Subcortical Parturition Activity I & II
Abstract of First MS: From Twilight Birth to the Biological Role of Endogenous Hallucinogens I: Sub-cerebral LSD Birth Memory
Bruce McConnell PhD
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Abstract
Background: Thus far, virtually all literature on hallucinogens has emphasized the psychological effects related to the hallucinogenic state, largely originating from the cerebral cortical domain, generaly considered to be associated with the excitatory prefrontal 5-HT2a/2c (serotonergic) receptors. However, a relatively rare, non-psychological, somatic effect of hallucinogens is seen occasionally group within the vast majority of psychedelic users, presenting a drug response that takes the form of prodigious contraction of skeletal muscle into specific body positions. Described as an "aberration" in early books, it was stopped by the injection of nicotine and later identified by psychologists as evidence of "obsessive-compulsive" personality. This pure somatic response is described here and it takes two forms: One is the LSD recapitulation of insults absorbed at birth from an erasable memory and the other is the above mentioned muscular work, revealing a thus far unknown pharmacology of hallucinogens, also birth related.
In this first of two papers, the retrieval of a somatic birth memory by LSD is described, revealing the sub-cerebral function of hallucinogens as mediators of memory consolidation within the parturient fetus. The rarity of these effects is accounted for by the conditions of the subject's birth by "Twilight Sleep" (TS), a long abandoned obstetric method that used scopolamine to inhibit cerebral memory by its anticholinergic action on the amygdala-hippocampus axis and the hypothalamus.
Methods and Materials:
Street blotter LSD at a dose of approx. 25ug was used, whose authenticity was verified by three other hallucinogens producing exactly the same effect on the same subject in several experiments described in the second paper of this series and by classical LSD effects seen with other users of this same preparation.
Results: A 45-year-old male subject's first trial with (street) LSD evoked the return of the birth memory as a reliving of pristine sequential physical skull sensations exactly as they would have occurred during an independently confirmed TS birth. Flashbacks of this sequence returned spontaneously, diminishing to disappearance, never to return.
Conclusions: 1) The existence of a sub-cerebral somaic memory is demonstrated.
2) This memory is reversible pharmacologically and is erased by a natural process heralded by flashbacks; Flashbacks are not the noxious aftermath of LSD “toxicity” as commonly believed. Basically, they are signs of autonomous attempts to remove noxious memory, in support of the long-held suspicion that relief from certain traumas first requires cortical interpretation.
3) The extensions of this kind of memory to REM healing and PTSD therapy are suggested in terms of a reversible neurobiological model involving serotonergic agonist interaction with the brainstem raphe 5-HT1a receptor.
