DXM FAQ

[TheHempress]

This was written by William White and can be seen at Erowid and The Third Plateau.

I'm sorry I didn't write this myself, but it looks like we need one here. This will do until I can muster up the gumption to write one of my own.




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3 DXM QuickFAQ
from the DXM FAQ
used at the Third Plateau with the permission of author William White


This is a quick question-and-answer section about DXM which avoids most of the technical detail of the full FAQ sections. However, since DXM is a complex drug, you are advised to read the appropriate sections in the full FAQ.


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3.1 What is DXM?

DXM, or dextromethorphan, is a cough suppressant drug found in cough syrups and cough medicines. It can be used recreationally, but there are risks.


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3.2 You Mean I Can Get High Off Cough Syrup?

Yes, if you choose the right kind; if you pick the wrong kind, you can end up dead. And you may not like the "high" you get; some people love it, others hate it.

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3.3 What Kinds of Cough Medicine are Safe?

Basically, anything containing ONLY dextromethorphan hydrobromide (DXM HBr). Popular US brands include Robitussin Maximum Strength Cough (and generic equivalents), Drixoral Cough Liquid Caps (the red kind), and generic equivalents.

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3.4 What Happens if I Drink the Wrong Cough Syrup?

If it has gauifenesin (Robitussin DM and generic "DM" syrups have this drug), you'll probably puke your guts up. If it has acetaminophen (paracetamol), you stand a good chance of a painful, prolonged death. Anything else, you're likely to ruin the trip and may end up in the hospital.


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3.5 I'm Taking Other Drugs -- Can I Take DXM?

Quick answer: it depends. Don't take DXM if you are taking any of the following other drugs:

Antidepressants of any kind. MAOIs (monoamine oxidase inhibitors) are the worst; DXM + a MAOI will kill you. DXM with other antidepressants can cause serotonin syndrome, an unpleasant and occasionally fatal condition.
Diet drugs like phentermine, fenfluramine (Redux), or phen-fen. Again, a risk of serotonin syndrome.
Non-drowsy antihistamines (allergy medicines) like Allegra, Seldane, or Hisminal.

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3.6 What's the DXM Trip Like?

Well, that depends on how much you take. There are four different kinds of experiences, based on the dosage; these are called plateaus. The first plateau is a mild stimulant effect with a little bit of a buzz, and has been compared to MDA. The second plateau is more intoxicating and has been compared to being drunk and stoned at the same time. The third plateau is dissociative, like a lower dose of ketamine. The fourth plateau is fully dissociative like a higher dose of ketamine.

You should not attempt higher plateau doses unless you have someone with you who can take care of you in case you get sick or freak out. It happens on DXM. Many things can happen unexpectedly on upper plateaus, such as spontaneous memory recall, complex delusions, hallucinations, out-of-body experiences, near-death experiences, and perceived contact with spiritual or alien entities. You need to be pretty stable and grounded before you can handle these things.


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3.7 How Much DXM Do I Take?

See the full FAQ; it's complicated and depends on your body weight; furthermore, some people can't handle DXM due to a genetic mutation in an important enzyme. So you always want to do a low dose on your first trip, and then increase gradually with each new trip.

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3.8 Is DXM Like Acid?

No. It's more like ketamine or PCP, but not much like them either.

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3.9 Is DXM Fun?

Some people think so; others point out that while the lower two dosage plateaus are more recreational or fun, the upper two seem to be more suited for self-exploration and shamanic work.


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3.10 Is DXM Dangerous?

Yes, especially if you take too much. Some of the more important dangers you might want to know about are:

Nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, and allergic reactions (often from the cough syrup itself)
Hot flashes, dizziness, and bad trips
Psychotic breaks (generally from high dose use)
Psychological addiction and depression (generally from regular use)
Irreversible brain damage (from chronic use at high doses)
The last -- brain damage -- is fairly rare, occurring in less than 1% of the regular users I've interviewed. They all used DXM very frequently. If you do DXM twice a month or less, you'll probably be OK. But remember there's always the risk of something going wrong.



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3.11 If DXM is Dangerous, Why Do It?

That's up to you. Most people in our culture seem to shun the idea of taking real risks, whether it be through drugs or high-risk sports such as mountain climbing and hang gliding. On the other hand, when someone goes and climbs a mountain without adequate equipment and training, and then falls to her death, nobody goes and blames the mountain.

There are many people who believe that the risks of DXM (or other drugs) are worth the rewards. If you are a legal adult and are willing to take responsibility for your actions, in my opinion you should be permitted to experiment with psychedelics to your heart's content.



To read the full FAQ, click here.

Personal experiences of mine:
The hills are alive with the sound of cough syrup.
Extra! Extra! TheHempress Attempts to Climb out a Window during her recent DXM trip!!

[sassafrasquatch]

First off lets get some general information about DXM. It is a drug found in many cough and cold medecines, and it is an OTC drug. Many younger people steal products such as Corcodin and Robotussin Maximum Strength because it contains almost exclusivly DXM, but popping a bunch of pills or drinking a whole bottle of cough syrup can have some harmful and nauseating side effects. There is however, many ways to extract the DXM from the medicine to eliminate these side effects. This thread describes one for extracting the DXM out of any cough syrup. On that note, lets get to the guide.

What You Will Need:
- Cough Syrup (must contain DXM and must not contain pseudoephedrine. I used Robotussin Maximum Strength because it contained the most DXM per 5ml. {15mg per 5ml})
- Ammonia (clear, not lemon or any other kind)
- Lighter Fluid (leaves no residue)
- Lemon Juice or Citric Acid (I used lemon juice)
- Plastic container (2 Liter bottle, Milk Jug, ect.)
- Sealable plastic bags (minimum of 2)
- Funnel (must fit the opening of plastic container)
- Scissors

All of these items can be purchesed at a store like Wall Mart or something similar. Ammonia is a household cleaner, although not as common today as back in the day. To purchase Lighter Fluid, you must be 18 so that will be found near the cigerettes, or wherever they sell cigerettes.
*NOTE*
Some large corporations have certain procedures which are there for trying to stop some processes. For example if you go and buy certain chemicals at the same time, they may think your going to make meth or something and try to stop you, so I reccomend that you buy some of these ingredients at different times, or at different stores at least so that you wont have a problem. Anyway now on to the directions.

Procedure:
*Step 1*
Pour your cough syrup into the large plastic container. Ammount of bottles of cough syrup depends entirely on how much extracted DXM you want. Its pretty much pointless to do 4 or 8oz of cough syrup because thats only 1 or 2 doses, so get a few.
*Step 2*
Pour Ammonia into the bottle. Ammount of Ammonia should equal or be greater than the ammount of Cough Syrup. Excess does not matter, but make sure you do have at least equal ammount.
*Step 3*
Stir or shake the mixture. It doesnt have to be shaken a whole lot, just make sure that it is thoroughly mixed.
*Step 4*
Add Lighter Fluid to the container. Lighter Fluid should equal about half that of the total ammount of cough syrup. Excess here is also not a problem, but half the ammount of cough syrup is enough. (E.G. for 16oz cough syrup use 8oz lighter fluid.
*Step 5*
Shake the fuck out of the container. Make sure the cap is on tight, and keep shaking it for about 5 minutes. By the time i was done with this step, both my arms were pretty tired.
*Step 6*
Empty the contents of the bottle into a sealable plastic bag. Let the bag sit for 5-10 minutes, and you will see that it will seperate into two layers.
*NOTE* The layer on top is called the organic layer, and the layer on bottom is called the water layer. This is how it will be for the rest of the procedure.
*Step 7*
Take the plastic bag and hold it by one of the top corners. Let the bag tip sideways so that it is in diagonal shape, in comparison to the ground, (Basically hold the bag by the corner and let the weight go to one corner). Carefully cut a very small portion of the corner that is pointing down, and let the water layer (on bottom) drain out into your yard. You do not need this layer. When the organic layer draws near the hole, pinch it slightly with your fingers so you dont lose any of the organic layer. When all of the water layer is gone, use the funnel to put the organic layer back into the large plastic container.
*Step 8* (optional)
Add water to the container equal to or greater than the ammount of organic solution in it. Shake it for a few minutes, and procede to empty it into another plastic bag, seal it, let it seperate, and drain the water layer again, always keeping the top layer and putting it back into the plastic container. This can be done however many times you wish, all it does is make sure the mixture is clean. I did it twice but if you are paranoid, you can do this however many times you want.
*Step 9*
Add a lemon juice/citric acid solution to the organic solvent in the container. Ammount of water in the solution should equal half that of the total ammount of cough syrup in the beginning. Ammount of lemon juice/citric acid should equal about 1 and 1/2 tablespoons per 8oz water.
*Step 10*
Shake the fuck out of the container again. Again, make sure cap is on tight and shake it for about 5 minutes.
*Step 11*
Empty contents into another sealable plastic bag. Let it seperate. This time it might take a little longer to seperate, 5-30 minutes. Unlike the other times, this time save the water layer (on bottom) and put it into a smaller plastic container, and discard the organic layer. What you are left with is your extracted DXM.
*Step 12*
Boil the liquid for a few minutes. This just ensures that all of the chemicals you dont want are gone, (ammonia, lighter fluid). Now you have your final product. As far as dosage goes, it depends on how much DXM is in each bottle you used. For Robotussin Maximum Strength there is 352mg in each 4oz bottle, which is one good dose. The liquid should have a very bitter taste to it, and depending on how many times you used water to filter it, be completely clear and odorless. Like I said, I did that twice and got a nearly clear substance with a hint of a smell of regular cherry cough syrup.
You can drink this straight with a chaser, or dilute it into pop or juice, it doesnt really matter, just dont eat a whole meal right after you drank it because there is a possibility it will be absorbed into the food and not your system. After an hour though you should be ok to eat whatever you want.

There is also a guide to this on Erowid that explains more in detail the chemical process of this, (E.G. what adding ammonia does to the cough syrup, ect.). Also if you are doing 16oz of cough syrup or more, you will probably need large containers and large sealable plastic bags, depending on how much you are doing.

http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/dxm/...shtml#toc.11.1

I highly reccomend this process because you get the same effects that DXM is known for, plus you dont have the nauseating and harmful side-effects. Have fun and try it out!

P.S. i had to write this twice cause the first time it got screwed up. I will never write a thread and try to post it again without copying it first

[hempflower9]

this is seriously a great way to extract DXM!!! its easy and it works oh so good! a little busy work, but the results are worth it!!! plus you dont toss yer cookies! (barf)

[JaneInMyBrain]

Ive done DXM many times and never barfed (although ive come close just held it in scared id lose the DXM) but i still HATE chokin down the shit. So thanks i will try this out!

[FearAndLoathing]

Damn straight. This is the only way I do DXM. Doesn't take too long either, 3 hours top for me, but I got it memorized heh. 1 thing I can add though is cool down your DXMjuice before you drink it, it goes down a lot easier when its cold. But then again you're drinking like a shot anyways so it doesn't really matter. I like it cold though.

[JaneInMyBrain]

i didnt read it yet but printed it off so it might already have this answered in it. But when you do it like what % of the DXM is takin out. Cuz i wanna know for sure how much i am doin. And i dont wanna like lose alot of it and not know it then not even trip hard.

[TheHempress]

Awesome thread!

[hippie john]

is DXM a relativle stable chemical? whats the shelf life oniit after its been extracted.... seems like it would be a good idea to mix up like a gallon of cough syrup at a time if it had a long shelf life..... albeit that would be expensive...

[sassafrasquatch]

As far as how much DXM is lost, it is very minimal. The only way for you to lose some is through the various tranfers of the liquid from container to container, and of course error when seperating the layers. Boiling it does not cause any DXM to leave the solution.
As far as shelf life, it should last a pretty long time if you have it in a tightly sealed container in the fridge or something. I wouldnt risk keeping it like that for more than 6 months though, just because it would suck to make a whole gallon of it and then have it become worthless lol.

[sassafrasquatch]

today i tried out the extracted DXM and thought i would just post about it since it was quite different from the other times i have used it without extracting it first. First of all, i started feeling slight effects after 45 minutes or so and after 1 hour there was a defenite change. this is different from the other times i used dxm because it came suddenly. This may be just because i diluted it with some juice though. Anyways, the one hour mark after taking it i decided that it "took effect" and it did not totally leave me until 4 hours later. The peak time during this was exactly in the middle, 2 hours after the effects, or 3 hours after taking it.
As far as effects that i started to notice around 40-45 minutes it was quite like being drunk. But, after another hour or so it kind of takes on its own feeling. I did not seem to take enough to have visualizations, but then again i only did approximately 300-350mg.
*note* much of these stats are dependant on physical properties. I am 135lbs 5'9".

[JaneInMyBrain]

im scared i really wanna try this but what if i do it wrong. Or what if i dont get all the ammonia of lighter fluid out?? Could i die from drinking those? does this thing REALLY even work?

[sassafrasquatch]

its very simple if you follow the directions as it says, and if you have any questions you can just ask them. For the lighter fluid and ammonia, you get that all out just by doing the extraction right, and Step 8 which is actually optional ensures that all of that stuff is out of there. if you are scared that those chemicals might still be in it, do step 8 a few times, (i did it twice). The final product i got did not taste or smell like either lighter fluid or ammonia. (yes i tried tasting small amounts). Does this work? HELL YES!! i have done 2 bottles of the stuff so far out of the 4 i extracted, each time was fucking awesome. Also, if you really have a weak stomache, boiling it and reducing it will greatly lessen the amount of liquid you have to drink. Oh also i just recently read on the internet that it is bad to take DXM if you are taking ant-depressants regularly, but my girlfriend did it yesterday and was just fine. I think it has those bad effects with a really high dose (like 1500mg is what it said in the guide).

[rollin_stoned]

by lighter fluid do you mean the naphtha zippo fluid type stuff?

this shit sounds cool. scary and cool.

[sassafrasquatch]

yes naphtha is the ingredient that is vital in this process. you can even go to a paint store and pick up some pure naphtha if you can, which works well if not better, and you probably wont have to use as much.

[THC101]

ive been really interested in doing DXM and ive looked through the FAQs many times, but cant seem to find an answer to my question

Q: Is DXM worth it? like, how intense is the trip? wat do you feel like, drunk? on the first trip, wats it like? and how much should u take ?


i bought a bottle of robotussin awhile back but i got thw wrong shit, it had guaifenesin in it, and i read that that shit will make you puke your guts out.. now if i were to use this extraction method, would that eliminate the guaifensen? thanks