I just finished A Really Good Day, Ayelet Waldman's rather astonishing microdosing memoir. Although it's been a couple decades since my last hallucinogen-fueled adventure, my interest has been rekindled, and then some. I'm ready to take another trip... only this time, instead of hanging out at Hot Topic for hours, grooving on the blacklit Hendrix posters and watching the cashier's face melt, I want to find a therapist willing to help me maximize the benefits of the experience. Is this even possible?
After finishing Waldman's book, I did some research and learned that LSD-enhanced therapy sessions were not uncommon during the two decades between its synthesis by Albert Hoffman and its subsequent criminalization (by Nixon, natch). Over the last ten years or so, interest in hallucinogen-fueled has been revived, and several studies at John Hopkins and elsewhere have confirmed the psychological benefits of a single dose of psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) for the terminally ill. (And on a side note, MDMA, AKA ecstacy, another drug used in therapy until it was banned, has been the subject of several recent studies involving patients suffering from PTSD.)
So the winds are changing, and my odds of succeeding in my quest are better than they've been at any other point in my life. My youthful experiences with acid and 'shrooms were, without exception, some of the most profoundly transformative I've ever had. I'm certain that, with a little professional assistance, I'd be able to resolve problems I didn't even know I had. My question is, how should I go about finding a willing guide?
The main objective, it seems, would be to orchestrate things in such a way as to eliminate any chance of liability for the therapist. I figure as long as I dosed somewhere off the property before the session began, we'd both be in the clear.
But how would I locate someone likely to be comfortable with that scenario? It's the sort of subject I'd rather broach in person, but it would be a drag to have to schedule a bunch of preliminary sessions with different shrinks until I found one who seemed like they might be receptive.
The Psychology Today website has a feature that allows you to browse local therapists. After refining your search according to various criteria (insurance accepted, specialized services, etc.), you can email your choices directly. This would certainly be faster than the above method, but I don't know if email would be an appropriate medium for such a batshit request.
(Of course, I live in Portland, so batshit is sort of a given...)
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