Written by Jae Sevelius, PhD
Mikayla questioned whether mushrooms could support her when she discovered that psychedelic-assisted treatments using psilocybin mushrooms may be able to treat depression.
Since early adolescence, she had battled gender anxiety and associated suicidal thoughts. She frequently dozed off while wishing she may wake up as a transgender people or not at all. Mikayla looked up a few studies that looked into the efficacy of psychedelic change solutions to” cure” transness online.
She took mushroom vegetables on her own because she was able to locate a suitable clinical trial. Mikayla’s encounter led to a deep realization that there was nothing intrinsically wrong with her, in contrast to relieving her from what she perceived to be the problem of being transgender. She lamented the years she had lost to self-hatred while sobbing with love.
She realized for the first time that she was surrounded by people who were unable to see beyond their own constrained gender perspectives and who could not offer the encouragement and encouragement she required. She imagined herself to be a stunning, beautiful people connected to an enormous heritage of history, present, and future people who live beyond the linear with the aid of the mushrooms.
innovative care
The practice of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy ( PAT ) has drawn a lot of attention in recent years. This type of treatment combines counseling with the medically supervised usage of kaleidoscopic medications like MDMA, psilocybin, LSD, and ketamine to maximize the advantages of these medications for mental health.
For those who have tried conventional treatments that have failed them, PAT represents hope. It is hailed as a groundbreaking treatment for many mental health conditions, including sadness, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, and addiction. Access to PAT is still generally inaccessible to those who need it the most, despite growing evidence of efficacy and safety.
I am aware of how frequently people like Mikayla feel they must manage this difficult ground on their own as a clinical psychologist and scientist working on transgender health care. The American health model has medicalized and pathologized both psychedelic experiences and transgender identities, even criminalizing them.
Psychedelics have been classified as Schedule I substances by the United States government since the early 1970s as part of the War on Drugs, despite a promising field of medical research and no evidence that these medications are addicted. For more than 40 years, opiates have been illegally used, which has had serious repercussions, including mass incarceration and the obliteration of additional studies into their effects on mental health.
Additionally, Western medicine started to create solutions for trans people in the middle of the 20th century under the presumption that transgender identity was a mental illness that required treatment. Researchers looked into the possible use of psychedelics in change therapies to transform queer and trans people into immediately and cis people. Sadly, despite their known negative effects, these techniques still exist nowadays. Mikayla came across this research when she tried to” cure” her transness with psychedelics.
underrepresentation of transgender individuals in clinical studies
PAT, excluding ketamine, is now just legally available in the framework of clinical trials. Both the waiting lists of prospective enrollees and the exclusion names for the majority of applicants are lengthy. Clinical research shows a significant underrepresentation of transgender and gender-expanded individuals, and PAT tests are no exception.
This means that, like Mikayla, the majority of people now use kaleidoscopic medications for healing purposes unrelated to medicine. For more than 5,000 years, this has been the case in cultures all over the world throughout human history. For decades, underground therapists in the United States have been providing these medications to patients who have benefited from radical, often life-saving, effects.
Touch does not completely remove structural barriers to care, but its promise does offer transgender people a special desire. In many ways, Touch may promote gender encouragement, foster self-compassion, and offer a way to reconnect with oneself and people. Some claim that psychedelic experiences that lead to spiritual or unified experiences does cause a feeling of “divine blessing,” which is the highest form of affirmation that one’s higher power can convey. People should ideally have a qualified doctor with them to help them with their sessions.
The customer will feel network and affirmation when seeing a gender-affirming therapist. People who experiment with stimulants on their own, like Mikayla, even claim to feel more connected to their bodies and to have more sympathy for themselves. As many people leave with the intense understanding that true affirmation must first come from within, PAT may also lessen the need for other people to affirm one’s gender in addition to increasing access to it.
In order to provide the best treatment, we must constantly challenge health oversight of the individual experience and the ways in which we have internalized this oversight. We must keep fostering safe, welcoming environments for transgender people to fully express themselves, work together, and foster intercommunal unity. We can all enjoy greater flexibility in this way, both individually and collectively.
Along with the additional work of crossing and changing these systems, there is a lot of internal work to be done, but as we do therefore, we reclaim everyone’s right to healing. Reclaiming our right to choose for our own bodies and future is something we must both do. This covers embracing all modes of treatment, including hopeful kaleidoscopic experiences. People like Mikayla wo n’t have to travel this terrain by themselves in this way.
Jae Sevelius, PhD ( they/them ), professor of medical psychology ( psychiatry ), has dedicated his career to improving health and lowering barriers to transgender communities ‘ care.
