If you need a little break from your everyday stresses and simply want to stop the nagging sense of impending doom, well, you’ve got options. Alcohol is one option, but using it to alter your feelings opens up a whole can of worms that can lead you down a dark path. You might want something more natural.
Mushrooms might sound appealing, but they might not be legal in your jurisdiction. What about mad honey? That’s right—mad honey might be what you need. The name’s a little misleading, though, because the last emotion many people feel on the stuff is anger.
If you heard about mad honey for the first time a few seconds ago, relax—you’ve come to the right place. We’ll cover everything you need to know about mad honey’s effects, the potential risks of consuming mad honey, and how it stacks up to shrooms when it comes to experiencing a high.
What is Mad Honey?
Mad honey is a special type of bee liquid that isn’t known for its sweetness—it’s actually quite bitter. Instead, mad honey gets its reputation from its physiological effects, which can include giddiness, stupor, dizziness, tingling, vertigo, delirium, and even hallucinations. Some users even report getting mad horny off of mad honey.
So, does mad honey make you high? Yes, in a way. The euphoria you experience after consuming mad honey may not be as pronounced as the feelings you get from marijuana or shrooms, however. You’re more likely to experience low blood pressure, reduced heart rate, and slowed breathing. Because mad honey reliably produces these physical effects, folks have used the substance to treat a wide variety of physical ailments.
A few conditions for which people have used mad honey include:
- Hypertension (high blood pressure)
- Arthritis
- Diabetes
- Dyspepsia
- Gastritis
- Pharyngitis
Where is mad honey from?
Unsurprisingly, you can’t get mad honey from just any regular grocery store. You might need to head to your local health food store or, if you don’t want to interact with human beings, shop online for some good mad honey products.
Where does mad honey come from, though? You can harvest it in Nepal, Turkey, and a few places near the Caucasus Mountains where rhododendron flowers love to hang out. As it turns out, the nectar and pollen from certain rhododendrons contain something called a grayanotoxin.
After bees extract the pollen and nectar, pass around their nectar spit with other bees, and eject the grayanotoxin-containing substance into mad honeycombs from their special stomachs (sorry, that’s just nature), you’ll eventually get mad honey. It’s red and not nearly as sweet as the honey you can purchase in plastic bear-shaped jars at the supermarket.
Risks of Mad Honey Consumption
Because we don’t live in a perfect world, mad honey carries the potential for some unpleasant side effects. Negative mad honey effects include:
- Diarrhea
- Weakness
- Fainting
- Confusion
- Nausea and vomiting
- Chills
- Severe fatigue
- Dangerously low heart rate
In very rare cases, mad honey can cause death. Death from mad honey poisoning often occurs when the heart pumps so slowly that major organs do not get the blood they need to function. Cardiac arrest is of particular concern for people with pre-existing heart conditions.
Still, mad honey has caused only a handful of fatalities since the 1800s. Starting with small doses and slowly increasing them will almost certainly not cause you any problems.
Is Mad Honey Legal?
Yes, mad honey is legal in the United States. That status leads many people to wonder whether or not mad honey is a drug. While mad honey has somewhat psychoactive properties like shrooms or marijuana, it has yet to land on the federal list of controlled substances. That might change as the substance becomes more widely known, but anyone purchasing mad honey in the U.S. is safe for now.
Does Mad Honey Work Similarly to Magic Mushrooms?
While their psychological effects are similar, the underlying mechanisms of mad honey and magic mushrooms are quite different.
To start with, magic mushrooms, shrooms, whatever you want to call them, produce psychoactive effects due to psilocybin. After someone consumes a psilocybin-containing substance, their body converts it into psilocin. Psilocin binds to certain serotonin receptors. You might know serotonin as one of the brain’s essential feel-good chemicals.
Psilocybin’s bond with these serotonin receptors causes all sorts of abnormal, but temporary, changes in the brain. The brain’s default mode network can get interrupted, which often leads to users reporting a quasi-spiritual experience while on psilocybin. Some areas of the brain can also start communicating with other areas they rarely speak to; this communication is correlated with euphoria and hallucinations.
As far as scientists know, mad honey does not bind with any serotonin receptors. Instead, mad honey’s effects come from grayanotoxins and their interactions with the body’s sodium ion channels. These sodium channels excite certain nerve and muscle cells in the normal course of business, but grayanotoxins cause prolonged periods of these excitations. The precise mechanisms of psilocybin and mad honey are not known, however, due to a lack of quality studies.
Are magic mushrooms legal?
Unlike mad honey, magic mushrooms are illegal at the federal level and in most states. Oregon and Colorado are the only two states that have legalized psilocybin. A smattering of cities in other states, such as Oakland and Seattle, have decriminalized it.
Nootropic Mushrooms vs. Shrooms
Although the majority of Americans do not have legal access to psychedelic mushrooms, nootropic mushrooms, which do not contain psilocybin, are widely available. Nootropic mushrooms contain certain substances that improve various cognitive functions.
A few common types of nootropic mushrooms are:
- Cordyceps
- Lion’s mane
- Turkey tail
- Reishi
- Chaga
- Shiitake
- Maitake
Nootropic mushrooms won’t significantly alter your perception or result in spiritual experiences, but they may help you focus more at work or school.
Find the Best Mad Honey and Mushroom Products with Gold Dragon
A key thing to remember as you’re shopping for nootropics and mood-altering substances is that your experiences will be unique. You may not feel euphoric and relaxed after consuming mad honey. That doesn’t necessarily mean you should quit trying new products—-consider mad honey cultivated from a different part of the world, for instance, or go for concentrated extracts.
Gold Dragon carries some of the finest mad honey and mushroom products you can find anywhere online. If you have any questions about our inventory, our staff is always available to answer them.
New to mad honey? Try our Intro to Mad Honey Bundle!
