Ayahuasca Retreat Veteran Can No Longer Enjoy Regular Tea Without Crying

Returning ayahuasca retreat participant Derek Holloway, 36, has reported that after completing seventeen separate ceremonies over the past three years, he is now unable to consume any form of tea without experiencing what he describes as 'a micro-ceremony,' which manifests as uncontrollable weeping and occasional visions. 'I was at Starbucks,' Holloway said, eyes glistening. 'I ordered a chai latte. By the second sip, I was sobbing in the pickup area and telling the barista that she reminded me of a jaguar spirit I met in a ceremony in Iquitos. She asked me to leave.' Holloway's therapist, Dr. Rachel Stern, explained that the phenomenon is 'consistent with a deeply conditioned psychosomatic response' in which the act of drinking warm liquid from a cup has become neurologically associated with 'profound emotional catharsis and encounters with serpentine entities.' 'His brain has essentially reclassified all hot beverages as sacred plant medicine,' Dr. Stern said. 'Earl Grey, green tea, even hot chocolate — they all trigger the ceremony response. He wept through an entire pot of Lipton at his mother's house last Thanksgiving.' Holloway has attempted several workarounds, including drinking tea from a glass instead of a cup ('still cried'), drinking iced tea ('cried less, but still saw a condor'), and abstaining from tea entirely ('felt spiritually incomplete'). 'The medicine never leaves you,' Holloway said, quoting his shaman. 'Although I wish it would leave me alone long enough to have a normal cup of English Breakfast.' Holloway's shaman, who operates a retreat center outside Cusco, responded via email: 'The plant spirit works through all vessels. Derek's integration is simply more thorough than most. He should try coffee.' Holloway reports that coffee 'just makes him anxious,' which he considers 'a blessing, relatively speaking.'