06 - Interview With The Truth Fairy

04/16/22 • 52 min

PUNK Therapy | Psychedelic Underground Neural Kindness

Content Warning: Trauma and abuse memories

Dr. T interviews The Truth Fairy as part of his research and together they explore the value of somatic therapy as well as how a therapist must be prepared for the journey when combining somatic with psychedelics.

Dr. T presents The Truth Fairy with some questions he has developed as part of his research, questions she’s not heard ahead of time. What results is a conversation on what somatic means and its importance to the therapeutic process. The Truth Fairy explains the differences between right and left brain tendencies and how somatic healing seeks to tap into the more creative and connective abilities of the right brain.

Dr. T addresses the idea of the relational in therapy and the concept of “relationship over outcome” which leads to questions about including medicine in the work. The Truth Fairy relates experiential stories on how somatic therapy looks very different when working with psychedelics and lays out things the therapist must prepare for themselves and their client before embarking on that journey.

“The body is an extraordinary, complex organism with so many systems, organ systems, all working in synchrony and collaboration on the best of days and working out of synchrony and out of collaboration on more difficult days. We have history inside us.” The Truth Fairy

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Somatic therapy explanations and techniques

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Punk Therapy: website |email

Content Warning: Trauma and abuse memories

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Somatic therapy explanations and techniques

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Punk Therapy: website |email

Previous Episode

05 - Nine Perfect Strangers

Content Warning: Sensitive stories that include uninformed consent / sexual abuse

Spoiler Alert for ‘Nine Perfect Strangers’

Dr. T and The Truth Fairy discuss accuracies and controversies within the portrayal of microdosing on Hulu’s ‘Nine Perfect Strangers’ show.

With a nod to the fact that spoilers regarding the plot of ‘Nine Perfect Strangers’ are revealed in this episode, the character of the therapist Masha (Nicole Kidman) and the choices she makes regarding nondisclosure and microdosing with her clients at Tranquillum are under scrutiny and criticism from the psychedelic therapy community. While some things portrayed are not inaccurate, Dr T and The Truth Fairy discuss how Masha’s sense of urgency to rush the dosing and her decision not to inform her clients about the medicines she’s given them go against the best ideals of their practice.

The concept of informed consent is not abstract, rather it is the foundation from which therapy must proceed. The Truth Fairy reveals the potential dangers contained in urgency on the part of the therapist and in continuous dose increase. She and Dr T agree that careful preparation of clients is essential care, which Masha does not do. However, not everything rings untrue. They break down the facts and follies contained in the portrayal and share their own experienced-based best practices regarding psychedelic therapy.

“To bring serious trauma out of dissociation we have to be very very prepared on how we work with someone, how prepared they are to meet information, and we have to be so careful about how they meet their trauma.” - The Truth Fairy

Resources mentioned in this episode:

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Punk Therapy: website |email

Next Episode

07 - The Therapist and Substance

Content Warning: Trauma, fear, physical pain memories

Dr. T and The Truth Fairy discuss a book by Tim Read and Maria Papaspyrou called “Psychedelics and Psychotherapy: The Healing Potential of Expanded States”, and really dig into two chapters in particular. One of these chapters involves the topic of therapists and substance use in underground psychedelic work: should the therapist take medicine with the client, and if so how much and when?

They address chapter four of the book which involves the excluded and repressed unconscious and how integration, through therapy and medicine, can assist when the unconscious is carrying an immensity of experiences. The Truth Fairy shares insightful stories from her practice and Dr. T refers to what Jung called ‘the transcendent function’. This is a thoughtful and informative episode exploring a very wonderful book.

“I think that it really, as therapists doing psychedelic assisted therapy, I know that there, I'm sure there's some clinical situations where it's an absolute no-no for therapists to do the medicine, a booster dose. And I do think it has its rightful place. But if you're in a period that you're very sensitized, and there's a lot coming up for you, or you've done a lot of your own medicine work recently, and you are quite open and raw, and you're still integrating yourself, I think those are the times to be wise and perhaps hold off and not do any.” - The Truth Fairy

Resources mentioned in this episode: