Interview With a Ketamine Patient
At Growing Roots Integrative Health and Wellness, we offer a treatment called Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy. Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy, or KAP, is an innovative approach that combines the therapeutic benefits of psychotherapy with the use of ketamine, a dissociative anesthetic. We use ketamine to leverage intensive psychotherapy. This has proven to produce results far more quickly than traditional talk-oriented psychotherapies, particularly for those who have experienced severe PTSD and Treatment Resistant Depression/Anxiety. KAP is a powerful catalyst to allow inner access to difficult and often “stuck” material and emotions, and psychotherapy allows the client to actively examine, work with, and effectively process that material for long-lasting change.
To give our readers a better idea of how KAP treatment works- we interviewed one of our patients that underwent Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy. Here are their responses:
What led you to explore Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy as a treatment option?
I had been dealing with generalized anxiety that had been getting worse and worse over the course of a year or more, much of it related to PTSD. Other treatments had not been working effectively, including medication and talk therapy, and I was looking for something that would give me some relief from the symptoms so I could work to reframe my situation and try to develop better coping mechanisms.
Can you describe your experiences during a Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy session?
They felt very safe, but the experience itself is very disorienting. I didn’t feel too much anxiety from the medicine itself, but I did have to confront a lot of anxiety about “letting go.” That process of letting go and accepting that I was incapacitated opened up a lot of opportunities to reflect on why I had been so anxious and how I had become obsessed with controlling my environment. There were times in the sessions when I felt like I was so disconnected from my body that I couldn’t recall having one, but those moments didn’t feel scary.
The actual experience of ketamine is pretty indescribable, but there was a notable lack of anxiety, especially when compared to other psychedelic experiences. I was able to use the space to see my anxiety, different thought patterns, and physical experiences of depression and anxiety as “objects” separate from myself where I could explore their contours without having to fully experience embody the physical experience of those feelings and emotions. Being able to explore them as separate from myself helped me make sense of them in a way I hadn’t been able to before that, and decide how to deal with them moving forward.
How do you feel Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy differs from traditional talk therapy or other forms of psychotherapy?
KAP helped me move past intellectualizing issues I was experiencing and begin to understand them as objects separate from myself. Since I was “outside” of those feelings, I was able to explore them from a distance and understand how they tied into other areas of my life that I wasn’t able to in an ordinary state. One of the biggest benefits I found was that my body was separate from my emotions, meaning that I could explore the sources of my anxiety and depression without also having the somatic responses that would typically turn into a complete spiral if I was trying to explore them on my own.
Additionally, the altered state of consciousness led to surprising insights that weren’t directly connected to the intentions I went into each session with, but each introduced a new facet to my understanding of the overall situation. Even beyond working on specific anxious and depressive issues, the experience helped me gain a lot of insight into who I am as a person, and how impactful the thought patterns are that I identify with.
Have you noticed any changes in your mental health or emotional well-being since starting Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy?
In the short-term following my KAP sessions, I had a physiological break in the anxiety symptoms, which gave me some space to work on developing new thought processes, sort of like performance-enhanced CBT. In addition, I felt like I left with deeper insights into the habits and patterns I had fallen into.
Before KAP my emotions felt like a train rolling past me that I would grab onto without any self-control. I could see them coming and know that I didn’t want to go there, but I felt completely powerless to avoid them. The break in symptoms and the new perspective combined gave me the space to learn how to step back from specific emotions, and gave me a chance to look at my life with a broader lens where I started to understand the bigger things that were impacting my daily mental health.
A lot of the changes came after KAP, and honestly it was harder after than it was before, but because I was able to see the problems more clearly and then had to choose to work towards resolving them. Before KAP I couldn’t even identify the problems and was just suffering from their symptoms without really understanding how or why they were happening to me.
How has Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy impacted your perceptions or understanding of your own mental health struggles?
KAP helped me separate thought patterns from physical manifestations of anxiety and depression. Before KAP I would have an anxious thought and then a physical reaction, which would then tell my brain to start getting more anxious, and a feedback loop would start that would put me into a really bad place — really quickly. Having some separation from the mental and physical symptoms of anxiety and depression helped me get a different perspective that felt safer to explore, and let me go deeper into the anxieties to understand where the sources were.
What precautions or preparations did you take before beginning Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy sessions?
Took a break from cannabis (which ended up being really helpful in itself) and fasted for 5 hours before each session.
How do you manage any potential side effects or challenges that arise during or after a Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy session?
The challenges I experienced mostly stemmed from the disappointment of stepping back out into my life and realizing that most of the factors that had been causing the anxiety or depression were still there. At first I struggled with integration because of the disappointment and the feeling like nothing had changed, but as I worked to make the adjustments in my life and recognize how and why these patterns were there, I was able to integrate what I had learned and make positive changes. The biggest challenge was confronting the hope that I would finish my sessions and be completely cured, and the reality that I still had a lot of work to do on my own.
How do you integrate insights or experiences gained from Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy into your daily life or ongoing therapy?
Integration is a big part of my life in my work with psychedelics, and it takes patience, reflection, diligence, and forgiveness for when some changes or goals fall off. When integration from psychedelic experiences is still fresh, I do a lot of journaling and map out the connections, triggers, and outcomes of certain behaviors, and try to sit with any insights until they truly synthesize.
Something I would have done differently with my KAP was taking it slower when trying to make sense of abstract or vague insights, because once you decide what it meant, it’s difficult to allow the insight to take further shape and you can miss things. Now I try to take an insight and hold it without trying to force it to be something, and sometimes it takes months before it clicks.
What advice would you give to someone considering Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy as a treatment option?
It isn’t for everyone, and it isn’t a cure-all, but if your symptoms or issues align with the relief that ketamine can offer, it’s a safe way to explore non-ordinary states of consciousness and the change in perspective it provides. It’s a great option for people who are anxious about psychedelics because of the dissociative effects of ketamine compared to something like psilocybin, ayahuasca, or others.
Approaching a session with curiosity and willingness is the best way to learn what you are there to learn. Not trying to force anything to “make sense” in the moment is challenging, but letting your subconscious play itself out in front of you is an amazing opportunity to recognize the things that no longer serve you and try to understand how to let them go.
How do you envision the future of Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy evolving as a mental health treatment modality?
I think that ketamine is going to be a central component to trauma work by helping people work through body-stored trauma with a bit of separation between their minds and their physical symptoms. The dissociative nature of ketamine makes it a perfect tool for accessing physical sensations and experiences without immediately going into a trauma response, which can help people reconnect with their bodies (paradoxically, by disconnecting from their bodies), work towards somatic releases, and explore deep traumas.
I also think that ketamine is a really incredible tool for people who may not be in the condition to push further into psychedelic therapy with psilocybin or MDMA. It’s a great “starter” experience, and IV ketamine is the most controlled environment possible because someone can back out of an experience fairly quickly. I do think that the commitment to a longer experience (knowing that there is no “off” switch) is a powerful tool for building resiliency, and personal growth is inherent in the arc of a full psychedelic experience (the Hero’s Journey), but I don’t think that everyone should need to jump head-on into those depths to explore healing spaces in non-ordinary consciousness.
If you’re interested in KAP as a treatment option, we are booking new appointments! Email our office for more information.
