Health Archives | Psychedelics Today https://www.psychedelicstoday.com/post_tags/health/ Education and Training for Clinicians and Beyond Wed, 05 Jun 2024 21:13:05 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.1.1 https://psychedelicstoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/PSY_001-Psychedelics-Logo_v1.2_Spore-Gradient-100x100.png Health Archives | Psychedelics Today https://www.psychedelicstoday.com/post_tags/health/ 32 32 How Psychedelics Became Key to My Long COVID Recovery https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/how-psychedelics-became-key-to-my-long-covid-recovery/ https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/how-psychedelics-became-key-to-my-long-covid-recovery/#respond Fri, 31 May 2024 14:59:56 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=23924 How did psychedelics become key to one woman's recovery from long COVID?

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]]> https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/how-psychedelics-became-key-to-my-long-covid-recovery/feed/ 0 Long COVID and Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/long-covid-and-psychedelics/ https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/long-covid-and-psychedelics/#respond Fri, 31 May 2024 14:24:27 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=23641 In this episode, special guest host Court Wing interviews Monica Verduzco-Gutierrez, MD: professor and chair of rehabilitation medicine at UT Health San Antonio; Joel Castellanos, MD: co-founder and associate medical director of the Center for Psychedelic Research at UC San Diego; and MaryAnn Welke Lesage: a long COVID survivor who reports experiencing drastic improvement in […]

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]]> https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/31/long-covid-and-psychedelics/feed/ 0 Psychedelics and Pregnancy: A Look Into the Safety, Research and Legality https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/05/01/psychedelics-and-pregnancy/ Wed, 01 May 2024 19:50:01 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9709 Psychedelics and pregnancy is a highly controversial and often unspoken topic. But beyond the stigma, what does the research, law and culture say?

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]]> What is Holding Space: Guiding Psychedelic Journeys and Creating Ideal Set and Setting https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/04/11/what-is-holding-space-guiding-psychedelic-journeys-and-creating-ideal-set-and-setting/ Thu, 11 Apr 2024 18:02:23 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=23157 Much like the psychedelic experience itself, the idea of ‘spaceholding’ or ‘holding space’ can strike some as a nebulous concept. The term is largely synonymous with psychedelic facilitation or ceremony leading. When executed poorly, or not considered at all, the consequences can be severe for the recipient. Why Holding Space Matters When the psychedelic kicks […]

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]]> Women and Psychedelics, Microdosing, and the Challenges of Psychedelic Parenthood https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/04/05/women-and-psychedelics-microdosing-and-the-challenges-of-psychedelic-parenthood/ Fri, 05 Apr 2024 16:54:30 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=23078 In this episode, Alexa interviews April Pride: creative entrepreneur, veteran of the cannabis space, and now, founder of SetSet, an educational platform and podcast (picking up where The High Guide left off) for women curious about psychedelics. With Alexa about to embark on the journey of motherhood, she asks many of the questions parents working […]

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]]> How Long Does A Microdose Last? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/03/15/how-long-does-a-microdose-last/ Sat, 16 Mar 2024 00:30:37 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22777 The microdosing movement is flourishing, fueled by global citizen scientists reporting transformative wellness benefits. Yet, the practice is still an experiment. Most people have no idea what a microdosing protocol entails, what the experience feels like, or how long a microdose lasts. They are simply curious to know if low-dose psychedelics could be a game-changer […]

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]]> PT495 – Self-Love, Narrative Therapy, and Post-Traumatic Growth https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/03/15/pt495-dr-1drea-pennington-wasio/ Fri, 15 Mar 2024 16:39:24 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22738 In this episode, David interviews Dr. 1Drea Pennington Wasio: integrative physician, psychedelic-assisted therapy facilitator and psilocybin retreat leader, international speaker, podcaster, and author of several books, including Sacred Medicine: Exploring The Psychedelic Hero’s Journey. She discusses her personal metamorphosis and name change inspired by a powerful ayahuasca experience, and how that moved her into a […]

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]]> Psychedelic Integration: How to Weave Your Experiences Into Daily Life https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/02/28/psychedelic-integration-for-daily-life/ Wed, 28 Feb 2024 20:27:30 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22515 So, you’ve had a psychedelic experience. And somewhere within the sensory avalanche, the perplexing interior narrative, and avoiding looking at your own face in the bathroom mirror, you (gasp!) may have actually learned something. But what comes next? How can you ensure to take the insights you gathered and apply them to your life? Enter […]

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]]> PT487 – Interoception, Healing Through Connection, and Learning to Trust Our Bodies https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/02/16/pt487-saga-briggs/ Fri, 16 Feb 2024 17:51:18 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22390 In this episode, David interviews Saga Briggs: freelance journalist and author of How to Change Your Body: The Science of Interoception and Healing Through Connection to Yourself and Others. A collection of interviews, peer-reviewed research, and personal story; the book dives deep into the mind-body connection, how to become more embodied, and our need for […]

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]]> PT484 – Seeing Through the Smoke: The Importance of Telling the Truth About Cannabis https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/02/06/pt484-dr-peter-grinspoon/ Tue, 06 Feb 2024 18:25:33 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22302 In this episode, Joe interviews Dr. Peter Grinspoon: primary care physician and cannabis specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital, TedX speaker, certified physician life coach, and author of the new book, Seeing Through the Smoke: A Cannabis Expert Untangles the Truth about Marijuana. He tells his story of growing up in a house where academics like […]

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]]> PT483 – Traumatic Brain Injuries, the Gut Microbiome, and the Potential of Psychedelics as Anti-Inflammatory Agents https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/02/02/pt483-dr-kate-pate/ Fri, 02 Feb 2024 18:53:35 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=22277 In this episode, Joe interviews Dr. Kate Pate: Ph.D. neurophysiologist; Founder and CEO of Coruna Medical; founding board member of the Psychedelic Medicine Association; and Founder of The Way Back, a company that will provide education and coaching services related to military, veteran, and first responder health – often in wilderness settings. She talks about […]

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]]> Gender Challenges in Psychedelic Retreats and Clinical Settings https://psychedelicstoday.com/2024/01/03/gender-challenges-in-psychedelic-retreats-and-clinical-settings/ Wed, 03 Jan 2024 14:39:31 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=21992 Do women respond differently to psychedelics than men? And, if so, how are their needs different when approaching these powerful substances? While crucial research is still limited to help us understand how and why the psychedelic experience might vary vastly among genders, the rise of female-only retreats, clinical settings, and thoughtfully designed psychedelic products and […]

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]]> PT463 – Bringing Intention, Ceremony, and Inner Healing Intelligence to Modern Medicine https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/11/24/pt463-dana-lerman-md/ Fri, 24 Nov 2023 17:13:19 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=21563 In this episode, Joe interviews Dana Lerman, MD: a decade-long infectious disease consultant who has since been trained in psychedelic-assisted therapy, ecotherapy, and Internal Family Systems, and is the Co-Founder of Skylight Psychedelics, where she prescribes IM ketamine and trains therapists who work with it. Lerman tells her story: how working with kids with cancer […]

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]]> PT462 – Touch Therapy, Wearable Technology, and Treating Trauma with Safety https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/11/21/pt462-dr-dave-rabin-md-ph-d/ Tue, 21 Nov 2023 16:45:56 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=21475 In this episode, Joe interviews neuroscientist, board-certified psychiatrist, health tech entrepreneur, inventor, and Co-Founder & Chief Medical Officer at Apollo Neuro: Dr. Dave Rabin, MD, Ph.D. He talks about his path to psychiatry; his realization that trauma and chronic stress were primary themes at the root of most mental illness; and the creation, research and […]

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]]> PT440 – Coming Back to Stillness, Microdosing and Adaptogens, and What We Can Learn From Autism https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/09/08/pt440-dr-joqueta-handy-phd-imd/ Fri, 08 Sep 2023 16:11:56 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=20476 In this episode, David interviews Dr. JoQueta Handy, Ph.D., IMD: speaker, author, educator, Natural Integrative Health Practitioner, and CEO and Chief Visionary of Brilliant Learning, Handy Wellness Center, and Brilliant Blends. She shares childhood memories of growing up on her Grandparents’ farm, where she developed a deep appreciation for nature, staring at the stars, and […]

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]]> Exploring the Vast Potential of Psychedelic Medicine: A Physician’s Perspective on Allopathy, Virtual Community, and Clinical Research https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/08/09/exploring-the-vast-potential-of-psychedelic-medicine-a-physicians-perspective-on-allopathy-virtual-community-and-clinical-research/ Wed, 09 Aug 2023 17:57:29 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=19984 Neurology physician Dr. Burton Tabaac’s interest in psychedelics began almost by accident. He happened upon the topic through a 2019 presentation during his fellowship training at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine – and may not have pursued a dedicated interest in the field if he hadn’t attended. “… In four years of medical […]

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]]> PT426 – Making the Impossible Possible: Flow Hacking and Peak Performance Aging https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/07/25/pt426-steven-kotler/ Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:25:36 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=19518 In this episode, Joe interviews one of the world’s leading experts on human performance: New York Times bestselling author and Executive Director of the Flow Research Collective, Steven Kotler. Kotler’s work explores the neurobiology of peak human performance, flow states, and aging, and the concept of getting our biology to work for us rather than […]

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]]> PT422 – Curative Mushrooms: Exploring the World of Grow Kits and Home Growing https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/07/11/pt422-oliver-carlin/ Tue, 11 Jul 2023 17:18:05 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=19072 In this episode, Joe interviews Oliver Carlin, Founder of Curative Mushrooms, a grow kit solution company designed to produce mushrooms of one’s choosing within 30 days with little effort and no growing experience. Carlin tells his personal story of 20 years in the Navy to a 7g psilocybin journey and the work of perfecting these […]

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]]> PT420 – DanceSafe: Drug Testing, Fentanyl Myths, and the Importance of Consent https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/07/04/pt420-rachel-clark/ Tue, 04 Jul 2023 17:22:55 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=19018 In this episode, Alexa interviews Rachel Clark: Education Manager for DanceSafe, a public health nonprofit specializing in serving people who use drugs and their communities. As we move into the prime festival season, more people are going to be doing drugs, and the importance of harm reduction and drug testing becomes even more central to […]

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]]> Psychedelic Summer Safety: The Ultimate Guide to Making the Most Out of Your Trip https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/07/04/psychedelic-summer-safety-the-ultimate-guide-to-making-the-most-out-of-your-trip/ Tue, 04 Jul 2023 13:17:42 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=18972 Planning on hitting a festival this summer? You’re not alone. With COVID restrictions and cancellations now a thing of the past, many music lovers are heading back into the wild and hitting summer concerts and festivals all around the world with renewed energy, making up for lost time with their psychedelic communities and their favorite […]

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]]> PT418 – Psychedelic Morning Show #2 with Joe Moore and Anne Philippi https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/06/23/pt418-psychedelic-morning-show-2-with-joe-moore-and-anne-philippi/ Fri, 23 Jun 2023 16:38:45 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=18823 In the second episode of our special, two-part series, the Psychedelic Morning Show, Joe Moore and Anne Philippi are live once again bright and early from Psychedelic Science 2023 in Denver. Listen to this podcast as they interview four guests working on the front lines of psychedelic research, law, and the treatment of chronic pain. […]

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]]> PT417 – Psychedelic Morning Show #1 with Joe Moore and Anne Philippi https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/06/22/psychedelic-morning-show-1-with-joe-moore-and-anne-philippi/ Thu, 22 Jun 2023 21:15:38 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=18801 Psychedelics Today is reporting live this week from the industry event of the year, Psychedelic Science 2023 in Denver. Listen in to this podcast as our co-founder, Joe Moore, and New Health Club founder Anne Philippi hit the conference floor bright and early in the first episode of a special two-part series, the Psychedelic Morning […]

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]]> PT411 – The Humanity of Healthcare Professionals, Ancient Psychedelic Use, and Breaking the Cycle of Colonialism https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/05/23/pt411-priyanka-wali/ Tue, 23 May 2023 18:23:35 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=18311 In this episode, Joe interviews Priyanka Wali, MD: board-certified practicing physician in Internal Medicine, MAPS-trained psychedelic facilitator, comedian, and co-host (with Sean Hayes of “Will & Grace” fame) of the HypochondriActor podcast, where they discuss interesting medical issues in a funny (and hopefully uplifting) way.  She talks about recognizing and protecting the humanity of healthcare […]

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]]> PT408 – Fireside Project: Harm Reduction Through Free Peer Support https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/05/02/pt408-hanifa-nayo-washington-and-joshua-white/ Tue, 02 May 2023 17:59:03 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=18112 In this episode, David interviews two of the founding members of Fireside Project: activist, healing justice practitioner, musician, and Chief Ambassador, Hanifa Nayo Washington; and lawyer, aspiring researcher, and Executive Director, Joshua White, Esq. Fireside Project was created after White volunteered for a help line for years and realized a few things: that follow-up calls […]

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]]> PT404 – Clusterbusters: The Horrors of Cluster Headaches and the Miracle of Psilocybin https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/04/11/pt404-bob-wold-and-eileen-brewer/ Tue, 11 Apr 2023 20:04:15 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=17828 In this episode, Joe lets Court Wing take lead in interviewing two of the leaders behind Clusterbusters: Founder and Executive Director, Bob Wold; and President, Eileen Brewer. A long-time friend of the show, Court Wing has become our resident expert on chronic pain, writing articles about how psilocybin relieved his chronic pain, and hosting Timothy […]

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]]> PT403 – Understanding the Brain: Psychedelic Neuroscience Demystified https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/04/04/pt403-melanie-pincus-and-manesh-girn/ Tue, 04 Apr 2023 18:17:39 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=17661 In this episode, David interviews neuroscientist, artist, and educator, Melanie Pincus, Ph.D.; and Ph.D. candidate in Neuroscience, lead or co-author on over a dozen scientific publications, and regular contributor to PT, Manesh Girn.  They tell their stories of how they became interested in neuroscience, and stress the importance of staying radically open-minded (or “epistemically naive”) […]

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]]> PT396 – Moms on Mushrooms: Motherhood and Psychedelics Inside a Broken Culture https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/03/07/pt396-tracey-tee/ Tue, 07 Mar 2023 17:50:03 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=17276 In this episode, in celebration of International Women’s Day, Victoria interviews Tracey Tee: co-founder and CEO of Band of Mothers Media, co-producer and co-host of the Band of Mothers podcast, and founder of Moms on Mushrooms, an online educational community for psychedelic-curious moms outside the prying eyes of social media. With similar histories of womb […]

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]]> Mind the Gap: The Importance of Gender Equity in Psychedelic Clinical Trials https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/03/07/mind-the-gap-the-importance-of-gender-equity-in-psychedelic-clinical-trials/ Tue, 07 Mar 2023 17:01:41 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=17289 Psychedelics, once heavily restricted for research, are now being rigorously tested through clinical trials to explore their potential therapeutic benefits. But how are women represented in the search to uncover the efficacy of psychedelic medicines? While the inclusion of women in psychedelic clinical trials is clearly important – both to understand the effects of these […]

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]]> PT380 – Microdosing, Talking to Physicians About Psychedelics, and Nurses as the Scalability Solution https://psychedelicstoday.com/2023/01/03/pt380/ Tue, 03 Jan 2023 17:22:51 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15853 In this episode, Kyle interviews C.J. Spotswood, PMHNP-BC: author and board-certified psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner currently enrolled in CIIS’ Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies and Research certificate program. Spotswood has worked with Psychedelics Today, teaching masterclasses for our Vital and Navigating Psychedelics for Clinicians and Therapists courses, but this is his first appearance on the show. His first […]

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]]> PT377 – Integrative Medicine: Health, Wellness, and Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/12/13/pt377/ Tue, 13 Dec 2022 17:05:05 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15613 In this episode, Joe interviews New York Times best-selling author, pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, and overall legend in the health and wellness space: Andrew Weil, M.D. As the author of 15 books on health and wellbeing and a regular in the media, you’re probably familiar with Weil and some of his work, […]

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]]> Psychedelics Weekly – Genetic Memory, “The Psychedelic Renaissance,” and Harm Reduction at Music Festivals https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/12/09/psychedelics-weekly-genetic-memory-the-psychedelic-renaissance-and-harm-reduction-at-music-festivals/ Fri, 09 Dec 2022 16:30:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15581 In this week’s episode, Joe and David team up for the first time to discuss three articles: Chacruna’s breakdown of the study, “Ceremonial Ayahuasca in Amazonian Retreats – Mental Health and Epigenetic Outcomes From a Six-Month Naturalistic Study,” Double Blind’s “Why the ‘Psychedelic Renaissance’ is just Colonialism by Another Name,” and the results from the […]

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]]> Why Did Psychedelics Relieve My Chronic Pain? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/11/18/why-did-psychedelics-relieve-my-chronic-pain/ Sat, 19 Nov 2022 00:37:50 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15198 In part 2 of the article, “Surprising Results: Psilocybin Trial for Depression Alleviates Chronic Pain,” the disappearance of Court’s chronic pain leads to a new understanding of cortical remapping, mirror box therapy, and how science can treat phantom limb pain. Immediate Changes Post-Dosing I had years of experience in cold water training from my Aikido […]

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]]> Surprising Results: Psilocybin Trial for Depression Alleviates Chronic Pain https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/11/15/surprising-results-psilocybin-trial-for-depression-alleviates-chronic-pain/ Tue, 15 Nov 2022 21:08:07 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15008 An NYU psilocybin depression study participant discovers an unforeseen application for psychedelics: the treatment of chronic pain. Part 1 of the series: Psychedelics and Chronic Pain. Everything Worked, but Nothing Lasted In the fall of 2020, I was living a pretty successful and happy life – on paper. I had co-founded a very popular, leading-edge […]

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]]> PT373 – Integrative Psychiatry & The Safety of At-Home Ketamine https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/11/15/pt373/ Tue, 15 Nov 2022 18:33:25 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=15033 In this episode, David interviews Dr. Ben Medrano: Co-Medical Director with Nue Life, board-certified psychiatrist specializing in integrative psychiatry, and former Senior Vice President and US Medical Director of Field Trip Health. He discusses his path to Nue Life; from growing up around mental illness, to the rave scene, to Buddhism, to his years working […]

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]]> PT369 – Chronic Pain and Phantom Limb Pain: Could Psilocybin Be the Answer? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/11/01/pt369/ Tue, 01 Nov 2022 18:28:23 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=14711 Listen to this episode on how psychedelics could be the answer to chronic pain, featuring Founder of REMAP Therapeutics, Court Wing, and Drs. Joel Castellanos and Timothy Furnish of UC San Diego's Psychedelics and Health Research Initiative (PHRI).

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]]> PT368 – Ketamine, Group Work, and the Power of Just Being There https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/10/28/pt368/ Fri, 28 Oct 2022 13:25:16 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=14567 Listen to this interview with Dr. Steven Radowitz: Medical Director at Nushama, a wellness center in New York City primarily offering IV ketamine. He discusses integration, group work, and the inner healer.

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]]> Inflammation Nation: How Psychedelics Could Combat Widespread Chronic Pain https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/10/19/how-psychedelics-could-combat-chronic-pain/ Wed, 19 Oct 2022 20:28:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=13599 Could a nation defined by inflammation find relief in psychedelics? It’s a verifiable truth that the United States of America may be considered a global leader, especially when it comes to the prevalence of mental and physical health disorders. In fact, of the nearly 330 million people in the population, millions to hundreds of millions […]

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]]> PT365 – KAP: Self-Agency Through Intention, Titration, and Ceremony https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/10/18/pt365/ Tue, 18 Oct 2022 15:35:41 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=13773 In this episode, Kyle Buller interviews Dr. Jennifer Montjoy: psychiatric nurse practitioner with a private practice specializing in ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, and Medical & Research Director at TRIPP (Transpersonal Research Institute of Psychotherapeutic Psychedelics); a 501(c)(3) organization that provides psychedelic training and research opportunities largely for female and BIPOC scientists. She talks about her protocol, the self-transcendent scale she’s using with clients pre- and post- induction, how ketamine can help people get over past trauma through shifts in emotional memory, and what she sees most in successful cases: a gradual shift toward self-agency. She also discusses how integral titration is in her process; how ACE (adverse childhood experience) scores work; how dissociation can help with childhood trauma; how clients often naturally fall into using Internal Family Systems to describe their process; and how physicians and therapists shouldn't be afraid of the concept of ceremony.

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]]> PT335 – Christopher Dawson & Andrew Galloway – Modernizing Traditional Plant Medicine With Neuroscience and Luxury https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/07/08/pt335/ Fri, 08 Jul 2022 16:14:08 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12693 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Christopher Dawson & Andrew Galloway: Co-Founders and CEO and COO, respectively, of Dimensions; a Canadian-based company creating retreats that blend traditional plant ceremonies with neuroscience and a luxurious, five-star environment. They each tell their story and how it led to the beginnings of Dimensions, where they worked for a year with a "Dreamlab" team of MDs, psychiatrists, practitioners from different fields, and even a design agency to create different programs for different substances – all with a focus on true set and setting and integrating perfectly with nature. They talk about Health Canada and the country’s trajectory towards legal psychedelics; critiques of traditional addiction treatment and the efficacy of 12-step programs; the tension between the psychedelic space and traditional healing space; investing in biotech; the polyvagal theory; how animals deal with trauma (and how we don't); and the concept of integration: If you're just taking a pill and not doing the work, are you missing the point entirely?

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]]> PT334 – Prof. David Nutt – The Human Brain, Addiction, and Telling the Truth About Drugs https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/07/05/pt334/ Tue, 05 Jul 2022 14:24:53 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12673 In this episode, David Drapkin interviews David Nutt: Psychiatrist, Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Drug Science, Chief Research Officer at Awakn Life Sciences, and Edmund J. Safra Professor of Neuropsychopharmacology in the Division of Brain Science, Dept of Medicine, Imperial College London. After a successful study on MDMA in the treatment of alcohol use disorder, Nutt is looking into if improvements can be made to MDMA. He discusses how serotonin seems to affect the default mode network; Robin Carhart-Harris’ “Trial of Psilocybin versus Escitalopram for Depression" study and the realization that psychedelics were doing something different in the brain; Measure 109 and the importance of how Oregon establishes a new paradigm around legal mushrooms; drug hysteria in the US and UK and how drastically that differs from Portugal's incredibly successful approach to drugs; why real world evidence is the core of science; and why psychedelics seem best at disrupting internalizing disorders.

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]]> PT332 – James Lanthier – Patentability, Capitalism, and The Next Generation of Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/28/pt332/ Tue, 28 Jun 2022 14:23:42 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12594 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews the CEO of Mindset Pharma, James Lanthier. Mindset Pharma is a 3-year old biotechnology company built on discovering and developing new psychedelic compounds to be used as medicine for a variety of indications. While the efficacy of the psychedelics we know can’t be denied, the goal of science is to improve, and Lanthier believes optimizing these drugs will make them safer, more predictable, and more palatable for a far greater portion of the population. Lanthier discusses what’s going on at Mindset Pharma; why patents alone will not be sufficient protection from competition; the long game of biotech, psychedelic stocks, and overreaction to slow growth; the Nagoya protocol; mescaline; the need for big pharma and capitalism; the art of formulation; and how microdosing could soon be revolutionized.

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]]> PT331 – Julie Zukof & Dr. Michelle Weiner – Psychedelic Women, Coaching, and Ketamine For Fibromyalgia https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/24/pt331/ Fri, 24 Jun 2022 19:34:55 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12561 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Julie Zukof: Head of Strategic Partnerships for Nue Life and the creator of Psychedelic Women, and Michelle Weiner: a double board-certified Doctor specializing in integrative pain management, using cannabis, ketamine, and other holistic modalities to get to the root cause of chronic pain. Weiner discusses the central sensitization of fibromyalgia; ketamine infusions and dose discovery; the differences between how therapists and coaches are viewed (and the need for both); session music and trusting the facilitator in their music choice; and the importance of preparing for a ketamine experience through meditation and/or breathwork. And they talk about Psychedelic Women, which was just founded in January as a result of Zukof realizing how much women were a minority in the psychedelic space. She talks about why we need more women in psychedelia; women's natural inclination to connect and support each other; and how medicine should mirror that attitude.

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]]> PT330 – Dick Simon – Researching Ethnobotanical Efficacy and the Search For New Therapeutic Molecules https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/21/pt330/ Tue, 21 Jun 2022 21:02:20 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12529 In this episode, Joe interviews the Co-Founder and CEO of Sensorium Therapeutics, Dick Simon. Sensorium was created to fully research plants and fungi that already have established efficacy – their goal being to have the largest collection of psychoactive plants, to use machine learning to figure out exactly which molecules are doing what, to then synthesize new drugs that are safe and effective, and eventually bring these new compounds through the FDA approval process. Simon talks about how so much of what we know to be effective and beneficial is based on assumptions or best guesses, and while that doesn't discredit very real benefits, it does beg the question: Is this all optimized as best as it could be? He also discusses how recent advances in neuroscience and technology are catalyzing molecular research; the benefits and challenges of nutraceuticals; geopolitical conflict resolution; the challenges of benzodiazepines; and the problem with people needing to be treatment-resistant or seriously ill to gain access to psychedelics. He hopes that what Sensorium Therapeutics learns over the coming years will help bring better medicines to more people.

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]]> PT329 – Dr. Scott Shannon – The Board of Psychedelic Medicine and Therapies https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/20/pt329/ Tue, 21 Jun 2022 04:11:52 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12511 In this bonus episode, Kyle interviews Dr. Scott Shannon: psychiatrist, Founder of Wholeness Center in Fort Collins, CO, and Co-Founder and CEO of the Board of Psychedelic Medicine and Therapies (BPMT); a non-profit public benefit corporation which was recently created to certify healthcare professionals in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Shannon feels that the majority of people who are interested in (and could benefit from) psychedelics would prefer that their experience be as close to a conventional medical setting as possible. And especially with the risks of rogue practitioners, licensing boards want to see predictability, uniformity, regulation, and that we as a psychedelic culture are placing importance on being accountable and self-governing. He discusses what the certification process will likely look like; why uniformity is so important; what people should look for in psychedelic education; and the importance of breaking from a siloed and hierarchical model into one that's cross-disciplinary, where professionals of all types can work together for the betterment of the patient.

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]]> PT327 – Rick Doblin, Ph.D. – Confronting Abuse in Clinical Trials and the Future of Psychedelic Medicine https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/14/rick-doblin-phd/ Tue, 14 Jun 2022 13:50:27 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12444 In this episode, David Drapkin interviews Founder and Executive Director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), Rick Doblin, Ph.D. MAPS has recently been at the center of media scrutiny, notably through New York magazine's “Cover Story” podcast series, which chronicled instances of alleged sexual abuse within the MAPS clinical MDMA trials. We wanted to provide an opportunity for Doblin to respond to these very real concerns, and he does just that, discussing how MAPS reacted; what could have been done better; what this has all meant for MAPS; and how it feels to suddenly be seen by many as an enemy in a space they helped build. He also discusses what the post-approval psychedelic landscape could look like; their goals for facilitator training and how they align with requirements in Oregon; their desire for a patient registry or “global trauma index”; and the importance of collecting and analyzing real-world evidence. And he talks about MAPS and their globalization goals: how exploring psychedelic therapy specifically in countries with little to no tradition of psychotherapy can lead to new therapeutic models.

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]]> PT326 – Dr. Rick Barnett, Psy.D – Addiction, Recovery, and Competency in Psychedelic Therapy https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/06/10/pt326/ Fri, 10 Jun 2022 12:55:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12426 In this episode of the podcast, David Drapkin interviews Clinical Psychologist and Founder of the Psychedelic Society of Vermont, Dr. Rick Barnett. They talk about addiction, recovery, varying therapeutic models, and how the combination of psychedelics and psychotherapy help to disrupt harmful negative patterns. Dr. Barnett also shares about his upcoming conference, the Psychedelic Science & Spirituality Summit, happening on the summer solstice (June 20-21, 2022) in Stowe, VT.

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]]> PT323 – Dr. Reid Robison & Steve Thayer, Ph.D. – Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy, Therapist Burnout, and LSD for Anxiety https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/05/31/pt323/ Tue, 31 May 2022 13:42:40 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12300 In this episode of the podcast, Kyle Buller interviews Dr. Reid Robison and Steve Thayer, Ph.D. of Novamind, and hosts of the Psychedelic Therapy Frontiers podcast. Robison and Thayer talk about their work with ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP); their combined efforts with Numinus Wellness to scale psychedelic therapy accessibility; the nuance of ketamine treatment; how ketamine can be used for therapist burnout; the benefits of group ketamine sessions; the inner healer; and the platform of standards and training they are currently building at Novamind.

The post PT323 – Dr. Reid Robison & Steve Thayer, Ph.D. – Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy, Therapist Burnout, and LSD for Anxiety appeared first on Psychedelics Today.

]]> PT322 – Kimberly Juroviesky, Capt., USAF, Retired – Ketamine and Complex Regional Pain Syndrome https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/05/27/pt322/ Fri, 27 May 2022 16:37:58 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12279 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews retired Nurse Practitioner, Midwife, and Air Force Captain, Kimberly Juroviesky, who was forced to retire from her career and aspirations in the Air Force after she fell during a training exercise and again on ice months later, eventually realizing she had developed Complex Regional Pain Syndrome – a little understood condition where essentially, nerves continue to tell one's brain that a healed injury should still hurt. After she tried ketamine and it cut her pain in half, she created the Ketamine Task Force to fight to get insurance to pay for ketamine (and eventually, other legalized psychedelics). She discusses CRPS and her path to ketamine; the redefining of "treatment-resistant"; the lack of knowledge from so many physicians about drug interactions and proper dosing; the utility, timing, and efficacy of each ketamine method; how chronic pain and suicidality are intertwined; and the relationship between the timing of ketamine sessions, improvements, and problems returning.

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]]> PT321 – Lyle Maxson – Virtual Reality, Biofeedback, and Digital Therapeutics: The Future of Mental Health https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/05/24/pt321/ Tue, 24 May 2022 12:55:50 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12238 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews Lyle Maxson: Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Entheo Digital, a “technodelic” company focusing on digital therapeutics and virtual reality as adjuncts to psychedelic-assisted therapy, and theoretically, as new forms of medicine. Maxson discusses using VR before and after psychedelic experiences as a priming and integration tool; VR's potential to ease first-time trip anxiety; Entheo Digital's SoundSelf system and the powerful influence of biofeedback; and the question of whether or not technology (on its own) could initiate a non-ordinary state of consciousness with the same benefits as one brought on by psychedelics. He also talks about the likelihood of using different tools to be able to naturally activate endogenous DMT; the idea of a Steam-like internet marketplace for digital medicine; the possibility for technology to trigger lucid dreaming; the concept of highly-personalized digital schooling, and the tough question of how to not become so reliant on technology in such a quickly advancing technological world. And how can we use technology not for escapism, but instead, for good?

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]]> PT320 – Anne Philippi – The New Health Club, Intergenerational Trauma, and Psychedelics in the Workplace https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/05/20/pt320/ Fri, 20 May 2022 14:40:31 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12191 In this episode of the podcast, David Drapkin interviews Founder & CEO of The New Health Club podcast and former journalist: Anne Philippi. She covers a range of topics pertaining to non-linear healing; intergenerational trauma; the birth of TNHC; how both COVID and war crises demand psychedelic intervention and services; and how psychedelics can heal the workforce and evolve the workplace.

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]]> PT318 – Del Jolly, Rashad Evans, and Jake Plummer – Functional Mushrooms, Brain Injuries, and the Importance of Slowing Down https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/05/13/pt318/ Fri, 13 May 2022 16:08:58 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12153 In this episode of the podcast, recorded live from the Archipelago Attic space in Denver, CO, Joe sat down with Unlimited Sciences founder, Del Jolly; Former UFC champion and Hall of Famer, Rashad Evans; and 10-year NFL veteran quarterback, Jake Plummer, at the initial launch of their new functional mushrooms company, Umbo Mushrooms. Plummer and Evans discuss how difficult transitioning back to normal everyday life after a sports career can be, and how CBD, following the Stamet's stack protocol, and how learning about all the anecdotal evidence of brain injury healing started to make them question what kind of long-term issues they may have coming to them. Jolly believes that functional mushrooms have just as much, if not more potential to help humanity than the often higher-praised psilocybin.

The four of them talk about a lot in this nearly 2-hour panel discussion: the power in language; how valuable it is to learn from each other in group preparation and integration sessions; how the UFC and NFL feel about psychedelics; microdosing and competition; NFTs; the Telluride Mushroom Festival; the problem with TBI often being misdiagnosed as PTSD; what steps we can take to better align our communities to the set and setting we want; the importance of slowing down; how every person has a specific audience they can reach; how we can learn from Indigenous people about our lost connection to community; and the interesting question of if we actually feel better from eating mushrooms because as a society, we completely removed them from our diets and our bodies have been craving them ever since.

The post PT318 – Del Jolly, Rashad Evans, and Jake Plummer – Functional Mushrooms, Brain Injuries, and the Importance of Slowing Down appeared first on Psychedelics Today.

]]> PT314 – Daniel McQueen, MA – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/29/pt314/ Fri, 29 Apr 2022 13:51:22 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=12028 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller interviews Daniel McQueen, MA: author of “Psychedelic Cannabis: Therapeutic Methods and Unique Blends to Treat Trauma and Transform Consciousness” and Executive Director of the Center for Medicinal Mindfulness in Boulder, CO. McQueen discusses how the clinical model is too limited in perspective for psychedelics, how transformational being a guide for others can be, the importance of practitioners practicing self-care, and how cannabis can be as powerful a psychedelic as DMT.

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]]> PT313 – Christine Calvert, LCDC – Holotropic Breathwork, Ethics, and Dying To Ourselves https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/26/pt313/ Tue, 26 Apr 2022 14:02:53 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11944 In this episode of the podcast, Joe interviews Chemical Dependency Counselor and Holotropic Breathwork® facilitator, Christine Calvert. They talk in detail about the many facets of Grof Transpersonal Training, the holotropic paradigm, the ethics and nuance of spaceholding, and what it means to die to ourselves.

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]]> PT312 – Deborah Snyder – Ecology, Synergy, and the Biosphere https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/22/pt312/ Fri, 22 Apr 2022 12:30:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11901 In this Earth Day episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews publisher, ecologist, planetary steward, and co-owner of Synergetic Press, Deborah Snyder. The two cover a wide range of ecology-based topics like earth as a biosphere, the environmental ecological engineering project Biosphere 2, the importance of thinking in whole systems, and how psychedelics play a role in our understanding of the complex, organic living systems we live in.

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]]> PT310 – Omar Thomas – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/15/pt310/ Fri, 15 Apr 2022 14:03:10 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11806 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, David Drapkin interviews Omar Thomas: certified death doula and founder of Jamaica’s Diaspora Psychedelic Society. Thomas discusses his work at DPS; how Jamaica is shaping its framework as a psychedelic health & wellness destination; the importance of openness within the home about psychedelics; the value of creating a sacred, intentional approach to death; re-thinking waste and wealth in Jamaica; how psychedelics relate to death; and how observation and self-directed growth lead to lasting change.

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]]> Could the Sonoran Desert Toad Cure Narcissism? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/14/could-the-sonoran-desert-toad-cure-narcissism/ Thu, 14 Apr 2022 22:49:31 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11757 The continued exploitation of this fragile species for its DMT encapsulates narcissism itself. Until recently, the Sonoran desert toad, Incilius alvarius (formerly Bufo alvarius) was not on my wildlife-watch radar. Then an email from the owner of a group of psychedelic retreat centers operating in Latin America, Portugal, and the Netherlands brought the greenish brownish […]

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]]> PT308 – Dr. Ido Cohen, PsyD – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/08/pt308/ Fri, 08 Apr 2022 13:57:25 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11725 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller interviews Dr. Ido Cohen, PsyD.
Dr. Cohen is a clinical psychologist and co-founder of The Integration Circle: A San Francisco based organization focused on encouraging psycho-spiritual growth for individuals, couples and groups. This discussion unpacks all the nuance of integration, its importance, and how commitment to ourselves through the process can lead to long-lasting, sustainable change.

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]]> PT307 – Kathryn L. Tucker, JD – The Right to Try Act and the Battle for Psilocybin Access https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/05/pt307/ Tue, 05 Apr 2022 13:46:19 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11676 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews Kathryn L. Tucker, JD: Special Counsel at Emerge Law Group, where she Co-Chairs the Psychedelic Practice Group. Tucker has had a 35-year career in advocacy and protecting rights of terminally ill patients, serving as lead counsel in three landmark federal cases around constitutional rights and dying. Most recently, she was part of the team responsible for enacting Oregon's groundbreaking Measure 109. She discusses the mechanics of how access to psychedelic medicine works under Right to Try; how she feels about decriminalization vs. legalization and how it all relates to what she's seen in the field of death and dying; what she's excited about in Oregon; and how measures in Colorado could take things even further. It's been over a year with no answer on how the DEA would be enabling psilocybin access to patients under the Right to Try act, so she invites activists everywhere to shine the bright light of public scrutiny on the insulting inaction of perhaps the government's most ineffective agency. There’s a clear path here where everyone wins, so please, call your state’s elected officials and demand that they actually do their job.

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]]> Canada’s SAP Expansion Signals a Step Forward for Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/01/canadas-sap-expansion-signals-a-step-forward-for-psychedelics/ Fri, 01 Apr 2022 18:28:42 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11636 Health Canada’s recent SAP revision brings a new opportunity for patients and a clear responsibility for prescribers. Health Canada’s recent decision to include psychedelic medicines in its Special Access Program (SAP) was met with a lot of fanfare. The SAP amendment brings good news for certain patients – specifically, treatment-resistant patients suffering from serious mental […]

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]]> PT306 – Dr. Devon Christie – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/04/01/pt306/ Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11653 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller interviews Dr. Devon Christie: Senior Lead of Psychedelic Programs with Numinus Wellness, clinical instructor, counselor, and Co-Investigator and study therapist for a Canadian MAPS-sponsored trial investigating MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD. She talks about the importance of biomedical ethics and the unique considerations of psychedelic-assisted therapy: how psychedelics enhance the vulnerability and suggestibility in a well-established power dynamic, and how being aware of your power and biases is of the utmost importance towards not influencing your patient's experience. And she talks about the complications of touch and establishing (and honoring) informed consent; how true mindfulness can cultivate a greater capacity for self-regulation; how to handle situations where the client wants to know if a memory is real or not; the idea of psychedelics as placebos; and other therapeutic concepts like harm of neglect, undue influence, making pleasure a virtue, cultivating agency, combating physician burnout, and the expectation effect.

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]]> PT303 – Adam Bramlage – Cannabis, Microdosing, and Our Evolutionary Connection to Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/22/pt303/ Tue, 22 Mar 2022 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11553 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews Adam Bramlage: Founder and CEO of Flow State Micro, a functional mushroom company and microdosing educational platform. Bramlage talks about his journey to psychedelics and discovery of microdosing, and how he worries that the troubling issues he saw in the legal cannabis industry are already finding their way to the psychedelic space. He discusses what he experienced when he started microdosing; how he connected with James Fadiman; the concepts of neurogenesis and a gut-brain axis; how more and more professional athletes are using psychedelics to heal brain injuries as well as optimize performance; concerns over chronic microdosing; and why the goal is always to microdose less over time. And he also goes deep into the history of microdosing and our ancestral connection to psychedelics (particularly psilocybin), touching on Hernán Cortés; R. Gordan Wasson banking for the vatican; Christianity, Jesus, and mushrooms; repeated examples of control through the erasure of history; Tim Leary; Al Hubbard; MKUltra; the Tarahumara Indians' peyote-influenced ultra-running; cave paintings; Whitey Bulger, and more.

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]]> PT302 – Dr. Adele Lafrance – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/18/pt302/ Fri, 18 Mar 2022 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11496 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller interviews clinical psychologist, author, researcher, and developer of Emotion-Focused Family Therapy (EFFT): Dr. Adele Lafrance. EFFT involves teaching family and significant others emotion-processing and behavioral support skills, how to make therapeutic apologies, how to not react in a knee-jerk way, and how to find problematic caregiving problems where families accommodate for mental health issues (and therefore perpetuate them). She also discusses the idea of healthy anger; the Hoffman Process; emotion coaching; the power of validation; similarities between EFFT and Internal Family Systems; rolling with resistance; tips to incorporate family into therapy more; the concept of a shame hangover and checking in on "tomorrow you"; and that even with all the preparation in the world, there's no way to adequately prepare someone for the vast array of possibilities within (and after) a psychedelic experience.

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]]> How Can We Apply Harm Reduction to HPPD? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/17/harm-reduction-and-hppd/ Thu, 17 Mar 2022 23:27:22 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11503 In last week’s blog, Ed Prideaux told us everything we know (and don’t) about Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (HPPD), visual snow syndrome, and flashbacks. In part 2, he addresses ways to deal with the distress of having HPPD and ways to reduce the risk of developing it in the first place. The real “problem” with […]

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]]> PT301 – Kabir Ali – Addiction, Ketamine, and the Overlooked Gift of Self-Love https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/15/pt301/ Tue, 15 Mar 2022 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11447 In this episode of the podcast, David Drapkin interviews Chief of Staff and Head of Operations at Nue Life, Kabir Ali. Ali speaks about the power of ketamine-assisted therapy; how our current society seems to be driving us to escape; the lack of education in mental health he's seen in his travels; how self-love is the most overlooked gift of psychedelic-assisted therapy; and addiction (his struggles, how people can have these relationships with anything, concerns over the addictive properties of ketamine, and the importance of having the right people in your corner when using a substance to overcome another). And he discusses Nue Life: the benefits he's seen from integration work in group settings, the health coaching they've made a large part of their program, what he's most excited about, and why he views Nue Life as a next-gen mental health company rather than a ketamine clinic.

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]]> PT300 – Dr. Richard C. Schwartz – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/11/pt300/ Fri, 11 Mar 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11399 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller and David Drapkin interview the author of “No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model,” and the creator of the IFS model itself: Dr. Richard C. Schwartz. Schwartz discusses how IFS came about and what it entails; how he views the Self; how IFS relates to the body; the 8 Cs of self-leadership qualities; how to address the actions of one's different parts; and how often people in psychedelic-assisted therapy sessions find themselves naturally thinking within the IFC framework. He also talks about the importance of preparation and facilitators knowing their own parts; his psychedelic history and why he's no longer afraid of death; what he strives for in integration work; the 5 Ps facilitators need; Sandra Watanabe's concept of a "cast of characters"; soul retrieval; starling murmuration; and the Pixar movie, "Inside Out."

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]]> HPPD and Flashbacks: Everything You Need To Know – And What We Don’t Know, Too https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/10/hppd-and-flashbacks-everything-you-need-to-know/ Fri, 11 Mar 2022 00:42:37 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11407 Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder, or HPPD, is among the more mysterious, debilitating, and under-researched possibilities of psychedelic drug-taking. As enthusiasm around psychedelics and their possible benefits continues to grow, it’s imperative that researchers, user populations, and clinicians look closely at HPPD and other possible hazards. HPPD is little-known among clinicians, and many reporting these experiences […]

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]]> PT299 – Ed Prideaux – HPPD (Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder): A Synopsis https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/08/pt299/ Tue, 08 Mar 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11383 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews Ed Prideaux: UK-based writer and journalist working to raise awareness around Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (HPPD) in affiliation with the Perception Restoration Foundation. While HPPD is known in the psychedelic community, it's not talked about or researched enough, and often considered by many as fake, flashbacks, or a trauma reactivation. Prideaux likes to call HPPD "post-drug perceptual changes," and talks about how it came about in his life and how it affects him; what visual snow syndrome and other common HPPD visuals look like; neurodiversity and looking at things from a “critical psychiatry” lens; how he thinks HPPD relates to anxiety and distress from depersonalization effects and isolation; and how so much of the lack of knowledge and progress around HPPD is a direct result of the drug war. Does HPPD happen more when the experience happens in youth? Are there dormancy effects? Is cannabis a larger trigger than people think? Is the biggest trigger being overwhelmed by a larger-than-expected dose? Is LSD the most commonly reported culprit due to how long the trip is? Could entering into more non-ordinary states of consciousness actually be the solution? The Perception Restoration Foundation is working on a study in Macquarie University in Australia looking at neuroimaging of people with HPPD, they just released an HPPD information guide in collaboration with MAPS, and they are working to finalize and release a documentary called "HPPD: Stuck in an Altered World.”

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]]> PT298 – Michael Sapiro, PsyD – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/04/pt298/ Fri, 04 Mar 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11343 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, Kyle Buller interviews Michael Sapiro, PsyD: clinical psychologist, writer, meditation researcher, integrative coach, former Buddhist monk, Vital teacher, and now 3-time podcast guest. He discusses the idea of bringing psychedelics to prisons; his mental time travel work with The Institute for Love and Time (TILT); rebuilding trust in the medical community; and the difference between a diploma and real-world experience and proper training. And he talks about the complicated dynamics involved in what many see as a fantasy career; how he knows when to intervene; how he views "doing your own work"; whether or not the work can be gentle or joyous; the idea of joking during a session; his work with combat veterans and the intensity of 5-MeO-DMT; mainstreaming mysticism; and trusting that the universe has our backs.

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]]> PT297 – Laura Mae Northrup, LMFT – Radical Healership in a Profit-Driven World https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/03/01/pt297/ Tue, 01 Mar 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11290 In this episode of the podcast, Kyle Buller interviews author, educator, podcaster, and somatic psychotherapist: Laura Mae Northrup, LMFT. Northrup is the author of the just-released Radical Healership: How to Build a Values-Driven Healing Practice in a Profit-Driven World, which was written for people entering the field as psychedelic practitioners (she calls it "a self-help book for healers"). She discusses what "doing your own work" really means; what people struggle with when entering the field; the ways gained power, unconscious motivations, or issues you haven't worked on can influence the ways you work with others; why preparation is maybe more important than integration; capitalism and why practitioners shouldn't feel bad about charging money for their services; the importance of trauma training; and why, while society usually feels differently, you don't actually have to be perfect to become a healing practitioner.

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]]> Reclaiming Ownership of Your Body With Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/02/24/reclaiming-ownership-of-your-body-with-psychedelics/ Thu, 24 Feb 2022 19:54:46 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11216 Prolonged negative body image will often lead to depression and anxiety, and unfortunately for many people, can lead to body dysmorphia or an eating disorder. Could psychedelics help reframe one’s relationship with their body? Psychedelics offer promise for those who struggle with eating disorders – 9% of the world’s population according to the National Association […]

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]]> PT294 – Andrew Tatarsky, Ph.D. & Juliana Mulligan – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/02/18/pt294/ Fri, 18 Feb 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=11153 In this episode of Vital Psychedelic Conversations, David Drapkin interviews Andrew Tatarsky, Ph.D.; author and developer of Integrative Harm Reduction Psychotherapy, and Juliana Mulligan; writer and head of Inner Vision Ibogaine. Both are part of The Center for Optimal Living in NYC (CFOL); Tatarsky as the Founder and Director, and Mulligan as the Psychedelic Program Coordinator. They talk about reframing addiction, the ways society divides us by accepted behaviors, how being taught to doubt ourselves as children creates trauma, the idea of the "disease narrative" and self-demonization, how research studies support the idea of the quick fix, and harm reduction as a pathway to a better self.

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]]> PT290 – Kylea Taylor, M.S., LMFT – Vital Psychedelic Conversations https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/02/04/pt290/ Fri, 04 Feb 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10996 In this episode of the podcast (and episode 3 of Vital Psychedelic Conversations), Kyle Buller interviews Kylea Taylor: M.S.; LMFT; Grof-certified Holotropic Breathwork® practitioner; and author of several books, including her newest: The Ethics of Caring: Finding Right Relationship with Clients.
She talks about learning breathwork from the Grofs at Esalen, working through her 5-year spiritual emergency, her work bringing breathwork to a residential substance abuse recovery program, and her InnerEthics® program.
They also discuss how much the psychedelic community undervalues the reciprocity and knowledge one can gain from sitting for someone else; how our multiple selves complicate already-complicated relationships, having dreams about taking psychedelics; and three tools likely not yet mentioned in this podcast: Angie Arrien’s naming ceremony, SoulCollage®, and Brainspotting.

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]]> PT289 – Payton Nyquvest – Shifting the Mindset on Pain, Psychedelics, and Accessibility https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/02/01/pt289/ Tue, 01 Feb 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10922 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore sits down with Co-Founder and CEO of Numinus, Payton Nyquvest. Nyquvest tells the story of how ayahuasca became the cure for his chronic pain, and discusses how people so often fall into a box where their diagnosis becomes their identity and their lives become about symptom moderation and not getting to the root cause. He talks about how Numinus came about; how Health Canada's Special Access Program could be huge towards more legalization; the importance of a safe container and community; and the need for a shift in how we view psychedelics and self work in general, from something we view as a last-ditch resort to something we treat more as regular preventative tune-ups or check-ins. Numinus is working with MAPS in their Phase 3 MDMA for PTSD study, and have just produced what may be the first legal psilocybin mushroom since the 1970s.

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]]> Introducing Vital: Immersive, Inclusive, and Personal Psychedelic Training for Professionals https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/01/27/introducing-vital-psychedelic-training-for-professionals/ Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:20:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10825 “Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire.” – William Butler Yeats The interest in psychedelics as a therapeutic tool is growing at a rapid pace, both by individuals looking for better solutions outside the current medical regime, and by practitioners looking for new and better ways to help […]

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]]> Horizons: Grounds for Collective Effervescence https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/01/21/the-horizons-conference-as-grounds-for-collective-effervescence/ Sat, 22 Jan 2022 01:13:11 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10763 Gathering as professionals in psychedelics has taken on new meaning. It’s more – a lot more – than just networking now. In early December, Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics (an annual conference often referred to just as ‘Horizons’) re-emerged from the proverbial ashes of COVID-19; a pandemic that led to the dismantling of social connectivity and […]

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]]> PT285 – Andrew Penn, NP – The Need for Nurses in Psychedelics, The Placebo Effect, and Appreciating the Subtle https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/01/18/pt285/ Tue, 18 Jan 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10730 In this episode of the podcast, Kyle Buller and David Drapkin interview Andrew Penn: nurse practitioner, Co-chair for Sana Symposium, Associate Clinical Professor at the University of California–San Francisco School of Nursing, and Co-founder of OPENurses; a professional organization for nurses interested in psychedelic research. Penn discusses how the only way to talk about psychedelics for therapeutic use in the old days was in a sidebar to speeches on drug abuse, why psychedelics and SSRIs may actually work together, microdosing and the placebo effect, how the placebo effect may play into other aspects of healthcare you might not have thought about, why psychedelics needs more skeptics, the importance of care in healthcare, and OPENurses (The Organization of Psychedelic and Entheogenic Nurses); which he co-founded to make sure more nurses were involved (and front-facing) in the psychedelic space.

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]]> PT283 – Greg McKee – Nociplastic Pain and Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/01/11/greg-mckee/ Tue, 11 Jan 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10684 In this episode of the podcast, Joe interviews Greg McKee: Chairman and CEO of Tryp Therapeutics, an early-stage biotech company focusing on nociplastic pain and how it could be alleviated through the brain rewiring often possible in the psychedelic experience. They are first looking at psychedelics for chronic pain and eating disorders, and when this podcast was recorded, had just received FDA clearance to begin a fibromyalgia study at the University of Michigan (with studies on phantom limb pain, complex regional pain syndrome, binge eating disorder, and hypothalamic obesity likely coming after). McKee discusses the origins of Tryp, the benefits of using synthetics, the positives to take away from Compass Pathways' preliminary psilocybin Phase 2B trial results, and why a lot of early psychedelic investors may be mistakenly panicking.

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]]> PT281 – Oliver Grundmann, Ph.D. – A Thorough Exploration of Kratom https://psychedelicstoday.com/2022/01/04/oliver-grundmann-phd/ Tue, 04 Jan 2022 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10619 In this episode of the podcast, Joe Moore interviews Clinical Professor at the University of Florida, College of Pharmacy: Oliver Grundmann, Ph.D. They discuss a substance that has been mentioned on the podcast, but never fully dissected: Mitragyna speciosa – otherwise known as kratom. And they cover it all: what to look for when purchasing kratom; possible risk factors and drug interactions; the contaminants most often seen; its history with the FDA; its safety profile; what the veins mean when people describe kratom as "red vein;" what is being researched today; how to safely explore kratom and monitor dosing; what the future could hold; and of course, the science behind how it works. Grundmann is currently analyzing Top Tree Herbs' products to see how they differ from others, specifically looking at how much mitragynine people are actually getting when drinking a tea dissolved in water (vs. levels from the whole plant dissolved in methanol, which most current research shows).

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]]> PTSF90 – Colorado’s Natural Medicine Healing Act and Guidelines for Emergency Ketamine Administration https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/12/24/ptsf90/ Fri, 24 Dec 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10527 In this week's Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore and Kyle Buller highlight some recent news: most notably the emergence of the Natural Medicine Healing Act, which will allow Colorado voters to decide whether or not to legalize possession and personal cultivation of ibogaine, DMT, non-peyote-derived mescaline, psilocybin, and psilocyn up to 4 gram), as well as establish "healing centers," where adults could receive treatment from trained facilitators. They then cover the University of Texas' Dell Medical School opening a center to study psychedelics, YouTube user Psyched Substance's recent admission that his drug use had gotten out of hand and he has quit everything, and Colorado health leaders working to establish specific guidelines around how police, paramedics, and EMTs handle ketamine – which obviously needs to happen after Elijah McClain's 2019 death from being forcibly given entirely too much.

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]]> PT276 – Micah Haskell-Hoehl – Healing, Equity, and Federal Policy https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/12/07/pt276/ Tue, 07 Dec 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10403 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews seventeen year veteran of federal policy and founder of Healing Equity and Liberation (HEAL) Organization, Micah Haskell-Hoehl. Through HEAL Organization, he's working to gather evidence that proves to providers that it makes financial sense to cover all types of psychedelic therapy, get public funds allocated to give everyone access, and fix barriers so people have the time and resources necessary to work with these medicines. He has worked with the Plant Medicine Coalition to create the National Council on Federal Psychedelics Priorities to collect like-minded individuals and organizations, figure out exactly what psychedelic policy should look like, and take the first steps to get this (unfortunately slow-moving) process going.

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]]> The Wild World of 19th Century Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/12/03/the-wild-world-of-19th-century-psychedelics/ Fri, 03 Dec 2021 23:16:20 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10383 Psychedelic reporter, creator of Stoned Gamer, and Neuroscientist himself, Zeus Tipado, dives into the wild world of 19th century neuroscience, highlighting the misinformation, weird ideas, unproven theories, and outright racism of the era.

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]]> PTSF87 – Ketamine, Addiction, and Mysticism + Kelsey Ramsden of MINDCURE https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/12/03/ptsf87/ Fri, 03 Dec 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10366 In this week's Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore interviews CEO of MINDCURE, Kelsey Ramsden. She discusses iSTRYM, their app designed to use A.I. to examine real-time data from users and provide drug-agnostic insights and recommendations; and the Desire Project, in which they are researching MDMA to help combat Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder (HSDD), an affliction that leaves women unable to feel sexual desire. Joe and Kyle also discuss a recent issue with the Facebook group and a rather accusatory tweet, whether or not ketamine is addictive, the shortcomings of at-home ketamine therapy options, and if we should always be striving for the mystical in psychedelic experiences.

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]]> PTSF86 – Ayahuasca, Chronic Pain, and Legal Psilocybin, with Payton Nyquvest of Numinus https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/26/ptsf86/ Fri, 26 Nov 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10305 In this week's Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore and David Drapkin interview Numinus Co-founder and CEO, Payton Nyquvest. Joe and Kyle Buller first discuss upcoming courses, Wonderland, Covid, whether or not psychedelics are in an "ivory tower,” and Mike Tyson: his insistence on saying "toad" and his relationship to Gerry Sandoval. Then, Joe and David speak with Payton Nyquvest of Numinus, a company that offers ketamine-assisted psychotherapy and features Numinus Biosciences, which recently produced the first legal psilocybin product derived from natural psilocybin-producing mushrooms. Nyquvest discusses how his mother's substance abuse recovery and a trip to an ayahuasca retreat center taught him how to reimagine his chronic pain as a gift, psilocybin, and more.

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]]> PT274 – Juan Pablo Cappello – Nue Life: Using Digital Phenotyping to Personalize Healthcare https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/23/pt274/ Tue, 23 Nov 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10284 In this episode, Joe Moore and Kyle Buller interview CEO & Co-founder of Nue Life, Juan Pablo Cappello, from his home in Miami during the Wonderland conference. Cappello first talks about growing up in Chile, his family's relationship with San Pedro, his entrepreneurial past (starting the first online bank in Latin America), and how selling that company for $700 million felt like an abject failure. And he discusses how the idea of depression and PTSD being symptoms of an unaddressed root cause led to the creation of Nue Life, and what he wants to do with what he considers a primarily data-based company: use the massive amounts of data connected devices are already harvesting from us (digital phenotyping) for our benefit rather than our detriment. He believes most medical models focus primarily on the continued income from maintenance medications like antidepressants, and instead, A.I. could use this data to recognize patterns in behavior and make recommendations based on each user's specific data points – a sort of health ecosystem attuned to what works best for each person.

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]]> PTSF85 – Ahmad Doroudian, Ph.D. of BetterLife Pharma and Dr. Abid Nazeer of Wesana Health https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/19/ptsf85/ Fri, 19 Nov 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10250 In this week's Solidarity Fridays episode, we’re featuring two shorter interviews, recorded in a media room at the Wonderland Miami conference last week: CEO & Director of BetterLife Pharma, Ahmad Doroudian, Ph.D., and Chief Medical Officer at Wesana Health, Dr. Abid Nazeer.
Doroudian discusses the non-hallucinogenic compound, 2-Bromo-LSD. While the LSD we know and love has shown great signs at being effective for the treatment of cluster headaches, many people (including Doroudian) do not want to experience the hallucinatory part of this medicine, so BetterLife Pharma has been researching using this LSD relative to address this very need (and it may be even safer than LSD too).

Part 2 of this split podcast features David Drapkin sitting down with Chief Medical Officer at Wesana Health, Abid Nazeer, who talks about opening the first ketamine clinic in the midwest, the need for integrative wellness, and traumatic brain injuries, which they're researching alongside MAPS. He talks about what he wants to do with Wesana Health, which is essentially creating a "center of excellence" hub where a patient can be referred to different departments (spokes) specializing in any number of possible healing modalities, all under the same network.

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]]> PT273 – Erica Rex – Clinical Trials and Spontaneous Mystical Experiences https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/16/pt273/ Tue, 16 Nov 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10191 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Erica Rex: writer and participant in one of the first ever clinical trials using psilocybin to treat cancer-related depression. She talks about her complicated path to becoming part of the study, the study itself, and how integral communication, community, and integration were toward her healing. And she tells 3 different stories of spontaneous mystical experiences; tears in the fabric of her universe where the lines between reality and dreams were blurred, including one where a friend's deceased mother (who she had never met) spoke to her in a dream about her own family. This leads to a discussion about the DSM, psychiatry, and how we don't know anywhere near enough about schizophrenia or these strange brushes with the mystical.

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]]> PT272 – Veterans Day 2021 https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/11/pt272/ Thu, 11 Nov 2021 14:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10152 In this episode, Joe Moore was in Las Vegas for the Meet Delic conference, and, inspired by Jesse Gould’s presentation, decided to record an episode with three veteran friends for a special Veterans Day release. While they chose to keep their names and personal details anonymous, they share a lot about the military and the difficulties of transitioning back into civilian life. They talk about drug use in the military; how little there is in the way of a transition process; how much families are affected by the mental health of someone on deployment; how challenging it is for someone who has good mental health practices in play to be able to continue them once in the service; and how the normal mind state for most soldiers is a combination of tucking all emotions and anxiety away, assuming they're going to die, and powering through until there's time to work through it all (which of course never comes).

But it's not all dark, as they also talk about how psychedelics, wilderness therapy, and long hikes have helped them reevaluate their lives, see themselves (and others) from different perspectives, and get to places of happiness (but with continued work). This is a candid glimpse into the camaraderie of vets, and their laughter and support of one another really drives home one of their main points: the importance of finding a community of people who support you, understand you, and don't judge you.

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]]> PT270 – Dr. Rachel Yehuda – Research Trials and The Future of Psychedelic Neuroscience https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/05/pt270/ Fri, 05 Nov 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10095 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Dr. Rachel Yehuda: neuroscientist, researcher, Professor and Vice Chair of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Director of Mental Health at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center. Dr. Yehuda talks about the importance and complications of research trials: the difficulty researchers have in remaining neutral; how protocols have an arbitrary beginning and end that may not make sense to the participant; how the process of getting funding for one’s own clinical trial begins with creating a specific protocol; and how, while it can often feel like therapy for participants, the purpose of these trials is often more for researchers to learn from participants how to better run the trials themselves. And she discusses her background and path to psychedelic research, why knowing the pharmacology of a compound doesn’t explain enough, what she thinks the next few years of psychedelic neuroscience looks like, how to work with big corporations who may seem like they're only in it for the money, and how we need a science to predict and analyze who will or won't respond to a particular treatment (and why).

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]]> PT269 – Adam Strauss – Comedy, OCD, and The Mushroom Cure https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/11/02/pt269/ Tue, 02 Nov 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10059 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Adam Strauss: New York-based writer, comedian, and performer. Strauss tells his story of growing up with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder; struggling with decisions, control, and anger, and how a small 2006 study on psychedelics and OCD mixed with meeting someone who had had a life-changing ego death at age 16 led him to try to fix his OCD with psilocybin. The subsequent trips (especially the bad ones) became a template for how to work with his OCD, as they taught him to accept, feel, and breathe through the emotions his OCD was trying to protect him from. He tells the full story through his one-man show, "The Mushroom Cure," which he's hoping to turn into a special. He also talks about comedy in the era of Covid and why he doesn't do much stand-up anymore; the creation of his YouTube show, “The Trip Report”; Terence McKenna and the concept of humans coevolving with psychedelics; drug urban legends and the misinformation of the drug war (Oprah and MDMA causing holes in the brain); and why psychedelics may be the best tool towards saving the planet.

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]]> PTSF83 – Abuse in Psychedelics: Complicity and Groupthink https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/10/29/ptsf83/ Fri, 29 Oct 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=10051 In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore and Kyle Buller discuss the recent accusations of abuse against two prominent figures in this space by friend of the show, Will Hall – something you may have been wondering when we'd address (and which Joe wrote about in yesterday's blog). They talk about the frustrations of not knowing what to do with stories people have confided in them, the complications of sexual energies coming out in psychedelic sessions, the cult-like mentality of protecting abusive facilitators, the politics of becoming a narc, the financial dangers of defamation, and how the best way to tremendously improve safety in psychedelic work would be to end the drug war. And they talk about Bank of America canceling the account of the Scottsdale Research Institute likely due to their research of psychedelics; Prime Minister Boris Johnson considering legalizing psilocybin; and legalization progress in Luxembourg, Switzerland, and East Hampton, Massachusetts.

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]]> PTSF82 – Wonderland Miami, with Patrick Moher of Microdose https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/10/22/ptsf82/ Fri, 22 Oct 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9987 In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore sits down with photographer, entrepreneur, veteran of the cannabis industry, and current CEO at Microdose; Patrick Moher. Moher talks about his path through the cannabis world and to Microdose; entrepreneurship, his business ethics, and how to build a team; and everything Microdose is working on, including CME-accredited training, a magazine, and a documentary. But they mostly talk about Moher's biggest project right now, the massive psychedelic expo happening November 8-9 in Miami: Wonderland. We're psyched to announce that we're Silver Sponsors of the event, and Joe, Kyle, and David will all be attending. Featuring an insane lineup of speakers (Robin Carhart-Harris, Rick Doblin, David Nutt, Mike Tyson, Matthew Johnson, Ben Sessa and many more), projection mapping, VR applications, an art exhibit, wild decorations, and sure-to-be memorable afterparties, Moher's goal was to create a business-minded event that people would actually have fun at. We'll surely be talking more about Wonderland as we get closer to the already-very-close first day, but if you want to act now and save some serious cash, use our affiliate link in our bio (or use discount code "psychedelicstoday" at checkout) to buy tickets!

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]]> PT267 – Rebecca Kronman, LCSW – Psychedelics, Pregnancy, and Parenthood https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/10/19/pt267/ Tue, 19 Oct 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9953 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Rebecca Kronman, LCSW: Brooklyn-based therapist offering ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, writer, and founder of Plant Parenthood: a digital platform investigating (and de-stigmatizing) the relationship between family and psychedelics. She dives into the very controversial topics of psychedelics and parenthood and psychedelics and pregnancy, discussing the safety concerns; the difficulties of drawing conclusions from inadequate data; the many confounding factors in analyzing children born of psychedelic-using parents; the near impossibility of ethically researching the outcomes of pregnancy and psychedelic use; and why, when you consider the multitude of prescription drugs and unnatural foods so many of us consume, does the idea of a mother taking a psychedelic during pregnancy feel so wrong to so many? And they talk about affinity groups, the concept of considering psychedelics as life-saving medicine, the societal scrutiny mothers face, harm reduction, the idea of addiction being a complication of PTSD, drug exceptionalism, and how disclosing drug use to your children is a great opportunity to move the conversation into one of both compassion and injustice.

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]]> PTSF81 – Somatics, Reframing Trauma, and the 7 Lens Approach, with Liam Farquhar https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/10/15/ptsf81/ Fri, 15 Oct 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9939 In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Kyle Buller speaks with integration specialist, past Navigating Psychedelics student, and Netherlands-based legal psychedelic guide, Liam Farquhar. Farquhar talks a lot about trauma and how it's a far more common part of life than psychiatry has led us to believe, and how whatever is overwhelming the body and causing its fight or flight response could really be anything. They talk about Covid-related burnout and the struggle for healthcare workers to show up for patients, how working through trauma is not a rational, "talk it out" process, and how the best way to work through trauma might be by physically shaking for long periods of time. He also talks about his "7 Lens" approach, Internal Family Systems as modern-day shamanism, Peter Levine, the Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm, Bernardo Kastrup and idealism, how the brain is a receiver (not creator) of consciousness, and the idea that even by defining "soma," we're separating the mind and the body. This one will definitely get you thinking, folks.

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]]> PTSF79 – Psychedelic Facilitator Abuse and Space Holding Ethics with Dr. Ido Cohen https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/10/01/ptsf79/ Fri, 01 Oct 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9807 In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Kyle Buller discusses Hulu’s show, "Nine Perfect Strangers" with previous guest, Dr. Ido Cohen. This episode (which does contain spoilers!) focuses on the themes portrayed in the show and how they relate to the psychedelic space, looking at the role of community and accountability when abuse is happening within healing containers (whether at a retreat or in the larger community). They also look at the negative aspects of the show such as poor protocol, lack of consent, and the facilitator, Masha, having her own agenda and providing trauma treatment without being trauma-informed. Hopefully, shows like "Nine Perfect Strangers" open space for us to think together as a community and create more integrity, support, and honesty around facilitators and psychedelic retreats. And hopefully they also encourage us to become more empowered to acknowledge in ourselves when to draw the line when we don’t feel safe.

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]]> PT264 – Gibrán Rivera – Group Process, Self-sovereignty, and Rethinking Masculinity https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/28/pt264/ Tue, 28 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9789 In this episode, Joe Moore interviews Boston-based teacher, coach, facilitator, and podcaster, Gibrán Rivera. Rivera talks about the importance and benefits of group process: How we're in a crisis of meaning and connection, and group work creates the structure of belonging so many people need. And they dig into the spectrum of healing itself: How so much Western psychedelic work is hyper-individualized, but over time, with spiritual maturation and self-sovereignty, the act of helping others can become a necessary part of one's own healing journey. And he discusses a lot more: How the recent focus on toxic masculinity, to many, has felt like a demonization of any masculinity; his "What Should White People Do?" project; how trauma can be weaponized; the idea of saying 'congratulations' to news of divorce; how social movements often give people a license to hate; the dangers of focusing too much on the abstractions in psychedelic trips; rites of passage; Holotropic Breathwork; and the importance of shaking your hips.

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]]> PTSF78 – Navigating the Vast Psychedelic Space: Where Do You Fit In? https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/24/ptsf78/ Fri, 24 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9776 In this week's Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore and Kyle Buller sit down and tackle a question we are often asked at Psychedelics Today: "How do I get involved in the psychedelic field?" They highlight the various paths one could take, from the more obvious roles we typically see (therapists, clinicians, guides, trip-sitters, scientists, researchers, and journalists) to the less-discussed (politicians, marketers, artists, accountants, SEO experts, social media consultants, and more) and come to the conclusion that it's really about figuring out: what skills you have and what you could bring to the emerging field, what solutions you could find answers to, and what’s realistic based on your experience, age, geography, willingness to learn, and degree to which psychedelics are involved. And would you still want to take that path if they weren't? They discuss the benefits of volunteering, attending any event you can (to both learn and network), and even just starting a club and letting the power of community steer your direction. Hopefully this podcast helps you take your first step down a new and exciting journey!

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]]> Meet Microdosing TikTok—And Why the Community Matters https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/22/meet-microdosing-tiktok-why-the-community-matters/ Wed, 22 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9630 Original Illustration by Martin Clarke Microdosing TikTok is a vibrant community of everyday people researching and experimenting with microdosing for mental health, and finding support in the process. What if I told you that the microdosing movement has taken TikTok by storm? Or that TikTok wasn’t just a place for dancing or kids, but a […]

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]]> PTSF77 – Progress and Context, with Jesse Gould of the Heroic Hearts Project https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/17/ptsf77/ Fri, 17 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9634 In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe Moore and Kyle Buller are joined by return guest Jesse Gould: Founder and President of the Heroic Hearts Project, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit helping military veterans find healing through psychedelic-assisted therapy. Gould discusses the acceleration of the Heroic Hearts Project over the last few years, their new allies, and the many projects they’re involved in, SB-519's progress and how its pause can be seen as a good thing, Oregon's trajectory and how what happens there will be a model to build on, how the container around a drug experience can make all the difference, how silly it is to put psilocybin through the same research ringer we put new drugs through, and his feelings on leaving Afghanistan and the trauma soldiers are already experiencing as a result. And he talks about what he sees as the biggest challenges right now: 1) creating more long-term, multidisciplinary, integration and community-based models of care, and 2) making sure that if these drugs go the medical, insurance-based route, we take care of the people who fall through the cracks of those traditional systems. And he reminds us that while small failures are frustrating, it's important to put things in context: Not every measure will be perfect and not every bill will pass, but slowly, many politicians are changing their minds, and every small step is just that- a stepping stone in the right direction.

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]]> Understanding ‘Spiritual Emergency’ in the Context of Psychedelics https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/15/understanding-spiritual-emergency-in-the-context-of-psychedelics/ Wed, 15 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9555 Understanding what spiritual emergence and spiritual emergency are, how they differ from psychosis, and how to integrate them in psychedelic therapy.

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]]> PT262 – Carlene MacMillan, M.D. – Set, Setting, and Systems: Adding Insurance to the Conversation https://psychedelicstoday.com/2021/09/14/pt262/ Tue, 14 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000 https://psychedelicstoday.com/?p=9600 In this episode, Kyle Buller interviews psychiatrist, co-founder/CEO of Brooklyn Minds, and co-host of the Clubhouse show, New Frontiers: Carlene MacMillan, M.D. She talks about the importance of setting up the infrastructure to be able to handle the impending legality of psychedelics and the importance of insurance companies being able to cover them, and how many clinicians don't want to offer ketamine because of costs but will offer Spravato due to insurance coverage. And she discusses how medicine needs to move from the procedure-based, fee-for-service model toward value-based care, why self-insured employers can be more flexible around mental health care, how the intentions of good people at insurance companies are halted by bureaucracy, the notion of nonprofits all being good (and for-profits all being bad), why public benefit companies are better for the future, and how we need to apply the same multidisciplinary approach we take in medicine toward our ideal vision of legal psychedelic care.

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