How psychedelic therapy may help with climate change anxiety

The Washington Post via MSN ^ | November 3, 2023 | by Emily Willow, MD

[Oldeconomybuyer]

As our weekly therapy session drew to a close, my patient, a young woman in her early 20s approaching college graduation, said that she had been feeling a lack of motivation, but that it felt different from her usual depressive symptoms.

A worrisome climate change report had recently been published, and she felt paralyzed by uncertainty of what the world is going to look like. She asked, “How can I decide where I want to go? Will it even be safe to live in California when I’m older?”

As a psychiatrist, I have noticed a growing trend among patients in suffering from what mental health professionals are calling eco-anxiety and climate grief.

Psychedelic therapies may have a growing role in supporting this unique trauma and grief. By exploring and utilizing these tools in our sessions, some of my patients have experienced a reduction of their anxiety symptoms, more acceptance and awareness of their emotions and increased energy and motivation toward environmental activism.

Many of my patients have been affected by long stretches of wildfire smoke exposure and have experienced mental fogginess and irritability because of poor air quality or post-traumatic stress disorder related to wildfire evacuations.

Some of my younger patients are concerned about planning for an uncertain future, including decisions about going to college or whether to have children. Others are feeling heightened anxiety and stress about more profound existential concerns about the fate of the planet and its ecosystems.

The effect of climate change on mental health is a new area in psychiatry and psychology. Climate mental health covers a broad spectrum of emotional and psychological responses. Many people, including some of my patients, feel anxious and powerless from a displaced emphasis on personal responsibility and action, rather than the larger responsibility of corporations and governmental policymaking.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Dr. Willow completed adult psychiatry training at University of California, San Francisco and has received advanced training in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy through Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. Her treatment philosophy focuses on opening patients to their own inner healer, using mindfulness-based techniques and a somatic approach. She aims to weave together multiple modalities to create a unique treatment plan that is intuitive, integrative and holistic.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

“Will it even be safe to live in California when I’m older?”

In many places, California isn’t safe NOW and it has nothing to do with the weather.

[gov_bean_ counter]

Mmmmm. I think that is how some got climate change anxiety in the first place…

[VanShuyten]

Worked for me. I’ve been free of climate change anxiety for almost 50 years!

[lurk]

Or, a cheaper route, is to see climate change as a scare tactic and stop being controlled by it.

[ChildOfThe60s]

How about we just tell them the truth?

[maddog55]

A lobotomy would be better.

[G Larry]

Since “man-made climate change” is a hallucination, I guess psychedelics couldn’t hurt......

[nickcarraway]

Just don’t fly 9n a plane.

[Manic_Episode]

To paraphrase Homer Simpson: “Drugs, the cause of, and cure, for all of life’s problems.”

[Wdempsey]

Most anxiety will be removed with the removal of Biden and the entire Obama apparatus.

[FlingWingFlyer]

Drop a tab and all you worry about da penguins and da Cola Bears will go away. Nothing but Unicorns and rainbows.

[kickstart]

Just make the idiots so stoned they will not know if they are hot, cold, wet, dry, or stupid.

[Islander7]

Don’t worry, be happy. 🎼

[ExTexasRedhead]

The jabbed and boosted won’t be around for any climate change disasters. They’re already screwed.

[2nd Amendment]

Dose em up! Especially on Election Day!

[Bounced2X]

A psychiatrist?
"Go ask Alice, when she's ten feet tall"

[Larry Lucido]

Take two of these.

[aquila48]

Bookmark

[vpintheak]

So, you’re stupid enough to have mental issues about Climutt Chainz, so of course you’d be stupid enough to take psychedelics as a “treatment”.