When the psychedelics come back, the story of the Hollywood Hospital in New Westminster will come back.

From books to streaming services, content to social media campaigns,Psychedelicshas flashbacks.

Also known as hallucinogensPsychedelicsare a type of psychoactive substance that alters perception, mood, and cognitive processes. They were a well-known foundation in the world of turn-on, tune-in and drop-out of thehippie counterculture

in the 1960s. (psilocybin), or while sipping peyotety (mescaline), psychedelic substances have been used to treat illnesses such as depression, anxiety, addiction, and PTSD.

One of the places that used psychedelic for therapeutic purposes decades ago wasHollywood Hospital in New Westminsternamed after the holly tree in front. The hospital, the sixth largest white mansion street, first opened in 1919 and was widely known as an alcohol treatment facility.

1957, J. Things changed when Dr. Rosmaclean bought the facility and brought in LSD enthusiast Al Hubbard. The facility will continue to manage LSD to treat alcoholism, anxiety disorders, depression, and rocky marriages — more than 6,000 monitored trips will be recorded. According to them, success ranged from 50 to 80 percent. The facility was completely closed in 1975.

The fascinating story of the hospital and the psychedelic psychiatry practiced there are recorded in the book:Acid Room: The psychedelic trials and hardships of the Hollywood Hospital, by by Jesse DonaldsonandErikaDyck, PhD.

"There has been a lot of innovation in this area for over a decade. Vancouver. Donaldson, a writer and journalist based in Vancouver, said on the phone: "It's interesting to see these newspaper articles (1940s and 50s) where people were talking about psychedelics in very non-hysterical language. Today, many of those conversations were colored by years of public debate, criminalization, and bans, which was very true at the time. "

Despite reported success in treatment, people using unsupervised non-medical methods have classified psychedelic substances as drugs of abuse of no medical value. Canada classified psychedelics as illegal substances in 1968. Then you get a message that these drugs are bad, and consuming them can be terrible.

"When we're talking about drug use, we're talking emotionally, whether it's therapeutic or entertaining. Science is there. We're these things. We know that they are safe and that when used properly they can be incredibly beneficial, but we have found them in our political and social context. So, for many people, emotions are usually more important than facts, so moral panics about this can happen very easily, "Donaldson said.

At the heart of this story are some interesting and curious characters. Outstanding is Hubbard, a psychedelic pioneer of bohemian LSD packing and perhaps a secret government operative. Hubbard claimed to have converted writer Aldous Huxley to LSD, and was reportedly able to count acid king Timothy Leary as one of his fans.

"He was called Johnny Appleseed of LSD. I was wondering," Who the hell is this guy? " I think the story that always comes to me in history is the story of finding a fascinating character, "Donaldson said of Hubbard, who had a Gulf Islands lab.

"Find someone who is doing something interesting, unusual, or ready-to-use outside of names and dates. It's a kind of hook for me, and I've started digging.

Later, Donaldson contacted Dyke, a professor at Saskatchewan University and an academic historian who wrote a book on psychedelic psychiatry. After all, Dyck is B from his personal collection. C. I was in the process of digitizing the records of the hospital that I moved to. Museums and archives.

"I always designated it as a story that needed its own book," Dyke said of the New West facility. "Perhaps after 30 minutes of conversation, we decided that it might actually be a good thing to work together to write this together. There are so many between us. Access to media points and different types of archive records was different. ”

As the war on drugs approaches detente, this book is a fascinating memory of decades ago. Will be. As the denials shouted, these medicines not only made headcases, but also made clinical advances in health.

"They were like these bigger characters, but in a way boring," Dyke said of an early generation of psychedelic researchers. I did. "They actually came across several ways in a conservative way.

" People like Abram Hoffer and Humphry Osmond were members of the American Psychiatric Association. They were of some sort. There were these interesting kinds of conservative radicals in some respects as I was trying to line up my toes. They are in the tent, but they are pushing.

" I was really fascinated by that kind of conservative in that story, and they found people like Hubbard attractive but potentially dangerous and dangerous. They are the same about Really. I felt that. "

The hospital literally made the headline in 1959 when the state newspaper Ben Metcalfe wrote a six-part front page series on psychiatric therapy. .. But most of the time it was flying under the radar.

"Maybe it was in Kitsilano, or at a crossroads with other kinds of sexy stories about hippies, riots, and revolutions. It's a spot, but This was such a messy place. It's a private place in New West, "Dyck said. "There were people in white coats working there. It looked boring, mainstream, and current."

Despite looking boring, Dyke and Donaldson For many patients who had access records, that was nothing.

"Without the story of individual patients, this would be a much less convincing hell," Dyck said. "It's normal people like you and me, but if you look at the correspondence and patient files, you'll see that this is life-changing for many people. Certainly not everyone, but it's Draw a picture that is completely different from what we were told.

"This is life-changing and long-lasting for people. It's possible for us. It's an important part of the conversation that I felt needed to be amplified as much as possible. "

Regarding the growing popularity of microdosing and psychedelic resets today, Dyck said the people involved were too strong. It suggests looking at history to avoid the pitfalls of pushing too fast.

"It would be great if we could see something like this historically and remind us of the bigger questions about the cultural and ethical elements associated with psychedelics," Dyck said. .. "Science isn't enough. You really need to be careful about how this goes by not only going beyond regulations and passing proper tests, but also paying attention to safety issues. There are.

"There are all sorts of problems that can undermine or annoy the success of the psychedelic revolution ... and many of them aren't scientific at all. And this is what we culture. And safety, and remind us that we need to pay attention to all those kinds of things at the same time."

" Don't ruin this again, "Donaldson added.

dgee @ postmedia. com

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