Ketamine, for everyone?

What matters is what happens before and after, in relationship, in community, in real life.

It feels bizarre to see ketamine splashed across newspapers as a problem while I’m watching it change people’s lives here in my office.

I never want to minimize the real dangers.

And it’s still frustrating to hear it spoken like a four letter word or a cheap shot to make us feel more powerful against abusive leaders or out of touch elites. In fact, it hurts. It’s as if using a story about ketamine to make our cultural villains scarier will make us safer. It won’t.

But those stories will confuse a lot of people who need support, including people who are suffering and people who are simply stuck. Support that thoughtful ketamine use can provide.

And I’m writing this because I want to make room for a more mature conversation, one that doesn’t collapse into hype or fear.

I find myself in a dilemma. I have countless experiences of watching altered state work radically change people’s lives for the better, including my own. I have the honor of holding space for KAP clients. I’ve heard dozens of stories of healing and deep hope, including ones that happened outside a therapist’s office.

I want more people to have access to these profound resources.

I am tired of watching power brokers fracture public life through so-called transcendent beliefs without owning their impact. I am also tired of stuck people being made to feel like drug addicts for wanting a solution humans have sought for millennia. The novel, the open, the unexpected.

I am tired of pretending that only the clinically unwell are drawn to altered states, relief, and escape while most of us spend hours every day on our phone.

If ketamine can be a safe reset and a path out of stuck patterns, I get it and I’m in.

So in one breath I am advocating for wider accessibility and a more open-minded vision. And that path has its own pitfalls.

As access increases, I am watching wellness culture try to sell transcendence without integration. Productivity gurus try to hack the mysteries for new business ideas. And we are right back where we started – power, escape, bypassing accountability.

I want to be candid. Some of my most clarifying shifts as a leader and ideas for building community, have come from experiences in altered states. The question is, how will we steward these shifts? Who will we allow to anchor us as we build something bigger than ourselves?

Because ideas and insight aren’t a quick fix.

And safety means grounding in relationship.

Overpromising is unethical.

And, in the end, the trip never did the work for me.

What mattered was what happened before and after, in relationship, in community, in real life.

There are risks. Just like a power drill can do more than a screwdriver, this power can generate resources or expedite harm. This is part of the dilemma. How do we widen the conversation without turning a blind eye to the power and the risks?

Nuance doesn’t make good click-bait.

So here are the questions I’m sitting with: What would it look like to talk about ketamine with harm reduction and hope instead of moral panic and miracle cure? What does accountability actually mean when we’re talking about the power of altered states? And how do we stay in the dilemmas together instead of giving in to the pull of reactivity?

--

Autumn Starks is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), Internal Family Systems Certified IFS Therapist, Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT), special interest in Complex PTSD and other disorders resulting from religious trauma and spiritual abuse, Certified in Psychedelic Assisted Psychotherapy through the Integrative Psychiatry Institute, and is the founder of Starks Therapy Group in Oak Park, IL where she partners with Richard Clark, CRNA, APRN, to provide ketamine-assisted psychotherapy and they host together the Ketamine Collective for therapists.

#ketamineassistedtherapy #ketamineassistedpsychotherapy #ketaminetreatment #psychedelictherapy #ketamine

-------------------

DISCLAIMER: The sole purpose of this post is to keep individuals informed of Starks Therapy Group's events, provide useful information related to mental health issues and provide thoughtful content related to self care and mental health. It is not intended to diagnose or treat any mental illness. This post is not monitored daily and is used for information sharing only. If you wish to communicate directly with someone at Starks Therapy Group, please call (708) 689-3055 or fill out our Contact form‬. If you have a medical emergency, please call 911.