Psilocybin and Cognitive Function: Short-Term and Long-Term Effects

Magic mushrooms can be found all over the world and have long been as medicine as well as in religious or spiritual ceremonies.

21:43 12 August 2024

Psilocybin is a compound found in a particular group of fungi. More commonly called “magic mushrooms” or simply “shrooms”, this compound interacts with the brain’s serotonin receptors, causing mind-altering effects. Magic mushrooms can be found all over the world and have long been as medicine as well as in religious or spiritual ceremonies. 

People typically take shrooms orally by eating dried or fresh mushrooms. People often use dried mushrooms to brew tea and there are several ingestible products, such as gummies and chocolate bars, that are infused with a microdose of psilocybin. As these products become more widely available, psilocybin use has become increasingly common. 

While taking magic mushrooms is generally safe from a short-term physical standpoint, shrooms do impact a person’s psychological and physical well-being. In this guide, you’ll learn how long do magic mushrooms stay in your system as well as the short and long-term impact of psilocybin use.

How Long Do Magic Mushrooms Stay in Your System

Typically, users start feeling the impact of magic mushrooms within an hour of ingesting them. While the effects can last for hours, shrooms remain detectable in your body for much longer. Urine tests can detect magic mushrooms as long as three days after use. Blood tests have a shorter window of a few hours. However, hair tests are able to detect shrooms for months after they’re consumed. If your hair is extra long, that window stretches into years. 

While most employment drug tests won’t look for hallucinogenics such as shrooms, drug tests for other purposes do detect them. Just how long shrooms are detectable depends on a few traits of the user:

• The person’s age
• Their weight
• How often the user takes shrooms
• If they use other drugs as well

Short-Term Effects of Using Psilocybin

As a hallucinogenic, magic mushrooms cause altered temporal and spatial perceptions as well as changes to users’ moods and emotions. Short-term effects of psilocybin include:

• Feeling euphoria or intense joy
• Feeling like the surrounding area isn’t real
• Feeling disengaged from your surroundings
• Visual or audio hallucinations
• Peaceful feelings
• Dizziness
• Nausea or vomiting
• Impaired coordination or muscle weakness
• Confusion and inability to concentrate
• Paranoia and confusion
• Frightening hallucinations

People coming down from a trip may experience headaches, fatigue, depression, or anxiety.

As mentioned above, shrooms typically take less than an hour to kick in and the effects should reach their peak in two or three hours. Users start to come down from a trip in about six hours.

Magic Mushrooms Long-Term Effects

Physically, magic mushrooms cause few physical side effects and typically don’t cause a physical addiction. However, they can easily become psychologically addictive, with long-term regular use resulting in several psychological effects.

• Chronic users can develop a condition known as HPPD. People with HPPD can experience visual hallucinations without ingesting mushrooms. Hallucinations can last weeks or months. This condition isn’t “flashbacks,” which last only a short while.
• Chronic psilocybin use can cause depression, anxiety, and even psychosis.
• Long-term users report changes to their personalities such as more creativity, connectedness, and openness. Others have experienced a lack of impulse control and problems socializing.
• Psychological dependence in which a user takes mushrooms as a compulsion or to deal with emotional or physical challenges. 

Ultimately, the risks of physical side effects or addiction are relatively low with shrooms, using them does come with serious long-term impacts on an individual’s mental and emotional health. It’s best to approach magic mushrooms with an abundance of caution and respect while understanding your unique circumstances.