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What Is Iboga?
Tabernanthe iboga is a powerful psychedelic from West Africa that has been in use for centuries in traditional healing ceremonies. It can be used in its traditional form from the root bark of the plant (known as iboga), or in the laboratory-isolated form of ibogaine which only contains the central psychoactive substance (known as ibogaine). Today iboga is best known for its miraculous ability to cure or drastically reduce addiction to substances like alcohol, crack cocaine, and heroin in a single treatment. It can also help people overcome addiction to prescription opiates such as morphine, methadone, Vicodin, Percocet, and OxyContin. While this may sound too good to be true, scores of personal testimonies and now clinical research is backing up this claim, and iboga treatment centers are popping up all over the world specializing in treating addiction, post traumatic stress, and mood disorders.
Ibogaine addiction recovery therapy
Ibogaine is "the closest thing to a silver bullet for addiction as you’ll ever find. If there ever was a miracle drug for eliminating opiate withdrawals and addiction, Ibogaine is it."
Ibogaine is an indole alkaloid found in the bark of the root of the African shrub Tabernan. It has strong anti-addictive qualities, including high efficacy in acute opioid withdrawal and addiction. In laymen’s terms, Ibogaine is a secret tribal hallucinogen that helps you achieve your two most difficult goals.
1) Ibogaine can significantly reduce opiate/opioid withdrawal symptoms in under 24 hours.
2) Ibogaine eliminates the desire for opiates/opioids. Many people who have taken Ibogaine swear that it cured their addiction altogether.
Ibogaine treatment has a mortality rate of 1 in 300, with deaths coming from brachycardia (heart rate slowing way down) and lethal combinations with other drugs. The risks of this treatment should therefore be weighed very carefully, and treatment should only be done in a medical setting.
People with a history of heart attack, heart murmurs, arrhythmia, heart operations or severe obesity should not take ibogaine. Before taking ibogaine the individual should not use his drug of choice for the time period the drug needs to be sufficiently eliminated.
Ibogaine is considered the 'active' compound in the Tabernanthe iboga plant, used for centuries as a healer, teacher, and catalyst for ceremonies by the Bwiti people indigenous to
what is now the Central-west African republic of Gabon. But the versatile plant has remained virtually unknown in the West, where it has a very different history. Researcher Howard Lotsof, PhD, addicted to heroin and methadone, discovered the anti-addictive action of ibogaine in 1962. Given a capsule of pure ibogaine HCL by a trusted friend who was familiar with chemistry, Lotsof was simply seeking a new high. He was astonished when coming out of this difficult experience 36-opiate-abstinent hours later to realize he had no physical craving for opiates, and even more remarkably, very little of the agonizing physical symptoms normally associated with opiate withdrawal.
Methamphetamine is a stimulant drug usually used as a white, bitter-tasting powder or a pill. Crystal meth, a form of the drug, looks like glass fragments or shiny, bluish-white rocks. It is chemically similar to amphetamine.
Methamphetamine increases the amount of the natural chemical dopamine in the brain. Dopamine is involved in body movement, motivation, pleasure, and reward (pleasure from natural behaviors such as eating). The drug’s ability to release high levels of dopamine rapidly in reward areas of the brain produces the "rush" (euphoria) or "flash" that many people experience. Methamphetamine is highly addictive. When people stop taking it, withdrawal symptoms can include anxiety, fatigue, severe depression, psychosis and intense drug cravings.
Ibogaine is the only treatment for heroin, opiate, opioid, crystal meth and fentanyl addiction that can eliminate withdrawal and craving in 30 to 45 minutes.
Ibogaine is not currently approved for any medical uses in the U.S. It is used as an alternative medicine treatment for drug addiction in some countries. Its prohibition has slowed scientific research. The use of Ibogaine for drug treatment is now accepted in Canada, Mexico, France, and the UK. In many cases, administration of a therapeutic course of Ibogaine is followed by intensive counseling therapy. Often more than one round of the drug is needed for lasting sobriety.
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My son had ibogaine treatment in January this year for his meth addiction, and he has not taken any drugs since. He is a completely different boy with a very different outlook on life. He had been on antidepression meds for years and has never suffered from depression or taken any meds since his treatment. This was the only treatment that worked for his addiction and I know if it wasn't for Ibogaine I would have buried him as he did try to take his life many times. He is a success story for Ibogaine.
My son and I are involved with a group of 20 people here that had Ibogaine treatment for their drug addiction, and not one has gone back to drugs or had any problems with the treatment. Some of them had been to rehab quite few times and still couldn't kick their habit until they had Ibogaine. One of the girls is now married with a child and living a life without drugs for 5 years now. Ibogaine is a prescription medicine here and has to be administered by a doctor in a nice clean clinic, not some dirty hotel room, and we don't call it a miracle drug. It is just a treatment that should be available to addicts that want to give up and can't do it with other treatments. Ibogaine here is a herbal product not a drug. Every single person has different experiences when they have Ibogaine so unless you or anyone else has tried it you can't really speak about it like we can. And another thing you don't have to have a drug problem to take it. We've had doctors, psychiatrists and herbalists try Ibogaine and they have all been impressed. And it is wonderful to finally get my son back and see light in his eyes just like all the other ex-addicts here.
I am from New Zealand. I am Maori and we use the bush and forest to heal our sick ones. That is why I believe so much in Ibogaine and I have seen so many people successfully get off drugs using this treatment. And yes, I do agree that a doctor has to be involved and all the tests done before hand. We do not call it a miracle treatment or promise that everyone will become drug free, because it is still up to the person if they want to become drug free. Ibogaine gives them a 3 to 6 months chance after it has cleaned their insides to start working on their problems as to why they went down that track in the first place. Addicts can work on their problems with help as Ibogaine stops the craving for drugs for months. This is a very important part of the treatment once they have been cleaned.
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DMT and psilocybin helped me quit crystal meth
By Brian
My story involves a transformation in mind and the escape from a crippling addiction. I have no doubt my recovery was spurred by the catalyst of psychedelic experience, specifically dimethyltryptamine and psilocybin. I’m a 44-year old male from a middle working class family, and I've had an interest in mind-altering substances since my teens.
A year ago I was involved in an affair with crystal methamphetamine that took me to the brink of insanity and physical breakdown. I have DMT and psilocybin to thank for helping me gain perspective and snapping out of its evil spell.
I had some marriage problems, dissatisfaction with my job and frankly boredom that led me back to a old Friend of the Devil that I had managed to stay away from for a good 20 years. I had some experience with meth in my youth, being surrounded by it when I moved to Arizona after high school. That was the late ’80s and early ’90s, and it was a different recipe — less refined. I did get dependent on it back then for a few years, but it never effected me as badly as it did in the recent nightmare it dragged me through. I think the lack of purity and a more recreational approach, as well as a lack of a surplus of the drug to consume, kept me from really losing it back then. I also thought that since I never smoked or injected it I could maintain some control over its pull, but this is a big lie.
This is where psychedelics work their magic in an addicts mind, because they don’t allow you to lie to yourself. Addictions are perpetuated by lies. How else could you look yourself in the mirror with your red skin breaking out from the ooze of chemical sweat and think what I need is just another line of toxins of course? I warn anyone that thinks they are strong enough to experiment with the meth demon: you can be easily fooled. I came into a situation where I could acquire it easily from someone at work. My idea was to use it as a weekend recreation and motivational supplement for mundane chores.
I was getting a much purer product than I had seen 20 years ago — rocks that looked like shards of glass, as many have come to refer to it now shards or glass. I still thought if I refrained from smoking it and just snorted it on the weekends then took a day off to rest before going back to the grind I would be fine. This did work in fact for a while. I enjoyed what seemed like a renewed lust for life and my hobbies of playing guitar and wrenching on my vehicles.
I was getting what seemed to be a lot done helping my wife run her own business etc. This is the insidious nature of the drug because you’re fooled into thinking it’s short-lived performance enhancements are worth the side effects. This starts a game of denial where you watch yourself deteriorate but are helpless to the chains of the addiction, finding a way to justify every time you need to get high. This evil parasite takes up a home inside not just your body but your very soul. If there is such thing as possession by demons, meth addiction qualifies. I kept it a secret from my wife for a long time, hiding it better than I was aware of. I finally confessed during a crisis of our dog almost dying. Meth took me to a state of paranoia eventually that I never would have imagined. Hearing voices, peering out the window sure someone is watching my sorry state of being with malicious intent. I started having delusional hallucinations of parasites attacking my body. I thought the world was out to get me. When I look back on that person I don’t even recognize who I was.
It was a shameful shell of who I really could be and I thank the plant gods for getting me back on the road to recovery. My wife needless to say was upset and felt betrayed, so I agreed to become an outpatient in some expensive rehab of counseling sessions. The counseling was ok but was pushing me toward the standard 12 Step program. I wasn't very impressed with the NA model of abstinence from everything and affirmations of “I’m a loser ready to fall off the wagon anytime.” But that is a flawed ideology, because each moment is a chance to be someone new and different.
Psychedelics show you that your only obstacles are mostly flawed self-perceptions. I continued my own self-healing with DMT and a couple psilocybin trips. I know those were my inspiration to finally flush the last bag of meth down the toilet. I had had previous experiences with psychedelics as early as my late teens. In high school I started with LSD and later had encounters with mushrooms and ecstasy. I look back on those early days of use as less important than my recent journey because the intent was much more recreational then. I took them along with friends to enhance concerts, camping, and hiking adventures more than for their introspective value.
My introduction to DMT would show me a different perspective from some of my more introspective, intense LSD and psilocybin trips, with a unique presence of a caring intelligence. This intelligence offered guidance in a truthful direction giving insights to denied behaviors.
DMT somehow found me at just the right moment to be saved. The first time I used it, it blew my mind. I took a few puffs of an off-white powder, and my room was transformed into some glowing alive space. Everything looked alive and vibrating on some invisible lattice mapped in light. I was astonished to see a figure hovering by in an egg shaped holographic spacecraft with tribal drums and chants echoing in the background of some other time space. Never had I seen anything this intense on any other substance... and it made my beliefs in supernatural realms a reality I could experience at the puff of a pipe — amazing!
Looking back on my behavior, I always played the victim role. I perceived everything happening as out of my control. I can’t say I’m some enlightened being after imbibing the spirit molecule, but I know I’m a better person. My mind is no longer obsessed with dark thoughts of victimization. I found renewed interest in art and expression, and in meditation and Buddhist philosophies. I also have found an interesting side effect is I no longer crave alcohol. I will have a beer or two but no desire to get hammered anymore.
I recommend psychedelic therapy to anyone in the grips of addiction with a willingness to be saved. But be prepared to see yourself and your world in a new light―the transformation is not all warm and fuzzy rose garden parties. It can be a rude awakening to the work that you were running from while getting high.
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I started doing meth at 17. My addiction deepened, and I was arrested for being under the influence of meth. I was sentenced to a 28 day in patient program, then 6 months of out patient group sessions. I completed my 28 day program and then moved back to MO to finish out. I was speeding again within 2 days of being back. I completed my out patient program while using.
Just after I turned 20 I was at a Festival in MO called "Shwagstock". I had showed up spun pretty heavily but as the day wore on I was unable to find any more. Just as the come down was about to get really horrible a friend of mine showed up with some Liquid Acid. I couldn't tell you the strength, but the trip itself lasted nearly 14 hours. I had done acid before so I didn't go in unaware of what was going to happen, but my friend gave me some advice I'd never had before. She told me to focus on my inner self, to see the beauty in the world and try to draw in and keep it. On this trip I had my very first epiphany.
Over the next 4 months I put aside my weekends for Psychedelics. Mostly LSD, but Shrooms as well, Mescalin and Peyote once apiece. I found that every time I'd come out the other side I'd feel changed, and the changes never faded. At first it was just general stuff. I started to smile more (very strange for the angry, depressed person I used to be), the world around me seemed more beautiful no matter what state of mind I was in. Trees seemed greener, the wind felt more crisp, the smell of morning dew seemed more sharp. Then more drastic changes happened, my anger vanished, I began to feel positively about myself, and most importantly to myself, reality stopped looking like such a horrible place to be. I've been clean from Meth for 5 years.
-TomorrowByStorm
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I was responsible for dosing 65 patients with ibogaine hydrochloride to reverse drug dependency for over 18 months. All the patients I saw had severe and long-term addiction problems with cocaine, heroin, morphine, amphetamines, crack cocaine and methadone (the nastiest of all of them, I found).
Immediately after administration of ibogaine, all patients showed short-term improvement, many improved permanently and to this day, and many have coped somewhere in between, improved lives but not abstinence, and with lapses at times.
Of the 65 individuals, I would have to say it was almost universal that these individuals did not have their biological father in their lives for all or most of their childhood to adolescence. That was the striking universality of treating these individuals who are self-destructively using these substances, I found that "Daddy" issues are the paramount psychic wound that invites drug dependency.
Ibogaine hydrochloride is very safe, there were absolutely no health anomalies in all the time we worked at Iboga Therapy House 2002 - 2004 version. In fact, all the patients lives improved markedly, and their drug withdrawal and drug cravings were vastly curtailed upon administration of ibogaine.
The problem was in the patient's release to the world. Treating a substance dependent individual is futile if they are sent back to the same neighborhood and in the same social mileux. They are sure to lapse then. They need a new environment with one person who can help them keep busy and away from temptation. Alas, most people I treated were at risk to themselves if they had more than $10 in their hand. A substance dependent person has many triggers that set off a flush of mania for drugs and #1 is having money on your person, because now you can buy drugs. #2 is being in your neighborhood you usually score in, #3 is ANY neighborhood you can score in, #4 is hanging around with your friends (all whom likely are into the substance you must now distance yourself from).
So in order to give someone the best chance to get beyond substance dependency, the individual will need to:
1) Live in a new neighborhood
2) Change partner or have no partner
3) Get all new friends
4) Get a new lifestyle, job or way of living
Or re-phrased, stay away from all drug-using friends and acquaintances, avoid all old scoring neighborhoods, carry only $5 for emergencies and have a trusted friend (not using) buy your daily essentials. Keep busy and have plans to keep very, very busy. Ibogaine treatment also reduces your need to sleep for more than 3 hours for 2 or 3 weeks afterward, so keeping busy is very important. Taking up physical exercise is so important in recovery, as is an greatly improved diet, these two are greatly underestimated and under-utilized by those recovering.
This is a necessary program of recovery, but it is very, very difficult, especially for people, who, after years of severe drug dependency, have burned all their bridges with family, friends, employers, etc.
-Marc Scott Emery
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A British Columbia study was the first time ibogaine's therapeutic benefits for opiate addiction are being measured systematically in a public investigation.
Preliminary results justify much of the hype. "I've witnessed people's lives being turned around," said Leah Martin, one of the study leaders. Of 20 pre-study clients who took ibogaine at the facility, 13 were found to be abstaining when evaluated later, after an average interval of six months. The abstainers included six out of seven cocaine or crack addicts, three of eight opiate addicts and four of five people with other addictions, including methamphetamine.
With an overall abstinence rate of 65 percent, ibogaine does way better than the 10-percent average of conventional drug-treatment programs, Martin said. What's more, the clients at the B.C. facility are usually the hardest cases.
"People who contact us have already done every type of program in their city and are scouring the Internet. They've been in detox multiple times and are highly resistant to other therapy. They say, 'This is my last hope,'" she said.
Ibogaine works in 2 ways. It eliminates cravings for heroin and other drugs, but it also often works at a deeper level, by causing them to revisit life experiences, good and bad, helping many find ways to heal and ensure cravings don't come back. Scientists say it's like hitting a reset button for your brain. Traces of the drug remain in the body for up to 6 months, continuing to ward off addictive urges in unknown ways. "It truly is its own category of drug," Martin said.
"Ibogaine appears to work on every neurotransmitter system we know about", Kenneth Alper, Professor of Psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine, told the Journal of the American Medical Association in a 2002 story on ibogaine. Alper, who is also a co-investigator in the study, has called the use of ibogaine "one of the biggest paradigm shifts regarding treatment for addiction in the span of my career".
-Alex Roslin
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I had the pleasure of doing ibogaine to cure my addiction to crystal meth, and it worked! I’m 100% better. This stuff is a miracle. We need to legalize it. I feel like I never even used meth and am therefore free from the feelings of needing it. God bless ibogaine.
-taija
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Rocky Caravelli, a former Oregon resident who operates an ibogaine treatment clinic in Mexico says he tried ibogaine in Portland to shake a methamphetamine habit. "It was the first thing that really worked for me," Caravelli said. "It cured the opiate withdrawals, and resolved my meth cravings. I was amazed."
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On hearing about ibogaine, Madhu Braunger thought the substance might work for her son. But to convince him, she thought she had to try it herself first.
She scraped together the $6,000 fee and during spring break last year, flew to Mexico to try ibogaine. Once checked into the clinic, Braunger doubted she could go through with it. Sitting with clinic staff around a fire ring on the patio, Braunger decided to try.
Given three pills, she was left in a darkened bedroom with a pitcher of water and a candle. A baby monitor let the staff keep tabs on her.
Braunger's description is hard to grasp, she knows that. She said she visualized parts of her own ego, and then seemed transported to somewhere in the universe "where I saw absolutely nothing but love."
The treatment, she realized, could help her son confront the complex issues that drove him to his drug use.
"I knew right away that I was going to recommend it to my son," Braunger said.
Braunger sensed the time had come when he became suicidal after another round of drug abuse.
"He came to the house. He was straight," Braunger said. "He said, 'I will do anything.' "
Braunger made her way into the ibogaine underworld, recruiting a practitioner to travel to Portland to treat Hansen in a motel room.
"The result," she said, "was stunning. He quit drugs, got a job and turned himself in for fugitive warrants."
"It worked." Braunger said. "The monkey was off his back."
-Les Zaitz
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James was addicted to methamphetamine.
“I’ve destroyed everything and everyone in my life,” he confides to us. “I can’t go home again. I’ve lied, cheated and stolen; I’ve been fired from jobs, lived on the street, done so much damage that all the ‘amends’ in the world wouldn’t begin to fix it. I can’t stay clean, even though I know I have to. That’s my biggest fear, that I’ll get out of here and go right back to the same life as before. If that happens, I’m already done. I might as well be dead already. I’m not, am I?”
James is restless as he leaves the beach house for the clinic on the morning of his ibogaine session. He tells us he got zero sleep - his mind just wouldn’t leave him alone, berating him with all the fear and failure he had shared with us. Still, as he pulls away in the van bound for Tijuana, he flashes a confident smile and two thumbs up.
When James returns to the beach house two days after treatment, he looks as if he’s been to war. He’s pale and shaky, doesn’t want to talk, says he doesn’t mean to be rude but is anyway. He manages a crooked grin in our direction. “Unbelievable,” he rasps.
Two days post-treatment, we are sitting together under the watchful care of Anny Ortiz, the onsite therapist. Through biofeedback and breathing, she’s taken James into a deep state of relaxation. His eyes are closed, his body open, his words unchecked as he recounts the horrors of the first few hours of his ibogaine treatment.
“Then, it’s like, I saw something on the other side of all that, something bright… luminous. I knew I had to get there – but I was stuck in all this **** and noise and the terrible things I’ve done to people and the even worse things people have done to me… and every time I’d try to get out I’d get sucked right back in and I’d feel that… rage… rising up again… and I would do anything to make it stop! It’s like, ‘Do I have to ****ing die?! And then this very clear voice said: ‘Don’t die. Forgive.’”
James pauses. His lips quiver; his eyelids tighten. And right there, before our eyes, James seems to kick back into his ibogaine experience. His breath sharpens; his movements become twitches and shivers. After a time the tears come – for all of us, actually. His words pour out like a litany as he starts to forgive – himself, his parents, the people in his life, friends and enemies, anyone who’s ever hurt him, anyone he’s ever hurt; he’s naming names, releasing rivers of pain and regret, asking to be cleansed, forgiven. His voice becomes barely audible, his whispered prayers punctuated by such statements as: “So beautiful,” “Oh my God,” and “Thank you.”
Ten minutes later James is holding us all in a big group hug. “I love you guys so much,” he says, his gentle yin reciprocal to his bearlike physicality. “Thank you for being with me for this experience. It means more to me than you’ll ever know.”
Over the next few days, James’s inner and outer talk begins to change. He articulates his vision for a new life. He tells us he believes that now it’s possible to repair some of the damage in his life. Even more important, he says, for the first time he feels as if he’ll be able to stay clean. While still at the clinic, he reconnects with his mom, who invites him to come back home. He also reaches out to his former employer (who fired him for using drugs) and is told that when he’s ready, there’s still a job for him.
James remains in touch with us post-treatment. His phone calls are sweet, upbeat, full of optimism and enthusiasm. He’s back to work and has moved into a sober living community.
-The Fix
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I was in an experimental mood and made the mistake of trying meth. For the next 3 months I couldn't even get out of bed without it. I was stuck in an endless cycle of chasing a high and fighting the crash for 3-10 days at a time, sleeping for a few days, rinse and repeat... Then my friend had the bright idea to try tripping and weening off of it.
I was so addicted at the time that I was like "If I stay up for a few days on meth, I'll be tripping hard anyway..." Well, 1/4 gram of DMT got the weening off going, and at the end of it I suddenly hated my addiction. I started meditating, studying Buddhism, and crying every time I started a binge because I couldn't say no to it. Then a month later I did LSD, and I asked god to remove my addiction because I couldn't do it alone and... Well, it actually worked. I'm off meth for two weeks and the cravings are less and less every day, I'm sober and happy again, wide awake without drugs enjoying my life, meditating and writing... It's been a wild ride, I don't regret meth because it lead to me building a personal relationship with our higher self, and I think I may have achieved a permanent state of semi-enlightenment.
So for any addicts out there wondering if the tripping actually works, after four months of my life revolving around meth I'm sober and ecstatic. Yes this does, work you just gotta make a constant effort. It took a few trips to really get nailed in, but now I don't even feel like drinking or smoking weed, or tripping or anything. Tripping got me off drugs! I even dropped my meth friends, found the confidence to make new friends and talk to women, thank you psychedelics.
-AlmightyPhoenix
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Last month, dozens of ibogaine researchers, activists, and treatment providers gathered for a conference in Barcelona, where topics included safety and sustainable sourcing of ibogaine from Africa. Dr. Kenneth Alper was among the attendees who gave a presentation on the benefits of ibogaine to the Catalan Ministry of Health. The NYU prof believes ibogaine’s most likely path to prominence in the United States will be as a medication for meth addiction, for the simple reason that doctors and treatment providers have found that small daily—and thus drug-company-friendly—doses seem to work better formeth addiction than the mind-blowing “flood doses” used on opiate addicts.
Alper says no one thought to try non-hallucinogenic quantities of ibogaine until recently. Ibogaine treatment providers tend to have been former ibogaine users, and most assumed that the introspection brought on by tripping was key to overcoming their addictions. “That’s just how it evolved,” he says, noting that the large doses do seem to work best for opiate detox. “You’re talking about a drug that has been used in less than 10,000 people in the world in terms of treatment. It’s not surprising that’s how it evolved.”
“The visions have some psychological content that is salient and meaningful,” Alper adds. “On the other hand, there is no successful treatment for addiction that’s not interpreted as a spiritual transformation by the people who use it. It’s the G-word. It’s God. We as physicians don’t venture into that territory, but most people do.”
-Keegan Hamilton
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Ibogaine addiction therapy
By Keegan Hamilton
Clare Wilkins got hooked on heroin at the age of 20 while majoring in Latin American studies and psychology at Cornell University. Drug use led to depression, and she dropped out her senior year. She’d been trying to get clean using methadone for eight and a half years when her younger sister learned about ibogaine via the Internet. Wilkins, then 30 years old and employed as bookkeeper, read up on the subject, started saving up and, in 2005, shelled out $3,200 for a session at the XYZ Clinic* in Tijuana.
The trip—in both senses of the word—changed her life.
“I received a direct message that I was washed in love,” Wilkins says of her first encounter with the hallucinogen. “That the universe in its entirety is full of love, and that courses through us and was there for me. There was this soul body, this light body that had no beginning and no end. My fingers had no end; there were atoms coming in and going out."
“It got me off of methadone completely,” she continues. “My sense of shame about my addiction was washed away without having to practice with a therapist and talk, talk, talk.”
The experience was so profound that she elected to stay on at the clinic as a volunteer. Confident and chatty, with long brown curls and a disarming smile, Wilkins feels she has a knack for guiding patients through their ibogaine-induced spiritual awakenings.
“On ibogaine, all your walls come down,” she says. “You can’t lie. You get an opportunity to look at yourself honestly and see how you respond. My role is to be there as a comfort. People compliment me by saying, ‘You knew exactly when to hold my hand.’”
In 2006, XYZ Clinic director Martin Polanco offered Wilkins a full-time job. She’d heard rumors he was considering selling the clinic in the coming year, and on a whim, she offered to buy the operation from him outright.
“It was one of those ‘Can I put that back in my mouth?’ moments,” Wilkins recounts with a laugh. “I didn’t have the money; I didn’t even have a car.”
Wilkins borrowed $3,000 from her mother for a down payment, changed the clinic’s name to XYZ Biomedics*, and made monthly payments to Polanco for the next year and a half.
Stays at the clinic aren’t cheap. For the standard 10-day detox, Wilkins charges $7,500, travel not included. She employs a staff of 10, including two Mexican physicians, a paramedic, a masseuse/acupuncturist and a chef. The chef, Wilkins’ sister Sarah, is a recovering addict who credits ibogaine for kicking her drug dependence.
Aaron Aurand, a live-in volunteer, feels the same way. “I did eight months of court-ordered inpatient treatment before I came here,” says the native of Spokane, Washington. “I got more therapy here in five days than I did in that entire time. Lots of junkies don’t want to look inside themselves. With this, you’ll get shown.”
In addition to ibogaine, Wilkins emphasizes nutrition. The clinic’s pantry is mostly organic and gluten-free and boasts a cache of vitamins and supplements that patients gobble by the handful.
“The body has its own framework and can heal itself if you remove harmful substances and balance the systems. We do colon cleanses and liver cleanses even before they get the ibogaine,” she explains, pointing out that there are practical reasons for the former: “You get people who come in here—especially opiate addicts—who are clogged up.”
To date, Wilkins says, she has treated more than 300 patients. “Sixty-two percent of our clients are chronic-pain patients,” she says. “You’re not talking IV [heroin] addicts or crack addicts. You’re talking grandmas on Oxycontin.”
Some people come for “psycho-spiritual” purposes. Ken Wells, an environmental consultant from Santa Rosa, says he underwent conventional counseling for depression for 15 years before trying ibogaine as a last-ditch effort to save his crumbling marriage.
Three days after taking ibogaine for the first time, Wells compares the experience to “defragging a computer hard drive.” He experimented with psychedelics decades ago in college, but, he says, ibogaine is like nothing else.
Ibogaine’s effectiveness has already helped it gain acceptance abroad. Lawmakers in New Zealand, where methamphetamine use has skyrocketed in recent years, have tweaked the nation’s laws to allow physicians to prescribe ibogaine. Dr. Gavin Cape, an addiction specialist at New Zealand’s Dunedin School of Medicine says the nation’s doctors are so far reluctant to wield their new anti-meth weapon. “There is strong advocacy in New Zealand for ibogaine, and it may turn out to have a place alongside conventional therapies for the addictions, but I’m afraid we are a still few years away from that goal.”
What Is Iboga?
Tabernanthe iboga is a powerful psychedelic from West Africa that has been in use for centuries in traditional healing ceremonies. It can be used in its traditional form from the root bark of the plant (known as iboga), or in the laboratory-isolated form of ibogaine which only contains the central psychoactive substance (known as ibogaine). Today iboga is best known for its miraculous ability to cure or drastically reduce addiction to substances like alcohol, crack cocaine, and heroin in a single treatment. It can also help people overcome addiction to prescription opiates such as morphine, methadone, Vicodin, Percocet, and OxyContin. While this may sound too good to be true, scores of personal testimonies and now clinical research is backing up this claim, and iboga treatment centers are popping up all over the world specializing in treating addiction, post traumatic stress, and mood disorders.
Ibogaine addiction recovery therapy
Ibogaine is "the closest thing to a silver bullet for addiction as you’ll ever find. If there ever was a miracle drug for eliminating opiate withdrawals and addiction, Ibogaine is it."
Ibogaine is an indole alkaloid found in the bark of the root of the African shrub Tabernan. It has strong anti-addictive qualities, including high efficacy in acute opioid withdrawal and addiction. In laymen’s terms, Ibogaine is a secret tribal hallucinogen that helps you achieve your two most difficult goals.
1) Ibogaine can significantly reduce opiate/opioid withdrawal symptoms in under 24 hours.
2) Ibogaine eliminates the desire for opiates/opioids. Many people who have taken Ibogaine swear that it cured their addiction altogether.
Ibogaine treatment has a mortality rate of 1 in 300, with deaths coming from brachycardia (heart rate slowing way down) and lethal combinations with other drugs. The risks of this treatment should therefore be weighed very carefully, and treatment should only be done in a medical setting.
People with a history of heart attack, heart murmurs, arrhythmia, heart operations or severe obesity should not take ibogaine. Before taking ibogaine the individual should not use his drug of choice for the time period the drug needs to be sufficiently eliminated.
Ibogaine is considered the 'active' compound in the Tabernanthe iboga plant, used for centuries as a healer, teacher, and catalyst for ceremonies by the Bwiti people indigenous to
what is now the Central-west African republic of Gabon. But the versatile plant has remained virtually unknown in the West, where it has a very different history. Researcher Howard Lotsof, PhD, addicted to heroin and methadone, discovered the anti-addictive action of ibogaine in 1962. Given a capsule of pure ibogaine HCL by a trusted friend who was familiar with chemistry, Lotsof was simply seeking a new high. He was astonished when coming out of this difficult experience 36-opiate-abstinent hours later to realize he had no physical craving for opiates, and even more remarkably, very little of the agonizing physical symptoms normally associated with opiate withdrawal.
Methamphetamine is a stimulant drug usually used as a white, bitter-tasting powder or a pill. Crystal meth, a form of the drug, looks like glass fragments or shiny, bluish-white rocks. It is chemically similar to amphetamine.
Methamphetamine increases the amount of the natural chemical dopamine in the brain. Dopamine is involved in body movement, motivation, pleasure, and reward (pleasure from natural behaviors such as eating). The drug’s ability to release high levels of dopamine rapidly in reward areas of the brain produces the "rush" (euphoria) or "flash" that many people experience. Methamphetamine is highly addictive. When people stop taking it, withdrawal symptoms can include anxiety, fatigue, severe depression, psychosis and intense drug cravings.
Ibogaine is the only treatment for heroin, opiate, opioid, crystal meth and fentanyl addiction that can eliminate withdrawal and craving in 30 to 45 minutes.
Ibogaine is not currently approved for any medical uses in the U.S. It is used as an alternative medicine treatment for drug addiction in some countries. Its prohibition has slowed scientific research. The use of Ibogaine for drug treatment is now accepted in Canada, Mexico, France, and the UK. In many cases, administration of a therapeutic course of Ibogaine is followed by intensive counseling therapy. Often more than one round of the drug is needed for lasting sobriety.
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My son had ibogaine treatment in January this year for his meth addiction, and he has not taken any drugs since. He is a completely different boy with a very different outlook on life. He had been on antidepression meds for years and has never suffered from depression or taken any meds since his treatment. This was the only treatment that worked for his addiction and I know if it wasn't for Ibogaine I would have buried him as he did try to take his life many times. He is a success story for Ibogaine.
My son and I are involved with a group of 20 people here that had Ibogaine treatment for their drug addiction, and not one has gone back to drugs or had any problems with the treatment. Some of them had been to rehab quite few times and still couldn't kick their habit until they had Ibogaine. One of the girls is now married with a child and living a life without drugs for 5 years now. Ibogaine is a prescription medicine here and has to be administered by a doctor in a nice clean clinic, not some dirty hotel room, and we don't call it a miracle drug. It is just a treatment that should be available to addicts that want to give up and can't do it with other treatments. Ibogaine here is a herbal product not a drug. Every single person has different experiences when they have Ibogaine so unless you or anyone else has tried it you can't really speak about it like we can. And another thing you don't have to have a drug problem to take it. We've had doctors, psychiatrists and herbalists try Ibogaine and they have all been impressed. And it is wonderful to finally get my son back and see light in his eyes just like all the other ex-addicts here.
I am from New Zealand. I am Maori and we use the bush and forest to heal our sick ones. That is why I believe so much in Ibogaine and I have seen so many people successfully get off drugs using this treatment. And yes, I do agree that a doctor has to be involved and all the tests done before hand. We do not call it a miracle treatment or promise that everyone will become drug free, because it is still up to the person if they want to become drug free. Ibogaine gives them a 3 to 6 months chance after it has cleaned their insides to start working on their problems as to why they went down that track in the first place. Addicts can work on their problems with help as Ibogaine stops the craving for drugs for months. This is a very important part of the treatment once they have been cleaned.
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DMT and psilocybin helped me quit crystal meth
By Brian
My story involves a transformation in mind and the escape from a crippling addiction. I have no doubt my recovery was spurred by the catalyst of psychedelic experience, specifically dimethyltryptamine and psilocybin. I’m a 44-year old male from a middle working class family, and I've had an interest in mind-altering substances since my teens.
A year ago I was involved in an affair with crystal methamphetamine that took me to the brink of insanity and physical breakdown. I have DMT and psilocybin to thank for helping me gain perspective and snapping out of its evil spell.
I had some marriage problems, dissatisfaction with my job and frankly boredom that led me back to a old Friend of the Devil that I had managed to stay away from for a good 20 years. I had some experience with meth in my youth, being surrounded by it when I moved to Arizona after high school. That was the late ’80s and early ’90s, and it was a different recipe — less refined. I did get dependent on it back then for a few years, but it never effected me as badly as it did in the recent nightmare it dragged me through. I think the lack of purity and a more recreational approach, as well as a lack of a surplus of the drug to consume, kept me from really losing it back then. I also thought that since I never smoked or injected it I could maintain some control over its pull, but this is a big lie.
This is where psychedelics work their magic in an addicts mind, because they don’t allow you to lie to yourself. Addictions are perpetuated by lies. How else could you look yourself in the mirror with your red skin breaking out from the ooze of chemical sweat and think what I need is just another line of toxins of course? I warn anyone that thinks they are strong enough to experiment with the meth demon: you can be easily fooled. I came into a situation where I could acquire it easily from someone at work. My idea was to use it as a weekend recreation and motivational supplement for mundane chores.
I was getting a much purer product than I had seen 20 years ago — rocks that looked like shards of glass, as many have come to refer to it now shards or glass. I still thought if I refrained from smoking it and just snorted it on the weekends then took a day off to rest before going back to the grind I would be fine. This did work in fact for a while. I enjoyed what seemed like a renewed lust for life and my hobbies of playing guitar and wrenching on my vehicles.
I was getting what seemed to be a lot done helping my wife run her own business etc. This is the insidious nature of the drug because you’re fooled into thinking it’s short-lived performance enhancements are worth the side effects. This starts a game of denial where you watch yourself deteriorate but are helpless to the chains of the addiction, finding a way to justify every time you need to get high. This evil parasite takes up a home inside not just your body but your very soul. If there is such thing as possession by demons, meth addiction qualifies. I kept it a secret from my wife for a long time, hiding it better than I was aware of. I finally confessed during a crisis of our dog almost dying. Meth took me to a state of paranoia eventually that I never would have imagined. Hearing voices, peering out the window sure someone is watching my sorry state of being with malicious intent. I started having delusional hallucinations of parasites attacking my body. I thought the world was out to get me. When I look back on that person I don’t even recognize who I was.
It was a shameful shell of who I really could be and I thank the plant gods for getting me back on the road to recovery. My wife needless to say was upset and felt betrayed, so I agreed to become an outpatient in some expensive rehab of counseling sessions. The counseling was ok but was pushing me toward the standard 12 Step program. I wasn't very impressed with the NA model of abstinence from everything and affirmations of “I’m a loser ready to fall off the wagon anytime.” But that is a flawed ideology, because each moment is a chance to be someone new and different.
Psychedelics show you that your only obstacles are mostly flawed self-perceptions. I continued my own self-healing with DMT and a couple psilocybin trips. I know those were my inspiration to finally flush the last bag of meth down the toilet. I had had previous experiences with psychedelics as early as my late teens. In high school I started with LSD and later had encounters with mushrooms and ecstasy. I look back on those early days of use as less important than my recent journey because the intent was much more recreational then. I took them along with friends to enhance concerts, camping, and hiking adventures more than for their introspective value.
My introduction to DMT would show me a different perspective from some of my more introspective, intense LSD and psilocybin trips, with a unique presence of a caring intelligence. This intelligence offered guidance in a truthful direction giving insights to denied behaviors.
DMT somehow found me at just the right moment to be saved. The first time I used it, it blew my mind. I took a few puffs of an off-white powder, and my room was transformed into some glowing alive space. Everything looked alive and vibrating on some invisible lattice mapped in light. I was astonished to see a figure hovering by in an egg shaped holographic spacecraft with tribal drums and chants echoing in the background of some other time space. Never had I seen anything this intense on any other substance... and it made my beliefs in supernatural realms a reality I could experience at the puff of a pipe — amazing!
Looking back on my behavior, I always played the victim role. I perceived everything happening as out of my control. I can’t say I’m some enlightened being after imbibing the spirit molecule, but I know I’m a better person. My mind is no longer obsessed with dark thoughts of victimization. I found renewed interest in art and expression, and in meditation and Buddhist philosophies. I also have found an interesting side effect is I no longer crave alcohol. I will have a beer or two but no desire to get hammered anymore.
I recommend psychedelic therapy to anyone in the grips of addiction with a willingness to be saved. But be prepared to see yourself and your world in a new light―the transformation is not all warm and fuzzy rose garden parties. It can be a rude awakening to the work that you were running from while getting high.
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I started doing meth at 17. My addiction deepened, and I was arrested for being under the influence of meth. I was sentenced to a 28 day in patient program, then 6 months of out patient group sessions. I completed my 28 day program and then moved back to MO to finish out. I was speeding again within 2 days of being back. I completed my out patient program while using.
Just after I turned 20 I was at a Festival in MO called "Shwagstock". I had showed up spun pretty heavily but as the day wore on I was unable to find any more. Just as the come down was about to get really horrible a friend of mine showed up with some Liquid Acid. I couldn't tell you the strength, but the trip itself lasted nearly 14 hours. I had done acid before so I didn't go in unaware of what was going to happen, but my friend gave me some advice I'd never had before. She told me to focus on my inner self, to see the beauty in the world and try to draw in and keep it. On this trip I had my very first epiphany.
Over the next 4 months I put aside my weekends for Psychedelics. Mostly LSD, but Shrooms as well, Mescalin and Peyote once apiece. I found that every time I'd come out the other side I'd feel changed, and the changes never faded. At first it was just general stuff. I started to smile more (very strange for the angry, depressed person I used to be), the world around me seemed more beautiful no matter what state of mind I was in. Trees seemed greener, the wind felt more crisp, the smell of morning dew seemed more sharp. Then more drastic changes happened, my anger vanished, I began to feel positively about myself, and most importantly to myself, reality stopped looking like such a horrible place to be. I've been clean from Meth for 5 years.
-TomorrowByStorm
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I was responsible for dosing 65 patients with ibogaine hydrochloride to reverse drug dependency for over 18 months. All the patients I saw had severe and long-term addiction problems with cocaine, heroin, morphine, amphetamines, crack cocaine and methadone (the nastiest of all of them, I found).
Immediately after administration of ibogaine, all patients showed short-term improvement, many improved permanently and to this day, and many have coped somewhere in between, improved lives but not abstinence, and with lapses at times.
Of the 65 individuals, I would have to say it was almost universal that these individuals did not have their biological father in their lives for all or most of their childhood to adolescence. That was the striking universality of treating these individuals who are self-destructively using these substances, I found that "Daddy" issues are the paramount psychic wound that invites drug dependency.
Ibogaine hydrochloride is very safe, there were absolutely no health anomalies in all the time we worked at Iboga Therapy House 2002 - 2004 version. In fact, all the patients lives improved markedly, and their drug withdrawal and drug cravings were vastly curtailed upon administration of ibogaine.
The problem was in the patient's release to the world. Treating a substance dependent individual is futile if they are sent back to the same neighborhood and in the same social mileux. They are sure to lapse then. They need a new environment with one person who can help them keep busy and away from temptation. Alas, most people I treated were at risk to themselves if they had more than $10 in their hand. A substance dependent person has many triggers that set off a flush of mania for drugs and #1 is having money on your person, because now you can buy drugs. #2 is being in your neighborhood you usually score in, #3 is ANY neighborhood you can score in, #4 is hanging around with your friends (all whom likely are into the substance you must now distance yourself from).
So in order to give someone the best chance to get beyond substance dependency, the individual will need to:
1) Live in a new neighborhood
2) Change partner or have no partner
3) Get all new friends
4) Get a new lifestyle, job or way of living
Or re-phrased, stay away from all drug-using friends and acquaintances, avoid all old scoring neighborhoods, carry only $5 for emergencies and have a trusted friend (not using) buy your daily essentials. Keep busy and have plans to keep very, very busy. Ibogaine treatment also reduces your need to sleep for more than 3 hours for 2 or 3 weeks afterward, so keeping busy is very important. Taking up physical exercise is so important in recovery, as is an greatly improved diet, these two are greatly underestimated and under-utilized by those recovering.
This is a necessary program of recovery, but it is very, very difficult, especially for people, who, after years of severe drug dependency, have burned all their bridges with family, friends, employers, etc.
-Marc Scott Emery
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A British Columbia study was the first time ibogaine's therapeutic benefits for opiate addiction are being measured systematically in a public investigation.
Preliminary results justify much of the hype. "I've witnessed people's lives being turned around," said Leah Martin, one of the study leaders. Of 20 pre-study clients who took ibogaine at the facility, 13 were found to be abstaining when evaluated later, after an average interval of six months. The abstainers included six out of seven cocaine or crack addicts, three of eight opiate addicts and four of five people with other addictions, including methamphetamine.
With an overall abstinence rate of 65 percent, ibogaine does way better than the 10-percent average of conventional drug-treatment programs, Martin said. What's more, the clients at the B.C. facility are usually the hardest cases.
"People who contact us have already done every type of program in their city and are scouring the Internet. They've been in detox multiple times and are highly resistant to other therapy. They say, 'This is my last hope,'" she said.
Ibogaine works in 2 ways. It eliminates cravings for heroin and other drugs, but it also often works at a deeper level, by causing them to revisit life experiences, good and bad, helping many find ways to heal and ensure cravings don't come back. Scientists say it's like hitting a reset button for your brain. Traces of the drug remain in the body for up to 6 months, continuing to ward off addictive urges in unknown ways. "It truly is its own category of drug," Martin said.
"Ibogaine appears to work on every neurotransmitter system we know about", Kenneth Alper, Professor of Psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine, told the Journal of the American Medical Association in a 2002 story on ibogaine. Alper, who is also a co-investigator in the study, has called the use of ibogaine "one of the biggest paradigm shifts regarding treatment for addiction in the span of my career".
-Alex Roslin
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I had the pleasure of doing ibogaine to cure my addiction to crystal meth, and it worked! I’m 100% better. This stuff is a miracle. We need to legalize it. I feel like I never even used meth and am therefore free from the feelings of needing it. God bless ibogaine.
-taija
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Rocky Caravelli, a former Oregon resident who operates an ibogaine treatment clinic in Mexico says he tried ibogaine in Portland to shake a methamphetamine habit. "It was the first thing that really worked for me," Caravelli said. "It cured the opiate withdrawals, and resolved my meth cravings. I was amazed."
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On hearing about ibogaine, Madhu Braunger thought the substance might work for her son. But to convince him, she thought she had to try it herself first.
She scraped together the $6,000 fee and during spring break last year, flew to Mexico to try ibogaine. Once checked into the clinic, Braunger doubted she could go through with it. Sitting with clinic staff around a fire ring on the patio, Braunger decided to try.
Given three pills, she was left in a darkened bedroom with a pitcher of water and a candle. A baby monitor let the staff keep tabs on her.
Braunger's description is hard to grasp, she knows that. She said she visualized parts of her own ego, and then seemed transported to somewhere in the universe "where I saw absolutely nothing but love."
The treatment, she realized, could help her son confront the complex issues that drove him to his drug use.
"I knew right away that I was going to recommend it to my son," Braunger said.
Braunger sensed the time had come when he became suicidal after another round of drug abuse.
"He came to the house. He was straight," Braunger said. "He said, 'I will do anything.' "
Braunger made her way into the ibogaine underworld, recruiting a practitioner to travel to Portland to treat Hansen in a motel room.
"The result," she said, "was stunning. He quit drugs, got a job and turned himself in for fugitive warrants."
"It worked." Braunger said. "The monkey was off his back."
-Les Zaitz
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James was addicted to methamphetamine.
“I’ve destroyed everything and everyone in my life,” he confides to us. “I can’t go home again. I’ve lied, cheated and stolen; I’ve been fired from jobs, lived on the street, done so much damage that all the ‘amends’ in the world wouldn’t begin to fix it. I can’t stay clean, even though I know I have to. That’s my biggest fear, that I’ll get out of here and go right back to the same life as before. If that happens, I’m already done. I might as well be dead already. I’m not, am I?”
James is restless as he leaves the beach house for the clinic on the morning of his ibogaine session. He tells us he got zero sleep - his mind just wouldn’t leave him alone, berating him with all the fear and failure he had shared with us. Still, as he pulls away in the van bound for Tijuana, he flashes a confident smile and two thumbs up.
When James returns to the beach house two days after treatment, he looks as if he’s been to war. He’s pale and shaky, doesn’t want to talk, says he doesn’t mean to be rude but is anyway. He manages a crooked grin in our direction. “Unbelievable,” he rasps.
Two days post-treatment, we are sitting together under the watchful care of Anny Ortiz, the onsite therapist. Through biofeedback and breathing, she’s taken James into a deep state of relaxation. His eyes are closed, his body open, his words unchecked as he recounts the horrors of the first few hours of his ibogaine treatment.
“Then, it’s like, I saw something on the other side of all that, something bright… luminous. I knew I had to get there – but I was stuck in all this **** and noise and the terrible things I’ve done to people and the even worse things people have done to me… and every time I’d try to get out I’d get sucked right back in and I’d feel that… rage… rising up again… and I would do anything to make it stop! It’s like, ‘Do I have to ****ing die?! And then this very clear voice said: ‘Don’t die. Forgive.’”
James pauses. His lips quiver; his eyelids tighten. And right there, before our eyes, James seems to kick back into his ibogaine experience. His breath sharpens; his movements become twitches and shivers. After a time the tears come – for all of us, actually. His words pour out like a litany as he starts to forgive – himself, his parents, the people in his life, friends and enemies, anyone who’s ever hurt him, anyone he’s ever hurt; he’s naming names, releasing rivers of pain and regret, asking to be cleansed, forgiven. His voice becomes barely audible, his whispered prayers punctuated by such statements as: “So beautiful,” “Oh my God,” and “Thank you.”
Ten minutes later James is holding us all in a big group hug. “I love you guys so much,” he says, his gentle yin reciprocal to his bearlike physicality. “Thank you for being with me for this experience. It means more to me than you’ll ever know.”
Over the next few days, James’s inner and outer talk begins to change. He articulates his vision for a new life. He tells us he believes that now it’s possible to repair some of the damage in his life. Even more important, he says, for the first time he feels as if he’ll be able to stay clean. While still at the clinic, he reconnects with his mom, who invites him to come back home. He also reaches out to his former employer (who fired him for using drugs) and is told that when he’s ready, there’s still a job for him.
James remains in touch with us post-treatment. His phone calls are sweet, upbeat, full of optimism and enthusiasm. He’s back to work and has moved into a sober living community.
-The Fix
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I was in an experimental mood and made the mistake of trying meth. For the next 3 months I couldn't even get out of bed without it. I was stuck in an endless cycle of chasing a high and fighting the crash for 3-10 days at a time, sleeping for a few days, rinse and repeat... Then my friend had the bright idea to try tripping and weening off of it.
I was so addicted at the time that I was like "If I stay up for a few days on meth, I'll be tripping hard anyway..." Well, 1/4 gram of DMT got the weening off going, and at the end of it I suddenly hated my addiction. I started meditating, studying Buddhism, and crying every time I started a binge because I couldn't say no to it. Then a month later I did LSD, and I asked god to remove my addiction because I couldn't do it alone and... Well, it actually worked. I'm off meth for two weeks and the cravings are less and less every day, I'm sober and happy again, wide awake without drugs enjoying my life, meditating and writing... It's been a wild ride, I don't regret meth because it lead to me building a personal relationship with our higher self, and I think I may have achieved a permanent state of semi-enlightenment.
So for any addicts out there wondering if the tripping actually works, after four months of my life revolving around meth I'm sober and ecstatic. Yes this does, work you just gotta make a constant effort. It took a few trips to really get nailed in, but now I don't even feel like drinking or smoking weed, or tripping or anything. Tripping got me off drugs! I even dropped my meth friends, found the confidence to make new friends and talk to women, thank you psychedelics.
-AlmightyPhoenix
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Last month, dozens of ibogaine researchers, activists, and treatment providers gathered for a conference in Barcelona, where topics included safety and sustainable sourcing of ibogaine from Africa. Dr. Kenneth Alper was among the attendees who gave a presentation on the benefits of ibogaine to the Catalan Ministry of Health. The NYU prof believes ibogaine’s most likely path to prominence in the United States will be as a medication for meth addiction, for the simple reason that doctors and treatment providers have found that small daily—and thus drug-company-friendly—doses seem to work better formeth addiction than the mind-blowing “flood doses” used on opiate addicts.
Alper says no one thought to try non-hallucinogenic quantities of ibogaine until recently. Ibogaine treatment providers tend to have been former ibogaine users, and most assumed that the introspection brought on by tripping was key to overcoming their addictions. “That’s just how it evolved,” he says, noting that the large doses do seem to work best for opiate detox. “You’re talking about a drug that has been used in less than 10,000 people in the world in terms of treatment. It’s not surprising that’s how it evolved.”
“The visions have some psychological content that is salient and meaningful,” Alper adds. “On the other hand, there is no successful treatment for addiction that’s not interpreted as a spiritual transformation by the people who use it. It’s the G-word. It’s God. We as physicians don’t venture into that territory, but most people do.”
-Keegan Hamilton
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Ibogaine addiction therapy
By Keegan Hamilton
Clare Wilkins got hooked on heroin at the age of 20 while majoring in Latin American studies and psychology at Cornell University. Drug use led to depression, and she dropped out her senior year. She’d been trying to get clean using methadone for eight and a half years when her younger sister learned about ibogaine via the Internet. Wilkins, then 30 years old and employed as bookkeeper, read up on the subject, started saving up and, in 2005, shelled out $3,200 for a session at the XYZ Clinic* in Tijuana.
The trip—in both senses of the word—changed her life.
“I received a direct message that I was washed in love,” Wilkins says of her first encounter with the hallucinogen. “That the universe in its entirety is full of love, and that courses through us and was there for me. There was this soul body, this light body that had no beginning and no end. My fingers had no end; there were atoms coming in and going out."
“It got me off of methadone completely,” she continues. “My sense of shame about my addiction was washed away without having to practice with a therapist and talk, talk, talk.”
The experience was so profound that she elected to stay on at the clinic as a volunteer. Confident and chatty, with long brown curls and a disarming smile, Wilkins feels she has a knack for guiding patients through their ibogaine-induced spiritual awakenings.
“On ibogaine, all your walls come down,” she says. “You can’t lie. You get an opportunity to look at yourself honestly and see how you respond. My role is to be there as a comfort. People compliment me by saying, ‘You knew exactly when to hold my hand.’”
In 2006, XYZ Clinic director Martin Polanco offered Wilkins a full-time job. She’d heard rumors he was considering selling the clinic in the coming year, and on a whim, she offered to buy the operation from him outright.
“It was one of those ‘Can I put that back in my mouth?’ moments,” Wilkins recounts with a laugh. “I didn’t have the money; I didn’t even have a car.”
Wilkins borrowed $3,000 from her mother for a down payment, changed the clinic’s name to XYZ Biomedics*, and made monthly payments to Polanco for the next year and a half.
Stays at the clinic aren’t cheap. For the standard 10-day detox, Wilkins charges $7,500, travel not included. She employs a staff of 10, including two Mexican physicians, a paramedic, a masseuse/acupuncturist and a chef. The chef, Wilkins’ sister Sarah, is a recovering addict who credits ibogaine for kicking her drug dependence.
Aaron Aurand, a live-in volunteer, feels the same way. “I did eight months of court-ordered inpatient treatment before I came here,” says the native of Spokane, Washington. “I got more therapy here in five days than I did in that entire time. Lots of junkies don’t want to look inside themselves. With this, you’ll get shown.”
In addition to ibogaine, Wilkins emphasizes nutrition. The clinic’s pantry is mostly organic and gluten-free and boasts a cache of vitamins and supplements that patients gobble by the handful.
“The body has its own framework and can heal itself if you remove harmful substances and balance the systems. We do colon cleanses and liver cleanses even before they get the ibogaine,” she explains, pointing out that there are practical reasons for the former: “You get people who come in here—especially opiate addicts—who are clogged up.”
To date, Wilkins says, she has treated more than 300 patients. “Sixty-two percent of our clients are chronic-pain patients,” she says. “You’re not talking IV [heroin] addicts or crack addicts. You’re talking grandmas on Oxycontin.”
Some people come for “psycho-spiritual” purposes. Ken Wells, an environmental consultant from Santa Rosa, says he underwent conventional counseling for depression for 15 years before trying ibogaine as a last-ditch effort to save his crumbling marriage.
Three days after taking ibogaine for the first time, Wells compares the experience to “defragging a computer hard drive.” He experimented with psychedelics decades ago in college, but, he says, ibogaine is like nothing else.
Ibogaine’s effectiveness has already helped it gain acceptance abroad. Lawmakers in New Zealand, where methamphetamine use has skyrocketed in recent years, have tweaked the nation’s laws to allow physicians to prescribe ibogaine. Dr. Gavin Cape, an addiction specialist at New Zealand’s Dunedin School of Medicine says the nation’s doctors are so far reluctant to wield their new anti-meth weapon. “There is strong advocacy in New Zealand for ibogaine, and it may turn out to have a place alongside conventional therapies for the addictions, but I’m afraid we are a still few years away from that goal.”
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