Psychedelics Gaining Traction as Potential Grief Therapy

Individuals and researchers are exploring psychedelics to process emotions at end of life.

Researchers have increasingly been exploring the use of psychedelics for anxiety at end of life — as well as to treat alcohol and drug disorders, depression, and PTSD. Now, the hallucinogenic substances have once again made headlines, thanks to Prince Harry’s admission that they assisted him to process his grief over his mother’s death.

In a 60 Minutes interview with Anderson Cooper, the Duke of Sussex revealed that he used psychedelics — including ayahuasca and psilocybin — to address his grief over the death of his mother, Princess Diana, in a car crash when he was just 12 years old. As he’d been unable to cry over her loss, Harry said he’d called up memories, or watched videos of his mother online, in an effort to produce tears. Then, he tried ayahuasca, a tea brewed from Amazonian plants that contains DMT, and psilocybin, the psychoactive component of magic mushrooms.

Psilocybin, the hallucinogenic component of magic mushrooms, is receiving increasing attention from researchers for therapeutic purposes.

“For me, they cleared the windscreen, the windshield, the misery of loss,” Harry told CBS. “They cleared away this idea that I had in my head that … I needed to cry to prove to my mother that I missed her. When in fact, all she wanted was for me to be happy.”

Researchers and individuals are increasingly acknowledging the role that psychedelics can play in processing grief and other difficult emotions around death and dying. For Prince Harry, they enabled him to stop demanding that he produce an expected reaction. For others, they open the space necessary for an emotional outlet. Research has shown that psilocybin reduces negative moods while boosting positivity.

The Food and Drug Administration has labelled psilocybin a “breakthrough therapy,” but has not yet approved the substance for use in the United States. Nevertheless, individual states are beginning to approve the regulated use of psilocybin. Meanwhile, ketamine is being administered off-label to treat major depression.

Psychedelics continue to be utilized therapeutically in extra-legal settings, as well. In an interview with SevenPonds, one practitioner shared how ayahuasca unexpectedly helped him to mourn his own mother’s death in childhood while “bawling my eyes out.”

Whether the tears flow, or not, such substances have aided various individuals to process the magnitude of their loss. And due to ongoing research, they will likely continue to gain greater acceptance in the medical community as a therapeutic tool to support difficult emotions at the end of life.