#18: Life After Ayahuasca with Laura Lockhart
“Not why the addiction, but why the pain?“
-Dr. Gabor Maté
The work of healing our trauma can be daunting, non-linear and complex. It is a path that conjures in us courage and resilience. On this episode, we have the honour of sharing an inspiring story of healing, transformation and wisdom. From an early age, Laura Lockhart has been struggling with mental health problems that included trauma, depression, panic attacks and multiple suicide attempts. Laura was diagnosed with so many disorders that many psychiatrists refused to take her on as a patient. Just when she thought she had exhausted all of her options, Laura met Dr. Gabor Maté, a world renowned author and trauma specialist. Dr. Maté believes that the mind and body cannot be separated and that disease is often an expression of deeper unresolved emotional stress. In 2014, Laura attended an Ayahuasca retreat with Dr. Maté and for the first time in her life, she was able to begin working with the deeper issues beneath her suffering. We hope you enjoy her story!
Laura is currently an intern psychotherapist in Toronto. She can be contacted at lauradlockhart@gmail.com
Highlights:
- Childhood Trauma and Suicidality
- Ayahuasca Retreat with Dr. Gabor Maté
- Working with Emotional Pain
Resources:
- Beyond Addiction, The Yogic Path to Recovery
- In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts, by Dr. Gabor Maté
- Nature of Things: The Jungle Prescription
- Landmark Forum
Listen:
Poem Inspired by This Episode
Full Transcripts
Thal
Welcome Laura to the show.
Laura Lockhart
Thank you for having me.
Thal
Thank you. Um, Laura, you know, I just, I’m very interested in transformative experiences and what that means in our lives. Um, maybe we can start with that. Like what was a transformative experience in your life?
Laura Lockhart
Okay, so a transformative experience in my life. Um, that would have to be my journey with Ayahuasca. So I had been severely depressed and um, panic attacks and a whole gamut of diagnoses from different psychiatrists. Um, doctor after doctor, couldn’t get the help that I needed treatment program after treatment program and I remained this emotionally disregulated, anxious, depressed person that the medical community was telling me that there was no hope. My doctor was like, I don’t know who else to send you to anymore. Um, I’d had psychiatrists see to me that I was so multifaceted that people wouldn’t want to work with me. I’d been told that I was going to be on medication for the rest of my life. So to treat it like I would if I was diabetic and just accept that this is the way it was. Um, and then I found Dr. Gabor Maté through Beyond Addictions Kundalini Yoga program. And I attended his seminar and he spoke about Ayahusca. And though I’d heard about it before it had gone in one ear and right out the other didn’t resonate with me at all. And then when Gabor spoke about it, it really resonated with me. And there was a, uh, knowing that I had to do this and um, because there was about 300 people at the seminar, getting up to him was impossible. I would have had to stand there for well over an hour probably. So I chose to go home and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And so I just opted to send him an email. Either he would get back to me or it would get lost in the millions of emails that he receives. And he responded to me later that night and just invited me to come back and talk to him. And so I did. And then about nine months later I was at his retreat. And, that was five years ago now. And I have not been on medication since. And although I still experience depression and anxiety, in no way, shape or form, is it anywhere near what it was.
Adrian
I’m curious what, what was in the email that you feel like really resonated with Gabor to respond to you?
Laura Lockhart
Um, it probably wasn’t the email. What had happened was during his seminar, it was his addiction seminar. So his Beyond his in the Realm of Hungry Ghosts seminar. And I wrote, I raised my hand and I told him, I said, I’m addicted to try and kill myself, which was true because that was the way that I had learned to cope with my pain started when I was about 14. Um, and there had been multiple attempts throughout my life and at the time I was meeting Gabor I was 38, so we were in my, in double digits by that point in time. Um, and he basically, he was very gentle with me and he asked if he could touch me and he’s like, what’s this feel like? And he just touched me very, very lightly. I was like, that’s hot. Like it feels, he said, yes, you’re a highly sensitive person and things impact you on a very deep level. And just that his invitation to me if I was willing to accept it, was to learn to suffer. So in other words, learn to feel my pain and learn to be with it as opposed to trying to escape it, which is what I was trying to do. Um, so I think it was that conversation that resonated with him. And then when I emailed him I said, I don’t know if you’re going to remember me, who wouldn’t remember that, but, okay. Um, and I just basically said that you had spoken about Ayahusca, but you spoke about it in regards to addiction. I didn’t consider myself somebody with a formal addiction because I don’t do drugs. Don’t do, I mean I’ll have a beer, but I’m not a drinker. Um, so I didn’t know if it was appropriate for me or if it was strictly for addiction. And, um, I just let them know that, you know, I had done so much in the medical system and I just didn’t feel I was getting anywhere. And he wrote back probably within hours and just said that he’d been thinking about me. So I think that that seed was planted in the seminar.
Adrian
Wow. Yeah. We’d love to go into the Ayahusca experience, but I think maybe if we can backtrack and hear about your life leading up to the, the invitation give you, if you can describe to us a little bit about the background perhaps growing up and, and what it was like as your pre-Ayahusca experience.
Laura Lockhart
Okay. So growing up I was the second child, um, six years apart, two very stressed out parents. My dad was a police officer, my mom was home with the children. Um, so dad’s working 12, 14, 16 hour days. Mom’s trying to raise a six year old and pregnant with me. There’s stress in the family. Um, and by the time I come around, I am what they described as an inconsolable infant. Um, what I’ve learned is, is that it was because nobody was attuned to me, so they couldn’t console me because they couldn’t attune to me because they were so stressed out. Um, it’s not about bad parenting.
Thal
They were not attuned to themselves.
Laura Lockhart
Right. Yeah. Um, so in that, I think what would also happen is because you have this screaming baby that’s heightening your stress and then you leave the baby. Like, I can’t do this anymore and you kind of leave the baby. Um, so there’s abandonment for me, lack of attunement, unintentional neglect, um, and some physical abuse. So I would get, I would, I was hit. Um, and then because my sister is six years older, she resents me. I’m causing all this problem in the family. So I’m the target of a great deal of resentment. Um, so growing up in that, I could see like the looking back, I can see the mis-attunement in my parents. By all means. I had, I had a good home. I was well clothed. I was well fed. Um, I was never left alone alone, but dad was down doing his artwork, mom was up reading the newspaper, I was alone. Um, and it, it goes throughout my whole family too. I see it in my whole family and I think it’s intergenerational. So, um, I have, I have memories of, um, parents flying into a rage and striking me. Um, and then as I get older, I’m unable, I’m less and less able to cope. Um, it’s, I see, I see relational issues starting at a very young age where probably, I can probably, the earliest I can trace it to is like six or eight where I can’t wait until it’s 10 o’clock in the morning, which is an appropriate time to make a phone call so that I can phone my friend because I’m so desperate for connection and so desperate to just be with somebody. And what does that cause on the other end? She’s needy. She’s, like clingy. Um, so people don’t like that and they disconnect from me. It’s too much for people. Um, so a lot of relational issues. Um, then get into middle school, high school and it’s just, uh, a hot house of loneliness, depression, anxiety. I wouldn’t go to school if I didn’t know.. If I didn’t have somebody to eat lunch with, um, because that loneliness was so deeply painful. Also experienced a lot of stomach upset, a lot of, um, intestinal issues. And my parents would take me to doctor after doctor after doctor. Nobody could find anything wrong. Okay. Well, finally one doctor says it’s stress. I think she’s stressed out. It’s the 70s who wants to believe that their infant is stressed out. We don’t have all this information yet. Um, so, um, by the time I get to high school, I’m so paralyzed with anxiety that the stomach upset is a daily thing. I’m missing 35 days in a semester. At one point in time they had asked me to leave school because what’s the point? Um, I didn’t end up leaving school. Fortunately for me, I became very physically ill at the school and was vomiting. So they saw that it was real. Um, like I wasn’t just some lackey, so they didn’t end up kicking me out of school. But I certainly didn’t get the education that I needed. Um, and nobody at the school was attuned to me. Like nobody stopped and said, why is this young woman who is clearly very bright and very articulate, not doing, not performing? Why is she missing so much school? Why is she isolated? Because I wasn’t a problem maker. I was that quiet child that never caused any trouble. I was very polite, very soft spoken, well spoken, so I wasn’t the “problem child”. So I get missed just okay, not performing up to her capabilities and passed onto the next one. Um, at that point in time, I didn’t know I had mental illness. I didn’t even know what mental illness was at the time. Um, there were times where my family physician had tried to put me on medication for depression, but telling me that it would help my stomach issues. Um, then at 16, so my first, my first suicide attempt was at 14, but I didn’t know how to do it. So I took like 10 Tylenol and it had no effect. Couldn’t figure out why it didn’t work, but it didn’t work. Um, and then at 16 was the, the, the Big One. And, um, my parents rushed me to the hospital, so small town, my dad drove me to the hospital. They had to call ahead to make sure the doctor was going to be there. They pumped my stomach, um, and admitted me overnight, but then released me the next day with no follow-up. Nothing.
Thal
Wow.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah.
Adrian
At this point I want to ask, because you mentioned your parents were, so dis-attuned to you. Was this the first time for them too, as a wake up call or were they sort of, you know, noticing that you weren’t well before that?
Laura Lockhart
Um, I think they were noticing I wasn’t well, but for them it was that I was just being difficult. So my not getting out of bed for them was just me being stubborn. Maybe asking for attention. Yeah, yeah. Me being a problem teenager. So the way they dealt with it was to try and force me out of bed, yell at me, get out of bed, um, force me to go to school. Yeah. It wasn’t, it wasn’t treated as maybe we should look at what this, what’s causing this.
Thal
And nothing at the school, like no counseling. No… Wow.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. None.
Adrian
And so after that, the Big One, you were sent back home after one day… What was it like, like coming back, realizing it didn’t work? Or you know, what was going on in your mind at the time?
Laura Lockhart
Um, for me that it was life. Um, what was going on for me was a lot of shame because there were friends that had been there that night, so there was a lot of shame and embarrassment and, um, my dad talked to, uh, the one friend that was there for the whole thing and just ask that it be kept confidential. Um, but other than that, nobody spoke to me about it. My friends didn’t speak to me about it. I didn’t speak to my friends about it. We just went on like nothing had happened.
Thal
Yeah. It’s like the shame was experienced on multiple levels. It’s like you’re experiencing shame. Your parents are probably experiencing it, your friends as well. And it’s like nobody’s talking about it. It’s like, as you said, it’s like misattunement on so many levels.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Yeah. So, um, life just carried on as per usual. And um, by the end of my first year of college, that’s when I started to realize, realize that there was something wrong. Um, that’s when the panic attacks started. So that hyperventilating, the shaking, the crying, the, um, the, the cold sweats of full blown panic attack to the point where it would last for hours. And I remember going to my mother’s and she, she brought me into her bad to like stay the night with her and at some point in time she realized that maybe she should take me to the hospital because that’s how bad it was. Um, so she took me to emergency, they put you in a separate room. Um, and the doctor came in and he was a very kind man. Um, but the first thing he did was prescribe, um, a bunch of medication and then sent me to a psychiatric outpatient program the next day. Um, and when I went to that, um, I went alone and I saw a social worker and she did my intake and assessment and then, um, she brought in the psychiatrist and he didn’t ask me many questions at all. Um, but together they decided that I was bipolar and put me on lithium and a bunch of other medications. And the lithium made me crazy person. Like I was a walking Zombie, but I had tremors all the time and every time I went back and I was telling them that, you know, my symptoms are getting worse, they’re not getting better or they’d would just up the medication. I’ve since had multiple doctors say, there’s, you’re not bipolar. There is like, I don’t even, I don’t have any symptoms of mania.
Thal
Yeah I was about to say like, it doesn’t sound like there was any manic episodes during your childhood or during your struggles.
Laura Lockhart
No, but I’ve since seen the report that they sent my doctor and in it she writes that, um, that my mother reports a year long manic episode when I was 11. She didn’t speak to my mother. I was there alone. And then she also reported that I reported a year long manic episode, my first year of college. That isn’t what I said. What I said was that I felt good about myself my first year of college because I was getting straight A’s and it was the first time in my life.
Thal
And so that was manic?
Laura Lockhart
That was my mania.
Adrian
You’re too happy.
Laura Lockhart
I was too happy. Yeah. I enjoyed those days a little too much.
Thal
You loved yourself a little bit too much.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. But I think she also factored in like a shopping addiction. And um, at the time I didn’t know that euphoria meant manic. I just thought it meant felt good. So when she asked me if I ever felt euphoric, I, I think that was the sticking point is that I said yes. You know, my first year of college I felt really good that I was getting straight A’s.
Thal
It’s in the wording.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. So, um, I hadn’t studied psychology yet. I didn’t know the connection. Um, so they just kept upping the medication, upping the medication. And I’m becoming more and more zombified. Um, I’m a mess at work. Work is starting to notice. Um, people are pulling me aside and saying, Laura, like something’s changed. This is not, you look at your writing, it’s like, this isn’t you. Something’s wrong. That was a catalyst to another suicide attempt. But this time I had a bunch of psychiatric medications to use. And I was rushed to emergency, um, where they didn’t, they didn’t pump my stomach. Now they just let you drink the charcoal, which is gross but better. Um, so they admitted me overnight into a psychiatric unit, um, which I fought tooth and nail, didn’t want to be on a psychiatric unit. They take away everything. They take away all your personal goods. Um, you’re in with other people. It’s just not a comfortable place to be when you’re feeling terrible. So at one point in time, I think I stayed two nights. Um, cause yeah, cause it happened on a weekend. So I had to stay Saturday night and Sunday night because the psychiatrist wasn’t in until Monday. So on the second night, a nurse pulled me aside on the ward and she said to me, I’m not supposed to tell you this, but I don’t think you’re bipolar and I don’t think you should be on all this medication, especially the high dosages that you’re on, especially at your age. I was 21.
Thal
Wow. So how many years since the first diagnosis?
Laura Lockhart
That was, that was probably like… it probably wasn’t even a full year since that first diagnosis. So I was still on the lithium and everything. Um, I can’t even remember what she looks like, but thank goodness she came into my life. So she told mw you’re over 18, you can refuse your medication. I don’t recommend you refuse it all. I suggest you go with half tonight. And then we’ll wean you from there. So that’s what I did. I immediately found a new psychiatrist who did all the testing. No, I’m not bipolar. However, it was still just more drugs, more drugs, more drugs, more drugs. Yeah. So that continued for the next 20-23 years.
Thal
Wow. Okay.
Laura Lockhart
So yeah. Okay.
Adrian
Yeah. At this point, it sounds like there’s awareness and even like a desire to get better, like, because you were seeking help so that wasn’t there early in your life. Um, what did you try? So in those 20 years, I imagine you must have tried many things, tried different modalities or techniques. What were some of the stuff that you were trying?
Laura Lockhart
Um, there was always a strong urge to get better. I was always jealous. Like I remember being in grade two or grade three and finding out that one of the kids at school saw a therapist and I was immensely jealous, but I never had the nerve to ask my parents. Um, I never thought they’d, they’d let me for some reason. I don’t know why. Um, and so when I finally started seeking help, um, I went the route that I knew. So I went the medical route. I went to my doctor who sent me to a psychiatrist. Um, I tried, so I tried many different, um, I tried CBT, DBT. Um, I did two inpatient programs, one through a psychiatric out in Oshawa and then one out in Guelph. Um, both inpatient one was eight weeks and one was 12 weeks where I lived there the entire time. Several different outpatient programs through the hospital. I tried a suicide program through a day program through a hospital. Yeah. I was seeing a psychotherapist, but probably I hadn’t tapped into any of the psychotherapy modalities, um, just all that, all the psychiatric stuff. And it wasn’t working for me. Um, yeah. But I knew there was something in me that could not accept that this was going to be my life, that I was not meant to be more than what I was at the time, which was a mess.
Thal
And, um, and so then you met Gabor?
Laura Lockhart
Yeah.
Thal
Okay. And what changed?
Laura Lockhart
Um, so in order to go to the retreat, I had to come off all my medication, um, which he cautioned me about. He did say, now, based on your history of suicide, you really want to have a discussion with your doctor about it, um, because you can’t do Ayahuasca on these meds. So my doctor was very open to it and very supportive. Um, he didn’t necessarily believe in Ayahusca. Um, but he was more inclined to let me go to a warm country where it would be sunny where I’d be in therapy circles. Um, so he was very open and he gave me a weaning schedule and I came off my meds.
Thal
And that’s amazing because you’ve just been doing the sort of mainstream psychotherapy modalities and the medical, um, circles. And so, and then you went from that to right away Ayahuasca.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah, it was a true calling. Like it was like I, I had to get there. Financially I didn’t know how I was going to do it. Um, my mother didn’t like the idea. She didn’t, A psychedelic in a strange country with a doctor, didn’t sound reputable to her. My dad was actually very supportive and said, what have you got to lose? And it was actually, um, they’re divorced now, but the two of them came up with the funds to help me get there. Um, so that’s how I got there.
Adrian
Could you describe the program a little bit and when we’re perhaps even your experience flying in, what was that journey like? I mean, it must’ve been… that alone, probably we could dive into an entire episode, I imagine.
Thal
Yeah like, you know, your inner feelings.
Laura Lockhart
Um, so I was scared. I was thinking, what am I doing? Am I a crazy person. So I didn’t follow the weaning schedule that my doctor gave me. I decided that, oh, I’ve missed these medications before many a times, you know, when you couldn’t get to the drug store or whatever. Oh yeah, I’m good. I don’t need to wean. And I went cold Turkey. Never do that. So I ended up violently ill for many weeks. Um, I landed in the hospital twice for IV because like for IV fluids, because I was so violently ill, they had to put me on a drug that they give chemo patients for the nausea. And at the time I’m not putting two and two together because it’s been a couple of weeks since I’d come off the medication. So I’m not telling them, oh, I’ve come off all this medication. I’m just telling them I’m not on any medications, so they’re not able, because I’m not giving them the pieces. They’re not able to put the pieces together. Um, so having been violently ill for several weeks, the thought of going into the jungle and vomiting was not appealing. It’s like, no, I’ve done that. Thank you. Um, and I was going alone with people I didn’t know I’d never met them. Um, I had only really talked to Gabor twice, so I didn’t even know him at the time. Um, I knew I knew about his, um, his episode on the Nature of Things with Dr. David Suzuki, A Jungle Prescription. So I had watched that, but I didn’t even delve into the research on Ayahusca or get to know much about it because the more I learned, the more nervous I became. So in order to do it, I had to like not investigate it. I had to just go blind.
Adrian
A leap of faith.
Laura Lockhart
Leap of faith. Um, the journey, the journey was chaotic. Um, so I left Toronto. They had to de-ice the plane, uh, because of the, when the plane was late getting to my connection, um, I might’ve missed the, the connecting flight. I meeting people on the connecting flight that are going to the same retreat so that we can travel in the other country together. So at least I don’t have to travel in a strange country completely alone, but I might miss my connection. So we land at the exact same time that my connecting flight is supposed to be taking off. And the flight attendant tells me they’re not holding the plane. They’ve already started booking the hotel rooms. So now I’m starting to like, okay. So I connect with one of the women that I’m supposed to meet. She’s already on the other plane. She’s asking them, uh, she can’t get any information. I get off my plane feeling somewhat defeated and um, somebody turns to me and says they’re holding the flight. Run! So I book it.
Thal
Wow.
Laura Lockhart
And I’m not very fast. [Laughing]
Adrian
In slow motion.
Laura Lockhart
I slow motion book it. And I’m rounding the corner in the terminal only to learn that I have to get on one of those trains to take you to another terminal, which you know, just like this is not booking it in any way, shape or form. But I’m booking it. The second I land my butt in that seat, the plane takes off. Like there is no time. It’s like land take off. So I made my flight, my luggage did not.
Thal
Wow.
Laura Lockhart
So I land in this very tropical country in very humid weather in my jeans and sweatshirt because I’ve come from Toronto where it’s snowing and my luggage hasn’t made it. Then we have to take a water taxi to the actual location that we’re going in. Getting off the water taxi, I fall into the ocean in my jeans and sweatshirt with nothing to change into.
Adrian
Welcome! [laughing]
Laura Lockhart
Welcome. Welcome to your Ayahuasca journey. Um, my luggage doesn’t come till the next day. It comes the next day. Thank goodness I didn’t have to wait a couple of days. Um, but I arrive at this Ayahuasca retreat center, which is very remote. Um, I remember walking the dirt path with donkey poop and having to take your shoes off and like crossing a river. And I just start to cry. I’m like, what am I doing? What have I come for? I want to go home and I want to go home now. Thank goodness the people at the retreat are very kind and very loving souls and they find me raggedy clothing to wear so that I can get out of my wet jeans. And uh, the woman I actually bunk with was able to provide me some clothing so that I could, you know, be comfortable. Um, but at this point in time I’m thinking, what have I done? Like I’ve left my comfort, my home, my friends, my family, everything to come here to this strange place that’s… And it was the most life changing experience I’ve had.
Thal
Amazing. Yeah.
Adrian
For people who might not be familiar with the Ayahuasca tradition, the plant medicine, could you share a little bit of background?
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. It’s not for everyone, but for those that are feeling the call, it can be helpful. I also didn’t just do Ayahuasca. I returned from my Ayahuasca journey and went into intense therapy.
Thal
So maybe we can, yeah. Integration.
Laura Lockhart
So, um, so what was the question again?
Thal
Um, so for our listeners who don’t know, what Ayahuasca is, can you, can you say about it?
Laura Lockhart
So it’s a plant medicine that’s been used in the Amazon for centuries for healing. Traditionally, just the Shaman would drink it and then work on the, the people, but it’s transitioned somehow that now the people and the Shaman drink it. Um, I had ensured that I was doing it in a very safe space because there are unreputable Ayahuasca retreats out there. There are unsafe Ayahuasca retreats out there. I made sure that I was going to a very reputable and very safe place to do this. It is a psychedelic, um, so you are vulnerable. Um, I did it. The lineage that I worked in, um, my Shaman works in is the Shipibo lineage and ceremony was kept very traditional. Um, the chants aren’t just, so it’s a whole ceremony. It’s a six hour ceremony. It’s done with intention. Um, every chant that comes out of their mouth is done for a specific reason to help move the energy to help in the healing process. It’s not a random, these people are highly skilled and know what they’re doing. Um, what else can I say?
Thal
How many, like how many times did you drink it, if you want to go into that?
Laura Lockhart
So my first retreat, which was highly transformative for me was three ceremonies. However, the difference between my retreat and a lot of other retreats, um, is that I had processing with Dr. Gabor Maté. So there were 25 or 26 participants and every day for hours on end, we would sit in a circle and process. And when one person works, everybody in the circle works. Yeah. That’s how powerful the circle is. Um, so there were nights where it had gotten dark and we had to do processing by flashlight because that’s how long we had been sitting in the circle. So from right after breakfast until bedtime, we were in that circle with the exception of a few breaks here and there for lunch and dinner. Um, a very regimented diet. Um, you can only eat specific foods. Um, in respect for the plant. Um, the way that’s been described to me is that you wouldn’t pour salt and sugar on your garden. So in respect for the plant, you treat your body with that same respect. Um, ceremonies were six hours long done at night in the dark. Um, very powerful, very painful. Um, some very difficult moments. Some times I didn’t think I was going to make it through to the other side. Um, and so very grateful when I did and the difference even after just the three ceremonies. The small things, very small things, which are actually big things. Um, for example, my dentist had been trying to get me to floss for 40 some years. Well now I was 38 at the time, so probably like 30 some years. And I came back from my Ayahuasca journey and I just started flossing every day. Like why? I don’t know. But I did. Um, things like I started wearing makeup again, um, because I had gone into such a depression where all I did was just wear sweatpants and didn’t do my hair. I didn’t do anything. I just throw on my sweats and left and I started taking care of myself again. Um, there’s still some self care that needs to come into place. I’ve still got some difficulty in that area, but, uh, immensely different. Um, but like I said, I didn’t just do ceremony and come home and go back to life as it was. I did ceremony and came home and the first thing I did was the Landmark Forum, um, which was also very powerful. Um, there some complications with it and the sales pitch, but the material itself I found very powerful. Um, and then following that I went into a trauma treatment center. Um, so not a western medicine, a holistic trauma treatment center. Unfortunately no longer exists, um, where I was there for four or five sessions a week for quite some time, um, where I had different modalities. So I had psychotherapy, I had massage, I had acupuncture. Um, where it wasn’t just like, okay, let’s look at your thoughts. Let’s look at the energy in your body. Let’s look at where you’re carrying things. Let’s look at where you’re holding this trauma. Um, yeah.
Thal
And, and so you were open to trying all these things after Ayahuasca like, it’s, it truly is a transformation considering that prior to Ayahuasca, it was, you know, mainstream, nothing holistic. And now it’s like there’s this openness.
Laura Lockhart
Some of the difficulty prior to the Ayahuasca journey was that I didn’t have the funds to try the holistic modalities, which I was starting to feel drawn to. I didn’t quite know that I believed in it yet. Um, but now I’m a firm believer.
Thal
Wait, no, that’s a good point too. Right? That the funds for the, like the fact that it is expensive. Yeah. Like some people are turned away because of the not having funds.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. So, um, I had looked into psychotherapists before, but I simply couldn’t afford it. Um, and I had, I also have fibromyalgia, so I had explored, um, just about everything I could at that point in time with regards to fibromyalgia. And what I was really getting was that I needed massage and I needed acupuncture and I needed things that I just couldn’t afford.
Thal
Which would make sense if it’s OHIP covered. But that’s a different conversation.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah, we could have a whole other episode.
Adrian
I wanted to go back, you mentioned the intensive integration circles, the processing with Gabor, for like entire day. What does that look like? What is processing? And because you had experience of psychotherapy, it’d be nice if you can maybe draw comparisons of the Ayahuasca experience to what traditional psychotherapy sessions are like, how are they different?
Laura Lockhart
Okay. Um, so, okay. But when you come out of an Ayahuasca ceremony, because it’s a psychedelic, there’s a lot of funky things that have happened in the night and it’s very easy to get lost in the, the visions and the experience and forget that there is very pertinent messages in those visions.
Thal
Um, especially when they’re negative and you know, they take you back to the specific experiences in childhood or whatever.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. So, um, what that looked like was often Gabor interrupting us and stopping the story. Um, and bring us back to our bodies and bringing us back to the emotion. Okay. So what was the emotion when you were seeing that? What were you experiencing in that time? And essentially bringing us back to the emotion that that whole experience was inviting us to feel, which would have been repressed at the time of the trauma. So it may have looked like somebody re-experiencing their trauma in the ceremony or it may have looked like something completely different that just brought up the same emotional state. But there was a lot of, you know, anger and fear and shame that people were given a safe place to go into and feel the things that they’d repressed in their bodies.
Thal
So he, so he was engaged during the ceremony as well? Like, or this is after the ceremony?
Laura Lockhart
This is after the ceremony. Yeah. So, um, after ceremony we all go to bed. It’s like three, four in the morning. Um, and then we wake up the next day and that’s when we do the processing. So each person speaks. So all 25 or 26 of us speak to our experience the night before.
Thal
Just speaking about the ceremony itself because there are two different perspectives, like some people see it as, so this is the contents of my psyche that are amplified during the ceremony or some people see it as this is the medicine, you know, teaching us and um, giving me stuff that I need at that moment. And maybe it’s combination of both. Um, I don’t know, but it’s just something that, you know, I was thinking about.
Adrian
What do you think it is? In terms of your experience.
Laura Lockhart
In terms of my experience, I would say it’s both. So it would show me things that my psyche was doing. Um, so I would often get stuck in and it was excruciatingly painful and this is my life, but where I would have the same three sentences repeat over and over and over and over and over, over and it was intense and it was rapid and I couldn’t stop it. That’s my rumination. That’s my negative self talk, rumination. And it was on full blast. Like it was intense. There were times where I thought I was going crazy. Um, it also showed me my anger and unfortunately at the time I wasn’t ready and I repressed it within ceremony. So I had this vision that came up and it was like black silhouettes and then flashes of red, like a very violent red. And I had no idea what it meant. And then I spent the next six hours in shear excruciating sub- humanlike pain that I’d never experienced before. And I was calling for them to get me charcoal because I wanted this medicine out of my system. Um, and unfortunately that got miscommunicated in the ceremony and they thought I was asking for tobacco. Um, but it was Gabor the next day that said that I didn’t want to do the work. He said that was you wanting somebody else to do the work for you. Very much my experience in life.
Thal
Wow.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Um, yeah. So, and it wasn’t until my seventh ceremony that that lesson came back to me and I got, I very much got that I was resisting my anger and that’s why my pain came up and that the more that I resist feeling what I needed to feel, the more I was going to experience my pain.
Thal
And, and so then your pain or your anger was strong enough or your resisting mechanism was strong enough that it was still overriding the ma, the medicine basically.
Laura Lockhart
Uh-huh. Yeah. Oh yeah. It was a, and they kept telling me not to resist. Like that was, I mean, what else can you tell somebody? There is nothing else to tell somebody other than stop resisting and they’re telling me in a very gentle way. Um, but I was annoyed. I was like, what do you mean stop resisting? Like how do I stop resisting? I don’t know how to stop resisting. What am I? So I thought that I was resisting the pain, so I would lay there in ceremony and try and like breathe and like, okay, allow the pain, allow the pain, allow the pain. Well, no, I had to allow the anger and that’s what I wasn’t allowing. And I had no idea. I had no idea.
Thal
I mean, I definitely relate. They’re like, you know, when someone tells the old just like, go or stop resisting and like, what do you mean? Yeah. You’re like holding, holding on tight with your body.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Yeah. But at no point in time, in any of my previous therapy had anybody addressed the fact that I wasn’t allowing my anger. I had no idea it was new found information to me that, oh, you mean I have to feel this? Yeah.
Thal
And so then the processing with Gabor helped you deepen that.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. So, yeah. So the next morning I had no idea it was anger even. When I told him about the vision and then I had no idea what it meant, he’s like, that sounds like anger. And I did the classic repression and denial and like dismissive. No, I wasn’t that angry as a child because, you know, we all had happy childhoods. Um, and he said he, he may have said, bullshit. I can’t remember exactly, but basically he said, that’s not true. Um, and he said, you can’t tell me. He said, how did you feel when your mother was hitting you? And that’s when it occurred to me that I had a murderous rage in me and that I was suppressing that. Not that you go out and murder people.
Thal
No, absolutely.
Laura Lockhart
But that you kept in touch with, with that so that it’s not stuck in you anymore. The feeling that you felt as a child and you were not able to express or..
Adrian
This first experience you had it sounded like a lot came up, a lot of insights, perhaps experiences. What did you do with all that new stuff? Coming back from that trip? You mentioned you started flossing, there were some behavior changes. What else could you add in terms of the experience re-entering back to your life?
Laura Lockhart
I really just had to learn to learn, to feel what I hadn’t been feeling and that took a lot, a lot of work. Um, it sounds so simple and really it is, but it’s so complicated. Um, I remember laying on the table with the act, my acupuncturist, and he was, and I could feel the mechanism happen where it’s like I was feeling it, feeling it, feeling, and then I was like, oh, I’ve just repressed it. I don’t have control over that, but I was doing it. And so bringing that awareness into my, into my body, not just into my logic but into my body was very important and that took a lot of work and a lot of safety. I needed a lot of safety and..
Thal
And trusting yourself.
Laura Lockhart
Trusting myself, trusting those around me that they might be giving me some difficulty information, but they’re doing it from a very loving place. Yeah.
Adrian
How did your relationship with Gabor continued to evolve after the first ceremony?
Laura Lockhart
Um, he really became a mentor. Um, he doesn’t like the word therapist. Um, but he became a, I don’t even have the words for it. Um, he just became like the catalyst for my seeing what I needed to see, which I wasn’t seeing. And there were times where he wouldn’t talk to me unless I had gone and felt what I was feeling. So he would say, you’ve asked for help, I will help you. But what I want you to do first is to identify the emotion, sit with it, allow it, have compassion for it, hold it and then we’ll talk. Which was frustrating but important because my way of not being with emotion was to reach out for help.
Thal
How did that look like? Did you have like a specific practice that you were doing or just…?
Laura Lockhart
Um, I didn’t know I was, I was winging it. Um, they don’t tell you how to feel your emotion. They just tell you that you have to feel it.
Adrian
Go look it up.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah, go, go look it up.
Thal
Cause I do that too. That’s why I’m asking you. I’m like, how do I feel this? I just Google it. [laughing]
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Um, yeah, so I didn’t know. I was really just winging it and um, what it would look like for me was to just sit quietly and be with whatever was there. Um, and in actual fact, I got a lot of training in my therapy on how to do that, which was like identifying the sensation in the body, allowing the sensation to be there. Um, even inviting it to get bigger, a lot of meditation around, around my pain. So instead of trying to suppress my pain, trying to numb my pain, inviting it, welcoming it, and letting it be there and learning that it was, it was actually a lesson that I had been trying to numb for decades.
Adrian
You mentioned landmark forum as one of the things that seem to kind of immediately proceed the, your experience. Uh, what did you get out of that, that training?
Laura Lockhart
That I was creating a lot of my own suffering and I was doing it with the, the, the, the story in my head, the, the dialogue that was going on in my brain. Projecting a lot of my own stuff onto people. Um, making meaning out of things that didn’t mean anything. Um, and living my life as though what I believed about myself was true when in no shape or form was it?
Thal
Yeah. That it’s like static and rigid, that it does not change that, you know, oftentimes we see ourselves and our personalities as these things that I’m this or I’m that.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. And that in order to, in order to excel in life at whatever it was that I wanted to do, that I had to step out of the fear and that I had to act anyways. And that really showed up in a lot of my, um, my therapy because like I said, I couldn’t afford this therapy. So I had to find ways to get it, and that meant showing up and just trusting the process that I was in the right space and that if it was meant to happen, it was going to happen. And if it didn’t, then it wasn’t the right, the right path for me. Um, it also showed up in school. I couldn’t afford school. I, I hadn’t worked in years. Um, and, but as long as I stayed, stuck in the story of I can’t afford this, I was never going to do it. So I stayed stuck in that for many years. Um, and then I really, that teaching really stuck with me that like, just make it happen. Don’t, you may not know how you’re going to make it happen, but just make it happen. And so that’s what I did is that I applied to the school with no idea of how I was going to pay for it. And I even got the first bill. Please deposit this amount of money by such and such a date and still had no idea how I was going to pay for it. But I, I took the risk and I threw my hat over the wall cause I had to go get my hat then. And just, um, if, if I wanted it bad enough, it was going to happen and that I would work extra hard to make it happen.
Thal
And so, okay. So when will come in and you, you did the first retreat and then landmark and then you went again and did another retreat?
Laura Lockhart
So, um, yeah, so the first retreat, landmark, um a Trauma Treatment Center in Toronto. Um, and then another retreat and then.
Thal
How was it different then from the first one? How is it different than going back to the plants again?
Laura Lockhart
Um it was, it was different in that I was different. Um, the resistance was still there, but it wasn’t as strong and it wasn’t as potent. Um, so I was able to allow a lot more than I had the first time. Um, which meant I got a lot more out of each ceremony because I was allowed, I allowed the medicine to work more than I had prior.
Thal
You let go.
Laura Lockhart
I let go in some, in some cases. Um, there were times where, um, I was in excruciating pain again, um, both emotional and physical. And I remember the helper on the retreat telling me, you know, ask the plant to teach you in a gentler way. And I did. And it amplified. Um, so that was the lesson that I needed at that point in time for whatever reason. Um, yeah. So after that second retreat, um, I went to another retreat that wasn’t a medicine retreat. Um, but it was all about like the ego constructs that we live in. And, um, and I spent a month at this retreat, I’m learning to let go of the beliefs and projections and things that I put on myself and other people and then back to Toronto for more therapy. And then, um, so school came about two and a half years on the journey.
Adrian
This is training to become a psychotherapist?
Laura Lockhart
Yes.
Adrian
What, what inspired you to make that decision to become a therapist for others?
Laura Lockhart
Um, I had always wanted to be, um, I remember probably when I first started at universities that was my goal. It was that I wanted to become a psychologist, a PhD psychologist, and have my own private practice. Um, thank goodness that didn’t happen because I wouldn’t have known how to help anybody at the time. Um, but because my mental health derailed, I was able to get my undergrad, but there was no way I was going to be able to do a Masters or a PhD. I mean, I couldn’t even function hardly at all. Um, so it was really a dying dream. Um, and then it wasn’t until I met, um, the psychologist at the Trauma Treatment Center, Jesse Hanson, and he was the one that suggested to me, well, there’s other routes. Um, how about have you looked into psychotherapy training because that might be more up your alley, um, where you have to do your own work in order to learn to become a psychotherapist. And that really appealed to me, but again, I was stuck with the, that construct if I can’t afford it. So couldn’t make it happen. And it wasn’t until about two years later that it finally clicked in that I’m not going to make it happen if I just stay stuck in this story of I can’t afford it. Yeah.
Adrian
So, so what, what happened the last minute you said you didn’t have the funds and the due date was coming?
Laura Lockhart
Yeah, I had an anonymous donor. Um, I still don’t know who, um, they approached Jesse at the, the Trauma Treatment Center and decided to donate the money, but they did that based on what they were seeing in me, in my growth.
Thal
That’s amazing. So yeah, it’s amazing. Then what happens when we drop the stories that are not serving us.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. And when we’re on our right path.
Thal
Absolutely.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah.
Thal
Soul path.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah.
Adrian
Yeah. I mean it’s, it’s, it’s such an inspiring story. I imagine you hear that often when you, when you share with others, but at the same time, I’m careful not to paint overly, you know, a rosy picture because this is reality. I want to ask you, what are some challenges you still face today on the path of healing?
Laura Lockhart
Um, so I still, I still struggle with relational difficulties. Um, I still isolate a lot. Um, I still struggle with self care around food. I still have a tendency to binge eat and binge eat junk food. Um, getting my eating under control has been very difficult. Um, I still struggle with my body. Um, so I still have a weight issue. Um, I still have difficulty, um, getting into my body in movement, any kind of movement is still very, very difficult and very painful for me. So yeah, it really does. Like hearing me speak really sounds like I’ve turned the other page and everything’s glowing, but it’s not. Um, but it is immensely different than what it was. So I no longer trying to kill myself. I’m no longer, um, the thoughts still come up, but I no longer attach to them. Um, so now I know that I don’t want to do that. Um, before I used to think that I really truly wanted to die, but now I just, the thought will come up and I just think, and I don’t want to do that. Like I respect myself now.
Thal
So it’s this, you know, very deep level of self compassion that you’ve accessed through healing.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Yeah.
Thal
And it’s important then to understand that healing is not a rosy path, but it’s one worth taking. And you know, I’m also touched by your story and it’s, you know, it requires a lot of courage.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. And healing isn’t linear. Like as long as I heal, I will still go back into those old patterns every once in a while and expand and contract and then, but my contractions get a lot smaller. And my expansion, it’s got a lot bigger and I mean I’m able to function.
Adrian
Laura what’s your vision for, for your, I mean one, one the one hand for the future of psychotherapy but, but also at a personal level for yourself?
Laura Lockhart
So my vision for, um, psychotherapy is that more of the people start to recognize these alternatives. Um, and psychedelics obviously in safe places with proper assistance, um, that we really open up to just new ways of doing old ways of doing things that are becoming new again.
Thal
Yeah. Thanks for mentioning that.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Um, yeah. And for myself, my vision is to, um, work with people that are me. That are very much like me. Um, yeah. People that have tried everything are determined to get better, won’t stop at anything to get better because that was me. I was going to knock on every door in the city.
Thal
And I think one of the really important things to understand is someone listening to this and struggling through the same issues feel like they’re the only ones going through that at that moment. And it’s just knowing that that’s not true is helpful too.
Laura Lockhart
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s not true. Um, there’s so many people out there like, yeah. So, yeah.
Adrian
Thank you so much, Laura. What an incredible story and thank you. I also want to mention for people that might be interested in reaching out, um, personally, uh, they can, they can contact us on the podcast and we can definitely direct them to you. Yeah. And there might be some inkling to reach out to Gabor as as well, but he doesn’t take client s and he’s not doing his retreats anymore, so, yeah.
Thal
Thank you. Thank you, Laura, for sharing your story with us today.
Laura Lockhart
Thank you.
