhere. A deliriant, he discovered nutmeg in a book about legal highs in his early 20s. “[It was an] awful, terrible experience,” Trott said. “I did it about eight o’clock, and I was really disappointed because I thought ‘I’m gonna get high tonight.”
“It takes about three hours to take effect. Nobody tells us that… And so I went to bed. About two or three o’clock in the morning, I woke up and my head was spinning and I was dizzy and I needed to go to the loo. So I got out of bed, I couldn’t stand up. And I’m literally crawling.. [I remember] pulling my hands up and [seeing] glue coming out.”
“I sort of got there and I couldn’t urinate, [then] I managed to get back, the floors [were tipping], and it was not in a nice way. The next day I still had a headache. My stomach was sore, I couldn’t go to work on Monday, and I was ill for a week. It’s a poison.” His experience with nutmeg contributed to his section of the book called ‘Deliriums‘ which the author described as ‘your experience coming apart and being put together in the wrong way’.
“The sensory organs are just not working correctly, and they’re coming back together in the wrong way and your perception of what’s around is totally wrong,” he explained. “And you end up in serious trouble. If you survive the drug, you’re probably going to be maimed or psychologically damaged for some time.”
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This particular experience with nutmeg put him off drug use for years
The experience deterred Trott for quite some time, making him reluctant to try datura, another deliriant. The bait was the number of kids on online forums taking it. He knew then that he had to try it to properly understand it and discuss its impact in detail.
“That’s why I had to have some of the drugs that I really didn’t want to, and datura was one of them. Because it was a deliriant and I’d been so badly burned with nutmeg… One of the problems with datura is that one seed can be seven times more powerful than the next. Now in terms of dosages, you can imagine the nightmare that is.”
“[You can have] seven really powerful seeds, which is sort of the equivalent of 49 weak ones, which is potentially going to kill you at that level. I had to have every drug I could that was in popular use, simply because […] if the police or the government say don’t do that, you know, it doesn’t have any carry any weight. But if someone who’s actually had 182 drugs is saying, ‘No, you don’t really want to do that. But if you do want to do it, do that’, there’s a chance they might listen,” he said.
Not everything is measured in facts and figures
The book is not just a cheat sheet for drug use as it also documents funny experiences, legal advice, and drug tourism. There’s also a section committed to ‘how to handle yourself in the real world’. Above all, the idea is to just be completely honest about what’s out there.
While looking back, Trott doesn’t think that the drug use has negatively impacted his body, but he sternly believes they have altered his mind.“In terms of mental health, I’ve changed. And I’ve changed because of the psychedelics… it’s sort of made me think, ‘What I should be doing? How can I help others?’,” he explained.
He is unconcerned about the risk that the book may have on indoctrinating non-users into a world of drugs as he believes that if you were to actually pick up a copy, you are already a user or were considering becoming one. He is however hopeful that the book could also help others. Such as concerned parents who may be worried about their teenage children.
The last word
Trott explained: “I’ve got two kids, and you’re thinking. ‘Well, you know, they’re in a situation where they might be taking drugs, should there be fore-armed? Should they actually know if they’re going to take a drug? You’ve got this choice of letting the child go into this risky situation without being armed with facts and data and safety information. And just, you know, taking a risk. Or [you can] arm them with harm reduction or safety procedures and knowledge about the drugs that are prevalent in the location before they go into it. You have the power to do that.”
There are ’10 commandments available in a free PDF format which can be downloaded online for those curious. However, he urges those who choose to purchase the book to not skip the safety measures, saying: “You’re cheating yourself. Information and knowledge are empowerment.“
We cant fault him – he felt that his journey would be useful to others, even being a long treacherous road. One thing he believes for certain is this – “It’s going to save lives.” And that is something we can all agree to get behind. And to think nutmeg, a popular baking ingredient we’ve probably all tasted in our meals at some stage could be so risky at higher doses.
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