An afterthought: On the other hand a solid trip could be just what he needs. I'm so torn on this.

Hey Glitch,

Being recovered alcoholic/opiate addict I'd be happy to share my opinion with you. As I don't know your brother or the full extent of his addiction, generally speaking, I think the last thing an addict needs is a psychedelic trip fresh out of any kind of recovery program. When you come out of rehab its like learning how to live again. Being sober is a scary and unfamiliar thing to the mind of an addict -- having minimal coping mechanisms to deal with the oddities and stresses of life it makes you want to use anything you can get your hands on. It sounds like the choice to be sober wasn't his based on the troubles with the law as well and attitude is everything. Psyches can be a powerful teacher and healer for struggles with addiction but proper set and setting are important, especially internal setting.

Though a healing from the mushrooms might be what he needs as an aid in finding the source of his need to drink or use drugs in the long run, immediately after rehab doesn't sound like the best idea to me. If it's out of your power to keep him from doing it (if possible don't give him the mush, or have someone close to you help intervene..), then I would be with him and make sure he's alright during the trip. After just coming clean off of drugs and alcohol he's bound to be out of balance physiologically, psychologically, and emotionally to some extent.

On the other hand, taking a dose strong enough may be the jolt he needs to bring him to realization about his behavior and internal state. If you have the choice, try to get him to wait at least a little while after getting out. Convince him that it will be better if he wait and puts some real thought and intention behind it. He may not listen but its worth a shot.

The best advice I can give you is to come at every situation with love for him, because any time an addict is told what to do or that what he's doing is wrong he will react defensively. Anyways, good luck to you friend. I hope this helps, just my opinion as I've had many years of experience being an addict, spending time with them, and helping them heal. Psychedelic use, both irresponsible and ceremonial, have been a huge part of my path to breaking free from the chains of addiction (though now I will only use these teachers respectfully and ritualistically). I had to have some extreme experiences, both good and bad, to finally realize what I was doing. I made many extremely dangerous and irresponsible decisions that played a part in many aspects of my life, but I came out OK. Sometimes people have to walk a rocky path in order to realize their true selves. Whatever happens, chances are he is going to be alright and so are you!

Peace!

Mushrooms wont wreck his brain or his psyche.... But they also dont sound like the best choice right out of treatment.

Also, not sure what his intention with mushrooms is.... If he plans on just having fun and getting high, then it is definitely a horrible idea for him. Would just be the first step back towards dependency. If his intention is healing... Maybe he would get lucky and it would help, or maybe he would trade one substance abuse for another.... Really tricky for someone addicted to drugs to self-treat themselves with another type of drug.

Mushrooms can be really helpful for addiction - in the right setting and with the right intention. But for an addict that might require some boundaries and structure that it doesnt sound like your brother really has. Mushrooms can be really insightful and healing... But they can also be easy to abuse.

I think best thing you can do is really talk to him a lot about this. Help him figure out his real intentions for wanting mushrooms, and maybe offer him some of your insights if you can. Communication at the very least wouldnt hurt, and it may help his steer clear of the mushrooms till he is better prepared, or if he eats mushrooms anyways - maybe it will help guide his intention and experience in a productive direction.

Thanks for the thoughtful replies. I visited him today. We talked about how treatment is going and his plans for the future. There does seem to be a little change in his attitude, but only time will tell how genuine it really is. His answer for why he wants to take mushrooms wasn't good, "to see what it's like. I've never done them before." So we talked about the ways that mushrooms might help or hurt him. It sounds like he now might be willing to wait until he gets a job and an apartment. Hopefully he will wait for me to be there rather than doing it with his old, questionable friends. It has the potential to be beneficial if his head is in the right place.

Most rehab treatment is not very effective sadly - often about 10-20% effective with the highest rated rehabs being about 30% effective at most. Only exception that has a higher then 30% success rating is Takiwasi in Peru which combines Ayahuasca treatment with regular rehab treatment and has a 70% success rating.

Hopefully he makes some new friends... I had a lot of addict friends and the only ones who generally got clean were ones that changed their entire social groups and stopped being with people who still use. Easy to slip back into old patterns with the people you use to use with....

Sounds hopeful though - I hope things go well.

Actually, Iboga has pretty impressive statistics too.

Yes - I just dont know of any studies or hard numbers about iboga success ratings - especially from specific groups. (might be out there, but I havent seen it)

BBC performed the study on Takiwasi. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/crossing_continents/3243277.stm

Lotsof (1995) stated opioid abstinence was:

29% @<2 mo
19% @>12mo

Although I'm sure I've seen better figures more recently somewhere...will look.

Those statistics are shockingly low compared to what one would guess from reading anecdotal reports. I guess it really isn't a magical bullet for addiction treatment...

Does anybody know the statistics for attempts at quitting with methadone/buprenorphine?

IMO i'd suggest you let him do what he will, just don't enable him. I wouldn't give such a person any psychedelic at that point; it's good to get a good stay in sobriety after rehab before taking another plunge

There's a 2012 Powerpoint/PDF over at MAPS.

From that:



Reading between the various lines, I think if people go back to the same scenes/situations, then they can fall back into addiction relatively quickly. Essentially, iboga's the 'easy' part (!!!) and escaping the circumstances which led to addiction is the hard part. The same can probably be said for any other detox therapy...

Yeah that makes sense. Do you have stats on methadone/buprenorphine treatment? I'm having a hard time finding concrete numbers here.

Hi, sorry but I don't, and I wouldn't know where to begin with methadone. There must be papers though?

https://en.wikipedia.org...clinic#cite_note-Maine-2

Wikipedia says that the relapse rate for methadone patients is around 80-90%, although the source cited is paywalled so I can't see it unfortunately.

EDIT:
Okay so I found the source but it seems kinda unreliable. It actually says 70-90%.

http://bangordailynews.c...s-them-and-society-best/