Something To Think About
Drugs have such a bad ring to them. When one thinks of drugs, an image of DARE, bad high school kids and people in prison come into picture. This is because we have been conditioned by society to equate drugs with disapproval; we have been turned off to dispose the idea of consumption and view them as dangerous and destructive. But when it comes to alcohol and cigarettes, “Please! It’s on me this time.”
With Ketamine approved for depression and psychedelic clinical trials underway around the world, it begs the question, “Are drugs the new mental health tool?” And we are not talking about recreational use. We are specifically referring to medicinal use under medically-controlled environments. Can marijuana, psilocybin, LSD, DMT, Ketamine and others be used effectively to treat mental health conditions such as alcoholism, depression, anxiety, etc?
I hope I have sparked a new curiosity in you. Now it’s your turn to do your own research and convince yourself whether drugs have the potential to provide mental health benefits. Are we doing our due diligence by researching these compounds for therapeutic use, or is this just another excuse to legalize them and get high?
Are you Ready? (This is Defeating Stigma Mindfully)
DSM (Defeating Stigma Mindfully) 
I guess it depends how you determine “used effectively.” There are things that can quell anxiety, stress, etc., but if they rob you of other functions of life, like motivation, are they really effective?
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Right on Joshua. Time will tell. So far, the phase 2 clinical trials have been impressive for psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression.
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I feel drugs are a temporary solution to a problem.
They don’t really address the core pain within a person or where it’s coming from. Nor help a person learn healthier ways to cope and manage their situation whatever that may be.
If drugs are going to be used, then I feel personally that it should be with some kind of therapy also. So you have the two working together.
Otherwise you can end up hooked, or on them for absolute years, unable to live without them.
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Not with psychedelics. Please do your research on psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression. But yes, I agree that therapy is necessary.
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I strongly recommend listening to the recent Joe Rogan episode with Graham Hancock and Brian Muraresku. Right up your alley.
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Thanks for letting me know!
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A friend of mine told me that marijuana works as remedy for depression, maybe it works for him. Drug intake is getting serious.
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No evidence based on clinical trials. It’s all user-reports.
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I wish I could report more positively on psychedelics from a personal standpoint. Perhaps they are a miracle cure for some. For others they are a mixed blessing.
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I have yet to find a blog that dares to delve into (what I call) the very problematic perfect storm of psychological/emotional dysfunction — a debilitating combination of autism spectrum disorder and significant adverse childhood experience trauma (and perhaps even high sensitivity) that results in substance use or abuse. This, of course, can also lead to an adulthood of debilitating self-medicating.
The greater the drug-induced escape one attains from its use, the more one wants to repeat the experience; and the more intolerable one finds their sober reality, the more pleasurable that escape should be perceived. By extension, the greater one’s mental pain or trauma while sober, the greater the need for escape from reality, thus the more addictive the euphoric escape-form will likely be.
If the adolescent is also highly sensitive, both the drug-induced euphoria and, conversely, the come-down effect or return to their burdensome reality will be heightened thus making the substance-use more addicting.
As a highly sensitive child, teenager and adult with ASD—an official condition with which I greatly struggled yet of which I was not even aware until I was a half-century old—compounded by a high ACE score, I largely learned this for myself from my own substance (ab)use experience. The self-medicating method I utilized during most of my pre-teen years, however, was eating.
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Thank you for sharing this meaningful message! It seems like you’ve been through a lot
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I think that’s how society wants it to be but they should also be emphasizing the other things that’s equally important
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Yes, we’re heading towards a great interest in potentially utilizing marijuana and hallucinogens for physical and mental health disorders. I’m not against this, as long as they’re backed by extensive clinical trials. Thoughts?
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You said it right
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