Ayahuasca and Cancer: One Man’s Experience

reprinted as a public service from the Bulletin of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies
MAPS – Volume 8 Number 3 Autumn 1998
to the MAPS Home Page

by

Donald M. Topping, Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, University of Hawai’i  President, Drug Policy Forum of Hawai’i  2514 Oahu Ave. – Honolulu, HI 96822  Home: 808-988-6287 – Office: Phone & FAX: 808-988-4386  Website: www.drugsense.org/dpfhi

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After being diagnosed with cancer of the liver, the author was advised by oncologists that his chances of survival were slim. He went to ayahuasca for a second opinion.

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A YEAR AGO I NEVER DREAMED that I would be writing about two subjects, both of which are generally considered taboo. One of these is cancer. We avoid talking about cancer – “the Big C” – because it speaks of our fears of mortality and pain. When an office mate is rumored to have cancer, she is viewed differently. We avoid the topic, or speak in whispers about it. We wish it would go away.

For entirely different reasons, ayahuasca is talked about in muzzled tones. The Drug Enforcement Administration – the grand arbiter of all chemicals in America – is responsible for this taboo and has classified DMT, one of its constituents, as a Schedule I drug, thereby rendering it illegal and nearly unavailable for fascinating medical, psychological, neuroscientific, and spiritual research. Like cancer, we tend to talk about it in whispers, too.

Since I now enjoy the privileges of a recently retired person, and a friend of cancer and ayahuasca, I can speak freely about them both. I say “friend” because that is the way I now see the relationship I have with both.

My direct connection with cancer probably started with my birth sixty-eight years ago, which sent me into the world with a genetic structure determined, at least in part, by family members of previous generations on both sides who had died of metastacized colo-rectal cancer. If there is any validity to the genetic predilection theory, I was directly in line for a first hand experience with cells gone amok to form tumors.

Diagnosis
And that is precisely what happened to me ten years ago when I was diagnosed with cancer of the colon. Since I felt great, I had doubts about the accuracy of the diagnosis, and requested to see the biopsy along with a pathologist. Sure enough, with the aid of a microscope, I saw with my own eyes the little cells, all bunched up like globs of red mud. How did that happen? I wondered.

Immediate surgery was the order of the day. I begged off in order to experiment with natural healing. The surgeon and I agreed on a four-month timetable, during which I followed a naturopathic regimen: micro-doses of various substances, vegetarian diet, visualization and plenty of rest and exercise. After this period, the second biopsy revealed no cancer cells. I was overjoyed; the surgeon seemed disappointed, and asked for another biopsy in two weeks, to which I agreed.

This time around he was able to dig up some more tissue with cancer cells, and convinced me that I should have the surgery. I did, and was told five years later that I had been “cured” through the wonders of surgery.

Relapse
All went well until September 1996, when a routine physical exam revealed that my CEA count – an indicator of carcinogenic activity – was up. Another blood test shortly thereafter showed the CEA count going up rapidly. Further exams were conducted, during which two suspicious looking dark shadows were seen on the right lobe of my liver. A biopsy was soon performed on the tissue taken from the shadowed area. The verdict from the pathologist: the Big C.

Having lost a grandfather and father to metastatic liver cancer, I was seriously concerned over this new development. What to do? A preliminary conference with one of the oncologists said that surgery might be a possibility, provided there were no other tumors in my vital organs or lymph glands. That meant further exams.

Prognosis
While waiting for the results, I went to the University of Hawaii’s medical library for some research on liver cancer. I was referred to the “bible” of oncology, a two-volume tome titled Cancer: Principles and Practices of Oncology (1989), edited by Vincent T. DeVita, Jr. I turned to Section 3: “Treatment of Metastatic Cancer to the Liver,” by John E. Niederhuber and William D. Ensminger. The opening paragraph had the following encouraging words:

“The spread of malignant cells from a primary tumor to the liver and their growth therein carry a grave prognosis for the patient. While these meta-static liver tumors may be the first evidence of the progression of a patient’s cancer, and often – especially in colorectal cancer – are the only tumors detected, they almost always signal widespread dissemination of the malignancy. Despite improvements in early detection of liver metastases, new drug development, improved surgical techniques for resection, and innovative targeted therapies, most patients will not survive.” (p. 2201)

The remainder of the chapter was devoted to sustaining that dismal prognosis. In a word, the future looked pretty grim. Until, that is, I began to seek information on alternative therapies.

Seeking an alternative
I turned first to Dr. Andrew Weil, who recommended the following: 1) have the tumor surgically removed, if possible; 2) start taking micro-doses of maitake mushroom extract; 3) read Michael Lerner’s book, Choices in Healing.

While waiting for my mail-order requests for the maitake and Lerner’s book, I had further meetings with surgeons, who were not exactly reassuring. I was told by one that my chances for survival were around 25-30%. Another put it at under 15%, if you factor in the risks of the surgical procedure itself. It appeared that they had read De Vito’s cancer bible, too. They also advised me that if surgery was possible, I should follow it up with a year of fairly heavy chemotherapy in order to kill off any remaining cancerous cells (along with the majority of healthy ones) that were undoubtedly floating around in my bloodstream.

When the Lerner book arrived in the mail, I sat down and read through its 621 fascinating pages as rapidly as possible. At the same time, I began taking the maitake mushroom extract, and to prepare myself both physically and mentally for the surgery and the follow- up. During this period I discovered other literature on alternative therapies, including Essiac, macrobiotic diets, reiki and coffee enemas, all of which offered as much or more hope than the oncologist’s bible did.

Surgery
The surgeon (aptly named Dr. Payne) removed the right half of my liver on November 26, 1996. During the following five days I was attached to several catheters, one of which shot morphine directly into my spine. It was not until my discharge from the hospital that I realized how badly my body had been assaulted, not just by the surgeon’s knife, but by a mixture of drugs that are part of the arsenal of invasive surgery. The thought of further assault by chemotherapy was frightening.

Sometime during this period of painful recovery from the operation, I remembered having read something, somewhere about the healing properties of ayahuasca. I didn’t give it much thought at the time, since it seemed unlikely that I would be going to the Amazon, and wasn’t particularly interested in a psychedelic experience. Still, it lingered in the recesses of my mind, which was still reeling from the physical and psychic wounds of major surgery, the outcome of which was dubious.

Three weeks after the surgery, I went to my appointment with the oncologist who proposed beginning the chemotherapy treatment immediately. When I told him that I had decided against it, because I did not believe that further assault on my body would be beneficial, he seemed miffed, perhaps even insulted. When I told him of my plan to follow a program of alternative therapies, he snickered, but wished me well.

Santo Daime
In early April I heard of a group doing ayahuasca on the Big Island of Hawai’i. I began to make inquiries, which led me to a young man who had been with the group for several experiences, or “works,” as they are called by the Santo Daime church of Brazil. We met at my house one evening, during which he talked non-stop for over three hours about the sacrament and its psychic and physical healing properties. I sat fascinated as I listened, and concluded that I must find a way to have this experience, to see for myself if the accounts I had read and heard were true. Could this really be a curative experience, or was it just another psychedelic trip?

A few weeks later I learned that there would be a “works” on the Big Island, and that I could join the group. I readily accepted, even though I was still in a weakened condition from the surgery. This was to be my introduction to ayahuasca.

The group met in the late afternoon on an isolated knoll where a devotee of the Santo Daime had built a house, consisting of a large hexagonal room with three or four bedrooms off on the side. (I learned later that the hexagon is an important symbol within the Santo Daime.) About sixty people from all over Hawai’i had gathered for the event, most of whom had done it before. We were all dressed in white (as required), and when the time came to begin we took our seats in chairs that had been arranged in two semi-circles facing each other, men on one side and women on the other. I then began to realize, much to my disappointment, that I was in a very structured, group experience, not at all what I had anticipated from my limited reading on the way ayahuasca is traditionally used in the Amazon. Nevertheless, I entered the experience with hope, as well as apprehension. The residual pain from the surgery was a constant reminder of why I was there.

I will not describe the Santo Daime rituals that I observed during the two successive nights of the “works.” They have been described elsewhere. Rather, I will focus on my own experience, for which, as it turns out, I was unprepared. My only frame of reference was limited experiences with LSD, mushrooms and mescaline during the Sixties, none of which were associated with healing. I wanted to discover what it was about ayahuasca that led to the claims of its ability to heal and to teach.

First session
After some preliminary church rituals, we lined up to take our first cup of the brew just after sundown. A second dose was given about two and a half hours later. Within twenty minutes I began to feel what seemed like a faintly familiar rippling effect coursing throughout my body. As I looked around the room, I noticed that others were doing the same, while shifting in their chairs and trying to sing the church versions of icaros in Portuguese. At this point, I began to wonder if I had made the right decision.

Then, all of a sudden, the plant grabbed hold of me, and led me through a long trip into another reality, one that I was totally unprepared for. When I attempt to describe the ayahuasca experience to others who know something of psychedelics, I tell them that things like LSD and mushrooms distort and give new shapes to the reality that you are familiar with; ayahuasca takes you to another reality that you’ve never seen nor imagined before.

As I closed my eyes, images – if they can be called such – began racing at an ever-increasing speed before me. Swirls of colors, shapes, forms, textures and sounds simply overpowered me to the point where I became immobile. Like many others before me, no doubt, I became somewhat frightened. What had I let myself in for? When I opened my eyes, the phantasmagoria of forms vanished, and I saw myself in the same room with the others, all dressed in white, most of whom were moving their lips to the songs being sung by the Brazilians from the Santo Daime. I closed my eyes again, and immediately the images returned with surging intensity. They seemed to be trying to enter the deepest recesses of my body and soul. I found myself thinking, hey, this isn’t much fun.

During this period of initial disorientation, I was able to regain my focus on what brought me here in the first place. I was a condemned man. The oncologists and their bible told me that my chances of survival were slim. I had come to ayahuasca for a second opinion. That is when I began to let go, and let the plant do its thing. That is when I began to get my first glimpse into the incredible, stunning world of ayahuasca. There was no going back now. There was nothing to do now but let it happen.

Ayahuasca visions
As others have reported, I saw plants, serpents, birds and jaguar-like animals soaring, swirling, twisting and racing at almost lightning speed throughout my entire system, as though they were exploring a new habitat. At first, they didn’t pay any attention to me, even though I tried to stop them long enough to have a closer look. Before long, however, one of them would race up to me, pause momentarily, then rush off as though it had urgent business somewhere else. Then another would come up in my face, and do the same thing. There was no time for any communication between myself and the things that I was seeing. It was as though they wanted to take a complete inventory of who I was and what was going on inside me before they were ready to talk.

After a while (one loses track of time with ayahuasca) the figures began to slow down and fade somewhat in intensity. I was coming down, much against my will. My questions – whatever they were – had not yet been answered. At that moment, the Daime leader gave the signal to line up for the second dose of the brew. I took my place in the line. Needless to say, among the group of sixty people there had already been a lot of purging through vomiting; I was not yet among them.

As the second wave came over me, I felt much more relaxed and ready to talk to the animals if only they would talk to me. As though on cue, the racing figures began to stop by, look at me and smile before darting off into their world again. Then, all of a sudden, I saw a deep, black void. Nothing but darkness, which stayed in place for what seemed like minutes. All of the flashes, colors and forms disappeared while the blackness hovered over me. I sensed that it was death making its statement. It seemed to be saying, “Yes, I’m here too, part of the system; but I’m not so bad, so don’t be afraid.” In a short while, the darkness began to fade slowly as the kaleidoscopic frenzy returned until the brew and I both were exhausted, and I returned to my friend’s house for a long but fitful sleep.

Second session
The group of sixty gathered again the following evening for a second “works,” which I entered with much less trepidation, hoping for another bit of insight from the plant. That proved to be a false hope, probably because the plant had nothing more to tell me. Nevertheless, during the second trip I again felt the presence of the plant racing throughout my body, peeking and poking into every nook and cranny in search of something to work on, to straighten out, to put back in order, to polish. There was a definite presence, with similar shapes, colors and sounds. But, unlike the first time, there was no message that I could discern. The plant was just busy doing its work.

Several months passed before my next experience with ayahuasca. In the interim, I had continued with my vegetarian diet and Chinese herbs. I was gradually regaining weight and strength, while the scars and soreness of the surgery were slowly healing. I wanted to visit with the plant again to see if it had anything new to tell me, and to determine whether my first experience was delusional.

Third session
By good fortune, I met a person who had studied ayahuasca in Perú, learning from the shamans. When I told him what I was seeking, he agreed to lead me and four others through a session. This time the set and setting were entirely different from that of the structured Santo Daime. After bathing in the blue ocean water, we drove up to the end of a mountain road, left our car, and hiked to an isolated spot, a small plateau deep in the Wai’anae mountains of O’ahu, engulfed in lush foliage with an unobstructed view of the Pacific ocean in two directions. It is called Pupukea Highlands. The setting itself was an invitation for spirits to enter. Our group was small, and all of us had learned respect for the plant and its powers. We shared a common set.

We arrived at our spot in time to arrange ourselves before the moonless nightfall. By candle light we practiced deep breathing and toning in preparation for taking the brew. In ceremonial fashion, including blowing tobacco smoke over the brew, we each took turns drinking. Soon after, our leader extinguished the candles, reminding us to “Remember, the plant knows what it’s doing.” The isolation, silence and darkness were awesome.

I positioned myself comfortably on the ground, my back against the trunk of a large paper-bark tree. I felt very calm and relaxed, closed my eyes and waited for the plant to go to work. Once again, after about fifteen minutes I began to notice the familiar rippling effect. This time, however, the rippling quickly turned into full-blown turbulence. The plant was loose, and was wildly racing around exploring its new environment. It felt as though a caged animal had been released inside me, and was having the time of its life.

As the images and shapes began to appear, they had an air of joy and exuberance. The serpents were smiling, the jaguars laughing, and the giant birds swooped down over me caressing me with their outstretched wings. A parade of persons, both known and unknown, streamed by, each of them smiling and reaching out to touch me and tell me by look that they loved me. As the serpents and plants twisted and flashed before me, they appeared to be smiling and reassuring me that they had looked everywhere inside me, and that everything was o.k. As the evening went on, this cycle kept repeating. Images would come directly towards me at breakneck speed, smiling and laughing, then veer off for another tour of my entire system. I heard myself chuckling softly under the starlit sky.

Where was the darkness that I had experienced before? Where was Mr. Death, I wondered? Then suddenly, as though the plant heard my question, I saw the void. Only this time it was clearly in the background. It seemed to be peeping through the montage of vibrant colors and forms, as though to say, “I’m still here, don’t worry. It’s not time for me yet.” And then it faded away. As evening turned into night and morning, I saw the images slowing down and gradually fading away, almost reluctantly it seemed. We sure had a good time together that night.

Fourth session
About one month after that memorable night, I revisited Pupukea Highlands for another session, this time with a different mix of six people. I was prepared for a repeat experience, another exciting exploration and reassurance from the plant. But, that was not to be.

This time it was raining, which restricted our space under a makeshift tent. Again, we followed the procedures of the previous time, breathing, toning and ceremonially ingesting the brew. I lay down and waited for the action to begin. This time the onset was much more gradual, and never reached the intensity of the previous trip. The images were there: birds, serpents, plants, people. But, they were much less energetic, almost blasé. They seemed to be telling me, “We’ve already been this route, and we told you what we found. Let’s try something new.” Since I had entered the experience with a fixed agenda, the plant reacted as though it were bound. I now look upon that as my fault for not trusting the plant to take the lead.

If ayahuasca could talk in words, I’m sure it would have told me during that first trip to Pupukea to, “Take this energy that I’m giving you, and run with it. Latch on to one of the animals and go for the ride. There is nothing preventing you from soaring to new heights of consciousness and life.” That was the message that I got that first night in the Pupukea highlands.

Return to the doctor
Approximately two weeks after that session, I went for my scheduled visit with the oncologist. He greeted me warmly, and told me the results of my blood test the week before, which showed that my CEA count – the cancer activity indicator was not just normal. It was below normal! When he asked me what I had been doing to bring that about, I asked him if he had ever heard of ayahuasca. His reply was what one would expect from a physician trained in western allopathic medicine. I got as far as explaining that it is a medicinal plant used for centuries in the Amazon by shamans and healers, at which point he raised his eyebrows, shrugged his shoulders, and was no doubt thinking to himself, “Where did this nut come from anyway?” He ended the office visit with the pronouncement, “You’re one of the lucky few.”

Lucky? Perhaps so. But to dismiss my recovery against the odds as nothing but luck is to ignore centuries of experience by people who have learned to live with plants and understand them when they talk. From my experience thus far, I have learned to respect and listen to the plant, as well as those who know how to interact in the plant world. With more experience, I hope to learn some of that language myself. I will continue to treat my body and my spirit with ayahuasca, and work to teach others to respect it. As a former professor, the teaching part should come easily. In my current role as drug policy reformer, I will do all that I can to free this plant from the strictures that the DEA has so capriciously and arrogantly placed on it. I hope that people who read this article will join me in this effort.

 

Ayahuasca and Cancer: A Postscript

reprinted as a public service from the Bulletin of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies
MAPS – Volume 9 Number 2 Summer 1999
to the MAPS Home Page

by

Donald M. Topping, Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, University of Hawai’i  President, Drug Policy Forum of Hawai’i  2514 Oahu Ave. – Honolulu, HI 96822  Home: 808-988-6287 – Office: Phone & FAX: 808-988-4386  Website: www.drugsense.org/dpfhi

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After being diagnosed with cancer of the liver, the author was advised by oncologists that his chances of survival were slim. He went to ayahuasca for a second opinion.

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After the publication of my article Ayahuasca and Cancer: One Man’s Experience in the MAPS Bulletin I received several letters, e-mails and telephone calls from interested persons, some with cancer and others who are healthy but curious. The response took me by surprise, and pushed me to further thoughts about what I believe is happening with me and the role of ayahuasca.Before sharing these thoughts with MAPS Bulletin readers, I need to state very clearly that I am not proposing ayahuasca as a miracle cure for cancer or anything else. I am simply relating my own story and my sense of what is happening with me. At this point of our experience and knowledge, my story is best taken as another anecdote in the growing body of lore of the vine.

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First off, let me say that I am still healthy and that the metastasized cancer appears to be in complete remission. The original diagnosis was in September 1996. As I approach my seventieth year, I can say that I have never felt better, aside from a couple of aching joints here and there, reminders of my rough and tumble days. People frequently comment on how healthy I look and ask what I am doing to look that way.To some of these people I explain that I have changed my diet (vegetarian), exercise regularly, and have all but stopped drinking alcoholic and caffeinated beverages, and that seems to satisfy them. To others who I think can understand, I attribute my health to the vine. I presume that most readers of MAPS fall into the second category, but probably would like an explanation of how it works. Frankly, so would I. Lacking a concrete explanation, I will try to provide my insights, as provided by the vine as well as discussions I’ve had with fellow travelers here and there.

Several who have written about ayahuasca (notably Mabit, Grove and Vega[1]) talk about the three domains in which the vine appears to work: psychological, spiritual and organic. My experience confirms this notion, although the distinction between psychological and spiritual is not as clearly defined for me as that between spiritual and organic. Perhaps that is because of my unique approach to the experience, initiated by me in the quest for a restoration of health. Nevertheless, the psychological and spiritual dimensions have played an important, albeit a more subtle role in my recovery.

 I will briefly touch on each of these three areas as I experienced them during the past two years, but with primary focus on the organic domain. This is not to minimize the importance of the other two areas, which no doubt play important roles in my well-being.

Psychological changes
The most profound psychological change was noted during my fist experience when I encountered death in the form of a soft, deep, dark void. The clear message was that death is always present, but nothing to be feared. It is there along with all the other forces and elements of nature, nothing exceptional. Death happens. Stating these obvious facts in words sounds trite. But when the vine reveals such things, the impact is far more profound. Going into my first session the thought of imminent death, as predicted by my physician and the data, was a major concern. The vine put that to rest straight away.

As for other psychological impacts, I would include the lesson on the relative importance of things in life. One vivid example came during my fourth or fifth session when I saw a gallery of assorted clocks and watches, dozens if not hundreds of them, moving as though in a shooting gallery, with the minute and hour hands going rapidly in a counter-clockwise direction. I interpreted this as a commentary on my preoccupation with time and the fear of running out of it before I have accomplished my goals.

The vine seemed to be saying, “OK, if that bothers you, let’s make time run backwards.” The revelation to me was that the notion of time is something that humans view as a commodity to be measured, valued, calculated, saved, wasted, sold, etc., while in ayahuasca reality none of those things matter. Like death, time is always present. Living each day fully means much more than achievement.

Others, including some drug addicts, have reported psychological impacts that have resulted from ingestion of the vine, such as letting go of the ego while allowing light to illuminate the dark corners of the psyche and confronting the demon within. Some have reported this as a difficult experience. Although I have not had this type of psychic encounter, I think I understand the process. There is no place for ego or control when interacting with ayahuasca. There are no dark corners in which demons can hide from the probing of the vine.

The spiritual realm
The spiritual aspects of my experiences with ayahuasca are even more difficult to describe and define. Not having been a spiritual type since my adolescent disillusionment with Christianity, I did not have any expectations. My mission was the restoration of my physical health, which I naively believed to exist independently of the spiritual me. Ayahuasca persuaded me that I was wrong. How did this come to pass?

During ayahuasca-induced visions, I see and hear some astonishing things that have changed my perceptions and understanding of the forces at work in my universe. Plants morphed into animals, and vice-versa. Waves of varicolored lights separated into twisting, undulating ribbons of energy, at times resembling serpentine creatures, switching back and forth from plant to animal form, all the while emitting sounds that I can only describe as a rapid sequence of high-pitched chirps, a bit like the sounds made by dolphins but in a different tone. In the dim shadows of the forest at night, the surrounding plants became robustly alive, gently pulsating and moving toward me as though to join together. While there was nothing that suggested a singular deity, there was an unmistakable presence of a force that permeated the entire experience, linking my body with my inner self, and with the rest of my surroundings: others in the group, the plants, the air, the stars and beyond. Once I tried to follow the upward spiraling ribbons of light to see how far they would lead me into the infinite darkness. I soared upward, as though riding a comet’s tail, until the ribbons split off, forming arcs which veered off in a trajectory that would bring them back to begin the cycle again. I began to see this as the energy force that unites everything, the life force, or spirit, of the living and the dead, past, present and future.

It is on the organic level, however, that my experience has been easier to perceive and define for myself. Perhaps this is because I began my relationship with the plant for organic reasons: I was seeking the restoration of my health and protection from further distortions of my cellular structure.

The organic level
My view of cancer, however unscientific, comes largely from my having looked at my own cancerous cells under an electron microscope in the company of a pathologist, coupled with visions seen during sessions with ayahuasca. Quite clearly, small groups of my cells had all bunched up together, as though huddling for warmth or from fear. Why they had done this is the great mystery of cancer. It might be described as a case of cellular disorientation, cells that had gotten out of line, not caused by some invasive external bacterium but something from within.

Equally unscientific is my view of what I needed to correct this cellular deformity and prevent its reoccurrence. I can only describe that need as a realignment of the cells and a correction of the electro-chemical communication system that links them together through the complex and poorly understood functions of DNA, the fundamental communication system of all living organisms.

I can’t exactly explain how I have come to this conclusion. I have no background in science, and am only beginning to learn the fundamentals of the neurotransmitter systems, pre-basic chemistry and the entheogenic literature. My little learning could prove to be a dangerous thing, as Alexander Pope once said. Nonetheless, I have formulated rudimentary hypotheses which I will attempt to explain.

What ayahuasca does organically is to restore order and put everything into realignment. It polishes rough edges, illuminates dark corners, hones the senses, and, most importantly, ferrets out all physical (as well as psychic) detritus and purges it. One might compare it with fine-tuning an engine and changing the oil. That is basically how I see ayahuasca acting on me as it teaches my cells how not to get out of whack again.

Plants as teachers
The idea of a plant as teacher is as old as ayahuasca use itself. Most westerners, and scientists in particular, find this concept preposterous because it suggests that the plant is intelligent, has a spirit, and can communicate. I believe that this concept needs to be taken seriously. If, as has been suggested by Narby[2] and others, the DNA is the communication system of cells, then it is not far fetched to suggest that the DNA of the plant is talking to ours after it enters our electro-chemical system, teaching them about balance and alignment. In doing this, the plant serves to restore the symmetry that produces health and well being.

I do not believe that ayahuasca contains chemicals that destroy cancer cells like the chemotherapies do. That is not the way it works. Rather, ayahuasca serves to restore the normal, healthy alignment of cells while it seeks out and purges the aberrant ones that it finds while making its way throughout the body. Let me describe the experiences that have led me to this conclusion.

An ayahuasca session
Beginning maybe ten or fifteen minutes after ingestion, I begin to feel a force flickering throughout my body, growing in intensity to a ripple. These sensations are coupled with points of light flashing intermittently as the energy force makes its rounds throughout my body. They remind me of the little points of light that one sees in the optometrist’s office when taking the test for peripheral vision (Visual Field Analyzer).

As the minutes pass, this rippling sensation gets stronger, feeling almost like I have developed an internal vibrator sending out waves of energy. It feels like the Northern Lights surging in successive waves throughout my body.

In my case, this stage of the experience continues for one to two hours pretty much unchanged before I begin to have any visions, which is considered a very long onset period. What seems to be happening is that the vine is doing its organic work on me. It is exploring every nook and cranny of my entire system, racing around to ensure that everything is in order. Any disorder is corrected, and all of the garbage is swept up to be carried to my visceral dumpster for eventual purging. For me, perhaps because I am looking for organic cleansing, this phase lasts longer than for most other people. With someone like myself who has had metastatic cancer, there may be a lot of cleaning up to do.

When the visions finally begin, they seem to confirm my sensations. Among the first things I see are the curling, spiraling, intertwining, self-propelled ribbons of varicolored transparent light, alternately taking on features of serpents and plants. Sometimes they appear to be just ribbons of light. Inside each of them there is a black double-helix skeleton that seems to propel it. The resemblance to drawings I have seen of DNA is stunning. As the intensity and speed of the visions increase, the ribbons seem to be welling up from the deepest parts of my gut and the furthest reaches of my limbs, climbing, soaring and bursting into brilliant showers of light, like enormous skyrockets. From time to time I both feel and see a powerful upwelling of a brilliant gold mass of energy, coming from deep within me, climaxing in an orgasmic burst into infinity. With such surges of light I feel the internal cleansing, as though by some sort of cosmic Roto-Rooter(R).

I interpret these visions (among many others) as manifestations of what the plant is doing on the organic level. Once inside me, the plant begins doing its work, looking for dark corners to illuminate and malformations to correct, communicating from its cells to mine through the chemical chain provided by our respective DNA. In plain words, the DNA of the vine is talking to mine. The resemblance of these visionary forms to DNA is not from my imagination. I saw them long before I ever read Narby or made the connection with DNA, and was struck by their consistent reoccurrence during every ayahuasca experience. If one could see DNA in full action it would probably look much like what I have tried to describe.

The importance of the purge
Perhaps the most important aspect of the work on the organic level is the purge. As with most others, ayahuasca makes me vomit. Unlike others, however, I generally don’t vomit until the visions have faded, maybe four or more hours after ingestion. Again, I interepret the late vomit similarly to the way I interpret the late onset of vision. The vine needs more time with me to do the cleanup work, gathering the detritus and bringing it to the trash bin. When the cleanup job is done, the vine presses the vomit button and the garbage gets dumped. On two occasions I have experienced slight diarrhea, the other type of purging that ayahuasqueros report.

I cannot overstate the importance of the purge. This is the vine’s way of eliminating physical as well as psychic toxins that don’t belong inside a healthy body or mind. The cleansing effect is manifest, both immediately and for subsequent days or even weeks. Although the act itself is not pleasant, the lingering effects make it all worth while. It strikes me as a rite of purification.

But how does it work?
To accept my interpretation of how ayahuasca works requires a suspension of all previously held beliefs about the differences between the plant and animal worlds. It requires acceptance of the idea that plants can communicate, not only among themselves but with humans as well. We must accept the notion that, as our group leader once put it, “the plant knows what it is doing.” These are not easy concepts for westerners to understand or accept. Yet, this is how I, a life-long skeptic and pragmatist, see the plant doing its work. And it has undeniably worked well for me.

Could this be pure fantasy on my part? Could it be that I have constructed from my imagination an account in an effort to explain my experiences? I don’t think so. I have attempted to provide an accurate description of my experiences. And I am still convinced that my affair with the vine is largely responsible for my current state of good health.

My experience with ayahuasca and cancer is not unique. I keep learning of other such experiences among people from different parts of the world. Some of these have been reported in the literature, others by word of mouth. There are too many such reports to dismiss them as merely anecdotal. The curanderos of the Amazon have been using ayahuasca for healing purposes for centuries, during which they obviously saw concrete results, not necessarily for cancer but for a host of other diseases. As with other practitioners of folk medicine, they don’t pursue modalities of treatment that don’t work.

We come to the question: Does ayahuasca really work in treating disease as I and others have claimed? A considerable amount of anecdotal evidence suggests that it does. However, if we westerners (myself excluded), locked into our analytic mind-set, are to believe, we need to see controlled studies on humans with carefully measured data which could be studied and evaluated in a scientific protocol. Such a study should not be difficult to conduct if the obstacles of prohibition can be overcome. One way to do this is to conduct the study in a less repressive country. The other approach is to take on the DEA and defy them to prohibit scientific inquiry the world of entheogenic plants.

 It is my fervent hope that such studies will move forward in the near future. There is much to be learned from plants if only we can learn how to tune in.

1 Takiwasi: The Use of Amazonian Shamanism to Rehabilitate Drug Addicts,” Jaques Mabit, Rosa Grove and Joaquin Vega, in Yearbook of Cross-Cultural Medicine and Psychotherapy, (1995), ed. By Michael Winkelman and Walter Andritzky.

2 Narby, Jeremy (1998) The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge, New York, Penguin Putnam, Inc.

 

Traduções:  http://hesicos.googlepages.com/AyahuascaandCancer.doc