it seems the general consensus is that psychedelics are a bad idea for bipolars, depressives and schizophrenics.

but do you think psychedelics (e.g. psilocybin, LSD, DMT) could help the mentally ill?

-Quite possibly. New research is realising the potential for Salvia Divinorum as a cure for treatment resistant depression which is a common mental illness. Psiloocybin has been documented to help in the treatment of OCD, another mental illness related to stress and depression. LSD in trauma treatment, like MDMA for ptsd, etc, etc.

-TRY googling any of the above.

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> if you mean treating individuals with advanced severe mental illness, then that is something else. Certainly i would like to think that a good therapist with some suitable psychadelic knowledge and understanding may be able to help steer a patient with an early diagnosis into a more positive mental frame of mind. However treating any advanced illness is difficult because of accumulated negativities in many levels of the human psyche. Just my one pence of ideology!

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My girls mom is schizophrenic, I think drugs definatly helped bring it out of her. She is REALLY sick... I would never recomend someone with this illness try anything that could make it worse. But the others like depression and such I would have more hopes for.

I don't think so, in fact I think it is probably outright dangerous. If you're meddling with this stuff, you ought to be able to distinguish what's real and what's not (yes, I realize that's a crude way to put it and what's real or not is debatable, but nevertheless there is truth in this, even if this is not the best way to express it in words), and mentally ill people usually don't.



Agreed, but the person has to be willing to not run away from what is presented, or it may just make it worse.

You say NO, but wait. This is the trouble with saying NO, it puts a stop to trying out new things. We can thank the Government for stalling hopes for people suffering from a wide range of mental health issues by their making illegal of psychadelic drugs. This only served to stop studies into their positive effects. So we are now playing catch up and only now starting to understand new things about them.

-Obviously a trained specialist who understands brain chemistry and psychadelics potentials would be better to suggest if psychadelics would HELP. I'm not a specialist, but i do believe that there is a place for them as part of a positive treatment in ALL types of mental illness.

-Schitzophrenia may be helped with the right kind of psychadelic drug, but obviously not like a massive dose of shrooms- it has to be done correctly for example if it is to be done at all. Let us not jump to worse case scenarios here, when we may simply be talking about microdoses and talk therapy and learning new skills and viewpoints, etc.

-Certainly, the anti psychotics and tranquilizers that many mentally ill take do not assist them with treatment of their condition in any way, except make them easier to care for.Psychadelics on the other hand may help give some mentally ill people the ray of hope that may inspire them to help improve themselves. EVERY hope must be looked at, and is certainly worth trying out in certain willing individuals perhaps??

-Having worked closely with mentally ill people for 2 years, one thing you may not realise is that helping mentally ill people requires a LOT of time and patience, so there are no quick fixes, and it is often a tiring demanding process where the right therapist can make all the difference to improvement or not. Mentally ill people also tend to be some of the most stubborn toughest nuts to crack, which is probably why they are ill in the first place, because perhaps somewhere along the line of creation something in their make up said NO, I WON'T, AND THAT'S THAT!!

Difficult topic. I am tempted to say 'no' because of the mental dangers. However, in combination with a trained specialist the use of psychedelics might be an option of treatment. But always in a highly strictly controlled environment that is safe to the user, his mental state and his environment. The LSD from last friday was extremely heavy and confusing. I at some point even forgot I took a substance and had to derive this from the state my living room was in.

Being mentally ill and taking psychedelics might be countering the effects or worsen them. But with proper specialist treating these people, I don't see a reason why not, unless there is enough medical evidence stating that it is a really bad idea. Not legislation.

People who´re realy dellusional should definately stay away from psychedelic´s.

With depressions i think it depends on the type of disorder. People with bipolar disorders often tend to behave in a somewhat delluded way.

You need a rational mind to be able to deal with psychedelic´s.

I think people who´re suffering from mild depressions could benefit from it. But it also depends on your character. You need to be open for it as well.

- Really??, even with a trained specialist and scientific administration ????

I completely agree. I have a friend who was diagnosed with schizophrenia from a young age and used to take acid, DMT, mushrooms, etc. He said he was a complete paranoid mess. He has been a lot better since he stopped taking psychedelics and stopped smoking weed. He was also on 800mg of Clozapine a day, which turned him into a zombie. He stopped taking them because he is a composer and he couldn't get his creative juices flowing in that state.

I can't remember where i read it, but i know they used to give LSD to people with severe psychosis when it first came out in the Sandoz lab and it was not a success.

I think certain psychedelics can definitely help people with depression, but as polytrip said, it really depends on the person.

-I doubt that your friends dabbling into acid, dmt, shrooms was scientific or wise considering his diagnosis. Certainly i believe that used appropiately there may have been 1 of them which may have provided the help he would have have noticed. However how someone with schitzophrenia would take such things is also questionable. Also did he mix them up with clonaz???

- I doubt that your friends experiments really count based on this possible misuse, and such an example isn't strong enough to close down further research. ......"and we shall fight on , and not give in, no, we will conquer those black dogs, shroomies or not.....---===!!"

I have done sessions with several people that are bipolar, and 2 schizophrenics. All were fine, if not better. If I can find the source I will post some research done by a DMT church. In it they have several bipolars and schizophrenics, and none of them experienced any negative effects.

I think for some of them, yes.
But I think DMT would be the best choice due to matter that if he/she reacts negatively, the experience is over quite quickly(if vaporized).

'Mentally ill' as a descriptor is a broad term and I've little doubt that some who are labelled as mentally ill would benefit from this class of agent.But in order to determine which patients are those for whom these psychedelics may be of use requires an expansion of research activities into these compounds effects on our cerebral cortices, and a shedding of the negative stigma they still have attached to them.Research continues apace into the pathology of the psychiatric disorders and progress is undoubtedly being made, and simply highlights how lacking in specificity the accepted conventional medications actually are.The psychedelics need to be investigated deeply using the modern techniques, and who knows, if they themselves are not shown to be ideal agents then the possibility of more efficacious therapeutic derivatives coming about cannot be dismissed.

If you dont look, you will not see!

I have a friend who was seeing a psychiatrist for a long time for anxiety/depression and other things..I think she was bipolar as well. She was also on various meds. She left home to live most of her time on a beach with a bunch of other hippies and we used to eat mushrooms all the time..she also dropped acid weekly at this point, smoked weed and eventually drank with the diame. I think she got off her meds and her doctor was aware of all the psychs she was taking. She said they only helped her and did not care what anyone else said.

I think alot of peoples problems are actaully problems with our society that are just reflected in peoples mental well being. Psychedelics are great for depression IMO..anxiety-well look at the world we live in..psychs are great for that too..PTSD is anxiety, and look at how good MDMA and psilocin are as treatments. I have also known other bipolar people, adn i dont care what anyone here says, alot of them were just being forced into doing something that was not who they are from what I could tell. They did not belong where they were. It just was not who they were.

My great grandmother on the other hand, was insane reguardless. She would sleep with the mailman, accuse my grandmother of sleeping with her father and then later in the day chase her and her sister around with a knife. She was in and out of mental wards and had to be on medication. I think she had a few different personalities.

If we could seperate all the people who have these "disorders" due to outside circumstances from the people who really are schizophrenic or psychotic etc, I think we would see a big difference between the 2 groups.

i always dreamed of becoming a psychedelic therapist,since i do appreciate the healing power of these substances, i only started to doubt it as along my travelings i met more and more people filliping into schizophrenia after using them (specifically LSD) seeing people in this state is one of the saddest things,as there is so less we can do to help them, psychiatry drags can only make them numb and less dangerous to the environment, but they cannot cure them.
psychedelics are not a game,in the ancient cultures it was only the priests and shamans that were allowed to use them in order to help the rest of the community.


true,imo, depression is not even an illness,its only a natural reaction to an extremely ill world.

I hope that in the near future qualified professionals will be able to study this subject in depth and we are able to discover the true potential of these substances. I believe that the toolkit Dr. Shulgin has given to the psychiatric community holds many medicines that will prove to be invaluable to this work in the years ahead.

Gary Fisher did some very interesting and successful psychedelic studies with the mentally ill. Children even.




I do think in some cases it could be dangerous, but it's like that with people who aren't even mentally ill. I think there are alot of cases where psychedelic treatment could do wonders.

This is a post I made in another thread on this same issue.


Now I will also say that anything that has the power to alter the mind to the point of reversing or curing a serious mental illness can also do the opposite. I don't think everybody should be self administering these drugs but under proper guidance by a skilled therapist they have the potential to treat and maybe even cure a wide range of mental illnesses.

The general population, and anyone who has never actually researched the topic would probably hold the opinion that psychedelics would be worse for people with mental illness. But, psychedelics definitely have potential as an aid for depression, as well as various social disorders. I have also read that psychedelics may actually be useful even for some forms of schizophrenia, as there is evidence that psychedelics decrease symtoms of paranoia, one of the symptoms of schizophrenia. I don't have literature off hand, but psychedelics will only continue to gain ground for their therapeutic potential, I have no doubt of that.

There was recently a CBC documentary called "Jungle Prescription" about a Vancouver doctor using ayahuasca to treat drug addiction. Authorities found out and he was ordered to stop giving ayahuasca, despite the treatment being used successfully.