No Warning, No Label - What Really Happened When I Tried A Legal HHC Vape

I'm sharing this story as the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland has issued a rather stern statement about HHC. They said it “beggars belief” that products containing it are still being sold with no restrictions.

The first time I tried a HHC vape, I was told they “just take the edge off.” 

Not by a doctor or a drug dealer - by the staff member behind the counter in a perfectly legal shop. 

It came in black packaging and was sold with all the ease and ceremony of buying chewing gum.

I make no secret that I vape - purely nicotine vapes.

At the time I purchased the HHC vape, I thought it would be a cheaper alternative to what I was buying on other stores.

I certainly wasn’t looking for a high. But I liked the sound of something mild, something mood-adjacent. It did not mention cannabis in any way, shape or form - just HHC.

The way it was marketed - just a light herbal buzz, nothing more - made it sound like the smoking equivalent of having a hot bath.

I took a few drags now and again over a single week in the evening.

It made my ears ring a little, but I ignored it. That, I thought, was the “edge” being taken off. Did I feel like I'd just existed a sauna? No. 

On one particular night, I took two slightly longer drags - not much more than usual - and within minutes, my body had other ideas. 

The ringing in my ears grew louder. My hands began to shake. Not tremble - shake. 

The kind of shaking that makes it hard to hold a glass, or stand upright - violent shakes.

I ran to the bathroom and splashed water on my face. Nothing helped.

I called down to my husband and told him to ring an ambulance. 

He gave me a drink instead, because he assumed I was having a panic attack., which is not uncommon. So did I, for a moment. 

But it didn’t feel quite like panic. 

There was no dread, no doom.

Just something tight and wrong in my head, a hammering pulse behind my eyes. I honestly thought my heart was just going to give up - I've never felt it racing as fast. For anyone who knows what a panic attack is like, your heart tends to speed up - but this was different.

It passed. Eventually. Ten minutes later I was soaked in sweat and water, shaken, but standing.

What I’d taken wasn’t nicotine, or CBD, or some vaguely scented essential oil. 

It was HHC - Hexahydrocannabinol - a hydrogenated, semi-synthetic compound that mimics the effects of THC, the psychoactive ingredient in cannabis. 

I found this out after the fact, of course, during the obligatory 2am Google that follows all adult misadventures. 

Just as an aside, I don't smoke cannabis. I tried it once as a teenager and it did not agree with me.

HHC is not illegal. 

You can buy it in vape form, or in gummies, or in cheerful foil packets from various shops that pretend they’re selling "something to take the edge off" when what they’re actually selling is a legal grey area with fruit flavouring.

I'm sharing this story as the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland has issued a rather stern statement about HHC. 

They said it “beggars belief” that products containing it are still being sold with no restrictions. 

A new study from University Hospital Galway, published by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, reviewed the records of 214 people admitted for psychosis between May 2023 and December 2024. 

Of those, 28 had used HHC beforehand. 

Nine of them had taken only HHC. 

It was the second most common drug among those patients, right after cannabis.

And if that doesn’t concern you, here’s one more detail: of the 47 people admitted for a first-time psychotic episode, 16 had used HHC. Not heroin. Not MDMA. Just a vape they probably bought in the same street as the pizza place.

If you buy cigarettes in Ireland, you get a picture of a rotting lung. 

If you buy a bottle of wine, you get a reminder that it can harm your baby, your liver, or both. 

If you buy HHC, you get pastel packaging.

What you don’t get: a warning label, a dosage guideline, or even a whisper that this “mild” product might leave you horizontal on the bathroom floor wondering whether your upper lip is going numb.

Even the CEO of one of the companies that sells the stuff has said it probably should be regulated. 

I’ve tried to rationalise the experience. 

I wasn’t hospitalised. I didn’t hallucinate. I didn’t end up in a psych unit.

But I also didn’t know what I was taking, not really.

And that is what stuck with me. 

The sense that something had slipped past the warning systems. 

That something had been dressed up as casual, even healthy, when in fact it was pharmacologically powerful.          

It was just a few puffs of something legal. That’s the part I keep coming back to.