Thinking about doing an Ayahuasca retreat...recommendations if you've done it, please!

[Terestialnight]

I'm very curious to do ayahuasca. There are lots of places out there that do it in South America - and some in Europe. Have you done it? If so, what's your experience and are there any retreats you'd recommend?

No judgements please, each to their own.

Someone I know did. She wrote about her experience, it's a very interesting read.

www.raweva.com/life-changing-ayahuasca-experience/

Be very careful. I'm in favour of ayahuasca but some of these retreats are shady. They add extra ingredients that can be harmful, there are sexual harassment problems, and the facilitators don't always know what to do when things go wrong.

A relative of mine did it and he claims it helped him, but he is absolutely off his fucking nut, so I wouldn’t trust a word he says.

Thanks all. Yes, I would of course go to a reputable retreat

Did you go and any feedback?

Someone did it in my excursion group in Peru. The rest of us watched on whilst he hallucinated and then threw up everywhere. He was not at all well on our boat trip the next day. Wouldn’t be for me!

Hullo
I have been to a few, and know people who go regularly. It wasn't for me, although I was with a very close and responsible group and taita (leader of the ceremony) I did feel safe.I found the purging very hard. I don't feel that "mother medicine" spoke to me the way my friends feel about it. But it is true that, if you take it seriously, it can be very helpful. Opens the portals so to speak. Maybe I am just too strait laced (tho absolutely no stranger to mind altering substances, ahem) The musicians who usually accompany the ceremony are absolutely amazing and that was the most uplifting take away for me. I often listen to the ceremonial songs as it really soothes me and gives me a pure spiritual boost. Indigenous people have been using this vine for centuries and it is culturally very important to them.
i would recommend trying it once you have checked out the facility and qualifications. I do have friends who go in the UK as well. So maybe you don't need to globe trot to have your first experience. Best of luck and be safe !

You definitely don't want to be involved in anything like an excursion the very next day ! At least 48 hours in calm recovery I would say. It's exhausting.

I did go; it was a real eye opener, full-on, and very insightful. Not for the faint hearted. I went on to do two other plants/endogens last year - and the experiences have given me so much, in tandem with trad therapy. All with highly reputable facilitators and safe ceremonial settings.

@Terestialnight would you tell more about it?

What specifically did you want to know?

I did ayahuasca in the amazon basin in ecuador with a shaman in 1998. It was a very intense experience - mad visuals. I was only 22 and didn't really take it seriously. My friend went to one in north London, and I think got a lot from it though it sounded hard being on a camp bed in a room with other people screaming and crying. I'm definitely interested in the idea of it as being a psychological cleanse, as I have some mental health now, in my late 40s, but I'm a single mum with a 12 year old 100% of the time, no parents and a very demanding business! So I won't be able to do anything like this for a while! But thats an interesting article posted above, thanks for that. Makes me think I might do it again one day!

Throwing up is a definite part of it. I remember being sick when I did it.

Did you feel unwell

how did it help you is the main question i have realy

I wasn't sick at all - but this is unusual. I thought I would be as I had done another plant before and was really sick. I didn't feel physically unwell at all. But it was powerful and it did catapault me into a different place - I felt a true sense of altered consciousness. I personally didn't get a ton of mad visuals (some but not as many as other participants) but I got endless insights and voices - whether it's your own higher consciousness or the plants, who knows - and I was unable to move or feel the limits of our own consciousness for about 3 of the 5 hours. There was a lot of love in and between the more difficult stuff. It's really hard to explain - and also, it's so different for everyone. You can never encapsulate the experience for all.

When it began to wane, I sobbed right from my gut for about an hour. So overall, apart from the insights about my life, it felt like a tremendous release. The same for the second ceremony. And again later in the year when I did a private psilocybin ceremony with a psychotherapist.

I had felt very stuck/lost in some ways in my life suddenly, and this combined with a lot of grief, all at the same time. Therapy and the plants helped me work through all this.
None of it is a silver bullet - it doesn't solve everything nicely - but it is like a punch to your neural pathways. It can help shift and change patterns of thinking. And for me, it took me out of my head and put me in my body. You have to let go. You have no choice.

FWIW, I wasn't on a camp bed amongst a room of screaming people. It was really beautiful, there was live music, people were in their own world - some were crying and upset, others happy or quiet. A couple of people who were entrenched in something very strong were taken out and away. There was a great ratio of helpers to a small number of participants. I felt very safe. I actually have the feeling/calling to do it again this year...

Hope this helps.

DON'T do it. A close friend of mine ended up with severe life changing/ career ending mental illness consequently. Super smart person. REALLY smart. Not saying will happen to everyone, but the one example I know of had a tragic effect on their life..

I've done it. But I appreciate your concern and I'm so sorry about your friend. I don't think it has anything to do with intelligence, but possibly underlying issues. And it is rare. Regardless, that's truly awful.

This was about 20 years ago- up and down since then but regularly psychiatrically detained :( I guess that I was trying to communicate is this person was in no way gullible etc.. 'Eye scraping' was the most striking example of (perhaps an outlier?) cult in which they got entangled... Tried to 'recruit' closest friends (including me)... scary and sad (thankfully the last didn't 'take'...)

That's really sad and terrible; but honestly, I did extensive, extensive research and I've never heard of anything like this vis a vis ayahuasca retreats.

@Terestialnight thanks for answers

good that you weren't ill, that is the scary off putting thing