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Ok. So. Couple weeks ago, day after Halloween, I run into food that had my allergen in it. I went into big anaphylaxis. I'm still recovering. On top of that, I caught an uncommon bacterium that Normally only causes UTIs, but if you're immunocompromised, it also causes blood poisoning and pneumonia.
I got all of it.
I'm busted up and trying to recover.
I managed to write down the experience after and have been debating posting it. But this experience hit in such a fundamentally altering way that if you don't have context, you don't have context for ME anymore.
So, I'm posting it, with minimal alterations, today.
----------
I almost died on the first, just the other day.
We were eating a breakfast cheese and cracker plate, leftovers from the Samhain feast. I was chowing down on fancy cheeses, crackers,, and fruit. We were discussing the bad luck of our delicious bacon-bourbon-brown sugar tenderloin containing juniper, and the sheer luck we had stopping that reaction.
As he leaves the room for a minute I decide to have the Gardettos with a bit of brie. Delicious, violently crunchy.
My swallow gets stuck. Not in the usual way it does occasionally.
Air is not happening.
Oh fuck.
I pull myself off the couch and try to get to my backpack.
"Babe?" The word comes out with effort.
"What?" He sounded a bit annoyed but I had to go on.
All I managed was "It's...Gardettos." Then I get my first breath in in the last 45 seconds.
That noise apparently explained everything. When he comes out of the bathroom I'm suffocating and can barely breathe.
My last clear memory was walking toward my fiance, holding an EpiPen, not breathing.
I could not tell you how I got to the couch. I just remember collapsing on it. Then there was a light, and the faint sound of a choir. Y'all, I am not making this up.
I don't remember much after that. I couldn't get air anywhere. An EpiPen was administered. The PUNCH from it barely registers because it came with my breathing coming back.
But I couldn't move. Couldn't see. Breathing was on manual mode.
Boy was it dark.
And I was tired.
Too tired to breathe.
I do not remember getting hauled outside.
I'm not positive I remembered getting in.
The light. I'm moving. Up.
I attempted to yell at the light. All I got was a hideous inhale, but it vanished.
But came back. For longer this time. And this time it came with...music?
I could feel it: this body was trying to die.
I tried to thrash my body around, getting little better than squirming around. I had to fucking move, or I knew that was it—
A flash. This one brighter.
I can't go yet!
This time it felt different. I could feel that my body was spent, but that wasn't where I was. I was standing over my body, and through a midnight-and-stars rift, I saw him. My guide. His hand was out, golden hair cascading down, and what was that scent...then I recognized it.
"You're not just a Salvia trip."
"Of course not."
You know, basso voices' rumbles hit different when they don't have to be filtered by your body.
"You have to come with me."
"It's too early!"
When I tell you the look he gave ripped me apart...but he didn't look sad or upset with me...
"You know what could happen."
I did know what could happen. If you "get a tour and come back," the trip alters you in subtle ways. Many shamans and other spiritual leaders say that a near-death experience is the purest, most raw form of initiation there is. IF you come out of it right, things will be different for you. If you come back WRONG, it breaks something in your brain to the point that all you can do is pine for what you saw until you either Leave naturally, or forcibly Exit (that'd be literally sui), unable to properly integrate what you have seen into a unified existence.
"I know what could happen, but I'm asking to go anyway."
Then I jumped, hand raised upwards. I could feel the vibration around me fall away. I felt my spirit body reforming itself, shaping into something larger, more powerful. A name flashed in my head, and it caused this little 'jingling' noise in my head. It was one of mine, one that I knew only we knew. I saw my body forming into what matched my feelings—a perfect tribute in form to the integrated, idealized form I'd always felt to be the real one.
As it turns out, flying is like riding a bike after years of no practice: you wobble a bit at first but once you get going.
When our hands connected we rocketed upwards, until we were up so high we could see the edge of the earth, that line you see looking at the planet from low earth orbit.
I probably should have been watching him because soon there was a...THING, in the atmosphere. Everything went purple and black. I started feeling queasy. Note to self, eyes on the road.
"You'll recognize this," he said, as I looked around, and suddenly saw the buildings, the landmarks. Architecture that looked like it was a marriage of Greco-Roman and classical Japanese. Streets full—and skies full—of us. Lighting from powered crystal. The skies were unsullied by light pollution, and I could see the knife of stars in the sky forming part of the visible galaxy
This was not how I pictured it and it was delightful.
"Not much time. Eyes forward!"
I didn't just put my eyes forward, I closed them—that first jump tried to take me out.
As I was coming out of there, I swallowed hard to reset my head before I looked around.
And the sanctuary and temple are as I had seen them before: edge of dawn, violent red-to-black-blue sky. Quiet rippling lake. The columnhenges formed by the outside ritual setups. The obsidian pyramid.
"It's just like I thought," I say, aware that things are getting hazy somehow.
"One more stop."
"Forward?"
"Yes."
FSHWAM. Another flash of light, another burst of sound. By this point the chorus is constant.
We—no, I alone—come out in space. There is a rich, indescribable color to the darkness. I remember the Terry Pratchett gag about the color of magick before jolting to the realization that that's exactly what I'm looking at. I figure "neat color!" and I reach out to see it against me—
I'm either colored by a different form of space, or made of it. In the back of my hand—larger and more elegant than I'm used to—I can see stars, suns, entire galaxies. Around me, an unfamiliar solar system that I very gently, carefully touch and prod at.
I realize that I, as I stand (float?) here, am as incomprehensible to these people on these planets as the divine would have been. Too much to take in all at once, but if I can understand just a bit of it...maybe I can commune with it—
I suddenly realize: that's the difference.
It was never about control or subjugation. Ultimately, these are distinctions that mankind places over things it doesn't understand.
What if we offered not a fight, pushing things away, but rather an embrace? Find the worth, the beauty, in things without trying to place ourselves superior? I feel my universe-self expanding even as my solid boundaries stay the same. I have to hold it all, see it all.
I hover a starry hand over first one planet, then the next, wondering if they could see the vault of stars in my palms. I notice that there is a Saturn-like planet in my pinky finger.
As I bring my hand upwards to see it better two things happen:
First, the flash of light and chorus strike again, both lasting longer than last time. Suddenly I'm aware of my body on the stretcher again. The flash had come with convulsions, some of them sending VERY mixed messages to my body below.
Then I hear him in my head: "You have to go now."
"I haven't seen it all!"
"You will, but not if you don't go back soon!"
The flash fades and I can see (?) The inside of my ambulance. I'm sinking back down into my body, feet first. I'm too tired to fight him from letting me go, as much as I want to stay.
...I mean, it's been a few thousand years since we Traveled together like that.
The flash is a beam this time. The choir, a cymbal crash stretched out long.
Then, I see something unexpected in the light: my mom's face, looking more badass warrior than chic suburbanite.
Two words from her: "Not yet."
Darkness swallows me. I'm falling.
Falling.
Such a long way down.
Then nothing. What felt like ten seconds of nothing.
I realize just in time what I have to do. I'm so damned tired, but if I don't pull this off I'm not getting this second chance.
Every ounce of energy I have left goes to screaming "NOT YET" as loud as I can manage.
What actually happens, at my body level, is this (I'm told) disturbing sort of strangled "NYAAGH" rips out of me and I take an entire breath that I immediately choked on. I can't see, I can't open my eyes, and I feel like something is trying to wring me out.
Then I hear the paramedic: "You're okay, it only lasted about a minute. Had to get 3 Benadryl shots through you AND a load of prednisone. Just breathe."
Not gonna lie, the first thing my body actually let me do was just break down for most of the rest of the ride to the hospital. I was exhausted, I was in pain. I didn't have the energy to move, or talk, or cover my face. I was still breathing on manual, but now air was getting where it needed to be.
Then I made this pathetic noise as I realized that at some point while I was out, I'd had an accident on the stretcher and there was nothing I could do about it. The paramedic totally misinterpreted the noise, just reminding me to keep breathing.
Then my body really was done with me, and I basically was a zombie until the end of the exam they gave me at the ER.
It was my fiance and cousin who met me at the end. "Are you alright? Did they help?"
All I could say was: "I saw it. I know where I go" in this exhausted tone.
A ride was called. I am loaded into the car with the hospital blanket and a plushie.
I don't think I did anything after that. I frankly can only tell you that the things I remember clearly are the rye chip that put me critical on the couch and the trip afterwards.
I'm told I was GONE gone at least twice, with the first instance being on the couch.
I don't know what's next. I'm honestly a bit out of sorts.
At this point, all I can do is leave my offerings and rest.
Initiation is tiring after all.
I got all of it.
I'm busted up and trying to recover.
I managed to write down the experience after and have been debating posting it. But this experience hit in such a fundamentally altering way that if you don't have context, you don't have context for ME anymore.
So, I'm posting it, with minimal alterations, today.
----------
I almost died on the first, just the other day.
We were eating a breakfast cheese and cracker plate, leftovers from the Samhain feast. I was chowing down on fancy cheeses, crackers,, and fruit. We were discussing the bad luck of our delicious bacon-bourbon-brown sugar tenderloin containing juniper, and the sheer luck we had stopping that reaction.
As he leaves the room for a minute I decide to have the Gardettos with a bit of brie. Delicious, violently crunchy.
My swallow gets stuck. Not in the usual way it does occasionally.
Air is not happening.
Oh fuck.
I pull myself off the couch and try to get to my backpack.
"Babe?" The word comes out with effort.
"What?" He sounded a bit annoyed but I had to go on.
All I managed was "It's...Gardettos." Then I get my first breath in in the last 45 seconds.
That noise apparently explained everything. When he comes out of the bathroom I'm suffocating and can barely breathe.
My last clear memory was walking toward my fiance, holding an EpiPen, not breathing.
I could not tell you how I got to the couch. I just remember collapsing on it. Then there was a light, and the faint sound of a choir. Y'all, I am not making this up.
I don't remember much after that. I couldn't get air anywhere. An EpiPen was administered. The PUNCH from it barely registers because it came with my breathing coming back.
But I couldn't move. Couldn't see. Breathing was on manual mode.
Boy was it dark.
And I was tired.
Too tired to breathe.
I do not remember getting hauled outside.
I'm not positive I remembered getting in.
The light. I'm moving. Up.
I attempted to yell at the light. All I got was a hideous inhale, but it vanished.
But came back. For longer this time. And this time it came with...music?
I could feel it: this body was trying to die.
I tried to thrash my body around, getting little better than squirming around. I had to fucking move, or I knew that was it—
A flash. This one brighter.
I can't go yet!
This time it felt different. I could feel that my body was spent, but that wasn't where I was. I was standing over my body, and through a midnight-and-stars rift, I saw him. My guide. His hand was out, golden hair cascading down, and what was that scent...then I recognized it.
"You're not just a Salvia trip."
"Of course not."
You know, basso voices' rumbles hit different when they don't have to be filtered by your body.
"You have to come with me."
"It's too early!"
When I tell you the look he gave ripped me apart...but he didn't look sad or upset with me...
"You know what could happen."
I did know what could happen. If you "get a tour and come back," the trip alters you in subtle ways. Many shamans and other spiritual leaders say that a near-death experience is the purest, most raw form of initiation there is. IF you come out of it right, things will be different for you. If you come back WRONG, it breaks something in your brain to the point that all you can do is pine for what you saw until you either Leave naturally, or forcibly Exit (that'd be literally sui), unable to properly integrate what you have seen into a unified existence.
"I know what could happen, but I'm asking to go anyway."
Then I jumped, hand raised upwards. I could feel the vibration around me fall away. I felt my spirit body reforming itself, shaping into something larger, more powerful. A name flashed in my head, and it caused this little 'jingling' noise in my head. It was one of mine, one that I knew only we knew. I saw my body forming into what matched my feelings—a perfect tribute in form to the integrated, idealized form I'd always felt to be the real one.
As it turns out, flying is like riding a bike after years of no practice: you wobble a bit at first but once you get going.
When our hands connected we rocketed upwards, until we were up so high we could see the edge of the earth, that line you see looking at the planet from low earth orbit.
I probably should have been watching him because soon there was a...THING, in the atmosphere. Everything went purple and black. I started feeling queasy. Note to self, eyes on the road.
"You'll recognize this," he said, as I looked around, and suddenly saw the buildings, the landmarks. Architecture that looked like it was a marriage of Greco-Roman and classical Japanese. Streets full—and skies full—of us. Lighting from powered crystal. The skies were unsullied by light pollution, and I could see the knife of stars in the sky forming part of the visible galaxy
This was not how I pictured it and it was delightful.
"Not much time. Eyes forward!"
I didn't just put my eyes forward, I closed them—that first jump tried to take me out.
As I was coming out of there, I swallowed hard to reset my head before I looked around.
And the sanctuary and temple are as I had seen them before: edge of dawn, violent red-to-black-blue sky. Quiet rippling lake. The columnhenges formed by the outside ritual setups. The obsidian pyramid.
"It's just like I thought," I say, aware that things are getting hazy somehow.
"One more stop."
"Forward?"
"Yes."
FSHWAM. Another flash of light, another burst of sound. By this point the chorus is constant.
We—no, I alone—come out in space. There is a rich, indescribable color to the darkness. I remember the Terry Pratchett gag about the color of magick before jolting to the realization that that's exactly what I'm looking at. I figure "neat color!" and I reach out to see it against me—
I'm either colored by a different form of space, or made of it. In the back of my hand—larger and more elegant than I'm used to—I can see stars, suns, entire galaxies. Around me, an unfamiliar solar system that I very gently, carefully touch and prod at.
I realize that I, as I stand (float?) here, am as incomprehensible to these people on these planets as the divine would have been. Too much to take in all at once, but if I can understand just a bit of it...maybe I can commune with it—
I suddenly realize: that's the difference.
It was never about control or subjugation. Ultimately, these are distinctions that mankind places over things it doesn't understand.
What if we offered not a fight, pushing things away, but rather an embrace? Find the worth, the beauty, in things without trying to place ourselves superior? I feel my universe-self expanding even as my solid boundaries stay the same. I have to hold it all, see it all.
I hover a starry hand over first one planet, then the next, wondering if they could see the vault of stars in my palms. I notice that there is a Saturn-like planet in my pinky finger.
As I bring my hand upwards to see it better two things happen:
First, the flash of light and chorus strike again, both lasting longer than last time. Suddenly I'm aware of my body on the stretcher again. The flash had come with convulsions, some of them sending VERY mixed messages to my body below.
Then I hear him in my head: "You have to go now."
"I haven't seen it all!"
"You will, but not if you don't go back soon!"
The flash fades and I can see (?) The inside of my ambulance. I'm sinking back down into my body, feet first. I'm too tired to fight him from letting me go, as much as I want to stay.
...I mean, it's been a few thousand years since we Traveled together like that.
The flash is a beam this time. The choir, a cymbal crash stretched out long.
Then, I see something unexpected in the light: my mom's face, looking more badass warrior than chic suburbanite.
Two words from her: "Not yet."
Darkness swallows me. I'm falling.
Falling.
Such a long way down.
Then nothing. What felt like ten seconds of nothing.
I realize just in time what I have to do. I'm so damned tired, but if I don't pull this off I'm not getting this second chance.
Every ounce of energy I have left goes to screaming "NOT YET" as loud as I can manage.
What actually happens, at my body level, is this (I'm told) disturbing sort of strangled "NYAAGH" rips out of me and I take an entire breath that I immediately choked on. I can't see, I can't open my eyes, and I feel like something is trying to wring me out.
Then I hear the paramedic: "You're okay, it only lasted about a minute. Had to get 3 Benadryl shots through you AND a load of prednisone. Just breathe."
Not gonna lie, the first thing my body actually let me do was just break down for most of the rest of the ride to the hospital. I was exhausted, I was in pain. I didn't have the energy to move, or talk, or cover my face. I was still breathing on manual, but now air was getting where it needed to be.
Then I made this pathetic noise as I realized that at some point while I was out, I'd had an accident on the stretcher and there was nothing I could do about it. The paramedic totally misinterpreted the noise, just reminding me to keep breathing.
Then my body really was done with me, and I basically was a zombie until the end of the exam they gave me at the ER.
It was my fiance and cousin who met me at the end. "Are you alright? Did they help?"
All I could say was: "I saw it. I know where I go" in this exhausted tone.
A ride was called. I am loaded into the car with the hospital blanket and a plushie.
I don't think I did anything after that. I frankly can only tell you that the things I remember clearly are the rye chip that put me critical on the couch and the trip afterwards.
I'm told I was GONE gone at least twice, with the first instance being on the couch.
I don't know what's next. I'm honestly a bit out of sorts.
At this point, all I can do is leave my offerings and rest.
Initiation is tiring after all.
