What Is Ketamine Assisted Therapy?
Ketamine treatments are gaining popularity as a unique and powerful approach to treating drug-resistant depression, severe anxiety, addiction, chronic pain, post-partum depression, and PTSD. Ketamine is legal and safe for Coloradoans to use in a clinical setting, and the Innate Healing Center of Boulder is proud to offer ketamine-assisted psychotherapy sessions. Ketamine can be taken in a medical setting, or with a prescribed lozenge in a therapeutic setting. The Innate Healing Center of Boulder provides a safe and comfortable set and setting for its ketamine protocols. Learn more about the Innate Healing Center of Boulder Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy Process Here
Many women who are considering using ketamine have tried every tool out there in the fight for better mental health. Clients of the Innate Healing Center of Boulder often report feeling exhausted; they feel like no amount of healthy eating, exercising, prescription medication or personal growth work has an effect on their mental health. While these things can help to a certain extent, ketamine is proven to work on the brain in significantly different ways.
How Does Ketamine-Assisted Therapy Work, and Why Is It So Effective?
While both ketamine and antidepressants work to treat mental health disorders, their cellular process and success rates are night and day. Depression and stress create cellular wear and tear on the body. Chronic stress and depression wear down the synapses that connect neurons. While antidepressants focus on introducing new chemicals to the brain, ketamine actually works to repair the structure of your brain.
Ketamine works on a structural level to fix the pathways that have been ravaged by stress, depression, and anxiety— and the process begins happening within hours of taking ketamine. A study was conducted in 2019 to look at the cellular repair that happens after taking ketamine. The study found that ketamine was able to repair the damaged connections quickly and that the new connections were almost identical to the way that the neurons were before the cellular stress was induced. [1].
Another study looked at 30 depressed patients who were given ketamine. The study showed changes in brainwave activity, indicating that the ketamine had strengthened neural connections in areas of the brain involved in depression [2].
What Is the Difference between the Recreational Use and Therapeutic Use of Ketamine?
If you’ve heard of ketamine outside of the context of psychedelic healing, it’s likely in relation to other street drugs. Maybe you’ve heard about k-holes or special K, or that ketamine is a horse tranquilizer.
If you look at the DEA website, their stance on ketamine is pretty clear. They call it a ‘club drug’ [3] and list it as a schedule III drug [4] along with opioids like Vicodin and suboxone [5]
Hop over to the World Health Organization website and it’s a different story. Ketamine has been listed as an essential medicine since 1985 [6], and the WHO fact sheet for ketamine focuses on the positive aspects of ketamine when used in a clinical setting.
The tension between the two labels is clear. So, is ketamine an essential medicine or an addictive street drug? The answer has less to do with ketamine itself, and more to do with the context in which ketamine is used.
Recreational use of ketamine focuses more on the “party drug” effects, and less on the therapeutic value. While you can buy ketamine as a street drug, even with the intention of therapeutical use, it creates so many variables:
It may be cut with something dangerous
The dose and bioavailability will not be as effective as a pharmaceutically compounded medicine
You are losing the integral transformative psychedelic aspects of set, setting, and integration
Ketamine can be addictive, so proper dosage and monitoring is essential.
When you work with your Innate Healing Center of Boulder practitioner, they are monitoring your dosage, experience, and safety with the goal of healing in mind. Undergoing your protocols in a monitored setting is crucial to have a lasting and transformative experience.
Should I Take Ketamine in a Clinic or with a Therapist?
There are two ways to receive a ketamine protocol. The first is in a clinic where ketamine is administered through an infusion or injection. The second option is to receive ketamine in a therapeutic setting by consuming a lozenge with your therapist.
Ketamine Clinics:
Use a traditional biomedical approach. It will feel exactly like a doctor’s office!
Are staffed similarly to a doctors office with nurses and a doctor or CRNA
Administer ketamine intramuscularly or intravenously
Do not include psychotherapy and psychotherapeutic support in your experience
Do not offer therapeutic pre-sessions
Do not focus on set, setting, and integration for your experience.
Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy Practitioners:
Use an interdisciplinary approach, and combine traditional medicine with psychotherapeutic support.
Are staffed with a certified psychedelic practitioner who is trained in safety protocols for the experience.
Have you self-administer a dose-specific prescription lozenge that is prescribed by a psychiatrist.
Base your experience around psychotherapeutic support, with an emphasis on pre-sessions, set, setting, and integration.
The Importance of Integration in Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy
Your brain is incredibly malleable during the 72 hours following your ketamine treatment. Because new pathways are being formed, the integration process is crucial to your ketamine experience. In fact, integration after ketamine-assisted therapy increases the potential for healing and personal transformation.
Integration is the process of connecting the experience of your ketamine-assisted psychotherapy protocol with your day-to-day life. Thoughts, ideas, and sensations that arise during your protocol can be incredibly meaningful when it comes to your healing process. The integration process provides a space to make meaning of your experience, and to use your experience to inform your daily life.
When you are in a non-ordinary state of consciousness, it’s easy to “lose” what you thought about during your ketamine-assisted therapy experience. Your practitioner is there to record what is happening and help make connections between what you have discussed during your pre-session and how it connects to your ketamine experience.
What Does Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy Integration Look Like at the Innate Healing Center of Boulder?
At the Innate Healing Center of Boulder, your practitioner is trained to offer a safe, non-judgmental, and confidential space to process your experience, and the potential it may have for your personal transformation. Learn more about the process here.
Your practitioner will have specialized training and years of experience with the states of psychedelic consciousness, and they will use these tools to help you best integrate your experience into your life. More about your practitioner.
Are you interested in seeing how Cannabis-Assisted Psychedelic Therapy or Ketamine Assisted Therapy can help you heal? Get in touch with us to start the conversation about which of our services is the best fit for you.