Next, Maryam Jabir shared her experience as a participant in a phase 2b study of psilocybin therapy for treatment-resistant depression.
Having struggled with depression for many years, Maryam said she had tried repeated bouts of psychotherapy to the point she had almost begun gamifying her sessions: trying to make her therapist laugh, for example. Her mind was “like a Gordian Knot” by this point, she said.
It’s perhaps unsurprising, then, that Maryam was intrigued when she came across a media report that included a quote from a psilocybin clinical trial participant about how the drug might ‘reset’ one’s brain. She applied to the trial.
While she says that she was not expecting a silver bullet, she hoped it might provide “a raft, or even some driftwood” from which she could pull herself ashore and start to get better.
(Note: you really should listen to Maryam’s testimony in her own words. Here’s a link to the recording, which should take you to the relevant segment at 33:18.)
Going into the trial, Maryam says she deliberately tried to under-research psilocybin to avoid priming herself, and it wasn’t until her second preparation session with the study therapist that she realised she might have a full psychedelic experience. She was also apprehensive that she might not be in the ‘active’ arm of the trial, meaning the 25mg psilocybin group (as opposed to the 10mg or 1mg dose). Maryam suggested that was one of her primary concerns… she hadn’t even considered that she could ‘get worse’ after ingesting psilocybin.
She did, indeed, have “what is euphemistically called a challenging experience”, which resembled “a hurricane”. Upon coming out of the experience, Maryam said that she felt “like I had failed the team, the drug, my mum”. It was a very difficult time, she said.
“I also want to be very clear”, Maryam said, that the dose of psilocybin ‘didn’t make anything worse’, but it did make her confront many difficult things all at once. She questioned what is deemed an ‘ideal response’ in psilocybin therapy: “Is it a feel-good trip, or is it progress? Is it happiness, or is it healing?”
“If you’re skeptical about psychedelic therapy or if hearing my story is concerning you right now, I’d just invite you to reimagine the concept of what therapeutic means. For me, it’s as I said to my therapist: I’m past just wanting to feel good, I want to feel better. The first thing I said when they did take me out of the experience was: I can’t go on like this alone, I need help. And for me, that was a huge thing to acknowledge.”
While her experience was clearly difficult—“one of the hardest things I’ve ever gone through”—Maryam said she would do it all again, “exactly as it happened”. The benefits of her experience “took the scenic route”, she said, adding that “it’s undeniable to me what a force these treatments could have on mental health care; a force that has the potential to heal”, as opposed to damage control.
She was very appreciative of the trial team. “It’s frustrating to know that I can’t seek treatment again” she added, alluding to the lack of options, adding that “I would never feel safe enough to do it without similar support available.”
Maryam said she went from having excellent care during the trial to almost none. Peer-led integration groups in society are so important, she said. (Coincidentally, a few hours prior to Maryam’s talk, a paper published in Neuroethics titled: When the Trial Ends: The Case for Post-Trial Provisions in Clinical Psychedelic Research.)