Ketamine Therapy

Anything But Mid is hosted by Amy Edwards and Whitney Stropp. Neither host is a doctor and nothing here is medical advice. Lightly cleaned for readability.

Whitney: I'm Whitney.

Amy: And I'm Amy, and this is midlife, but we're anything but mid. That just rolled off my tongue like butter. Woo! Yeah, right on. Right on. Hello.

Whitney: Hello, hello, hello.

Amy: What are we doing today?

Whitney: How are you?

Amy: I'm great. I'm great.

Whitney: I'm very excited about today's topic because I've been asking you to do it since we started the podcast, because I have lots of questions, and you have a lot of, not a lot of experience.

Amy: We're not even wearing our headphones. What are we doing? This is crazy. Should we put them on? I don't know. It feels kind of good. Okay.

Whitney: I don't know. Well, let's put them on, and We do what we want.

Amy: We do what we want. That sounds That feels much better. So, yeah, I'm really curious why you've wanted to know about it so much.

Whitney: Well, because I love drugs.

Amy: Who doesn't? I mean.

Whitney: I loved the, you know, '80s and '90s of ecstasy and all of that, but and I'm always wondering, like, why aren't we taking that and doing something Like, I I I talked about it with my boyfriend, his mom can barely walk because of her hip issues, and she's done all these things, and nothing's working, and it reminded me of a story back in college, we all went out, and one of the people in our group had a broken leg. Well, we all took ecstasy, and guess what? That guy was dancing on that leg all night long.

Amy: So he had a broken leg with like A cast on.

Whitney: And And he was not concerned.

Amy: And felt no pain. Felt no pain.

Whitney: So I'm like, surely there's microdosing that we could do where where we can alleviate that issue, because it has become not only a mobility issue, but a depression issue, because you can't go anywhere, and chronic pain, and all that. So And then I know that you've gone down that road with ketamine for healing, therapy, obtrusive thoughts, I don't really know everything that you use it for.

Amy: Well, I'm prepared to tell you today.

Whitney: Yes, but I'm excited about it. And then, just recently, and why I brought it up to you again, is that my daughter's girlfriend is about to start ketamine therapy.

Amy: Ooh, cool. Good.

Whitney: And so I was like, well, I would love to know more about it.

Amy: For sure. I think a lot of people don't really understand the full scope of it because it's confusing, you know? And Yeah.

Whitney: Yeah, I mean, I don't even know I don't even know what it was before.

Amy: Well, that's what I'm going to tell you. You're going to trip out when I tell you what it was.

Whitney: Yeah, so I just I just want to know everything.

Amy: I tripped out. I didn't know, and I've done it in every form, which I'm going to cover too. So, well, let's just jump in since we're already on the subject. Okay, cool. Yeah, so it's an old older medication with a long winding history, and we're going to go back to the lab where it was first created.

Whitney: Back to the lab.

Amy: Yes. And then we're going to talk about my personal experience, because I've done it every way that you can, pretty much every way that you can. And so I do have some personal experience to share.

Whitney: Yes, I love it.

Amy: So ketamine was first synthesized in 1962. It was the Parke-Davis Lab in Detroit, Michigan, and a chemist named Calvin Lee Stevens, PhD, was consulted to help synthesize a new PCP derivative. Not even kidding. Phencycli- I practiced this. Phencyclidine? I think that's it. Which is PCP.

Whitney: A synthesized PCP for medical purposes or for drug use on the street?

Amy: Well, let's talk about it. Let's talk about it. Well, phencyclidine, which is PCP, and I verified that, like, it apparently, we're talking about PCP. Right. It was being used as an anesthetic medication at the time under the drug name Sernyl, that's with an S, S-E-R-N-Y-L. Sernyl had some useful characteristics as an anesthetic agent, but also had some bad side effects. It was not uncommon for patients to wake up after being administered Sernyl feeling delirious. They had jumbled speech, and they even experienced significant hallucinations during the recovery phase, and it lasted like too long. And so, they were like, "Okay, this has anesthetic properties, but too many side effects. So how can we make this better utilized as an anesthetic?"

Whitney: Right. Tweak it. Yeah.

Amy: Yes. So this dude, Cal Stevens, a che- where he's going by Cal now. Now we're on a first-name basis, Cal.

Whitney: Cal. Dr. Cal.

Amy: Dr. Cal. Anybody doing using ketamine is calling him Dr. Cal. He achieved that goal by chemically tinkering with the PCP molecule, and created what is known today as ketamine. Through Though that time that it was first researched, its chemical name was I don't CI-581. So this was first tested on animals, mostly monkeys, and in 1964, the first dose was given to a human. The first tests of it were done on prison volunteers.

Whitney: Oh, at least they volunteered.

Amy: Yeah. And I mean, they were tripping on ketamine, so what the hell, why not?

Whitney: That's right. What do they call Does PCP have a street name? Or did we just call it PCP? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Amy: I think it's PCP. Yeah. Angel dust.

Whitney: That's what I was thinking, but I didn't want to say it. Okay.

Amy: I think that's right, which Yeah, crazy. kind of fits, actually.

Whitney: Angel dust. It kind of fits. Sounds awesome.

Amy: It's pretty fucking awesome. Okay. All right, so anyway, it's just interesting like when you think of that title, and then what it does, like it kind of fits.

Whitney: Yeah. I never did it.

Amy: I've never done PCP. I'd like to say I've never done PCP, but I don't know, maybe ketamine. So maybe Does that count?

Whitney: Maybe. I think so.

Amy: So, anyway, it was done on prison volunteers, which is now illegal. That's not allowed anymore. But it was at In Michigan, at Jackson Prison by someone named Ed Domino and Guenter Corssen. These doctors, they tested like I said, it's no longer legal today, but this element helped to rapidly establish the safety of this new chemical compound.

Whitney: But also, from the little that I know, I would think that they benefited from having that, because it switches the way you think, so maybe it was rehabilitating.

Amy: I know. I wonder I wish I had that study. I I want to look into that. I was thinking the same thing. So, anyway, I would love to know. But the doctors got more curious, especially this Ed Domino. During a conversation with his wife about the response he had witnessed from the prisoners, he described that the prisoners seemed quote, "disconnected from their environment." His wife said, quote, "You mean there's some sort of dissociation? Why don't you call it a dissociative anesthetic?" So, he he did. It started being known as something dissociative, and it had a ketone group. I don't know what that means. I should have looked it up, but it had

Whitney: Well, ketones are in our Like, that gives energy to your cells.

Amy: Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know I I should have verified this, this, but I instead did not. So it had been called ket- It Ketamine is related to ketone group, and so ketamine. Originally, it was called, and in 1970, the FDA approved ketamine HCl under the trade name Ketalar. Ketalar For anesthesia. Ketalar was the dissociative anesthetic, and it became the most widely used battlefield anesthetic in the Vietnam War. Isn't that sad?

Whitney: I mean, it's good because they were they didn't know. They were like, Yeah. Well.

Amy: It became known as the buddy drug, B-U-D-D-Y, buddy drug on the battlefield because soldiers carried it on them. And if a fellow soldier suffered a severe injury, they could have their buddy inject them with a dose and get immediate pain relief without any risk of respiratory issues.

Whitney: Oh, wow.

Amy: You know, cuz anesthesia, when you're under, they have to watch your breathing. Yeah.

Whitney: Yeah, yeah, yeah. They have to monitor.

Amy: Prior to having ketamine as an option, opioids were the main go-to for relief.

Whitney: Not great. Mhm.

Amy: The doses of opiates like morphine that were required to treat severe injuries could sometimes cause respiratory depression, and this could now be given without causing a soldier to die from this opiate administration, right?

Whitney: Yeah.

Amy: So, meanwhile, as ketamine was being used on the battlefield, its use as an accelerant for psychotherapy was discovered very rapidly. The first proof of this work was reported from a psychiatrist named Salvador Roquet, I guess, Roquet, practicing out of Mexico City in 1972, the year of my birth.

Whitney: Oh. A great year all around.

Amy: It really was. The world changed. In 1973, a study of a hundred people who received IV ketamine with concurrent psychotherapy showed improvements in their mental health. So that's crazy, right? It's going back like more than 50 years.

Whitney: Yeah. '72. Yeah, wow.

Amy: I know. Despite these early studies indicating that ketamine paired with psychotherapy might have serious promise for treating mental health disorders, much of the progress in researching this modality didn't take off for many years. In 1971, President Nixon had

Whitney: The year of my birth.

Amy: Ah, yes, the year of our lady Whitney. President Nixon had declared the war on drugs. Here we go, right? So researching psychoactive compounds was not easy to do. Government getting involved again, right?

Whitney: Yeah, which is crazy because they also got involved with LSD, but to use it. They were Right.

Amy: They were fucking around. They did what they want with LSD. They boy did they. As a result, much much of the scientific progress on mental health treatment through ketamine during the 1970s through the early 2000s was it was focused on like medications like SSRIs, right? They just focused on those things, altering the brain's level of serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. It wasn't until the early 2000s that research on ketamine took off again. And by 2006, the National Institute of Mental Health had given a press release stating their studies were indicating that a single IV dose of ketamine had rapid antidepressant effects. Massive.

Whitney: Yeah. It's crazy.

Amy: Right? So in the early 2010s is when ketamine clinics started to take off. They began to emerge

Whitney: So they weren't illegal.

Amy: No.

Whitney: They were setting up clinics in the 2010s.

Amy: Yeah, and I'm going to talk a little bit about this sort of murky legal space.

Whitney: Right, right.

Amy: So, began to emerge and proliferate in the US and around the world. Most early clinics were opened by anesthesiologists who were comfortable using ketamine in the operating room, and offering IV ketamine infusions or intramuscular injections, which I've done both. So to date, more than 300 clinical trials have been held studying ketamine's utility as an agent to treat mental health disorders. In 2019, a large review of which I started in 2019.

Whitney: Oh, wow.

Amy: A large review of 235 patients undergoing ketamine-assisted psychotherapy demonstrated significant improvements in depression and anxiety. Ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, or I just think therapy, you know, it doesn't have to be psychotherapy, is currently in the stage of being perfected and clinic- continually studied. It shows promise to treat other mental health conditions such as OCD, PTSD, complex PTSD, postpartum depression, any depression, and chronic pain disorders, which you were talking about, too. This one molecule has been used in so many different ways for so many years and continues to find new uses. Ketamine is arguably one of the most important molecules in medical history, which like arguably, right? But it's so important because of all these ways. It's not it's not going in and readjusting your, you know, serotonin levels, right? It's

Whitney: It's not. It's changing the pathways?

Amy: It's changing the pathways. It is increasing your neuroplasticity. But

Whitney: It's addictive.

Amy: it it is You know, there are serotonin levels being affected if you're doing it outside of those, right? Which I've discovered as well.

Whitney: Right. When you started doing, yeah, yeah.

Amy: Yeah. Yeah. Let me just address one other thing, too. Ketamine is called a horse tranquilizer because that's what I specifically went and looked that up, like why are we calling it a horse tranquilizer? That is actually not really accurate. It is a potent FDA-approved dissociative anesthetic widely used in veterinary medicine to sedate large animals like horses. But this nickname's misleading because the drug was actually invented for humans and has been safely used in human healthcare for decades.

Whitney: And also, what is it doing to those horses? Like, it's not just sedating.

Amy: Well,

Whitney: Right? Or is it a certain a level that it just puts you out, and you don't get any of the dissociative properties? Like, I don't I don't I don't understand. Like, is the horse letting go of its ego and

Amy: The horse is in a k-hole. It's having

Whitney: It's talking with the angels.

Amy: A massive A k-hole.

Whitney: I'm I I'd love to know more about the k-hole.

Amy: I've I've only been in a k-hole once, which I will tell you about it, but I mean like full like wow, I can't function. And that was an accident, and it was like Not fun. No, no. I would wanted to be out of it. But I don't think that the levels that they're doing with IVs and stuff are are off-

Whitney: But one's a one's being I mean, it's being used as a sedative or an like, it's putting you out, or it's

Amy: Well, I don't think when I've done it as an IV I've been as far gone that someone could perform surgery on me.

Whitney: Right. But are you talk- Okay. I'm I'm jumping ahead. I'm going to let you

Amy: We'll talk about that.

Whitney: Yeah, I wanted to know your experience, yeah.

Amy: Yeah, I want you to ask those questions. The legal status of ketamine is varies across different jurisdiction, of course, right? And it can have significant implications for research and its application in clinical settings. I I know that my friend that owns the ketamine clinic where I started doing it, they've wrestled with this in different ways and had to adjust as they go, even over the last seven years.

Whitney: Well, I would think you could get sued.

Amy: Right, you have to have a doctor implementing. I mean, yeah, it's It's tricky, right? And so they have to abide by a lot of rules and a lot of therapy rules around it, too. They now, when I did it at first, they didn't have to have a therapist appointment beforehand, but now you have to have a pre-appointment with a therapist and you have to have guided therapy in conjunction with a lot of

Whitney: Oh, well, that's what I was wondering, because if you if I thought you were having your therapy while you were under the effects of ketamine.

Amy: Not for me, but I know that they do that with MDMA, and I don't know if they do that with ketamine actually. So I I you can't speak that well. It slows down your motor functions to a degree that you are kind of like not functioning as well. So I think the anesthetic part takes away your motor skills in a way that I don't think you If someone were to talk to you, I think you're pliable in that way, and I'll address that, too. Okay. But I don't think you could speak. So you can use it therapeutically to bring new thoughts in, which is what I've done, but I don't think you could actually speak in a psychotherapy way.

Whitney: Okay. Yeah, I know you you would listen to music, or you even made yourself your own meditation or something.

Amy: Mhm. I made myself my own meditations, yeah.

Whitney: Yeah, with your own voice. Yeah.

Amy: I've done it both ways, yeah. So the legal status differs from country to country and even within different regions of the same country.

Whitney: Like the US. It's legal in some states, and not in others.

Amy: Yeah. Generally, it's classified as a Schedule III controlled substance under the United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances. This signifies that ketamine is considered to have a moderate potential for abuse and may Which, I don't know. Moderate?

Whitney: Yours was moderate.

Amy: Yeah. And may lead to psychological or physical dependence. However, specific regulations regarding its possession, distribution, and medical use vary. Like in the United States, it's categorized as a Schedule III controlled substance under the Controlled Substances Act. This classification imposes strict regulations. And listen, I could be making mistakes here, don't take this all like I'm doing my best.

Whitney: We're not scientists, we're not doctors, we just did some research.

Amy: We're not even professional researchers, okay. This classification imposes We're going to need to put that in our notes now. Not professional researchers.

Whitney: Asterisk.

Amy: It imposes strict regulations on the manufacturing, distribution, and use of ketamine. However, it's worth noting that ketamine has also been granted breakthrough therapy designation by the US FDA for the treatment of treatment-resistant depression, which allows for expedited development and review of related research and clinical trials. Super interesting. So, breakthroughs in the understanding of ketamine's efficacy in treating mental health conditions like depression, PTSD, etc., have prompted increased interest and support for further research. So this is ongoing, which is really awesome. It is in the national conversation more than ever.

Whitney: Yeah, I think I think now more than ever, people are finally being more open to looking back at like LSD and PCP, ketamine, all of those things, MDMA, and see how we can use it now in in a in a smart way. I mean, the fact that my daughter's girlfriend is And she's, you know, in her 20s and her therapist is the one that suggested it. So I don't know I don't know how it how it works from there. I'm I would be shocked if it was legal in Texas, but I guess

Amy: Yeah, I mean, you can do it, of course, you can, yeah. Where was I? Let's see. Regulatory bodies are recognizing this need for more comprehensive studies. I just think, you know, across the board with these types of substances, we're having like breakthroughs.

Whitney: It can be, yeah.

Amy: People are more open to it, and I just think like our generation is now like, can we do this? Like let's go to the program.

Whitney: Yeah. Look, I just saw a news story in The Wall Street Journal, the toad poison, the the the pharmaceutical companies are

Amy: 5-MeO-DMT.

Whitney: are starting to like yeah, get their fingers in there.

Amy: Great.

Whitney: I know. Poor frogs.

Amy: But yeah, but I mean at the same time, that is good because I've done that, too, and it's like really powerful, and I don't want drug companies to fuck it up, but at the same time, then maybe we'll have

Whitney: More money gets put into it, more research.

Amy: More like stability, I guess, in the drug, you know, you won't have just rogue practitioners letting people smoke 5-MeO-DMT.

Whitney: in their basement. Right.

Amy: Right. I've never done it in a basement, but Okay, so but I have known some practitioners that were questionable, so. Not the ones I worked with. Regulatory bodies are recognizing this need and as a result, some jurisdictions are revisiting their regulations to facilitate responsible research while ensuring public safety. I guess that's what I was getting at, too, public safety. So it it it's of course limited a lot of times to specific medical professionals or specialized clinics, like the ones I've been to, or the one I've been to, here in Austin. And this can create barriers to access for people who could potentially benefit, but, you know, it's coming along. It's coming along, right? The It is being recognized more as a rapid-acting antidepressant aid, and has led to the establishment of ketamine clinics in many regions like Texas, which is cool. And they offer ketamine infusion therapy under the supervision of a trained healthcare professionals, which I do understand like since I did it, it was a little a little wilder, a little less regulated in 2019 when I started, and now like I said, I went back to that clinic and I was like, "I think I'd like a supportive dose, and to do it just once." And they were like, "You really have to do these other things now." And I was like, "Ah, fuck it."

Whitney: You're like, "Never mind. I'll get it on the streets."

Amy: I'm not, thank God. Okay.

Whitney: Well, I'm wondering if insurance covers it. I would

Amy: You know what, I I'm sorry, I don't know that.

Whitney: Yeah. I mean, the fact that she's I mean, she's just a She's a schoolteacher, she doesn't make a lot of money, and she already has some health issues, so I would bet that

Amy: The clinics definitely at least the clinic that I worked with definitely would help people that needed it, and they had different price structures for different people. So, yeah, cuz I know at the time I was like, "I don't think I can pay the full amount." And she gave me a deal cuz I was talking about it on my podcasts and stuff. So, anyway, so she was like, "We do that for people." Sliding scale, yes.

Whitney: Sliding scale. Yeah, yeah.

Amy: So the legal framework surrounding ketamine plays a crucial role in determining this accessibility and affordability of such treatment options. So now let's get into my own personal experience, which I want to tell you.

Whitney: Okay, so just to just to clarify, ketamine is used for mainly depression, helping with depression, but now they're moving into OCD and PTSD and all of that. But when you were going to do it,

Amy: I think there's

Whitney: what pulled you into it?

Amy: Oh, okay. Well, and there's also some talk about it helping people who are in recovery of addiction, but that is very questionable, because my part-

Whitney: Well, it's just like what they give meth people, but then they get addicted to that. Like

Amy: Yes, like look at Matthew Perry. I think he's a great example. He was probably told, "This'll help," and of course an addict's going to be like, "Give me that."

Whitney: Yes. So sad. Well, that's the key. It's not about the the You can get addicted, if you have the addict gene, and that the way that brain works, you can get addicted to working out, you can get addicted to food, you can get addicted to, you know, researching.

Amy: Yeah. Well, my partner is an active recovery. He is an addict in recovery, right? And so when he did it, he did it, too, and it did have the potential. Like since he's gone to treatment, never again.

Whitney: Yeah, my sister, as well. Yes. Yeah, you can't.

Amy: But it did reset some things that helped him so much, because when he relapsed, he was like, "I've never rela-" He relapsed after doing ketamine therapy, and he was like, "I didn't have any suicidal thoughts." And I think it he really thinks that the ketamine therapy helped his brain reset in a way where

Whitney: that helped with it, helped with that.

Amy: his relapse was not the same as his prior relapses, and he was able to come out of that relapse, and

Whitney: And not get in a shame spiral.

Amy: No. And like so so, you know, it's for addiction, I think that it is something that could help with those underlying problems.

Whitney: I wonder what Dr. Amen says about it. I bet he has something. We'll have to look into that.

Amy: I do, too. I do, too. Yeah, we should. We really should. So, okay, so how did I even start?

Whitney: Yeah.

Amy: I just randomly got invited to a one-year anniversary for a ketamine clinic here in Austin called Illuma, I-L-L-U-M-A, and Allie Waddell is one of the owners and her husband's a doctor, so they started this clinic, and she I had never met her, and she was just glowing. The day before I went, I was reading about different mental issues. I don't know what book I was reading, I wish I knew. And the guy writing the book mentioned rumination, and I was like, "What's rumination?" I looked it up and it is going over the same

Whitney: The thought, yeah. It's a loop.

Amy: thoughts, thought loops. And I was like, "Holy shit, I am a ruminator and I didn't even know until I here I'm 47, 48 years old." I'm like, "What a trip." And so, I had never heard it. The next day, I go to this anniversary party.

Whitney: So life is you're feeling like life is putting some things in in your sphere. Yeah.

Amy: Yes, in my path, right? I go to this thing. She is like glowing, and I was really coming I was in my second divorce still, and I was feeling just Just like I had to really reinvent myself, and I was in a darker place, and she was speaking to a group of people and telling what all IV ketamine IV therapy did, and she said it helps with complex PTSD, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, rumination. And I was like, "Rumination?"

Whitney: Did you hear that? Yeah.

Amy: "I'll have what she's having," right? She was so glowy and just alive.

Whitney: Well, when you say glowing, it was because from the inside out, she just what had this peaceful, happy energy?

Amy: Yeah. Yep. Yeah. She had a really amazing energy, and she had worked with ketamine therapy. And I was like,

Whitney: And she was doing the ketamine.

Amy: "I want to try this, and I want to interview you." Actually, I just said, "I want to interview you. This is really interesting to me." And then once I talked to her cuz for my show, I wanted to interview her. And once I started chatting with her, I was like, "I think I need to experience this to really understand it, because I don't have any concept of this. Can I do one and just pay you for that or whatever?" I didn't have much money at the time, because I was going through a second divorce. And so she cut me a deal to do one. So I said, "Let me just try it, and then we'll do our interview." So I went in and tried it, and the day after I did it, like I really I really felt like I dissociated. They didn't do a lot. I did IV, and

Whitney: Well Yeah, talk me through the actual day that you went in.

Amy: Mhm. An EMT, like, is there in the room I guess you'd call him that. Whatever, they're in the room with you monitoring everything. So you're

Whitney: So you have someone sitting there beside you.

Amy: hooked up to some stuff. You have You're hooked up to an IV.

Whitney: And you've got like a heart monitor?

Amy: You do. You have some monitors, and I think they have like one of those sort of blood pressure things. Yeah. I think it was that. And so they're watching on a screen to make sure everything's functioning okay.

Whitney: Okay. Blood pressure.

Whitney: And did they tell you to bring in anything with you, music or anything? Or they just said, "Lay down here"?

Amy: No. I went with theirs. I went with theirs, yeah. So I didn't know what I was doing, and

Whitney: Okay. Yeah, that's scary.

Amy: that music that they play and stuff, like they have a screen, too, that you can use, which was a little much for me. I I like to block out the world and just let my mind go. But I did notice that the music had some minor chords in it, and minor chords make it scary, and it was already scary enough for me. So I knew no minor chords in what I'm listening to. So if you're listening to binaural beats or whatever it is, just you have to be really careful. So that was a little scary for me.

Whitney: Mhm. Yeah. Right. So So you're laying down,

Amy: So I Uh-huh. Yeah, you're laying in a sort of recliner.

Whitney: they put your IV in, you put on your headphones, and then they slowly start the drip, and then then what?

Amy: Yep. And then you just start to fade into it.

Whitney: You feel float? Like like you're floating, or like you had a margarita?

Amy: Yeah, you feel like a A little more intense than that. You know you're there. Like I could open my eyes and look around and be like, "I'm okay." You know what I mean? Like you're not so far gone that you're like out there.

Whitney: Right. Are you having any thoughts, or are you trying to keep your thoughts?

Amy: Yeah, you can totally have thoughts. You can totally have thoughts. And like and then just I don't know, for me, I felt like I was in space, like floating in space.

Whitney: It was just a physical feeling that you had. It wasn't like, all of the sudden, you imagine your mind opening up, and there's an angel there, or whatever. You're just You just feel.

Amy: No. Maybe for some people. I definitely, as I progressed with it, had some visions where I saw the whole world and like I was able to know that I was supposed to use my voice to help other people. I saw the world with all these people in it using their voices, and it made me so happy, and I just felt more purposeful.

Whitney: Yeah. And that was not your first time.

Amy: Mhm-mhm.

Whitney: Your first time, you go in blind, basically.

Amy: It's It was pretty dark for me, meaning like I it actually went dark, and and I just felt like I was in space, and I would see this sort of like almost like a waterfall of of energy or something, and you just feel like you are dissociated. But afterward, I remember a friend said to me, "What if you weren't even dissociated and you just thought you were, and you haven't even gone all the way?" And I was like,

Whitney: Yeah, because of those minor chords. Oh, God.

Amy: "Oh, God." I know. So anyway, it's it's a little hard to describe, but you're not so far gone that you can't function or anything like that. Like you don't

Whitney: Right. And then once it was over?

Amy: So once it was over, you're a little out of it for the next couple hours. You can't drive. Someone drives you home, or you take an Uber, whatever, and I did have someone come pick me up and drive me home. And then the next day, I started having new thoughts about experiences I'd had

Whitney: Can't drive. Ah.

Amy: and very logical thoughts that I'd never thought before.

Whitney: Like just piecing something together, like, "Oh, when that happened, it was because I needed to learn such and such"?

Amy: Yeah, or there were thoughts I had about a dating situation that I would never want my children in, and it had never occurred to me from that perspective. And I was just like, "What? What?"

Whitney: Oh, right. It just flipped a switch, and you were like, "I don't even want to be in that anymore."

Amy: It just sort of go- Yeah, and you just sort of go and then you just go, "Why have I never thought that before? Because that's an absolutely logical thought." And it was so striking that I was like, and then it happened the next day, I I likened it to I I'm I was just drawing a circle in like if there was sand covering a table, I was just drawing a circle over and over. And it was not even like someone came and drew a new path in the sand. It was like someone came and blew all the sand away.

Whitney: Yeah. Mhm. Wow.

Amy: And so I was like, "Wow, my brain feels like it's getting reset."

Whitney: Different. Mhm.

Amy: And another one, for an example, was I've never liked my name, Amy. And I remember thinking I was just going about my day, and someone's name was Amy, and I thought, "Amy's a nice name." And then I was like, And then I was like, "Whoa, I've never thought that." And so it just

Whitney: That is so interesting to me, because it's not like you were listening to something that said, "Amy is a nice name. Amy is a nice name." It's There was nothing

Amy: Mhm. I had the thought on my own.

Whitney: That is so crazy.

Amy: So it was as if people talk about mushrooms the same way, right? Like you are having thought patterns, and this goes for depress- This goes for any of these things, right?

Whitney: Yeah. Yeah.

Amy: In our brain, the way it's functioning is a groove gets worn of a of a thought, and how do we reset that? Like it's like a sled going down a snowy hill, and it's going to follow the same path that's already been worn. And so it is resetting that path.

Whitney: Yes. Yes. And that's after one session.

Amy: And so Yeah. So I called her and I was like, "I need to do more of these. This is This is resetting my brain in the best way." And so she said, "Let's do it." And so I did a total of six, and I really do think it reset me in a way that I needed, and and even to get sober.

Whitney: Once a week? Right.

Amy: You can do it once a week, which is too much for me. I think I did it once every three or four weeks.

Whitney: Like, how often? Yeah.

Amy: So it took about six months for me to do. And and it was intravenous, and then at the time, they gave a supporting ketamine, which was a nasal spray.

Whitney: Ah. The nasal spray. I love to sniff stuff.

Amy: Ah, the nasal spray. So Yeah, that's me. And so I liked it a lot, and so I would use it in meditations just to kind of get out of thinking things during meditation, and took you to a different sort of spiritual plane.

Whitney: So you felt something. And in that and in that way, was it it just took the edge off, or you literally felt like, "Oh, my mind was on this plane, and now it's up here on this plane"?

Amy: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, you feel it.

Whitney: That's crazy.

Amy: Yeah, it's intense. And so I really liked that. So I started taking it out with me when I was out and about, going to a show, maybe, then I wouldn't drink as much, and I'd just have that for a little elevated feeling. You definitely develop a tolerance to it, and I started to really enjoy it to a point where I relied on it. And then she told me, "We're not offering that anymore, because it has a propensity for addiction."

Whitney: Right. And you're like, "Huh."

Amy: And I was like, "Yeah." And I told her straight up, I was like, "I think that I like like it too much."

Whitney: "I didn't notice." Yeah.

Amy: And so they offered troches, which you can put under your tongue. They also offered suppositories. So I got both of those. The troches, I ended up melting down and making my own nasal spray, right? I mixed it with I melted it down and mixed it with a saline nasal spray and would use that instead. So, whatever. Anyway,

Whitney: How were the suppositories?

Amy: and I didn't like it that much. Like, you're supposed to do it sort of like a whole therapy, like for an hour. And so you would use it that way, and that's not my thing. I didn't I I couldn't gauge it as well. Now, speaking of around that time, too, maybe 2019, 2020, maybe,

Whitney: Oh, wow. No.

Amy: I started I I became friends with a doctor who was administering it intramuscularly. And it had been a couple years since I had done the treatments. Couple years, maybe this was 2021. So I did two.

Whitney: Were we wearing masks?

Amy: I don't remember. And so I just remember where I was living. So, anyway, she came and sat with me, and, you know, is a doctor and ran a business here in Austin to So I was not hooked up to a monitor,

Whitney: Yeah. She just put it in your thigh muscle, or something?

Amy: but she was there. So it was intramuscular in your thigh muscle, just one injection, and so that's an hour long, too. And by this time, I was pretty good at it. I had done the six, and oh, backing up a little, with those six, I did, because I'm good at audio stuff, I did pull music that I knew was no minor chords. I created my own guided meditations along with it, which was a lot of affirmations, really.

Whitney: Sure. Yeah, tell me what you were hearing while you were under.

Amy: I was attempting to reset my brain to know my own worthiness, to know, you know, really positive, valuable things for myself. And so I was really trying to guide myself to more sobriety, more positivity, more purpose. And so I created And and I just feel like it's so strong when you can use your own voice, because you start to trust yourself and trust your own voice. And so I wanted to use my own voice. And so I would recommend that anyone could do this, and reach out to me if you need help creating one. But you could really do this even with your voice memos.

Whitney: Good things are Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah.

Amy: And and like with the app Insight Insight- No, not Insight Timer, sorry. Let me see what the app is. There's an app that you can put your own voice to meditations and to ThinkUp. ThinkUp.

Whitney: Ooh.

Amy: And so you could use ThinkUp, and you could use that. And I preferred You can lay down whatever. I prefer to use light-blocking mask, and there's one that's particularly used for psychedelics, and I can't remember what it's called, but it's like foamy, whatever. And then I sat up like in a meditative position, which the ketamine practitioners thought I was crazy. So, anyway.

Whitney: Eye mask. Mhm. Why? Because you could have fallen over or something?

Amy: I guess they just see people lay down. And I like to sit up and meditate, so.

Whitney: But every time you did this, there was someone in the room with you, except for when you were doing the nasal spray.

Amy: Yeah. Mhm.

Whitney: And the nasal spray was just a little quick pick me up, it's not an intense

Amy: Yeah. Yeah. But they do offer those suppositories to do it yourself or whatever, but I I don't know, I I liked it more.

Whitney: Intentional. Yeah, I I would want somebody in the room with me just because I would want to get as much value out of it as possible. But it's But I was imagining that they were talking to me, but they're not. They're just monitoring to make sure you don't freak out.

Amy: Right. Right. Now, the intramuscular practitioner, she's a doctor. She is very spiritual, so she was like sending good energy, so I think you could potentially work with somebody who's sending you energy, maybe doing reiki even during it or something like that, so I think that would be pretty cool.

Whitney: Mhm. Mhm.

Amy: So, yeah, I I I can see where you're coming from.

Whitney: Well, I I know for my daughter, her girlfriend would like her to be in the room with her. And I was like, as the mom, I'm like, "I don't want I don't know that I want her," not that nobody asked me and she's 23, she's going to do what she wants, but it kind of was like, "Ooh, I don't know that I would want Sydney in there." But nothing's happening. It's just you're just sitting there, what?

Amy: Mhm. Oh, you're just laying there. And it's only about an hour, 45 minutes or something.

Whitney: Yeah, and it's more to calm you down, to calm her down.

Amy: Yeah. And I think there could be a lot of value. One of the other meditations I made was one I tried it during the intramuscular without any affirmations, but I did say every 15 minutes, I had my own voice saying like, "Here here's your time marker, and everything's fine. You are safe," you know. And so then I knew how far along I was, and cuz you get real confused, like, have I been here 5 minutes or 50 minutes? I don't know. You know, and so you can just lose track of that, so it's kind of nice to have. So I could see how having someone you care about there to be like,

Whitney: Mhm. "You're safe." Mhm. Right. Right.

Amy: "It's been 15 minutes, and everything's fine."

Whitney: Yeah. Right.

Amy: And you'd be like As an anchor.

Whitney: That's true. Yeah. Okay.

Amy: Yeah, I could see how that That's what I did. I did anchor points in that one, and so that could be really valuable and cool, or you could ask the person that's the practitioner to say, "Hey, will you do this or let me know," you know, like, and you really want to take advantage of the experience in a different way a little bit to where you're like, "I can relax for this last 15 minutes knowing that, like, this is it, it's almost over."

Whitney: It's almost over. Yeah.

Amy: Yeah. Which I like, personally. So that was my protocol with it, and like I said, I do credit it with making a big difference, and so does Justin. And so, I mean

Whitney: How many did Justin do?

Amy: I think he did six. And it had changed for him already when he cuz he did it after me. And so he still had to work with a therapist afterward on all of those. So that was interesting, too. I never had to work with a

Whitney: Right. Right. It would be so interesting

Amy: For better or worse.

Whitney: for OCD. I have OCD in my family, I I I, well, I have like ruminating, which I feel like is a little bit of OCD. You're you're you're obsessing over Well, we talked about it off-air with, you know, just if you get a nasty comment on social media, you I just I can't let it go. Or if I feel like I said something

Amy: Mhm. Do you have OCD? You have tendencies? Yeah. Mhm.

Whitney: that I regret, I will just I cannot let it go. It's just a replay. But but I have family members who literally have to do certain things 10 times before they leave the house. And I even think my daughter has a little bit. Yeah. And and it's Yeah, it's torture.

Amy: Replay, replay, replay, yeah. Yeah. Counting.

Whitney: Yeah. So to have something that will release you from that is just pretty incredible.

Amy: Mhm. It It really is. It is incredible, and like I think that like, oh, I would love to know more about that.

Whitney: But you think psilocybin does the same type of thing, or

Amy: I don't know that it can release you from OCD in the same way. And this is a different experience. I didn't experience the type of hallucinations or the type of experience that I have when I'm on psilocybin.

Whitney: Mhm. Well, what are or 5-MeO-DMT, like they they've all done a little bit different something. Right. As far as the ketamine goes, what was your experience pretty normal in comparison to other people, or are there like what are the scare Are there side effects where you know, like what's the k-hole?

Amy: Okay, so a k-hole, I think, is I think you're essentially going in a k-hole when you are doing these treatments. Like, I think it could be termed that, but I think a k-hole is more of a party term. And so, for me, I thought I was like a professional in ketamine. Like, I thought I knew what I was doing and had enough of a of a

Whitney: The whole time. Right. sense of, yeah, tolerance, yeah, yeah.

Amy: tolerance in it and gauge for what I was doing, but I was with some friends in Costa Rica, and they had a powder form, and I snorted some of it, and I I I snorted too much, and literally right after I snorted it, I couldn't get the words took too much out of my mouth, and I I kept thinking, "How do I form these words?" And I couldn't get them out of my mouth, and I was like, "Uh-oh." Anyway, luckily Justin was there and they all went to this like night market and like were dancing around and stuff in Costa Rica, and I had to just He had to just stand there and hold me, and I went into this sort of like it felt like I was in this building like a pyramid, and I saw these entryways, I mean, like a full, whole thing.

Whitney: You knew. And you couldn't speak, so you're just having this this Yeah.

Amy: It was rough. It was really rough.

Whitney: experience. Were you crying, or

Amy: No. I don't think you're that associated with your body that you can function, really. I was just in my head, and luckily he just held me, and we stood there for like 30 minutes, and then they managed to get me in the car. We went to the restaurant that we were going to.

Whitney: You were kind of like catatonic. Yeah. They took you to the restaurant?

Amy: It was awful. It was awful. And so I get to the restaurant, and then he just stands outside the parking lot with me, and I didn't know where parts of my face were. Like, I literally thought my I he still laughs cuz I said, "Is that my eye?" Like thought my face parts were floating around. It was not good. I think that there's different types of ketamine, like little variations, like with the anesthetic of animals and stuff. And I don't know what I did in Costa Rica, so it just

Whitney: Yeah. Well, sure. Yeah. Were there any benefits the next day? Were you like, "Wow, I'm"

Amy: Nah.

Whitney: You felt like shit.

Amy: That whole trip, it was a little too much, yeah. It was too much, and so I don't know. I that's impossible for me to gauge, and so I regretted that, and I felt shame about it and stuff. But luckily all the friends were so experienced with ketamine that I literally finally got it together to go to dinner, and I felt like my face I felt like parts of my face were still every- I felt like a Picasso.

Whitney: Oh. Yeah, yeah. Mhm. Like a Picasso. Yeah.

Amy: But luckily one guy told a whole story about how he went into a k-hole at a Dave Matthews concert and was stuck in a Porta-Potty for 3 hours, and I was like I laughed so hard. I laughed so hard that I was just like Okay, they were all cool with it, so I didn't feel too embarrassed around people. But, you know, you got to you got to be careful. It's not a party drug. It is not a party drug. I can't reiterate that enough. It makes you dumb. You don't

Whitney: Oh, my gosh. Yes.

Amy: You think you are having a conversation with people intelligently, but you're not. And people know that you are not functioning on that level. So

Whitney: You can't speak. Yeah. Right. It is not something that you're supposed to go out on. It's something that you're supposed to be

Amy: No, don't. And people do, and I don't think it's appealing at all, and I do know people who have struggled with it as a party drug and addiction with it, so I mean, I have a friend who's really had to work to get sober from it and from it in particular. So I would just say don't do that.

Whitney: Yeah. Use Use it with a doctor. Do it Do it with a therapist, a doctor, in a clinic setting, that type of situation.

Amy: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yeah. So recently, I did think like, "Oh gosh, I can handle this." And a friend had it at dinner. Did I tell you this?

Whitney: No.

Amy: Yeah. I went to dinner with like four other women. She had the nasal spray. A friend has a company that does the nasal spray, and I have mixed feelings about it because I just don't know that it it should be used in that way. And so she had it with her, and I was like, "Let me try it," cuz it's been so long since I've felt it, and I just thought I could do it like I did before.

Whitney: How did Like the nasal spray? Right. Mhm. Oh, it was too much?

Amy: Dude, I was so fucking high. She I did squirt squirt, and gave it back, and I was instantly so high that I was so unhappy about, and I had to I was like, you just got to ride this out. But I mean, I didn't even know what to do.

Whitney: Oh, my gosh. What did she do? Did she

Amy: She started laughing. I told the girls at the table, I go I was like, "Y'all, I'm so high right now." And here I am with my mocktail, too, cuz I'm not drinking, I'm sober, and so I was so high, and I was reminded why I don't do it, and I had to just ride it out. And they were having a serious conversation about a lawsuit, not even kidding. They're talking about this lawsuit or whatever, and I was just in La La Land, and I just had to just sit there and stare into space and get through it, and it took me a good 20 minutes.

Whitney: Right. Right, right. Oh, my gosh. So you weren't enjoying it. Did Was she surprised at the Was she like, "No, you don't have a tolerance."

Amy: Yeah, she's like, "No, you don't have-"

Whitney: "You don't take that much." Like

Amy: She said, "I did wonder why you did two." And I said, "I thought I could handle it."

Whitney: Oh, my. But then But then it wore off.

Amy: But I could speak. I could speak a little, and I said like, "Y'all," I just told them, and they were like supportive and just like, "It's okay, you just sit there and ride it out." And so, anyway, another another woman watched me and was like, "I thought about doing it, but then I saw you, and I was like, I'm not doing it." So, anyway.

Whitney: Yeah. And 20 minutes later But then it was It wore off quickly?

Amy: Yeah, it was fine.

Whitney: You're like, "Yeah, and then we had dessert."

Amy: Yeah, and then I said, "Well, I'm glad I tapped out for that conversation actually, cuz it was a little dark for me." So anyway, you can do all this

Whitney: Yeah. Well, I want to try the nasal spray. I

Amy: I don't know that you do.

Whitney: Well, it's interesting, because I just So I have worked with an energy healer in the past that actually ended up being a medium, and so my husband would come in, and so I used her more for that, but also like cutting cords, and anybody who knows anything about energy healing, you know, a lot of Like, my TMJ, I'm sure it's energy in there that needs to get out, you know, or emotional trauma, childhood trauma, you know, whatever, there are there's things in there that can't get out, or you have She would always say, "They're They have their hooks in you." And so she would be cutting those ties, basically. Anyway, but also I got to talk to my dead husband, which is really why I I would contact her more. But I just reached out to her because lately I have been feeling like I am being held back.

Amy: Mhm. Mhm.

Whitney: I'm I'm finishing up this grief book that I've written, and and there are there's so much fear and doubt around it that I know I'm not I'm blocking any positive outcome that could happen, you know what I mean?

Amy: Mhm.

Whitney: And and so I'm like And then, just to be totally transparent, other people who are succeeding, I'm feeling jealous.

Amy: Mmm.

Whitney: And I'm like, "I don't want any of this." So I just reached out to her yesterday and was like, "I think I need some energy healing, maybe a couple of sessions." So we'll see, but I'm trying

Amy: No. Does she work with ketamine, too?

Whitney: No, no. No, but I'm just thinking, "Oh, maybe"

Amy: This might help.

Whitney: Maybe that's the route to go, too. But I, you know

Amy: Yeah. This might help. And honestly, I I was thinking the same thing, just even while we're talking and doing this work on ketamine, like I was noticing things I was writing in my journal today and just like little things that I feel like I'm like, ah, I could I could do better mentally on that, you know? And like I feel like a little bit of old patterns that I could still stand to move through and really put behind me. And so I was like, "Maybe I should do another session of this," you know, so.

Whitney: Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, well, maybe we can get a two for one.

Amy: That'd be awesome. Let's do it. We can lay there together, just split the ketamine.

Whitney: Let's do it. Hold hands. Oh, man.

Amy: Yeah. So, so all in all, I think it was very, very worth it, but just be careful everybody, cuz and it's not a party drug, so yeah, just be careful.

Whitney: Yeah. Yeah, but it definitely has some great benefits, and if you're with people that know what they're doing

Amy: For sure. I mean, for sure. And I think honestly, you know, I didn't have that therapeutic support with it, and I think it's such a benefit. I think it was really good for Justin.

Whitney: for sure. Yeah. No, I would want to do that. Yeah, I would want to talk it out and But you want to get a but that's like a ketamine therapist, you wouldn't do it with your regular a regular therapist.

Amy: No, I think they they I think they contract work with therapists who are maybe trained in this, you know, and

Whitney: They pair you. Yeah, I would I would want to have somebody that understands

Amy: Yeah, yeah, but I think they're like regular therapists, but they're trained in like in this type of therapy. But it might be interesting to schedule like that energy session maybe right after, when you're feeling a little more open, when your mind is a little more open and pliable, like that could be really interesting. Maybe not right after, but maybe the next day, you know, like that could be really interesting.

Whitney: Right. That's what I would like. Oh. I agree. It's funny because, in my mind, my now I have the fear of, "Oh yeah, but then the angels are going to come down and be like, 'Why are you doing drugs?'"

Amy: No, they're not.

Whitney: "Why are you doing drugs?" Jesus is going to be like, "You What are you doing?"

Amy: No way. No way. I don't believe they're judgmental at all. I think I think they're probably like, this is this is a really good path to staying open and

Whitney: I know, I know. No, they're not, they're not. Yeah. I want to do something soon.

Amy: I mean, it's called angel dust, hello.

Whitney: Well, do you are Is your friend's clinic still open here?

Amy: Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. As far as I know it is. I I check in with her from time to time, and I know that they've had some regulatory things go on, and stuff like that, so I I as far as I know, I think they are.

Whitney: Yeah. Sure. Yeah. All right, I'm going to look into it because I want to get this figured out before this book comes out, because I don't want to block

Amy: Yeah. No, you don't. Mhm-mm. You don't.

Whitney: I don't want to block any blessings. And I feel like I've got some beliefs way down deep that might be blocking some stuff.

Amy: Yeah. And I mean, I talk about shining bright and all this stuff, I really do believe it was instrumental in like getting me past a lot of my own personal blocks that were holding me back, a lot of shame around divorce, or you know, even starting to date at a later age, just all that kind of stuff that I talk about. I do, and I'm I talk about being sober now, like that that didn't come without some of this other stuff.

Whitney: Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Sure, sure.

Amy: So, you know.

Whitney: And just so you you guys know, people that are listening, I mean, we talk about, you know, ketamine or like energy healing or things that cost money, but even doing what you do on your social media, Amy, of the affirmations, looking yourself in the mirror, telling yourself that you love yourself, there are other ways to go about it. I just like the fastest way.

Amy: Yeah. No, it's true. I get it.

Whitney: So I You know, we laugh about being lazy, but I I I I do those things. Yeah, and I do those things. I am a very positive thinker. I I I I don't take a lot on because I know my worth. But everybody's got their shit.

Amy: No, it's a good accelerate. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah, they do, absolutely. So, and you know, it's just interesting to to know that we have all these different things, these tools at our disposal, and so it is it is a tool. You just have to use it right. So, anyway, I I'm glad you were so curious about it, and I'm glad to have thought about it, because that it is something that I that I know was so useful to me, and I might do it again, so.

Whitney: Try different. Yeah. Right. Yeah. All right, well, and if anybody else has any stories about their ketamine journey, we'd love to hear about it.

Amy: Yeah, we really would. Reach out or anything that you want to hear about, too. I just, you know, I know we're still growing and I'm just so grateful for the people that are here. I just want to say we're here to serve you, and we want to do the best job that we can, so that's why we keep putting these out, and and reach out to us anytime.

Whitney: Yeah. Yeah, yay! And always remember, we do what we want.

Amy: Yay!

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