Ketamine Couples Therapy in Denver CO
Soften into deeper connection
You and your partner are mired in a toxic pattern.
You’ve tried relationship therapy to work through some of the issues. It’s helped some, but you both still feel stuck in your defenses. Perhaps you’ve even been in and out of couples therapy for years and both feel like you can’t get out of your negative cycle. The one thing you can both agree on, is that something must change.
Every conversation ends in a fight, or someone storming away.
Rationally you want to listen openly to your partner to better understand them. When you get into the conversation though, your body becomes rigid and you can’t hold your tongue. Suddenly you’re talking over them and getting stuck in the same old fight. It escalates until one of you shuts down or walks away. You never address it again, instead you sweep it under the rug and move on. Except, you aren’t really moving on. You’re both building resentments. And the cycle starts again.
Besides avoiding any topics that may start a fight, you and your partner either avoid one another, or talk about the weather.
The conflict impacts other parts of your life as well. Your friends want to help, but you don’t want to burden them. You’ve even made some mistakes at work--mistakes that you wouldn’t have before.
Rediscover that tender love you once felt
I offer a cutting-edge and evidence-based approach to transforming your relationship through ketamine-assisted psychotherapy. Couples who have participated in ketamine couple therapy describe becoming more open to their feelings as well as more flexible in how they view their partner and the issues they encounter while in therapy.
“I felt open and floaty. The feelings of anger and blame softened so I could feel the deeper emotions of love and peace.”
-Ketamine couple therapy participant
*Not everyone is right for Ketamine-assisted therapy. If you have mania, schizophrenia, high blood pressure, are taking Benzodiazepines, or have other specific medical issues, ketamine may not be appropriate for you.
Ketamine couple therapy (KAP for couples) opens your mind, heart and soul to deeply transformative connection.
Ketamine couple therapy may help you:
Break free from harmful and engrained patterns
Increase openness between you and your partner(s)
Rediscover and nurture your relationship
Break down internal barriers so you can better feel your emotions and listen to your partner express theirs
Bring you a sense of love and belonging
Work through decades-old issues that keep resurfacing in your relationship(s)
Experience a lift in anxiety and depression for weeks or months afterwards
Tell me more about ketamine
Ketamine was FDA-approved in 1970 for use as an anesthetic. It is safe and effective and has been given to patients around the world billions of times. As long as used under medical supervision to patients who have been found medically sound, ketamine is considered to be a safe medication. It has been on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines for decades.
More recent research has shown that ketamine has significant antidepressant qualities which can help people with treatment-resistance depression. In fact, over 70% of research participants responded positively to the treatment, compared to their response to other antidepressant medications. Check out my ketamine resources page to learn more.
Couples and ketamine
Although not as well studied yet, couples who have undergone ketamine-assisted couple therapy share that they are much more open and available to have difficult conversations when under a light “psycholytic” dose (which allows for conversation) of ketamine. They feel softer, more tender toward their partner when discussing topics that usually cause them to blame or get defensive. Some couples who try ketamine therapy describe the ability to stay in usually painful experiences because the pain and judgment were gone. Ketamine with a trained therapist can support couples to reconnect and strengthen their secure attachment.
Ongoing integration work
After ketamine medicine sessions, couples will continue to work with me to take the lessons from the medicine back to everyday life. Ketamine causes a neuroplasticity or flexibility in the human brain, making the few days after ketamine ripe for re-learning how to be open and share emotions with one another again.
Ketamine is a tool that can jumpstart the healing process and help couples re-envision their relationship in a healthier place. It is also important to realize that you still have to put in the hard work. Once you can see there is a different way to interact, that’s when you and your partner need to do the work to keep that openness. Couples using ketamine during sessions will continue with non-medicine couple therapy to solidify the lessons and changes experienced under the medicine. Read more about what a ketamine journey can feel like here.
Reconnect with the feelings you had when you fell in love
How ketamine assisted therapy works
I received training that included my own ketamine experiences to support my clients using oral/sublingual ketamine in a therapeutic setting.
Following is a brief outline of my process. This process is flexible and we may stray from it, if appropriate. Depending on several factors you may undergo three to six KAP couple sessions over the course of a few months.
(1) Initiation
Begin couples sessions to determine if KAP is right for you and your relationship. We will also explore what the landscape of your relationship looks like. Where are you getting stuck? These are the areas we’ll focus on with ketamine.
(2) Consent
If ketamine seems like a fit, we’ll all collaborate on informed consent, intention setting, expectation exploration, and rapport building.
(3) Prescriber
You’ll both meet with a medical provider who will determine if you are medically fit to receive ketamine. I refer to Adam Sheely (http://theuntitledmind.com/) and Renee Rodgers (https://www.patientfusion.com/doctor/renee-rodgers-37892). The initial appointment with them runs between $350-$450 per person.
(4) The Medicine
You both fill your ketamine prescriptions at a compounding pharmacy.
(5) Co-creation
We all collaborate to create a safe journey space and a ritual that makes the most sense for you to enter the medicine and honor the healing space we co-create.
(6) The journey
Medicine sessions are two to three hours long. We’ll check in and do some grounding exercises in preparation. You’ll take the medicine and go on your 60- to 90-minute medicine journey with my guidance and music. Read my blog to better understand what the journey may entail. Since you’ll each be taking a lower dose than individual sessions, you will be able to talk and enter into the couple therapy process under the medicine. I will direct you both to work on something we’ve gotten stuck on during our regular sessions. In this way, ketamine couple therapy is more directive and less of an open-ended journey than individual KAP.
As you come down from the medicine, we’ll spend some time in the liminal space created and begin with some integration of the healing events from the medicine. Once complete, I’ll walk you to your transportation home.
(7) Integration
We will meet again within 48 hours of your medicine journey to incorporate what you experienced and process it using various integration techniques, including talk therapy, art, movement, journaling, and other methods. This is an ongoing process which takes place between sessions as well. We may process a journey for a few weeks before you go on another medicine journey. Depending on your situation, we may complete three to six medicine cycles over a few months time.
FAQs
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This is always a possibility—with any type of couple therapy. There is even a possibility that one or both of you won’t feel any affect from the medicine. These are topics we explore when discussing expectations and intentions in our early couple sessions.
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It really depends. I like to discuss the possibility of doing 3-6 sessions spaced out every few weeks, depending on the issue you are working on. As always this process is flexible and can be adjusted along the way. The effects of ketamine are said to build up over time, which is one of the reasons a series of several is recommended. Between medicine sessions we will continue to process previous sessions through integration methods.
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It is a dedicated space and time to ground the lessons and insights gained from a psychedelic journey into your “regular” waking life. We will take the feelings and ways that you both interacted under the medicine into everyday life. This phase of using psychedelic substances is the most essential step to reaping the benefits of these experiences.
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Ketamine is not meant to replace medications, but instead to boost their affects. You may indeed be able to decrease dosages, or even stop some medications. But this is not the goal of KAP. Because I do not prescribe medicine, this is a discussion for you and your prescriber to have.
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Many medications are ok to continue taking while undergoing ketamine sessions. This is best a conversation to have with the prescriber.
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For a limited time I will be charging double my hourly rate of $150 for a 2-3 hour session for a total of $300 per medicine session. I recommend we look at scheduling three to six sessions.
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It varies greatly. A small percentage of people do not have any reaction to ketamine, even with larger doses. For some it can feel warm and opening. For others, it can be an intense dive into another reality where there are no words to describe it. And each journey will be different. Your experience will be as unique as you are. Your inner healer knows what experience you need at the time. I will provide continuous support during the session no matter what comes up. Read more in my blog article: A Journey through Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP): What Does it Feel Like?
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This is a discussion to have with your medical provider. Usually we start a “dosing” session at a low dose to see how each person reacts to the medicine. It may take a few sessions to get the dose correct.