But also like other hallucinogenic experiences, abusing DMT can carry with it the possibility of a bad trip as well. Many experienced users point to using too much at once or going into the high with a bad attitude as the main causes for such an experience.
Here’s one account of such a trip from the online drug forum, BlueLight:
but due to the visuals overlaying reality, he wasn't my friend, he was a skeleton with pieces of decomposing flesh still hanging on and the most menacing, sharp-toothed grin I have ever seen. There was another presence in the form of anthropomorphized black mist… The skeleton came over and pinned me down. I have no idea what they were doing to me… It was loud, frantic, oppressing, exhausting, and felt pure evil...and I thought I was stuck there forever. It just kept going and going, getting worse with each second. Time was going so slow that it felt like days.
- BlueLight user zenmasterjack
It seems clear, then, that making the choice to use DMT is not something that should be taken lightly. The experiences it carries with it can end up being absolutely traumatizing.