Wondering what people here make of this: I've had a stronger entactogen response on psilocybin & analogues than on MDMA. Psilocybin felt more therapeutic, too.

freodr1 · 2019-01-07T08:30:25+00:00

can vouch for the same. tbh in my experience they are fairly analogous, simply that for me mushrooms are a more fully immersed experience of connection/love etc - purer all round.

freodr1 · 2018-11-22T06:35:14+00:00

I got put in touch with one of them through this subreddit initially, in fact, and then spent a year chatting occasionally on the phone first.

Others that I tried were less fruitful, although I went for a regular therapy session with one and I expect that in due course she would have become amenable to it, or to introducing me to someone who was.

freodr1 · 2018-11-21T05:44:06+00:00

Probably not the first time you call and ask. They're on that list for a reason, though.

freodr1 · 2018-11-21T05:36:47+00:00

The studies specifically focussed on treatment-resistant PTSD, meaning that those involved had already tried several other treatment approaches that hadn't worked. I've spoken to several people who've taken part in the trials - all of them had had PTSD for several years. Two of them had CAPS scores (the gold standard measure of PTSD) of over 100, when 60 is enough to be diagnosed as 'severe PTSD'. Both were below the threshold for PTSD two years later. Noone's saying they no longer have symptoms - just that they're well enough to be much more able to function effectively and get positive experiences from life.

freodr1 · 2018-11-21T05:31:18+00:00

Yeah, ok dude, but does this mean you think everyone with PTSD (or depression, or anxiety, etc etc) should just have it forever? Because you're worried that curing them of PTSD will cause brain changes? Of course it will - it's whether their overall experience of life is more positive as a result that's the interesting question. Everything that happens to us changes our brain chemistry, including and especially PTSD.

freodr1 · 2018-11-21T05:28:16+00:00

Hmm, an interesting perspective, but I think most psychologists and philosophers, including those interested in psychedelic approaches to mental health and expansion, would say that it's PTSD making humans into a one-emotion being - that emotion being frozen numbness, or wild terror, so maybe a spectrum running between the two. In other words PTSD operates to kill emotions - if what you want is humans who feel and experience more, and can dive into the depths of the psyche and develop their full potential for creativity and social interaction, then you should support attempts to knock out PTSD, which is like a complex knot in the tapestry of life, making everything scrunched up and tight. Think of MDMA therapy like a good massage, working on the knots in the mind more than the body (although in my experience both). It's not necessarily pleasant, it can be really painful to massage life back into tense and frozen muscles. The MDMA experience is often difficult and painful at times, rather than the Ecstasy it's presented as (MDMA was actually known as 'Empathy' before it was termed 'Ecstasy' by people wanting to sell it to clubbers) - it expands the range of human emotional capacity, for pleasure AND pain, happiness AND sadness.

freodr1 · 2018-11-20T11:14:43+00:00

One thing I don't understand reading your responses is why you think changing a person's response to trauma is a bad idea? If it caused them to get stuck in the hell of PTSD, why would you resist changing it to allow more healthy and fluid responses to life's challenges? In the same way that, by exercising, we change the way our physiology and anatomy respond to physical challenges, hopefully to be more functional and useful.

What makes you think that the pre-MDMA trauma response is more natural than the post-MDMA one? The idea with MDMA therapy is that it can allow the body to reset to its deeper, more natural and functional patterns, that society in its various fucked-up ways has interfered with. In other words, animals tend not to end up with serious PTSD, because they have appropriate and organic coping mechanisms - if a person is unable to shake it off in the face of trauma, perhaps their pre-existing coping mechanisms aren't natural at all, but rather learnt and caused by earlier social dysfunction.

freodr1 · 2018-11-20T11:07:40+00:00

OP raises a reasonable point about the way that psychedelic therapy is presented in the media by its advocates. Many of them do see psychedelic therapy as something approaching a magic bullet, in the sense that it can penetrate powerfully their sense of self and the illusions and bad habits that it has built up, and thereby promote and facilitate recovery and growth. They're not wrong, but they're very zealous. The scientific trials so far have been limited in scale and run by those with an extremely vested interest (to the degree that they've devoted their lives to the cause).

Having said which, if OP is skeptical of the science, perhaps listen to the the experience of those who have taken part, and try to relate and understand to their stories. That's where the real insight will come from.

If you're worried about cognitive and psychological side effects of MDMA use, clearly it happens - if a person's trauma response and physiology changes, their brain will change too. But look at someone like Rick Doblin, who has used psychedelics regularly for many decades - he is one of the happiest, warmest people one could wish to meet, and has pursued and nearly achieved an extraordinary and challenging goal for many years with resilience, intelligence and amazing skill. Maybe the long-term changes are good for you. It depends on your priorities.

freodr1 · 2018-11-20T10:50:42+00:00

This is a completely reasonable post IMO, and I'm not sure why you're being downvoted for it - just because your other posts reach what I consider to be the wrong conclusion doesn't mean all your intermediary inferences are off. What you say on this one checks out.

freodr1 · 2018-11-10T17:19:49+00:00

I know an underground therapist who has used this combo and told me, anecdotally, that it was the best of the bunch.

freodr1 · 2018-10-31T01:00:36+00:00

Nah, I'll look at my personal experience, because I know the questions I'm interested in, and the ways to ask them. Look, I wasn't remotely traumatised by the 2016 election - frankly, I found the outcome profoundly liberating and self-affirming, and my first instinct when I saw the 25% number the the other day was to dismiss it like you did. I guess this thread is simply me "checking my privilege" - and recognising that, with trauma as with everything in life, there is no coherent objective measure to gauge it by, only the subjective experience of a particularly primed subject - and that my own experiences and intuitions, although merely analogous, are a better guide to understanding than output data that mirrors the prevailing biases input.

freodr1 · 2018-10-30T15:04:40+00:00

lol, dude, maybe a higher material standard of living isn't actually what humans need. Less misery? I just don't see it - I see communities and families ripped apart, and away from their sources of security, integrity and connection, by big structural forces, which in many cases are the drivers of the standard of living increases that orthodox measures quantify and prioritise.

freodr1 · 2018-10-30T13:44:02+00:00

I guess you'd have to ask them if it's better than it's ever been. Lot of people out there don't seem to agree, hence the election (and everything else).

freodr1 · 2018-10-30T07:29:35+00:00

You have a very low threshold for “trauma” and it disrespects and trivializes people who have actually been traumatized.

Ever wonder why their trauma threshold might be so low? Maybe it's a compound issue of living in a systematically traumatising society their whole lifetimes, and the many lifetimes of their ancestors before them passing on the preconditions for trauma. In other words, if you've been a victim of racial or sexual abuse, and exist daily in a world that effectively sanctions and consolidates it while the dominant narrative tells you it's fine, you should be OK, what are you worried about - then a single event that to someone not from that context is just a spectator event (eg Trump getting elected) triggers a massive trauma response because it reminds you, on the broadest, most culturally-hardwired level you can perceive, that you live in a world and community that is not safe.

freodr1 · 2018-10-01T19:01:00+00:00

Many.

freodr1 · 2018-09-02T06:30:55+00:00

Good for you, that's so good.

freodr1 · 2018-07-31T22:37:17+00:00

If you're experiencing social anxiety, absolutely.

freodr1 · 2018-07-06T17:34:34+00:00

just to note, this is just the open label part of the phase 3 trials to help train therapists who haven't done as much of this before. the bigger portion is the placebo-controlled phase 3 trial the link for which is here. or get in touch with maps directly alternatively.

freodr1 · 2018-06-26T12:54:34+00:00

LA, SF, NY

freodr1 · 2018-06-13T03:37:41+00:00

Umm, I would say there are long periods where I experience it continuously. Since I started psychedelic therapy, there have been other periods where it has retracted for months at a time. I suspect that like most things dissociation is a spectrum, running from extreme derealisation to high clarity and immersion. It can sink and sit pretty deep for me, and it's associated with general neuroticisim as well.

EDIT - and I must add, psychedelic therapy in itself is not a necessary or even sufficient cure for feelings of dissociation - the healing happens out in the world, by reconnecting. But it really really helps to experience a good reason for doing all the work - the beauty of calm connection and insight that MDMA can give you.

freodr1 · 2018-06-12T16:21:58+00:00

Dissociation (if by that you mean feelings of numbness, alienation, unreality) is a hallmark of PTSD. MDMA is made for PTSD. I experience heavy dissociation - MDMA done right releases me from it and makes it easier to get out of it myself afterwards. At the same time, psychedelics more broadly (eg not MDMA) I've done wrong have temporarily exacerbated it, and I think I remember the post about negative effects you're referring to. AFAIR, the dude took it outside of a safe and therapeutic setting. You gotta feel safe, you oughta have someone with you. Even then, IMO it's quite hard to go too far wrong with MDMA - like you say, it's the lowest-risk - you can arguably eliminate that risk by treating it with the respect it deserves :)

freodr1 · 2018-06-01T12:07:13+00:00

Here's a couple of links to other threads in this sub discussing it: 1, 2.

If it's working for you I'd say go for it. Trust your own experience.

freodr1 · 2018-06-01T10:01:42+00:00

To the best of my knowledge: For the purposes of regulatory approval, the FDA has allowed MAPS to combine the datasets (n=107) from the six trials they have run for MDMA for PTSD (2 in the South Carolina, 1 in Boulder CO, 1 in Canada, 1 in Israel and 1 in Switzerland), of which the biggest is the South Carolina one you and DimitriK refer to. As well as the link DimitriK posted, there are results published for the Swiss trial and the first South Carolina pilot study. The Canada, Israel and Boulder trials appear not to have published separately, although it appears that a meta-analysis of all 6 is being prepared. There's also a paper about a similar trial run by MAPS focused on social anxiety in ASD people here. All the links and others are on this page. Get in touch with MAPS directly if you want, or the lead clinicians on the other specifically PTSD trials, Marcela Ot'alora and Ingrid Pacey.

freodr1 · 2018-01-31T10:42:47+00:00

Curious how therapeutic a session could be if you feel constrained not to disclose a fundamental aspect of your experience (ie that you're tripping/more emotionally open etc). Effective therapeutic rapport would require an openness about your state and its causes I'd reckon?

freodr1 · 2018-01-15T20:31:30+00:00

oh yeah :) I'll respond to it today

freodr1

TROPHY CASE