Hey Beth-  Sorry, I didn't see your post 'til today.  Ibogaine is illegal in the US; there are no clinical trials, no nothing, and since it's a hallunogenic most people who are working with it feel it will never be legal in the US.

 

But there are places to get it.  I did it twice in St. Kitts under a study that was being done by the Univ or Miami.  They've completed the research and now are doing treatment there about 4x year.  There is also a clinic in Mexico just south of San Diego, and I've heard that there's one in Vancouver, BC.

 

It is an amazing experience.  A very spiritual experience- ibogaine comes from a plant that some tribes in Africa use as a rite of passage.  They keep you completely comfortable with a short-acting narcotic for the few days you're there before you take the ibogaine, no sickness at all.  Then the morning they give it to you they wait until you're dopesick.  Then basically you go on a 24-hour journey (during which you don't feel dopesick at all) and when you come down, you're no longer addicted.  Just like that.  Not even any post-acute withdrawal symptoms.  None.

 

And for a couple of months (for me anyway), I had no desire at all to use.  Someone could have put a big bag of H right in front of me and I would have had no interest.  This is a result of the ibogaine turning into noribogaine which remains in your system for 2-6 months.  The problem (again for me) was when the noribogaine wore off, the cravings came back and I started using again.  I hadn't done enough work on myself over that period of time to deal with the cravings coming back.  And they were upfront about it- that you wouldn't feel like using for awhile, but that eventually the cravings would come back.

 

It still was definitely worth it.  I've heard psychiatrists (who've done it) say that an ibogaine journey is like compressing 10 years of therapy into 24 hours.  You do an incredible amount of work on yourself while your on the ibogaine.  So even though I used again (both times) it was probably about the most powerful experience of my life.

 

Don't want to go on and on about it (as if I haven't already, but I could go on for pages), but if you're interested in knowing more you can e-mail me directly.

 

Marco

Hi Beth-  You probably understand the science better than I do.  But the action that ibogaine uses to eliminate withdrawal symptoms is unrelated to its properties as an entheogenic.  When I was in St. Kitts, the doc in charge explained that the way that ibogaine eliminates withdrawal symptoms is different from conventional opiate agonists, that ibogaine itself is not a dopamine or opioid agonist or antagonist.  But it attaches to a wide variety of recptor sites including kappa and sigma.  And apparently one other that they think is equally important for opiate withdrawal, the NMDA receptor site.  Within about 5-6 hours after its absorption it's transformed thru the liver into the metabolite noribogaine which continues to occupies these site for months.  Again, this is completely incidental to it being a hallucinogenic drug.  In fact one of the things they're working on is trying to patent a noribogaine patch- which would attenuate withdrawal and remove cravings without giving the hallucinogenic experience.

 

FYI ibogaine was "discovered" (although it's been used in Africa for hundreds of years) in the early '80s by some junkies in NY who wanted to try it for fun.  (Believe me, ibogaine is not something one would ever do for fun!)  When they came down from their trip, about 24 hours later, they found they weren't dopesick and had no desire to do any H.  Word got around and there was an underground movement throughout the 80s and early '90s.  And then in the early '90s some serious scientists started doing research on it.  The best place to look for all ibogaine info is www.ibogaine.org.  It has everything from it's history, the science behind it, all research that's been done to date- scientific as well as social science,etc.  You could also look on the internet for Dr. Deborah Mash, who's done more serious research on it than anyone.  About all I can add is that it is by far the most powerful drug I've ever taken and when I was younger I did a lot of the different hallucinogens- acid, shrooms, peyote, and they are MILD compared to ibogaine!

 

Re the bup, I'm on 32mg per day.  I started on 4 and since it wasn't really doing anything for my cravings the doc kept increasing it every week until I got to 32.  He says that above 32 there is no additive value.  So supposedly if your dose is less than that, increasing it should help with cravings.  I feel like if I could put together a month or so without using, I'd be OK.  That's how it was for me on methadone-  I kept using the first few months, but once I got a month or so without using, the cravings pretty much disappeared.  I'm going on vacation next week for about 3 weeks and so am hoping that will do it!

 

Marco.