Ketamine, referred to sometimes as kitty or simply K, is a synthetic drug known for its dissociative and anesthetic properties. Originally developed as a medicinal tranquilizer for small animals such as cats, ketamine has since become incredibly popular among partygoers and recreational drug users.
Ketamine produces a number of different changes in an individual’s mind and body. The drug causes marked dissociation, a sensation that can cause confusion and disorientation as the mind becomes increasingly separate from the body. People can feel completely separated from their senses, feel their thoughts as different entities, and see themselves from an outside perspective.
At these higher and more intense stages of experience, users may become unable to move. The mind and body become so dissociated that they are no longer able to synchronize. As such, the user is unable to get their mind to move their body. This is known as a K-Hole.
What is a K-Hole?
In short, a K-Hole is an out-of-body experience. Despite being unable to move, and despite the separation of mind and body, you remain conscious throughout the entire experience. Any conscious experience that occurs independently of body awareness is considered an out-of-body experience.
Ketamine is a drug that is part of a class of compounds called arylcyclohexylamines. These drugs are dissociative compounds that work by separating perception from sensation. Other drugs in this class include PCP, 3-MeO PCP, and MXE.
Ketamine causes a K-Hole experience by interfering with a part of the brain known as the glutamate system. Glutamate is a brain chemical called a neurotransmitter. Different neurotransmitters have different functions, and glutamate is most important for helping your brain cells communicate.
By interrupting the glutamate system, ketamine basically stops your brain cells from communicating with one another. This obstructs your conscious mind and separates the different parts of your brain.
Symptoms of a K-Hole
The symptoms of a K-Hole experience are intense and can seem frightening. They span a range of physical and mental effects that amount to an out-of-body experience. These symptoms include:
Physical:
- Dizziness and vertigo
- Nausea
- Uncoordinated movements
- Blood pressure and heart rate changes
- Erratic and uncontrolled movements or jittering of the eyes (nystagmus)
Psychological:
- Dissociation, sense of separation or detachment from your body, your identity, and your surroundings
- Anxiety or panic
- Hallucinations
- Insightful thinking
- Positive changes in mood
- Confusion and disorientation
- Altered sense perceptions
For someone who is inexperienced with psychedelics or dissociatives, these effects can easily be overwhelming. However, experienced psychonauts often seek out this experience for reasons we will discuss below.
Why Would Anyone Want to K-Hole?
This intense experience is known as a K-Hole, and it’s one of the most sought-after experiences among ketamine users (and among some psychonauts in general).
Wary people may question why anybody would be interested in this experience, but there are a number of valid reasons that people might want to explore the K-Hole. In fact, with the continued development of psychedelic research and therapy, we may soon find doctors and psychiatrists recommending a K-Hole experience for its therapeutic benefits.
Here are some of the reasons that people currently seek this intense experience.
Mental / Emotional Benefits
Ketamine has become increasingly popular for its function as an antidepressant. Ketamine can have a profound and long-lasting effect on an individual’s mental health. It is especially useful for helping people come to terms with, accept, and move forward through depression.
The ability to cause people to dissociate from their emotions can be extremely beneficial. Rather than being caught up in your emotions, you’re able to observe them from an outside perspective. This lets you reframe your experience and regain control of your mind and body so that you’re no longer at the mercy of your emotions.
Recreation
Many people enjoy using ketamine simply because it produces a profound change in their state of mind. Dissociation can be an interesting state, especially for people who are unwittingly self-medicating to overcome mental or emotional issues.
Most ketamine usage occurs in dosages that are far smaller than those required to cause a K-Hole.
Ketamine is an anesthetic and numbs feeling in the body. These feelings are much more pronounced at K-Hole doses, and these doses are not generally appropriate for socializing or remaining engaged at social gatherings.
Spiritual Benefits
Ketamine produces a change in consciousness that may be similar to those that are achieved by long-term practitioners of meditation. Ketamine provides to some users a ‘cheat’ or ‘shortcut’ to strong meditative experiences.
Ketamine also encourages insightful thinking. Many users return from their experience with new knowledge or ideas that produce long-term changes in their state of being. People can derive many K-Hole meanings from these experiences.
Safety of the K-Hole
The K-Hole is an intense experience that requires a large dose of synthetic medication. There are, naturally, some things to be aware of in the interest of safety.
Firstly, ketamine is known to cause problems with the urinary system, including the kidneys. Using ketamine on a regular basis can cause damage to these areas and should be avoided.
Long-term ketamine use can also impair memory and cognition by damaging the glutamate system.
Heavy doses can slow down your heart rate, slow down your breathing, and lead to vomiting. These symptoms are relatively uncommon, but can certainly occur. If you’re wondering how much ketamine K-Hole, you should start small.
If you’re able to reach a comfortable state of K-Hole visualization or K-Hole euphoria at a lower dose, then you’re better off. This will prevent you from experiencing some of the more dangerous side effects.
K-Holes Are Safer Than Some Other Dissociatives
One of the most important things about the K-Hole, and one of the reasons that ketamine remains the most popular of the arylcyclohexylamines despite its illegality, is the fact that users lose the ability to move their body during the experience. This makes it safer than some other arylcyclohexylamines, which simply cause you to lose control of your body.
This is what happens when you take something like PCP. PCP is regarded as an incredibly dangerous drug because people remain fully mobile during the experience, even if they’re dissociated to the same level as they would be in a K-Hole.
If you’ve ever had a K-Hole experience, then you can imagine why it’s a lot safer to go through the experience being unable to move. If your body was still running around at the whim of your hallucinations and subconscious mind, you could get into all sorts of trouble.
Fortunately, on ketamine, there’s no chance that you’ll be moving around and putting yourself, or others, at risk.
Conclusion
The K-Hole is one of the most powerful experiences of any recreational drug. The K-Hole is an out of body experience that can cause paralysis and hallucinations. Many users enjoy these effects.
K-Holes are not without their side effects and risks. If you’re going to be using ketamine, make sure that you moderate your dosage so that you can reduce the potential for injury or addiction.
