- I was experiencing severe depression and chronic leg pain and looking for a solution.
- After researching ketamine therapy, I gave it a try and found it worked for me.
- But the IV treatments became too expensive to maintain, so I switched to sublingual lozenges.
From July 2019 to December 2021, I had excruciating pain running down my leg due to pressure on my sciatic nerve. I couldn't sleep without weed — or, when the pain was beyond weed's capacities, opiates. I was often so nauseous from my leg feeling like it was on fire that I couldn't eat, and I spent most of 2020 drinking Ensure.
During the first 18 months of the pandemic, I lived with that pain while also running my own business for the first time — a stressful endeavor under normal circumstances and a practically heroic feat while the world was falling apart. In this time I also lost two family members to COVID-19. Stress kept piling up, and I was at the end of my rope.
I'd tried antidepressants in the past and didn't feel they were right for me
The pain was too excruciating, and I started to feel like if I couldn't get it under control I didn't want to be here anymore. My therapist suggested trying medication, but I was wary. I'd spent my teenage years trying many medications one right after the other, including Prozac, Lexapro, and Effexor, the latter of which almost killed me.
I was unaware that some SSRIs could make my suicidal ideation worse, which is, unfortunately, what I experienced with Effexor. In addition to uncomfortable side effects like constipation, sleepiness, and excessive sweating, these drugs made my depression even more difficult to handle.
The pain-management doctor I was seeing in Beverly Hills was next to a ketamine clinic, and after limping past the office for the millionth time, I decided to call. I'd done some research into ketamine and talked with friends who'd gone through their own treatment.
From what I'd heard, ketamine didn't seem to require the kind of "wait and see" ambiguity people can experience for months with SSRIs; you'd know within a few sessions whether it worked for you. That benefit outweighed my particular ketamine-related fear, which was having hallucinations.
In addition to hallucinations, the risks of ketamine include abdominal pain (sometimes called "K cramps"), seizures, and more. Some people who've used it frequently have described feeling addicted to it. It's important to talk to your healthcare practitioner about your own risks as well as vet ketamine providers before pursuing treatment.
I gave ketamine therapy a try
The first few sessions were uncomfortable. My face was covered with an N95 and an eye mask, and I felt a little claustrophobic. I'd been told that the clinic would start slowly as the clinicians figured out the right dose for me and that during this trial period I most likely wouldn't have an out-of-body experience.
For these sessions I was in the in-between: aware of my body but not completely anesthetized. It felt similar to the twilight state I'd experienced when I had laughing gas at the dentist. This was uncomfortable for me; I'd had a traumatic experience once during a root canal where I was "out of it" but could feel everything happening to me. Since then anything that feels like laughing gas has made me panic.
I spent those sessions writhing and groaning, desperate for them to be over. The person administering the ketamine and a close friend who drove me to the clinic assumed I was just expressing the grief ketamine often brought out of people. When I came to, I told them that that wasn't the case and that I was actually extremely uncomfortable. I debated whether I wanted to keep going.
My dose was gradually increased, and on the third trip I entered what's often called a k-hole. I was completely divorced from my pain-ridden body — the goal of intravenous sessions. I saw endless pitch black, as if I were deep in outer space. Some outside force said: "You want a place with zero stimuli, stressors, or responsibilities? Just silence? Here it is."
On the fourth trip I got a higher dose. I felt like I died and met God — in a good way.
It worked — but I learned I'd need occasional 'tune-ups'
By the end of my six sessions I mentally felt better. Though my physical pain had improved only slightly, I felt more accepting of it, and the depression lifted for roughly six months. I was told I'd probably need a one-off "tune-up" after that. The $600 tune-up session I scheduled half a year later was worth it, as it delivered continued relief as promised. But continuing to get these sessions was not financially sustainable.
But now that I knew how much I could benefit from ketamine therapy, I wanted to find a way to continue. I started seeing ads for at-home sublingual-ketamine companies online and wondered whether they could serve as a viable alternative to a pricey intravenous session. I signed up for an at-home ketamine-delivery service that would allow me to have four sessions for $250.
After meeting with one of the service's psychiatrists on Zoom and sharing which of my intravenous ketamine doses worked best for me, I was prescribed a sublingual amount. Within a week, a package arrived with the medicine, an eye mask, a blood-pressure monitor, ginger pills (to ease nausea), and a journal. That weekend I let one of the ketamine lozenges — a cherry-flavored disc with a waxy texture — dissolve in my cheek for 10 minutes before swallowing and lying in bed.
Since it wasn't directly injected into my bloodstream, the sublingual felt milder, but not as mild as the twilight-like state that recalled my laughing-gas trauma. Stress melted from my body as I enjoyed a guided meditation that came with the sessions, during which a soothing voice cued me to take the medicine and then, after an hour of binaural-beats-like music, told me my session was over.
While I didn't die and meet God, I had a wonderful, deeply relaxing meditation session that left me feeling hopeful and buoyant for a few days.
Whether the ketamine was administered intravenously or sublingually, my brain felt like it was working better after my sessions, as if someone had done a hard reset on my mental health. While these new medicines aren't for everyone, I feel like I've definitely found something that works for me.