we are NOT the SAME
We Are Not the Same: Join our comedic journey as Bodybuilder Barbie flexes her muscles against Daria’s dry wit! Dive into the hilarity of life’s twists and turns through the eyes of two contrasting besties who prove that different perspectives lead to the best stories. Tune in for laughs, randomness, and a sprinkle of chaos!
we are NOT the SAME
What You Don't Know About Ketamine Could Change Your Life
Stepping into the world of ketamine therapy isn't just about finding another treatment—it's about discovering possibility when hope seems lost. In this illuminating conversation with Tina from the Ketamine Clinic of Spokane, we peel back the layers of misconception surrounding this powerful therapeutic tool that's transforming mental health care.
Ketamine has suffered from mischaracterization in popular culture, but as Tina explains, this medication has been on the World Health Organization's list of essential drugs since the 1960s. Far from its reputation as merely a "horse tranquilizer" or party drug, ketamine's carefully administered micro-doses are creating breakthroughs for patients with treatment-resistant depression, PTSD, and chronic pain conditions when nothing else has worked.
What makes ketamine particularly remarkable for trauma processing is its unique ability to create a dissociative experience where patients can examine painful memories without the overwhelming physiological response that typically accompanies them. As host and patient Heather beautifully described it, viewing traumatic experiences "through a dirty window" creates the emotional distance needed for processing without being consumed by it. This effect silences the constant mental noise and self-critical thoughts that plague many sufferers, opening space for healing.
The treatment protocol typically involves a series of six to eight initial infusions followed by personalized maintenance sessions, all in a carefully designed therapeutic environment with constant monitoring. While insurance coverage remains challenging, many patients find the investment worthwhile compared to years of ineffective medications and treatments that never quite reach the root of their suffering.
Have you been struggling with treatment-resistant mental health conditions or chronic pain that conventional approaches haven't touched? The profound relief many patients experience suggests it might be worth exploring this option. Visit http://ketamineclinicofspokane.com/ to learn if this treatment might be right for you.
-
Oh, we are not the same and we have a very special guest today. Yes, we do. We have Tina from the Spokane Ketamine Clinic.
Speaker 3:How are you, Tina? I'm great. Thank you so much for having me. I'm delighted to be here. Thank you for coming. I'm excited about this.
Speaker 2:We are so excited. Our listeners are so excited. We have been having so many questions about ketamine treatment, what it is I know, I've shared a lot about my journey with it and how it's helped me and now we have Tina who can answer all of our questions from the other side of it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll try to answer questions. I think it's very gracious of you to share your journey with your listeners. It's a very highly personal matter, personal thing to go through, for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a really good point.
Speaker 2:Very much.
Speaker 1:So just to start at the very beginning. So like, what exactly is ketamine treatment? Because I mean, some people hear ketamine and we all reference. I think like it's not like a horse drink.
Speaker 3:Yeah, ketamine has a bad rap.
Speaker 3:But, the reality is ketamine is a very old drug. It was developed in the 60s. It's in the World Health Organization's list of essential drugs and it's used in emergency rooms around the United States, most specifically for sedating children for procedures, because there's no risk of respiratory depression and it's a potent analgesic at the same time. So it's an old drug. It's a safe drug. It sort of fell into my view because, as a nurse anesthetist, we use it in the operating room for patients for post-operative pain relief, so we're very comfortable with the drug.
Speaker 3:We use the drug a lot. It's used all over the United States and, yes, it is used as a party drug, but so are a lot of other drugs like fentanyl, fentanyl is a very safe drug. We use it every day in the operating room. On the street not so much.
Speaker 1:Yeah, difference between getting something the right way and getting something the wrong way.
Speaker 3:Exactly, and like a lot of new things, um, ketamine gets a bad rap. Matthew perry has sort of brought it into the forefront again. It was improperly subscribed and given to him, prescribed and given to him and you know, he ended up with a fatal incident, yeah. So everybody sort of points a finger at ketamine. Well, alcohol can do the same thing. Yeah, you know, fentanyl can do the same thing. Any, any drug or substance that alters your respiratory pattern, your consciousness, you know, can have a fatal result.
Speaker 2:It's not the drug itself, it's he was not in a monitored state, correct? He was not like at the ketamine clinic.
Speaker 1:You are in a monitored room, you are you have somebody who's making sure that your heart is where it should be.
Speaker 2:He was in a hot tub correct.
Speaker 3:Right and he was taking hundreds and hundreds of milligrams which he had procured illegally from people that have consequently lost their medical licenses and gone to jail. And the reality is that the ketamine that we administer at the Ketamine Clinic of Spokane is a micro dose. It would be hard to hurt somebody with it. It's a tiny dose. There's no respiratory depression. We screen very carefully to make sure our patients are medically appropriate for treatment and we do fully monitor with heart rate, vital signs, pulse, oximetry. We have all the emergency equipment which we've never had to use. It's a very safe and really nice experience for most patients.
Speaker 1:When did they start using it for mental health? Was that straight from the beginning, or did that come later?
Speaker 3:No, it came later and I'm gonna say 20 or 25 years. But there's a lot of research on ketamine, but there's also a lot of research saying we need to do more research.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's how I feel every time I go to the doctor.
Speaker 3:Well, and a lot of medical providers believe no, no, no, this is too new, you can't have this this is out in the wild west, but people who are in the ketamine space, you know, feel that that is an inaccurate statement. There's people that have been treating patients with ketamine for the last 20, 25 years without any significant adverse effects.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because that's what's really important is being able to see the longterm.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:People are scared, Like when the vaccines and all this stuff like it's because no, there was no evidence of what could happen 10, 15, 20 years from now, but they have that now.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but I think we're also living in an unusual time where there is a lot of medical distrust.
Speaker 1:Yeah, living in an unusual time where there is a lot of medical distrust.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and there are a lot of they live there. Right and there's a lot of people that are flipping on things that have been very widely accepted, like vaccines. Vaccines are no good. Well, do you remember polio? Like that wasn't good, these measles, childhood illnesses.
Speaker 1:But we are living in a time with a lot of medical distrust and I think ketamine would absolutely fall underneath that umbrella cocaine, where they kind of lose the fact that like it actually helped a lot of people and served a lot of benefit and all that thing. So like again it goes to, if it's monitored and it's done correctly versus if you just take it. That's not the same thing. I think it's hard to cause.
Speaker 2:it is so personal, a personal journey for each person. It is very hard to measure someone's mental health before and after, like I feel, like the scientific, like I can tell you my experience with it, but there's not like a measure of like a blood test like here's before, here's after to prove as like some scientific test could be. It's on the end of it that it's helped me so much.
Speaker 2:It's something that I recommend to everyone to try for your mental health. It has alleviated any sort of medications for me being chained to medications mental health medications. My end of it is I see that big pharma may not like it so much because it does end up fixing you where you don't need to be hooked into a million other things that you try for six months and six months and six months and maybe get it right. Maybe not.
Speaker 1:Well, I think that brings up a good point of like can everybody have it? Like, what type of restriction is around this type of treatment?
Speaker 3:No, everybody can't have it. We screen really carefully. People with coronary artery disease that's not stable can't be treated. People with uncontrolled hypertension can't be treated. You know people you know that have morbid obesity. That won't fit in our chair can't be treated. So we look at every chart that comes through. All of our patients are referred by either their own family practice doctor through. All of our patients are referred by either their own family practice doctor anybody who has the authority to diagnose can send us a referral. So unfortunately not a therapist but a psychologist or psychiatrist. And we also get a medical doctor's chart note and we review their complete medical history to make sure they're appropriate for treatment.
Speaker 3:As far as mental illness or mental disease, we don't treat people with schizophrenia. If people are manic, depressive, we are real careful to stay away from ketamine when they're in a manic phase. So we are not mental health providers. We don't claim to be, but we do take all of these things very closely under consideration. We've been doing it for seven years and we haven't had any bad outcomes. We're pretty careful with who we look at for ketamine. Well, that's good to know.
Speaker 2:And I guess my only experience has been at the mental health side. But I know there is a for pain to chronic pain, which Lacey has actually been referred for that because she experiences chronic pain.
Speaker 1:And yeah, well, and I got the complex PTSD.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, there's that too. I just I went over that part. There's just both.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's both sides of the coin, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, ketamine we, like I mentioned before, we use it in the operating room during longer procedures to help with postoperative pain and we do administer ketamine in our clinic for people with chronic pain, any neuropathically mediated pain, chronic migraines, things that they've tried multiple modalities and aren't able to be helped. Ketamine can often come into play and people can have success with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I just found out, often come into play and people can have success with that. Yeah, because I just found out. So I went on Friday and I got cortisone, lidocaine shots in my neck and shoulder.
Speaker 1:And then they determined that apparently my headaches are actually migraines. And now they're trying to get me to do Botox. And that's like another 31 shots and I'm like is this going to fix my pain? And they're like, oh well, we don't know that part. I'm like why do I keep doing all of these things? It is really unfortunate, I feel like.
Speaker 3:I'm not getting anywhere. It's unfortunate and these are the hoops that people have to jump through and you know we ourselves can't make any promises. Some people feel a lot better and are helped and some people not so much. That's the reality of it. We're all individuals. Ketamine is a very gray area. It's not black and white, and we've had some amazing successes and we've also had some people that just didn't feel like they got a whole lot of traction from treatment.
Speaker 2:Which could be any treatment though that is any treatment because there's nothing that covers every single person. So it's just finding what works best for you.
Speaker 1:Which I think is what's so important, and I think there's a lot of barriers to people being able to do that within the mental health industry because it's so hard to get things covered. It's so hard to find people because the need so much outweighs what's available to people.
Speaker 2:But it's not hard to get prescribed any antidepressants or anything like that.
Speaker 1:I have bags. I literally have bags of tried and failed medications because I'm like eventually, someday I'm going to have to prove it.
Speaker 2:So basically you're saying you're just going to go ahead and try the ketamine clinic.
Speaker 1:That's what you're next, I keep telling you I'm like I keep telling you Right, all right, let's not something that's like blanket covered by insurance.
Speaker 3:And I wouldn't, I wouldn't say that's necessarily accurate. I would say that insurance companies are just very remiss in covering a lot of things in general, even things that are well accepted, and there's a nonsensical element to it because you know, we can keep somebody safe from suicidal thoughts with ketamine, but they won't pay for that. But they will pay for a hospital admission in a 14-day inpatient stay and electroconvulsive shock therapy, which is pretty effective.
Speaker 3:But extensive and dangerous and I'm not entirely certain why that is. I know that FDA approval is politics and money and the ketamine that we use is, like I said, a very old drug. It's off patent. There's no money there. No one's going to make any money patented. Janssen did create S-ketamine, the nasal spray. They did patent half of the molecule and released that as a nasal spray for depression and it is paid for by insurance. It's also prohibitively expensive and it is a set dose of either 16 or 32 milligrams. So, interestingly enough, janssen rolled out that drug to sort of take away business from ketamine clinics. But what it did was it gave people a glimmering of oh, I maybe feel a little better. And so the intravenous racemic ketamine is 100% bioavailable. It all goes into the body and that's the most benefit. There are other ways it can be administered, but the bioavailability isn't as good.
Speaker 1:If you're squirting it up your nose it might have a it's only based off of what you absorb, right it's?
Speaker 3:based off what you absorb. You could have congestion or you could have cold, or you could spray it the wrong way and then it's gone. It's just one spray and then it is discarded. So I'm not sure what insurance companies are thinking. Ketamine is not expensive. Many people obviously want to claim it on their insurance.
Speaker 3:We do provide super bills free of charge and some people get a little money back. Some people get no money back. Some people it goes to their deductible. What's a super bill? A super bill is a special medically coded bill that we will provide and that is the type of bill that insurance companies will look at and reimburse based on your diagnosis codes and our treatment codes. And if you want to get money back from insurance, you would need to have a super bill. You can't just provide them with a receipt. They don't usually reimburse on that Gotcha. So we've been doing that for a long time and we've had a whole variety of. Some people were 100% covered. Some people, you know, got $75 back, some people got 150. It's it's been real difficult. Some offices do bill insurance. You're like I read on the internet someone got it all paid for. But a lot of times they are ketamine clinics that are operated by mental health providers. So what they're billing for is an office visit. They're not billing for ketamine infusion therapy.
Speaker 1:That makes sense.
Speaker 2:I did want to touch on the bioavailability of the different, because I have tried the different routes. So I started at the Spokane K and Clinic, went over to the Ames Institute and did an intermuscular. I felt like the journey um, it was not the same.
Speaker 3:I'm going to, I'm going to stop you right there and I'm going to give you our analogy. The intramuscular is like the difference between flying on an airplane where you have a nice smooth takeoff you're in the air for a while and you land and a helicopter, because you get that shot and then you're up.
Speaker 1:And it's not gradual at all.
Speaker 3:We do not do that. We do not like it. We do not like the effect that we see that it has on people. We've never done it. We've had people that have come to our clinic and have received IM at other places and we convert them to intravenous and they're like oh yeah, I get it.
Speaker 2:Yes, it does. That was the only and I started there, thankfully, because who knows if I would have continued. It was just a deeper search. I thought I would go a little bit more and I always came back. I would see my PTSD specialist and then get would get infusion infusions at the ketamine clinic and I stopped doing that with her she also they did prescribe the trochees, the at home lozenges. Those are disgusting. I felt like they did not work. Also, it is very hard to have a correct set and setting in your home If you have children or anybody else.
Speaker 1:I just the setting is yeah, I feel like the setting has to be. Yes, what you've been with me before. The set and setting is so important. Yeah, I feel like the setting has to be important.
Speaker 2:Yes, which you've been with me before You've taken me to an infusion and it's the perfect set and setting so you're able to get into your journey.
Speaker 3:I feel like the trochies, they have a place. We do not prescribe because we do not have the type of physician-patient relationship that would allow us to feel comfortable to prescribe at-home use. But for people who really struggle with suicidal ideation, I feel like the trochees are a real valuable tool in preventing suicide. Because if someone has been seen at the clinic and they're doing very well and say, for example, they come every couple of months and then they have a breakthrough of you know, severe suicidal ideation or thoughts, if they had something that they could take to stop that, whether it would be a nasal spray or a trochee under the tongue, I think that would be very valuable.
Speaker 1:But again, it's almost like taking an aspirin during a heart attack.
Speaker 3:potentially, but again, I think that you know people who prescribe for home use need to be very careful. I know a lot of the companies, for instance Joyful, who only do prescribing for home use, have fallen maybe into some closer scrutiny and criticism because you don't really know what people are doing with that. They could all be, they could be hoarding it all, they could be selling it, they could be doing anything with it.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, I found the most benefits with the infusions at the spokane ketamine clinic.
Speaker 1:I feel the best I can't believe I'm going to say this out loud, but like I feel like I've had like the suicide thoughts for so long that it would be weirder for them to be gone, because I have absolutely no intention of ever like acting on them.
Speaker 3:But it's very common for me to like get in a car and be like I could just like you know people, people say I feel like that's really common people say some really interesting things about that, about the loss of obsessive, compulsive thoughts and the loss of suicidal ideation, and they make comments like I have so much extra time on my hands now that I don't have to think about this the noise, the mental, the mental noise being able to calm that.
Speaker 2:That's one thing that I do notice, as it's time for me to get a booster, things like that. The mental noise kind of comes back and it's harder to combat.
Speaker 3:So you said the word booster and I'm sure people are confused about that.
Speaker 3:We have a certain protocol that we like to follow.
Speaker 3:So when people come to our clinic we give them what's called a loading dose and that is six infusions sometimes eight for people who don't respond as well over a two to three week period and that sort of saturates the receptors.
Speaker 3:It causes the surge of glutamate and usually within about two weeks of your last infusion we'll kind of see if people are starting to feel better. Then we like them to come back for one more infusion in four to six weeks just to kind of keep them where they're at, and then we let people go and people come back once a month, once every two months. Some people come back before the holidays, some people come back before they perceive a stressful event, some people come back before right when they start to feel their moods slipping, as you said, and that is called a booster infusion and people are all over the board with what they like to do and we're very supportive of that. People will just call or text our office manager scheduler and get signed up for an infusion and we have people that have been coming to us for years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's been. It's been amazing. It's not just like a. I mean, maybe some have you had anyone that just ended and didn't need.
Speaker 3:I guess it's a varying scale, right, everyone's very individual we have had a couple people that have been pushed into remission, and those are that we. We absolutely know about because they followed up with us. Some people we don't see them anymore and we don't know if it became cost prohibitive, the if they didn't see a benefit, if the scheduling was too complicated, Sure.
Speaker 2:So um scheduling is very easy. I do have to say you guys make it so easy and nice and for someone who struggled with anxiety and PTSD um being able to text and schedule, it was so calming and peaceful.
Speaker 1:I won't go to a doctor that I can't schedule without having to talk to a person.
Speaker 2:They're amazing. No one likes making phone calls, no, and why is that such an anxiety? I get panic, full panic.
Speaker 1:Okay, because when we were kids, I feel like we loved being on the phone Like the actual phone.
Speaker 2:We did no not you.
Speaker 3:We took it into the closet.
Speaker 2:Yes, I know, now it's like I don't want it to ring ever I'm very much like I don't want to bother people.
Speaker 3:We're just too. We're too bombarded by all the external stimuli we don't need anymore that's so true.
Speaker 3:You just need a second of calm and it's good the ability but your case is really interesting because you had severe PTSD and we do see a lot of those patients and, to be frank, there aren't a lot of things that really treat PTSD. No, you can numb with a benzo, you can have a lot of therapy, but depending on what it is you've experienced, you may or may not let your therapist in fully. You may or may not let your therapist in fully. We have a really great self-protective mechanism that that really doesn't like to talk about a lot of things that have happened. So, for people who have suicidal thoughts that are not related to depression, which we see, and people with really severe PTSD, it's remarkably effective. Remarkably effective.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's the part that honestly like yes, my pain sucks, but like I would like my brain to feel better.
Speaker 2:So you're going to make an appointment, right? Didn't we already talk about this? You're biting the bullet and doing it.
Speaker 1:I'm working it out. Yes, okay, good.
Speaker 2:Trying Stay tuned on future episodes of her lazy journey.
Speaker 1:I just need the rest of the world to calm down a little bit.
Speaker 2:It will. There's no good time. You just got to go in. I know that's the thing too.
Speaker 1:There is no good time. It's like having kids you can't plan for it.
Speaker 2:No, you just have to. And for someone who's been through it, just do it. It makes such a difference and it is one of the.
Speaker 1:It's just very personal and Well, and I do feel like I've tried everything, I've done the talk therapy. I've done EMDR.
Speaker 2:You've done medications. I've done all the medications.
Speaker 1:I don't want to be on pills the rest of my life. I refuse to do that. I mean unless I absolutely have to Like tried and true. If I have to take it, I will take it.
Speaker 2:But I don't want to.
Speaker 1:I'd rather be in pain than be on pills.
Speaker 3:So done physical therapy, I do chiropractor, I get deep tissue massages you could I try everything you've just not tried one thing the one thing that we're here to talk I'm working on it I do think I do think I need it.
Speaker 1:I. I was recommended.
Speaker 2:I talked to a psychologist and he was like, yeah, this I think it would be good to have another point of view as well, because people know my story and how it's helped me.
Speaker 1:But, like you, kind of do it for the podcast, do it for the podcast do it for the podcast.
Speaker 2:Oh, we share everything anyways right um with the cost there is. Besides self-pay super bill, there's care credit, correct is that kind of people can do that as well.
Speaker 3:So another option we've actually never had anybody use that okay, so that is an option in case people. People have borrowed money from their parents. Um, it actually people. People find a way when you, when you think about you, know how expensive life is and how exactly everything is it's. It's a relatively low cost it's less than 500 for anusion.
Speaker 3:We do offer pretty generous discounts for first responders anyone who's been in the military, police or fire because we really care about those individuals and we really recognize the types of things that they go through in their everyday work For sure. So we try to make it happen any way that we can. Yeah, awesome.
Speaker 2:That's I don't know where. We just started scrolling, sorry. Long term benefits we we've kind of discussed long term benefits.
Speaker 3:It's another one of those gray areas you can, areas you can go to Google, Scholar or wherever you look for your scientific information and try to find current research. A lot of the research cites old research. A lot of the research says, yeah, we think this is great and this is new and up and coming, which it isn't really, which it isn't really. Some people, like I said, go into remission or they in general start to feel better. Depression is multifactorial. If a person is severely depressed, they might not be able to get up and take a shower and participate in activities of daily living. If ketamine got them out the door and got them showering, potentially they could start doing other things that helped lift their depression.
Speaker 3:It is not a silver bullet for everybody. We've had a couple kids that we treated that lived in their parents' basements. They had no exposure to sunlight, they had no physical activity, they played video games 20 hours out of the day and ate junk food, Like there was just nothing we could do with them. We gave them the ketamine but it didn't. It couldn't override their whole you know, living and family system. You need to, you know. Think about your thyroid, think about your heredity, think about activity, think about alcohol consumption, think about sleep For depression. It's a whole dynamic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, vitamin D is so important. Yes, and getting.
Speaker 2:I felt like ketamine helped me want to take care of myself again. After Luke passed away, there was the point where I didn't want to brush my teeth. We talked about that, which ultimately got me committed for 24 hours, but it made me want to start running and taking care of myself again and ultimately I quit numbing with alcohol. And so it's been like four years now of sobriety and I feel like the ketamine kicked that off.
Speaker 3:Humans are really, really good at numbing behaviors. Um, and we've talked about PTSD and maybe we should touch on childhood trauma. Childhood trauma can be really subtle. It doesn't have to be dramatic or painful. But when we don't want to think about or live through childhood trauma, we numb, and we do it in so many different ways with overeating, with alcohol, with different substances.
Speaker 1:And it's real Human beings are very clever, we'll do just about anything to, so I don't remember a lot before I was 14.
Speaker 3:And so you dissociate.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm just like I still does that.
Speaker 2:She claims bad memory, but it's like it's just, you're really good, I don't remember anything.
Speaker 1:I really don't like my sister remembers everything, and so the only stuff that I really don't Like my sister remembers everything, and so the only stuff that I really know about my own childhood is stuff that other people have told me. I just do not remember Some people are just really sensitive.
Speaker 3:Some people are just really emotionally sensitive and the world just hits them a different way.
Speaker 1:And I'm like well, maybe it's protecting me, Maybe we shouldn't mess with that.
Speaker 2:Let's let it not remember? Let the ketamine help you, let it out. I think as children we also, we do forget things, but we just continue on and shove things down and you still feel it mass, even if you don't like. You don't know what it is.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I feel like there's a really wonderful book called the body keeps the score.
Speaker 2:I've read it several times now and. I keep telling her maybe this is where your chronic pain is coming from.
Speaker 3:I think it's important and I think it's true If you don't have a documented injury and you have chronic pain. It is your brain. Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2:I'm not actually poking you right now. I'm just saying. I've told you this so many times.
Speaker 1:I know even I'm to the point now where, like I mean, I have all these diagnosis up around stress and things like that. It shuts my whole body down for days and there's no other reason than like stress because you're not even the chiropractors like this has to be more than just physical at this point and I'm like that's not your field and he's like I know there's some reason why you won't read this book that I keep giving you.
Speaker 3:It's a wonderful book. I struggle with self-help.
Speaker 2:I've read it several times and keep finding new pieces and it made me actually picked it up as I was going through my ketamine journey and I was reading it and it made me feel not crazy.
Speaker 3:I need to revisit it again.
Speaker 2:I've read it twice, twice, but it's been a little while. It's so good, it makes me, it made me feel so seen.
Speaker 3:There was parts where I'm like okay, this is not just me, and exactly I'm not alone.
Speaker 1:I'm not alone the first doctor who acknowledged that my pain was real. I cried for 20 minutes in his office and I was like I'm so sorry, but like your first person, that was like yeah, no, no, I can tell. And I was like oh, my God, I love you so much. That's awesome. Small validations.
Speaker 2:Where is the future of ketamine treatment going? I know I just saw something. I got an email from MAPS. There is ketamine and MDMA assisted therapy. Now Did I see that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so people have been researching that. Yeah, so people have been researching that, and I want to say the latest thing that I researched was that ketamine infusions standalone compared to ketamine infusions with a post-therapeutic interaction, there wasn't really much difference in outcome. Personally, we believe that having a therapeutic relationship is a really important part of the process, and one patient that came to us very, very harmed physically and mentally by PTSD. She had a therapeutic intervention the day after every infusion. We feel that there's about a 48-hour window where that ego is suppressed and you can make a lot of headway. And she did amazingly was able to go ahead and prosecute her abuser, which she had never felt able to do regained her physical strength.
Speaker 1:Put your walls down or something.
Speaker 3:Yes, like your ego is always going in the background and it's telling you everything that you don't want to hear. Your ego is telling you like I don't look right, I don't fit in. You don't want to hear. Your ego is telling you like I don't look right, I don't fit in, I don't have any friends, people don't love me, and one of the things that ketamine does in the dissociative space is it just suppresses that voice and you feel loved and you feel included and you feel that you're one with humanity. It just takes away that negative voice that continually goes, goes on, whether we're conscious of it or not. So it's a very powerful tool for that. People have articulated to me that one therapeutic session after ketamine they made, you know, six months worth of progress because they weren't. You know we, we have therapy, but we don't tell our therapist everything.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, I lied to my therapist and then I'm like this is why I'm in therapy. The one person.
Speaker 2:I would have my PTSD specialist. I would see her the day after I would get my ketamine infusion, and those were the best and I feel like the only smart the only true, because I'm really good at masking and everything is always fine.
Speaker 1:I left a therapist because she tried to make me talk about something I wasn't ready for and I was like I'm just not going to go to therapy.
Speaker 2:I didn't like that's how much.
Speaker 1:I have walls. I didn't tell my therapist something.
Speaker 3:And then I told her and she goes why didn't you tell me that? And I said well, because I thought you would judge me. Yes, and she's like that's not what I'm here for. I'm like okay, I feel that to my core though. Yes, I did. I didn't want to be judged, yeah. So ketamine is very valuable for that. Yeah, it's very valuable for letting the walls down, letting us process things, ego death.
Speaker 1:I would be so interested to see what I would be willing to say.
Speaker 2:I feel like I was able to talk about the accident with Luke yeah.
Speaker 1:I watched it. That's the thing for me. I feel like I have a unique perspective because I watched you heal.
Speaker 3:But to talk about the accident without the sympathetic surge and the trauma. Some people with PTSD I don't want people out there listening to be afraid that they have to go back to the event but some people do revisit the event, but as a bystander and and all the emotion that you felt you didn't feel safe after you weren't able to go somewhere after traumatic event and be you know, be comforted and held that emotion is missing when you have the ketamine experience and that's the whole dissociative. Our minds and our bodies aren't connected. You don't have the racing heart and the sweating. You're just like oh wow, this happened, that was terrible, let's move on.
Speaker 1:So you can process it without your emotions getting in the way. That's the whole thing is helping to process trauma, but in a non you know terrifying way. I think she's thinking my emotions is the part that I struggle with.
Speaker 2:Sure, I like to say it's okay, you have your emotion. Everything is blaring right in front of you. Right, you have the ketamine. All of a sudden, it's through a very dirty window. So there's a lot of a sudden it's through a very dirty window. So there's a lot of separation and it's easier to deal with.
Speaker 3:That's a great way to describe it. Yeah, you're not a part of it. It's happening, but you're not a part of it.
Speaker 2:Huh, okay, we'll get you scheduled here in a little bit.
Speaker 3:I do think I need it. I just I'm like I don't know it's.
Speaker 2:It's a lot it is. It's a leap of faith. Also will your entire life change and you will no longer be like and here's, here's, another perspective.
Speaker 3:That's a crazy thought too. So we had a patient come in I'm not funny anymore. Oh, you'll be funny, you'll be funny. We had a patient come in that and he just happened to stop by the office and we never we never see that, we're by appointment only and he came in and asked some questions and left, and then he scheduled a year later and I happened to do his first treatment. I remembered him and I said why didn't you, why didn't you come before, after we visited? And he said Because, even though I hadn't tried ketamine, I had the hope that it would work and it was the last thing and I knew that if I tried it and it didn't work, I would kill myself Like he knew that.
Speaker 3:But he thought as long as there's something out there that I can hope for, there's a reason that I can keep living. And his treatment was amazingly successful. He went ahead to get married. He had articulated before that he said I'm never going to get married because I'm going to kill myself and I want to do that to my wife. And it just he. Finally he. It's a leap of faith. It's a huge leap of faith.
Speaker 1:I know I'm going to cry. No, it's because I get it I can't be in pain. The rest of the month I can't do 40 years of this but the idea that there's something out there that could help you.
Speaker 3:You're afraid to try it, because if it doesn't work, then what then? What? So back to your question, the future of ketamine. I don't know. I don't know if mdma will take over, if psilocybin will take over, if insurance companies will start doing it regularly, if emergency rooms will start treating suicidal people with ketamine infusions instead of leaving them in the ER for two days and sending them up to psych. I don't know. We have been open for seven years and we're not the first, so clearly there's some longevity to it. Obviously, people are getting benefits. We have pretty solid Google reviews. We've helped a lot of people.
Speaker 2:I think the word just needs to get out more. I think because it's so word of mouth right now, because I had no idea about it till it was I wouldn't have known. An EMT friend told me about it and then I've just been telling people about it, trying to share my story and get it out there. I don't feel like um mainstay.
Speaker 3:there's a little more now than there was, but I feel like it's just not discussed and I don't but talking addressing what you've just said. There's a little more now. I saw a dentist office that was offering ketamine.
Speaker 2:That's a crazy though to me. I've seen some of that, but then it's kind of like why are dentists?
Speaker 1:doing everything, though, because they're offering botox now they're doing all like. I'm all you work on teeth.
Speaker 3:I'm all for expansion of practice I mean I, I do anesthesia for people, so I'm also stepping out of my lane, but the setting and how we care for people, yes, is next level I've watched a youtube video online before I came to the ketamine clinic because I wanted to see what I was getting involved with.
Speaker 2:There was a guy that was just put in a room on the ground with a blanket and I was like that's not.
Speaker 3:There's people that are in open spaces with curtains, and so at the ketamine clinic, each person has their own private room.
Speaker 2:We have a recliner weighted blanket aromatherapy and wonderful Tina's there and everybody else there is so amazing. We have a private room, we have a recliner, weighted blanket, aromatherapy and wonderful Tina's there and everybody else there is so amazing and caring and we do and we have relationships, the vibe and the energy.
Speaker 3:With our patients. We've had relationships with some of them for many years and we watch them on a camera. We don't record, but we watch their vital signs. We watch for any signs of upset or agitation. We go in and we put our hands on people and we ground them and we bear witness to their suffering and we care deeply for our patients yeah, it is like walking into because you have so much anxiety going in, especially like the first time, if you don't know what you're doing but just opening the door and walking in, it's like you feel the calming presence.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like it's okay setting is so important.
Speaker 1:It's just like okay, let's say you're shrooming your setting matters right. You can have a bad trip, or a good trip, depending on your environment.
Speaker 3:So it affects, especially when you're going into like a subconscious state like that, like whatever is around you is gonna affect what you think about I guess I would hope for the future that more governing bodies, shall we say, are are open to ketamine and psychedelic therapy and, and you know, allowing people and empowering them even to to choose their own journeys in a safe manner. Yeah, and it would be great if insurance started paying for it. I'm not sure that will happen. I know that there's a task force now with the ASKP the American Society of Ketamine Providers as a task force that is working on insurance reimbursement.
Speaker 2:See, I think that'd be great getting it into the hands of more people, because I think some of the cost is just what keeps people out. I know it's kept me out a little bit recently with like booster situations, just because kids you know mental health in general needs to be better funded in this country period I just want to say the price far outweigh. I mean, it's so worth every single penny. It's life changing and that's I.
Speaker 1:It works, it's worth it.
Speaker 2:It's a very small cost in the grand scheme of.
Speaker 1:Well, I was like 2023. I spent seventeen thousand dollars out of pocket on my medical.
Speaker 2:That's. That's bad on you.
Speaker 1:You could have gone to, and it wasn't, it wasn't successful and it was not successful, it was not successful. I just have bags.
Speaker 2:Of Think about if you had $2,500, and then you would have had so much relief, even 10% relief, which is you would have more than that, but even just 10%.
Speaker 3:I know and it's also disappointing and this is a little off track that more of the mental health providers don't offer genetic testing.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:That should be the first thing that's done, so you can understand which which, if you're a rheumatologist, if ssris aren't going to work, then why are we wasting six weeks on each?
Speaker 2:yes, okay so this was after luke passed away. My primary care, who I've seen forever, was so quick to throw all the pills, the xanax the sleeping medications, the I don't know. There was like four or five different antidepressants, anti anti-anxieties, but was unwilling to hear me out for ketamine treatment or anything else. Just take the Xanax, take the things, and he would be fine prescribing those forever. That would have left me in the most horrible state.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I could have. But family practice physicians, although doing an amazing job, do not need to gatekeep, because sending a referral is not an assumption of responsibility no, they don't need to gatekeep. They just need to send the referral and we will take care of it. If the patient is not appropriate, we won't treat them, but the liability for the infusion itself lies on our shoulders and that's why we're extremely careful, yeah, with who and how we treat yes, you are.
Speaker 2:You are, there's a process, it's not just calling and setting an appointment.
Speaker 3:So I'm not sure why the need to gatekeep.
Speaker 2:I think he told me there wasn't enough research at the time and I wanted to be like but you're going to tell me to take this for six months and then maybe we'll take something else and in the meantime, be a zombie. I just remember being very much like.
Speaker 1:Here's my experience with people in the meantime be a zombie. I just remember being very much like. Here's my experience with people in the medical field is like when they first meet me, they get excited because I'm a challenge and they're cocky and they're like I'm going to fix you or I'm going to figure it out.
Speaker 2:It's funny because she also works in health care on the prescription end. So it's.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it doesn't benefit me at all, zero percent. But then they can't figure it out relatively quickly and then they just give up, and then they no longer care about me. And now they don't like me because I was something that they failed. And then they send me to a new provider.
Speaker 3:That's unfortunate and it's painful. It's frustrating.
Speaker 2:Yes, I see that. I did want to know what inspired you to become involved in ketamine and because I can tell your passion and your heart is in it and you care so deeply and I was. I believe the universe works in ways and you were one of the very first ones that I'd seen.
Speaker 2:I think you might have been my very first infusionist I think, I was and it just set the tone for everything and I've continued to be connected with you and just such a blessing. So I know your heart and your passion is in it. So what led you to this?
Speaker 3:I had someone that I really cared about that had treatment-resistant depression and had tried multiple drugs, had had suicidal thoughts, and I felt just heartbroken for them and I wanted to help them. Just so I went down the rabbit hole like everybody else. And then I saw ketamine and I'm like, how do I not know about this? I give ketamine every day in the operating room. How do I not know that it has this effect on depression? And dug a little deeper and found a gal named Nicole who lives in Boise and she is also a nurse anesthetist, and she had just opened a clinic. So she was a person that gave me a lot of information and just helped me get started and I basically wanted to start the clinic for this one person who ultimately decided that that was not something that they were interested in oh no.
Speaker 1:That was a twist it was a bad twist.
Speaker 3:I was so proudly all wrapped up in a bow. Here you are and they're like. I don't want anything to do with that.
Speaker 2:Look at all the people you've helped now.
Speaker 3:It's perfect. And Josh is my business partner and he was sort of learning about it, almost along a parallel lines to what I was, and he was like, hey, what about a ketamine clinic? I'm like, dude, I'm already there, like I've already, you know, been doing the research, so let's, let's get started. Yeah, it's been a beautiful thing and it is. We all work for money and the money's great, but having some work that feeds your soul is very cool also.
Speaker 2:And you can tell that your heart is in it. And again, you just have to, if it's something that's calling to you, reach out to the Spokane Ketamine Clinic. I am going to link everything in the show notes and I'm going to figure it out, I'm going to send it. I'll send it for you. I'll make the text for you. Is there anything else that you'd like to share that we haven't covered yet?
Speaker 3:You know I don't think so. Just that you know people don't need to be afraid of this. This is a very safe drug and it is a micro dose, and there is bad publicity about everything Everything.
Speaker 2:And people abuse everything. People abuse everything that you can. Yes, abuse everything. People abuse everything that you can. Yes, energy, drinks, sugar, all the things. So every everything will have um, but from my experience, it's only been amazing. From everyone that I've referred, they've only had amazing experiences, and lacy's gonna have an amazing experience awesome.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you so much, heather, for having me. I really appreciate it, thank you so much and thank you for coming in.
Speaker 1:This was was really helpful.
Speaker 2:It was so good and you cried.
Speaker 1:I know, don't tell my therapist. Till next time, guys. Bye.
Speaker 2:Bye.