That’s how I started a chapter of my 2015 memoir, Nazis & Nudists. Entitled “Whispers in a Graveyard,” the piece recalls my first brush with psychedelic drugs at age 20 in 1969. It was an experience I would never forget, as you shall soon see. And it’s one I was reminded of by a recent article in the Los Angeles Times, where I later worked.
Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, it seems, has signed a bill fast-tracking the study of psychedelic drugs as potential treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and various other mental ailments suffered by people—including many veterans—worldwide.
” This is a pivotal moment for science, for mental health, and for every veteran who has waited too long for better treatment options,” said Amber Copone, chief executive of Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions, an organization sponsoring the legislation. It “will accelerate the research needed to transform care, not just for veterans but for all Californians affected by trauma, addiction, and depression.”
My question is whether it will help or harm.
Here in the Philippines, the issue of mental health has increasingly moved toward center stage, propelled, in part, by tragic events like the recent suicide of 19-year-old social media influencer Emmanuelle Atienza. The daughter of a prominent TV personality, she spoke openly of her struggles with depression and bipolar disorder.
“Mental health is just as crucial as physical health,” Sen. Rita Hontiveros said last year, “yet it often doesn’t receive the attention it deserves.”
Most commentators, however, have fallen far short of endorsing even the study of psychedelic drugs as a possible solution. Last year, in fact, seven suspects got arrested at a La Union beach resort for possessing candies and chocolate bars infused with magic mushrooms. “They reportedly advertised the alleged ‘therapeutic benefits’ of the mushroom through social media and promoted [it] as a form of soul therapy during yoga sessions,” the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency huffed.
My own experience with magic pills came in a different age, a time of flowery social revolution when young longhairs formed a counterculture venerating the spiritual extravagances of psychedelics. And that aptly describes my first encounter with mescaline, derived from the peyote cactus plants once used in the religious rituals of indigenous Mescalero Indians.
The cemetery was ancient, set in the rustic hills of Vermont, where I attended college. Kneeling there, I heard what I imagined to be the voices of the dead, curious about the intentions of this living intruder.” He’s afraid,” one particularly opinionated spirit declared. “Look at the way he walks, the doubt in his eyes…”
Then another replied. “He is afraid because he thinks he’s better than us,” it intoned. “Imagine the arrogance of feeling superior simply because you’re alive.”
Which is pretty much how schizophrenics experience reality. A recent study confirmed what psychiatrists have long believed; that people with schizophrenia often hear “voices” in their heads which they believe are coming from outside. “This idea has been around for 50 years,” a University of New South Wales researcher told ScienceAlert, “but it’s been very difficult to test because inner speech is inherently private.”
My brief interlude with insanity ended happily. “As I sauntered home,” I later wrote, “I felt as if an angel had landed on my shoulder. Light and breezy with a smiling heart, it made my skin tingle and my mind soar. Feeling a deep-seated joy, I stopped to lie in the grass and stare up at the pulsating mother-of-pearl sky. And that’s where my friends found me hours later, resting on green leaves, laughing hysterically that God was alive and death was no more.”
Unfortunately, some such hallucinations end in violent acts of self-destruction or worse. I pray California researchers can figure out why.
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David Haldane is an award-winning American journalist and author with homes in Southern California and Northern Mindanao. His latest book is Dark Skies: Tales of Turbulence in Paradise. This column appears weekly in The Manila Times.
