Man commits suicide after taking magic mushrooms

J Mysterio · 06-02-2015 11:45AM

kylith wrote: »

Guilt would be something if he'd done anything wrong, but they're perfectly legal in Amsterdam. It'd be like someone killing themselves after a trip to Ireland because they'd had a pint of Guinness

I'm saying the lad may well have visited a lady of the night to achieve that level of soul destroying guilt.

newmug · 06-02-2015 11:46AM

Fcukin hell. There's a reason drugs are illegal kids! Say no to drugs.

kylith · 06-02-2015 11:46AM

J Mysterio wrote: »

I'm saying the lad may well have visited a lady of the night to achieve that level of soul destroying guilt.

Sorry, I phrased it badly - I agree with you. I meant that getting guilty about taking shrooms in Amsterdam would be like getting guilty about drinking beer in Ireland.

RecordStraight · 06-02-2015 11:47AM

Tombo2001 wrote: »

boards.ie seems to be the place where people come to defend drug consumption and try to make out that it has nothing to do with mental health issues. Its kind of like the Iona Institute for illegal drugs.

I'd be in favour of legalisation, so I'm not some sort of anti-drug zealot - but, my god, there a lot of people in denial here about the harm drugs can do to your mental health.

Friend of mine underwent a complete personality change after spending a bit too long smoking during his years in Amsterdam. He seems to suffer from paranoia all the time now, always quick to take offence if he thinks he's the butt of a joke.

Xcellor · 06-02-2015 11:49AM

Ihatecuddles wrote: »

One of the last sentences in such a serious and sad article. Seems such an odd thing to say!

Reckon his dad is just venting wanting anything/anyone/any place to pitch the blame.

06-02-2015 11:49AM

Tombo2001 wrote: »

boards.ie seems to be the place where people come to defend drug consumption and try to make out that it has nothing to do with mental health issues. Its kind of like the Iona Institute for illegal drugs.

Careful now, expressing a dissenting opinion to that of the regular marijuana user can lead to rabid abuse and accusations of trolling.

Best steer clear of criticising Sinn Fein and Ming Flanagan too.

There is no debate or argument.

Tombo2001 · 06-02-2015 11:50AM

RecordStraight wrote: »

I'd be in favour of legalisation, so I'm not some sort of anti-drug zealot - but, my god, there a lot of people in denial here about the harm drugs can do to your mental health.

Friend of mine underwent a complete personality change after spending a bit too long smoking during his years in Amsterdam. He seems to suffer from paranoia all the time now, always quick to take offence if he thinks he's the butt of a joke.

Its the same school of thought that says "my granddad lived til he was 90 and smoked every day of his life, and they never did him any harm".

renegademaster · 06-02-2015 11:52AM

Alan’s devastated partner, Oonagh Heeney, claimed he was reluctant to try magic mushrooms on the trip.

“He had everything to live for. We were getting married the following November,” she told a Cork Coroner’s inqust.

it's quite obvious that he didn't

“The tragedy is that he didn’t really want to go on that stag party trip in the first place.”

“Alan never took drugs [before].... he felt so guilty after taking them,” she added.

so his guilt for taking the mildest form of magic mushrooms trumped the guilt of leaving his loved ones in bits after shooting himself?

Oonagh said her partner went to Amsterdam a happy, hard-working young man, devoted to his children and family but he returned a changed
person because of the drugs.

His older brother, Tom, issued an emotional appeal on behalf of the Bourke family for young people to realise the devastation and damage that drugs can cause.

“Alan was not a drug user and it is our opinion that the drugs he took were a significant contributory factor in his death,” Tom said.

“We would like to highlight the devastating effect that taking illegal substances can have on families.

except they were totally legal in the Dam!!

“Our family is a living testament to the damage and devastation that can result from a once-off recreational drug use.

there has to have been some totally unrelated underlying reason why a grown man would shoot himself 72 hours after taking the mildest form of mushrooms

kylith · 06-02-2015 11:53AM

RecordStraight wrote: »

I'd be in favour of legalisation, so I'm not some sort of anti-drug zealot - but, my god, there a lot of people in denial here about the harm drugs can do to your mental health.

Friend of mine underwent a complete personality change after spending a bit too long smoking during his years in Amsterdam. He seems to suffer from paranoia all the time now, always quick to take offence if he thinks he's the butt of a joke.

Dope won't suit some people like booze won't suit some people. I know more people who are happy and productive members of society who smoke dope than whose lives have been destroyed by it.

Weed and shrooms are basically harmless to 99.9999999% of people. You're not going to find anyone saying that heroin or crack are grand.

Tasden · 06-02-2015 11:54AM

kylith wrote: »

Sorry, I phrased it badly - I agree with you. I meant that getting guilty about taking shrooms in Amsterdam would be like getting guilty about drinking beer in Ireland.

From my reading of it it seems that the drugs just caused the initial feelings of guilt/paranoia generally. And because the drugs were the last "guilty" thing he had done that was what he focused in on and it went from there. It's not like he was thinking with a clear head so to speak.

His poor family and the kids. Very sad.

RecordStraight · 06-02-2015 11:56AM

renegademaster wrote: »

Alan’s devastated partner, Oonagh Heeney, claimed he was reluctant to try magic mushrooms on the trip.

“He had everything to live for. We were getting married the following November,” she told a Cork Coroner’s inqust.

it's quite obvious that he didn't

“The tragedy is that he didn’t really want to go on that stag party trip in the first place.”

“Alan never took drugs [before].... he felt so guilty after taking them,” she added.

so his guilt for taking the mildest form of magic mushrooms trumped the guilt of leaving his loved ones in bits after shooting himself?

Oonagh said her partner went to Amsterdam a happy, hard-working young man, devoted to his children and family but he returned a changed
person because of the drugs.

His older brother, Tom, issued an emotional appeal on behalf of the Bourke family for young people to realise the devastation and damage that drugs can cause.

“Alan was not a drug user and it is our opinion that the drugs he took were a significant contributory factor in his death,” Tom said.

“We would like to highlight the devastating effect that taking illegal substances can have on families.

except they were totally legal in the Dam!!

“Our family is a living testament to the damage and devastation that can result from a once-off recreational drug use.

there has to have been some totally unrelated underlying reason why a grown man would shoot himself 72 hours after taking the mildest form of mushrooms

There has to be? Has to? :rolleyes:

I don't think the family are suggesting it was his guilt over taking the drugs that made him kill himself - rather that the 'guilt' seems to have been a symptom of whatever the drug did to his brain chemistry.

strobe · 06-02-2015 11:57AM

Truffles are very mild. I've taken them as have several people I know. No of us would have had an effect from four of them. It'd be like drinking a shot glass of wine. You'd generally be talking 15-20 before getting psychedelic effects and then only relatively tame, very slight visuals etc. And your pretty much entirely back to normal/baseline after 5 or 6 hours.
Maybe they were some super strong species, maybe they were gigantic GM Truffles, or maybe he was extraordinarily sensitive. But they are far greater and more grasping assumptions to make than there is more at play here than "the shooms made him suicidle/insane."

DellyBelly · 06-02-2015 11:58AM

I'd say what happened is that he cheated on the fiance in the red light district he was feeling guilty and the rooms made him even more paranoid and the guilt got the better of him...very sad story

kylith · 06-02-2015 11:58AM

Tasden wrote: »

From my reading of it it seems that the drugs just caused the initial feelings of guilt/paranoia generally. And because the drugs were the last "guilty" thing he had done that was what he focused in on and it went from there. It's not like he was thinking with a clear head so to speak.

His poor family and the kids. Very sad.

Maybe, but we don't know if they actually were the last 'guilty' thing he had done. It's possible that he woke up with another woman, or a man, and that is what affected him so badly.

RecordStraight · 06-02-2015 11:59AM

kylith wrote: »

Weed and shrooms are basically harmless to 99.9999999% of people. You're not going to find anyone saying that heroin or crack are grand.

Just my luck then that the only friend I have who was a heavy cannabis smoker is the one person in a billion who was susceptible to this type of brain damage.

daRobot · 06-02-2015 12:01PM

It's an awful shame. RIP

They probably triggered a psychotic episode and he was unable to sleep (making it worse and worse) which culminated in a self inflicted gunshot.

Many people will be fine with mild mushrooms like this, but many wont, and that's the dice you roll when tripping.

kylith · 06-02-2015 12:02PM

RecordStraight wrote: »

Just my luck then that the only friend I have who was a heavy cannabis smoker is the one person in a billion who was susceptible to this type of brain damage.

Maybe it is just bad luck. Maybe he was a waster to start with. Maybe his family has a history of mental illness. Maybe he was on more than just weed.

But saying 'smoking weed makes you a brain damaged, paranoid mess' is like saying that everyone who drinks will become an alcoholic.

suicide_circus · 06-02-2015 12:04PM

strobe wrote: »

Truffles are very mild. I've taken them as have several people I know. No of us would have had an effect from four of them. It'd be like drinking a shot glass of wine. You'd generally be talking 15-20 before getting psychedelic effects and then only relatively tame, very slight visuals etc. And your pretty much entirely back to normal/baseline after 5 or 6 hours.

I have to say, a eh...friend, yeah a friend of mine has tripped and when say tripped I'm talking tripping absolute balls for about 8 hours on dutch truffles. That said, that was after eating about 30 of them.

Tasden · 06-02-2015 12:05PM

kylith wrote: »

Maybe, but we don't know if they actually were the last 'guilty' thing he had done. It's possible that he woke up with another woman, or a man, and that is what affected him so badly.

I dunno, I'm not understanding why people are automatically assuming the man cheated on his (now grieving) soon to be wife. There could be any number of reasons he felt guilty but my point was from what the family have said it doesn't seem like it was a case of him in a clear sober state just having an ott case of guilt for taking drugs (or whatever).

RecordStraight · 06-02-2015 12:07PM

kylith wrote: »

Maybe it is just bad luck. Maybe he was a waster to start with. Maybe his family has a history of mental illness. Maybe he was on more than just weed.

1. Nope - Commerce graduate, 2:1
2. Nope
3. Nope

kylith wrote: »

But saying 'smoking weed makes you a brain damaged, paranoid mess' is like saying that everyone who drinks will become an alcoholic.

I don't think anyone is saying that. But it clearly does damage the brain chemistry of different people to different degrees. Personally, I don't think it's worth trying to stop people taking drugs if they want to - it's your body after all. But let's not pretend there is no harm in it.

Creeby · 06-02-2015 12:07PM

People are very quick to presume he slept with a male/female and that caused the guilt but I would disagree.

I think it is quite obvious that it was the mushrooms/truffles that caused this tragic event and triggered something mentally in him. The fact he didn't want to go in the first place probably made the whole situation worse.

These things are not for everyone and are not something to be taken lightly.

Some people can smoke everyday for years and you'll notice very little change in them whereas somebody can smoke weed once or twice and freak out just off the smell of it. Everyone is different and I think we should judge it on that just like we should judge each substance alone.

Obviously too much of anything is bad for you. Wether that be a joint a day, a can of beer a day or even a cheeseburger a day. Everything in moderation.

KrakityJones · 06-02-2015 12:09PM

Ah hang about, just read the article and it says he tried 4 of the fungus.

They are about the size of a tic tac each, and in order to have any effect on you you'd have to eat about 100 of them, the truffles are nowhere near as potent as regular shrooms.

If they said 4 packets of truffles I'd be equally as sceptical as they taste like...blue cheese that has been left to rot in someone's socks, socks that were worn while wading through a sewerage system - ie they aren't very pleasant and take a lot of will to eat. It says he was reluctant to try them, no way in hell did he chew through 4 packs.

Sorry but tragic and all as that is, based on that information there is no way it had anything to do with the truffles.

strobe · 06-02-2015 12:10PM

suicide_circus wrote: »

I have to say, a eh...friend, yeah a friend of mine has tripped and when say tripped I'm talking tripping absolute balls for about 8 hours on dutch truffles. That said, that was after eating about 30 of them.

Well they contain the same active ingredient as magic mushrooms. Eat enough and you'll get the same effect. But yeah, you tend to be talking around the 30 mark and up to trip full on.

I dunno, like I said maybe they were some super strong species.

But I just think here are more likely explanations possible than the guy took a low dose of a psychedelic therefore suicide three days later.

renegademaster · 06-02-2015 12:10PM

DoYouEvenLift wrote: »

Maybe someone else will know, I don't know much about shrooms, but it could be possible that something in them triggered latent mental problems in him just like high THC strains of weed can do to some people.

If one was ever going to try a hallucinogen it'd really be better to go with DMT. Although that'd probably be too much for a first time experience lol. I know someone who worked their way up from shrooms to LSD before DMT and they couldn't put the experience into words, but said it should be mandatory for everyone.

dmt is far from too much for a first time trip, a person experiences a full on dmt trip for the first time 42 days before they're born and every single time you sleep as the release of this chemical creates your dreams, also a near death experience and as you die your body floods itself with dmt to cope with it all. out of all the drugs i've taken dmt is the nicest more recognisable effect i've ever felt and why wouldn't it, i've been on dmt every night since mid 1980!!

kylith wrote: »

Especially telling his partner that she deserved better.

I feel sorry for the family, but I really think there's more going on than a few shrooms.

I've only taken our own ones, would anyone be able to confirm what the effects of four Amsterdam truffles would be?

would be like smoking a single joint to yourself

RecordStraight wrote: »

There has to be? Has to? :rolleyes:

I don't think the family are suggesting it was his guilt over taking the drugs that made him kill himself - rather that the 'guilt' seems to have been a symptom of whatever the drug did to his brain chemistry.

Alan’s devastated partner, Oonagh Heeney, claimed he was reluctant to try magic mushrooms on the trip.
“He had everything to live for. We were getting married the following November,” she told a Cork Coroner’s inqust.
“The tragedy is that he didn’t really want to go on that stag party trip in the first place.”
“Alan never took drugs [before].... he felt so guilty after taking them,” she added.
Oonagh said her partner went to Amsterdam a happy, hard-working young man, devoted to his children and family but he returned a changed
person because of the drugs.

J Mysterio · 06-02-2015 12:12PM

I'm just about to eat a cheeseburger too. Double cheeseburger. I'm going to eat the **** out of it!

kylith · 06-02-2015 12:14PM

KrakityJones wrote: »

Ah hang about, just read the article and it says he tried 4 of the fungus.

They are about the size of a tic tac each, and in order to have any effect on you you'd have to eat about 100 of them, the truffles are nowhere near as potent as regular shrooms.

If they said 4 packets of truffles I'd be equally as sceptical as they taste like...blue cheese that has been left to rot in someone's socks, socks that were worn while wading through a sewerage system - ie they aren't very pleasant and take a lot of will to eat. It says he was reluctant to try them, no way in hell did he chew through 4 packs.

Sorry but tragic and all as that is, based on that information there is no way it had anything to do with the truffles.

Oh, are they the little black ones? I've never taken them but I've been told not to bother because they're so weak, and they taste like arse, even worse than psilocybin (which taste like mud and leaf mould).

kylith · 06-02-2015 12:16PM

RecordStraight wrote: »

1. Nope - Commerce graduate, 2:1
2. Nope
3. Nope

I don't think anyone is saying that. But it clearly does damage the brain chemistry of different people to different degrees. Personally, I don't think it's worth trying to stop people taking drugs if they want to - it's your body after all. But let's not pretend there is no harm in it.

No one is pretending that there's no harm in anything, just that for the vast majority of people there won't be, and that a very small dose of something is very unlikely to cause enough of a mental change in an otherwise healthy person to make him kill himself.

scrimshanker · 06-02-2015 12:17PM

RIP

Whatever happened to cause him to die, the poor guy and his poor family. Awful thing to happen. Lots of psychiatrists and pathologists who seem to know him in this thread... Or maybe it's all just baseless speculation about a private individual who was in such a personal hell (for whatever reason) that he killed himself...

Tombo2001 · 06-02-2015 12:22PM

scrimshanker wrote: »

RIP

Whatever happened to cause him to die, the poor guy and his poor family. Awful thing to happen. Lots of psychiatrists and pathologists who seem to know him in this thread... Or maybe it's all just baseless speculation about a private individual who was in such a personal hell (for whatever reason) that he killed himself...

Nice piece of psychiatric analysis yourself there.

Tasden · 06-02-2015 12:22PM

kylith wrote: »

No one is pretending that there's no harm in anything, just that for the vast majority of people there won't be, and that a very small dose of something is very unlikely to cause enough of a mental change in an otherwise healthy person to make him kill himself.

If taken along with an excessive amount of alcohol would it effect people differently though? Like your tolerance/ability to deal with the effects could be different to taking it stone cold sober?

Cause I know myself I get awful cases of the so called "fear" after some nights of just drinking and that's not even as a result of doing something "shameful" or whatever way you wanna phrase it, like his wife said he never did drugs before so I'm assuming he felt it was wrong to do so especially since he felt so guilty afterwards.

Man commits suicide after taking magic mushrooms

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