Episode 506 Sam Peterson Alternative PTSD Treatments That Work Transcript
This transcript is from episode 506 with guest Sam Peterson.
Scott DeLuzio: [00:00:00] What if the one thing that could save your life was something that you were told to avoid your entire career? If you’ve ever felt like you’ve tried everything, the VA appointments, prescriptions, therapy, and still feel like you’re stuck in the dark, you’re not alone. The pain, the nightmares, the hopelessness, it wears you down.
Now imagine a different outcome. Imagine waking up without that constant weight on your chest, being present with your family, sleeping through the night, actually feeling like yourself again. Today’s guest, Sam Peterson, walked that same road. He went from an EOD team leader in the Army to nearly pulling the trigger himself.
He found healing through unconventional methods. Ones a VA often won’t even acknowledge. Uh, ketamine, TMS hyperbaric oxygen therapy. And yes, even psychedelics, Sam isn’t here to sell you a miracle. Uh, he’s here to tell the truth about what actually works [00:01:00] when nothing else seems to be working. I. But before we dive into this episode in this important conversation, make sure you’re subscribed to the email newsletter at driveonpodcast.com/subscribe You’ll get my five favorite episodes sent straight to your inbox. No fluff, just the best insights to help you drive on. I just want to take a moment to raise awareness for something. Deeply important to our community, the Global War on Terrorism Memorial Foundation. This organization is working to build a permanent national memorial in Washington DC to honor the service members, families and civilians impacted by the global war on terrorism.
This memorial serves as both a tribute to those who served and a way to ensure their sacrifices are recognized and remembered for generations to come. If you want to learn more. Or find out how you can support this mission, visit GWOTmemorialfoundation.org Now let’s get into today’s episode.
[00:02:00]
Scott DeLuzio: Sam, welcome to the show. It’s really great to have you here. I’m looking forward to this conversation and yeah, welcome to the show.
Sam Peterson: Oh, thanks for having me. Appreciate being here and happy to get on, get onto this topic ’cause it’s really important.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, absolutely. Before we get into the important side, I mean, not that this isn’t an important side, but share a little bit about yourself and your background. Your, your journey. Journey as a EOD guy and kind of what led you into the mental health space and you know, all that kind of stuff.
Yeah,
Sam Peterson: Yeah, I mean, long story short it was, it was pain that brought me here. You know, EOD is one of the coolest jobs that you can possibly have. In the military, you know, you get to, you get to play around with explosives, you get to play around with robots, you get to put on this big green bomb suit and go cut wires on IEDs.
You know, it’s, it’s [00:03:00] super dangerous, but there’s nothing like that kind of risk and that kind of imminent death that just focuses, focuses you into the present moment
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah,
Sam Peterson: makes everything blur out. It is, it is like the ultimate flow state job as an EOD team leader with. Just some serious consequences if you screw it up.
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: but you know, the one thing that the recruiters don’t tell you, they show you all the videos like, oh yeah, robots and explosions, let’s go. it also has the highest suicide rate of any job in the military,
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: Because of all of the exposure to traumatic blast waves. And even just, just like the NFL where you, where we’re watching people get chronic traumatic encephalopathy, you know, just from all those hits even the innocuous ones are causing micro tears in your neurons.
The same thing is happening just with a more energetic force when you’re dealing with a blast wave. So. You know
Scott DeLuzio: How [00:04:00] I.
Sam Peterson: here was, you know, I almost committed suicide after I got back from my second tour. It was, it was one of my friends saved my life. Like the only reason I’m here is ’cause my phone went off in my pocket when I was about to pull the trigger. And night changed my life forever. ’cause he brought me over and he is like, Hey man, you’re super fucked up. We can all tell. Pours out some MDMA on the table, and he is like, I’d never done drugs before. I thought they put holes in your brain. I, I completely believed what the Dare Lion told us for all those years. And I was like, man, you know, whatever, I’m gonna, I’m gonna go put a big fucking hole in my brain if this doesn’t work. So whatever. So I, I did it and I sat down on that couch and I just opened up and I bawled my eyes out for like three hours and it was. one of the most cathartic moments I’ve ever had in my life up to that point.
I got to feel joy for the first time, and I was able to just shed this of all of the shit that [00:05:00] was built up from years and years and years, and that experience, you know, completely my life and changed it at the same time. And I, I didn’t really understand the impact of that until about five months later. I was talking to one of my mo, my my mentors in the motor pool. It was Memorial Day. We were about to go out to a field problem. You know, go out, go go home for the weekend. We come back on Monday. We’re you know, on Memorial Day Monday, driving out to the range, and we get a call that that Neil walked out into his backyard and blew his head off with his 3-year-old son in the house.
I, I was the last guy to talk to him at the unit. And you would never know. He was, you know, we all, we all, you know, I’m sure you experienced this too, there’s some of those e eights, those senior enlisted guys that are just happy all the time. And we’re in a, in an environment where everyone’s kind of a disgruntled jackass.
After a while, they’re just
Scott DeLuzio: Happy to be there.
Sam Peterson: super encouraging. [00:06:00] Well, imagine
Scott DeLuzio: That guy.
Sam Peterson: your unit making that decision.
Scott DeLuzio: Mm.
Sam Peterson: And, and it was just soul crushing and it made me fucking angry. Because I know that if Neil had had the same kind of experience that I had had, he would still be alive today. that’s why I’ve dedicated, you know, my professional career to. Helping veterans and first responders have those kind of meaningful experiences and to, to actually recover from these invisible wounds because all of this stuff is really, really treatable. We get fed a line of bullshit by the traditional medical establishment by the VA that your, you know, if you have a TBI or PTSD, it is a mark you wear for the rest of your life.
And all we can do is manage symptoms. That is bullshit.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: we can absolutely heal and rewire the brain and we’ve figured it out. It’s honestly not that hard and you know, my whole [00:07:00] professional career is dedicated to that. But one, bringing awareness to these issues, and two, helping to heal. Heal the brains, the minds and the spirits of veterans and first responders, and collecting the data so that I can put it into my little data forge, like, you know.
You compound it into a spear and shove it down the VA’s fucking throat, you might wanna cut that part out.
Scott DeLuzio: No, that’s, no, that’s okay. Because you know what, it’s, it’s honest, it’s, you know, and I, I, I appreciate that because so many people that I talk to myself included, have had bad experiences with the va. I mean. I had a, a situation personally where I had to wait like three months for a mental health appointment with the va, and when I went in, the guy that I was talking to, he was like, you’re, oh man.
You’re actually lucky to be here right now. In this appointment, like I should be, you know, grateful that they finally opened their doors and saw [00:08:00] me. And, and it’s like, honestly, I don’t feel all that that lucky to be here right now. Like, I, I would’ve felt lucky, you know, three months ago when I asked for the appointment if, if I got in and, you know, I got in right away and everything.
But like, you make someone wait that long, it, it seemed just like. No, that’s, that’s not lucky. That’s, you know, it seemed like he was almost like talking down to me, almost like I’m like a little kid or, or something. Like I, I, it was just a bunch of it turned me off, put it that way. Really, really turned me off.
And and, and. Pissed me off, quite frankly. And, and so, you know, other people have had similar stories where they, they’ve had that same thing. And I’m not saying, you know, discount the whole VA because it’s one experience, right. And, and there’s other experiences that people have had that, that are like that.
But there are also people who’ve had good experiences too. So I’m not totally knocking the va. They have some work to do though that, that, that much I, it, I gotta, gotta put out there. You know, but you know, for what you, you guys are doing is. You know, you’re, you’re raising [00:09:00] awareness of this, and I think that’s necessary for a few reasons, because.
A lot of times people just go to their doctor and just accept whatever the doctor says, whether it’s physical health, mental health, whatever. They just accept, Hey, they’re the doctor. They know best. We’re just gonna accept it. But then if you go into your doctor, again, physical health or mental health doesn’t matter, and you say, Hey, there’s this other treatment available, doesn’t seem like you guys are offering this.
What’s the deal? Hopefully that gets on their radar and they, they start. Investigating it themselves, and then hopefully they, they’re gonna want to start
Sam Peterson: You know.
Scott DeLuzio: you know?
Sam Peterson: It, it’s getting there.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: and I think there’s a, there’s some pretty dis, some pretty big distinctions to make that people don’t really realize about the va. So like, the first, the first thing, here’s how I describe the va. The VA is a loose affiliation of Greek city states that are governed by the myth of policies that don’t actually exist. Every VA is [00:10:00] different. They have different processes for different things. They’ve different thresholds for how they utilize community care. And they have kind of a different set of standards. There’s not some giant guiding principle that unifies the entire va, and you, you can figure this out pretty quickly.
If you go to the VA and ask them to pull up their policies and procedures, no one can find them.
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: They literally don’t have access to a unifying doctrine of medicine. If you were to go to any civilian hospital network, HCA is a perfect example. One of the largest for-profit hospitals in the country. my wife works for ’em. can go into h v’s share drive, and you can pull out any policy and procedure that they have. It’s right there at your fingertips. The VA doesn’t have that, and that’s part of the reason that you see care in these different places look so drastically different.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: You know, you can go to the Tucson VA down in [00:11:00] Arizona and it will be completely different from the Phoenix va, which is one of the worst ones. And
Scott DeLuzio: Should, should I tell you, should I tell you which va I was,
Sam Peterson: Which VA were,
Scott DeLuzio: it was a Phoenix va.
Sam Peterson: oh, man. Oh dude. Okay. Three Worst VAs I, I have to say Phoenix, Fayetteville, North Carolina, and Denver’s right under there.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay,
Sam Peterson: and there’s just levels of bureaucracy that are built up for no
Scott DeLuzio: sure.
Sam Peterson: I got, I, I was trying to get one of my really good friends, former, former Marine Purple Heart recipient.
Just This guy fell off the trauma tree and hit every branch on the way down with his face. And I was trying to get him into a co, our comprehensive program, which does TMS, ketamine and, and hbo. they told him at the Denver VA that they don’t do outta state referrals. And I was like, the fuck you don’t?
Scott DeLuzio: [00:12:00] Hmm.
Sam Peterson: This is a regionally organized. System Absolutely you do outta state referrals. You literally have to send people outta state for inpatient, to go to a VA program. And,
Scott DeLuzio: Hmm.
Sam Peterson: and that’s, you know, I’m, I’m hoping that that was the last administration that was in, in 2024. I am really hopeful that we’re gonna see an evolution in this system.
And I think that Doug Collins is, is doing a great job laying that out, getting into psychedelics, doing some more research on these things.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: I can’t wait until the day where our treatment protocol is the standard of care instead of something that we have to continually fight with them about.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. You know, I heard him talking about some of the things that he’s trying to do and you know, some of the stuff, his hands may be tied. There’s legislation that prevents him from doing X, Y, or Z, and okay, so then maybe you gotta have to go to Congress and say, Hey, let’s change some laws and let’s, let’s [00:13:00] get that done that way.
But that’s, that’s a. Bigger fight probably. But there’s a lot of stuff that’s like procedural or policy things that they, oh, this is just the way we do it. Well, well, let’s change the way we do it. If it doesn’t make sense, let’s change it. And that, that’s the kind of attitude that I was getting from him.
And it seemed like, it seems like that’s the right direction to go because if it. If you’re following a policy just for the sake of following a policy, ’cause that’s the way it’s always been done, but it doesn’t make any sense. Why are you doing it right? Like let’s, let’s change that policy and do something different.
Right?
Sam Peterson: nobody asks those questions. Or if we’re getting these results, if we’re seeing 20, you know, 22 veterans a day committing suicide, and those are just the veterans within the VA system, we have to ask ourselves, where the hell is all the suicide prevention money
Scott DeLuzio: that’s right. Yeah.
Sam Peterson: And, and I talked to the head of the suicide hotline and I was like, Matt. You know what you need to do to limit veteran suicide? It’s really fucking easy. [00:14:00] you need to do is make it so that your LPCs, the guys who are answering the, the level two calls, those, those calls that go from from the first level of triage up to the second level, give those providers the ability to put in a community care referral.
You will watch suicides plummet. Instead, we’re putting him back into a system that’s overloaded, overburdened, and, and, and doesn’t have the resources to reach all of these veterans. And we know that already. That’s why community care exists. And, and furthermore. We need to take a really, really hard look at the VA formulary for treating depression, anxiety and PTSD because it is not built in the best interest of veterans at all. And, and here’s a prime example. So two axioms of medicine. First one, do no harm. Pretty simple.
Scott DeLuzio: Sure.
Sam Peterson: one, least invasive procedure to most invasive procedure when you’re treating. Let’s [00:15:00] take the treatment of major depressive disorder as an example. The VA recommends in their formula for their formulary for treating major depressive disorder.
The VA recommends electroconvulsive therapy above transcranial magnetic stimulation. if anybody who hasn’t heard of electroconvulsive therapy, it is incredibly invasive. You go in you are put put under general anesthesia and electrodes are placed on your head, you’re asleep, and they induce a seizure. So that happens three times a week. It has a litany of side effects. Is it effective? Yes. It’s 80% effective at treating major depressive disorder. But you can lose your memories. You can’t work while you’re doing it. You have to have a ride to and from. It’s incredibly invasive. contrast that with transcranial magnetic stimulation.
Something we do here with
Scott DeLuzio: That.
Sam Peterson: we’re putting a, a helmet or a coil on your head. It’s outpatient. There’s no anesthetic. No anesthesia [00:16:00] required. We’re stimulating the brain and increasing the density of neurons in your prefrontal cortex in a very, very targeted manner about the size of a dimer a quarter, and that’s something you can come in, bam, bam, bam.
You’re done in 30 minutes. You walk out, you’re good to go. You actually feel a little bit more energized, at least I did when I did it. has a 75% efficacy rate for treating major depressive disorder and the VA places ECT of that in the formulary. That’s a problem.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Yeah, and I think that, again, it is just one of those things where it’s probably just always been done that way, so let’s just keep it that way and status quo and you know, all that kind of stuff. Maybe, I don’t know, but
Sam Peterson: Yeah, there’s some, there’s some, there’s some crease in the wheels that’s going on.
Scott DeLuzio: yeah, probably. Yeah, if it’s, probably follow the money and you’ll probably find some, some other reasons too that, that people are doing certain things, right?
Sam Peterson: Like, have you heard, you’ve heard of hyperbaric
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Yeah.
Sam Peterson: [00:17:00] So did you know that there are, so the DOD and the VA hate hyperbaric, right? They, even though if you look at all of the studies, like if you look at the preponderance of the evidence, it’s radically in favor. People get better even in the studies where they try to say it doesn’t work.
The only reason that the VA and the DOD don’t like hyperbaric is three studies. three studies that used one outcome measure each. They they used a self-reported outcome measure, nothing else. And in two out of the three studies, everyone got better and they said it was the placebo effect and that it’s a strong recommendation against. Th like, those studies need to be torn up, and the people who wrote them need to have their PhDs revoked. I’ve, I’ve told this to the scientists who did it.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Yeah.
Sam Peterson: like that, that’s what in research, in clinical research, that is a drastic, what’s called a type two error, a failure to [00:18:00] notice or a failure to give credence to a clinical effect that’s happening.
Whereas a type one error is, is, saying that there’s a clinical something clinical happening that’s not happening. This is a type two and it is egregious. Luckily we have people like Dr. Tiri down in Tampa who’s doing the largest HBO study that’s ever been done, and he’s getting blood samples and all sorts of metrics to show how this
Scott DeLuzio: affecting the physiology
Sam Peterson: of our veterans who are suffering from TBI.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, I mean, I’ve heard such great things about the hyperbaric oxygen therapy. It, it’s it incredible like, from football players who. Their mind was all over the place after years of taking those hits over and over and over again, especially before equipment has improved to, to help reduce that.
It’s still not great, but it’s, it’s better than what it used to be anyways. But you know, better than not wearing anything.
Sam Peterson: Not wearing anything. I’ll give you
Scott DeLuzio: yeah, [00:19:00] sure. But, you know, they, they went through, you know, series of, of treatments with this and it’s like their, their mind is clear and they’re, they’re able to,
Sam Peterson: Mm-hmm.
Scott DeLuzio: know, do things that they weren’t able to do before.
And it’s, it’s amazing like when you get those types of results from people and then take someone like yourself or other people that, that you work with you know, always around explosions, that’s gotta be bad for your brain, you know, with all the, all that stuff rattling around. And I. You know, when, when you have those, those types of situations happening where you’re constantly taking those hits, whether they’re the, the physical hits of you know, a football player or you know, getting blown up or the, the the shockwave blast that’s coming in you know, from a you know, an explosion, even if you’re at a, a distance, that that shockwave still travels and that that’s gonna have an effect on your brain.
And
Sam Peterson: these nice little micro tears.
Scott DeLuzio: yeah, and, [00:20:00] and the more that they happen, the more tears they are, the bigger they get and all that kind of stuff. And that’s, it’s crazy that they won’t use some of those, those treatments. So.
Sam Peterson: It’s just, it’s just a matter of like, you, you just have, like I said, you gotta get, get your little, this is, this is the reason that. Treating people effectively isn’t enough on its own. You have to collect the data. You have to show them, like with our program, our average time to reach full symptom remission, and I’m defining that as a 75% reduction in PTSD, depression, anxiety and TBI symptoms.
Average re or that reduction in symptoms is 75%. we’re seeing that happen in 14 to 17 days,
Scott DeLuzio: Wow.
Sam Peterson: you have to gather that data so you can just beat people over the head with it.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: I’ve, I get, I’ve had conversations with you know, physicians from Yale where they try to beat me over the head with the VA formulary, and I’m like, no, no, no, no, no. You guys, [00:21:00] you guys don’t get it. Like. you are doing, what? What talk therapy and med management do is well talk therapy. We’re trying to rewire the brain, but one thing that they don’t really pay attention to, and I feel like modern medicine just continues to miss the ball on this, is that. Anxiety, depression, P-T-S-D-T-B-I, all of these are highly, highly inflammatory to the brain. You are, you are creating a non permissive environment for your brain to rewire. you’re literally trying to engage in a process that’s highly energy intensive and. In a, in a neurotoxic environment. ’cause that’s what happens in your brain. Your brain becomes neurotoxic after long enough. In being in these, being in these states, these long-term states of depression, anxiety, PTSD and TBI,
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: you get to that root cause, unless you that inflammation in the brain, [00:22:00] you are pissing in the wind and you are wasting that patient’s fucking time.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Time. And not, not just the time for the, the patient, but the, the doctor who could be helping somebody else you know, doing something else. You know, or the, the therapist, the counselor, you know, they, there’s, there’s other things that they could be doing and, and wa you know, if you’re wasting, that’s wasting everybody’s time and money and re other resources that are, are, are out there.
So, you know, I wanna get back into kind of some of the, the treatments that, that you guys do and, and, you know, you talked a little bit about some of the stuff in your, your personal experience in your personal life, but what, what is like some of the, the more effective treatments that, that you guys have discovered and, and kind of through your research and, and things like that you know, for tb TBIs, PTSD depression, anxiety, all those things, what are some of the, the more effective things that are being implemented and, and, you know, how do they work?
And, and why do they work? Maybe.
Sam Peterson: yeah. Let me, oh, I can get into this [00:23:00] all day. This is, this is my happy
Scott DeLuzio: This is your sweet spot.
Sam Peterson: this is my sweet spot. Yeah. So we use a combination of culturally competent talk therapy that’s important. Ketamine infusion therapy, transcranial magnetic stimulation, and hyperbaric oxygen therapy. We put all, all of those together in a comprehensive treatment protocol.
That treatment protocol can heal and rewire the brain simultaneously. So I’m gonna go through. one of those we’ll start with ketamine. So one of the reasons that ketamine is a great upfront treatment is because it acts so quickly within. One to two infusions, and that’s like a couple of days. So within three days, you can take someone who’s got seriously acute symptoms and bring them pretty damn close to baseline
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: because ketamine downregulates inflammation in the brain and it increases neuroplasticity.
So that’s the process of your neurons branching out and creating new synaptic connections. That’s really, really useful for a number of reasons. I already touched on the [00:24:00] inflammatory problem in the brain. You know that that also causes additional shunting within your neurons if it’s been going on long enough, if it, if it’s more chronic enough. So ketamine is a great primer. It’s, it’s taking that inflammation down, getting your brain ready for these other treatments. Now, ketamine alone is not a magic pill. It works for a while, but. You know that inflammatory cascade starts to creep back up after a while. So ketamine is something we use as a primer.
It’s something we use as an initial treatment to get our patients, you know, feeling better immediately. You know, imagine these guys who, you know, have been in the hurt box, so to speak for a fucking decade.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: You the, the best way to get someone’s buy-in when they’re in that much pain is to just. Make it go away. And they’re like, okay. Tell me what else I need to do. We’re like, cool, like do the rest of this. And this can be your [00:25:00] new normal, but you have to engage with the rest of this. So the the other treatments we use once we get past, once we get past the ketamine and infusion therapy. As we do transcranial magnetic stimulation TMS is an MRI coil that’s in either a wand or a helmet. that MRI coil creates a magnetic field under the surface of your scalp, so in your brain tissue. And depending on where we stimulate, like for depression, for instance, we stimulate the dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex and that reinforces the neural connections where we’re stimulating. So. You know, just imagine that your brain is a music festival. And you’ve got PTSD. What happens in the brain if we were to just like, take a cross section of this thing and look at how it’s firing, you would see an underactive prefrontal cortex. So this, your prefrontal cortex is a stage, just has like a little dinky megaphone at this music festival. And your [00:26:00] amygdala, your fight, flight or freeze.
That emotional response that like we’re com bam, bam, bam. You know, from all of that that hyperactivity when you’re and and hypersensitivity when you’re. Overseas like that. Amygdala is a full on like Coachella stage with giant ass speakers. And when it’s, when you get triggered, boom, the sound system turns on and is blasting in your face and your amygdala hijacks your lived experience.
You get thrown into a panic attack or rage. So what we’re doing with TMS. Is we’re building up the number of speakers on your prefrontal cortex’s stage so that it can shout down your amygdala and tell it to shut the fuck up. And that, know, it’s a very oversimplified kind of, analogy, but allows you to take more control over your state.
You don’t just get sucked into the depression hole or thrown into a panic attack or, or a rage episode. You [00:27:00] can observe the trigger instead of being immediately reactive to it. So highly, highly useful. It gives you a lot more control. The third one, hyperbaric oxygen therapy. And, you know, we, we touched on it a little bit. But for those who don’t know what HBO is, you get into a chamber that is sealed. We increase the pressure in the chamber. We typically get up to, you know, 1.5 to 1.75 atmospheres. Absolute. I don’t know what the diving distance is off the top of my head, but it’s a
Scott DeLuzio: I,
Sam Peterson: term.
Scott DeLuzio: I used to know.
Sam Peterson: the pressure
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: You know, I was in a Navy class, I should know these things. My hair’s not long anymore. So basically we bring you down to pressure and you breathe in concentrated oxygen. Now what that does is not only does it decrease the amount of inflammation just physically because you’re under pressure, so it decreases the amount of inflammation going on in the [00:28:00] body. It also hyperoxygenate your blood plasma, so. If we, if we think about any of these, these disorders that are causing inflammation in the brain, that’s really serious because the blood vessels in your brain are very, very small. The, it’s not like, it’s not like we’re tapping into a femoral artery that’s like a Chinese super highway.
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: about small little country road blood vessels that with just a small amount of inflammation, all of a sudden you’ve completely shunted it off That creates a number of issues. If your cells can’t get oxygen through your red blood cells, they have to switch over to a different, a different way of making energy. go from what’s called cellular respiration over to anaerobic glycolysis. That’s a fermentation process. It’s how cancer cells make energy. It’s incredibly waste producing. And it causes a lot more knock on inflammation because of the toxic nature of creating that energy. So you can see pretty quickly [00:29:00] here how we can get into this kind of doom, inflammatory doom spiral.
Scott DeLuzio: Oh yeah.
Sam Peterson: What hyperbaric does is instead of relying on that red blood cell to get through that country road, we just build a damn pipeline. And by hyper oxygenating the liquid that your, that your red blood cells travel along, we can bathe the brain and oxygen and that allows all your cells to create far more a TP.
’cause a TP is, you know, our cellular fuel that allows your brain not only to branch out and create those new synaptic connections, but it allows your brain to start cleaning itself.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: And so that’s tho that’s a primary reason HBO is so effective, and it’s also one of the reasons that we have to use other things too.
We have to prime those new connections with TMS. We have to give the brain more fertilizer with ketamine. So when we use all of these things together, we see patients get better really fast, and they stay better we’re giving the brain everything it needs to heal. the right environment. [00:30:00] And you, when you couple that with culturally competent talk therapy, you can help rewire the brain in a, in a really constructive way. ’cause this is one of the things, and we’ll get onto the psychedelics topic. I’m sure neuroplasticity is something that everybody talks about with psychedelics, it increases neuroplasticity. Oh, that’s so great. Actually no. Neuroplasticity is a double-edged sword. Neuroplasticity can be either good or bad.
You are putting miracle grow on the ability to create new connections. If you’re not in the right frame of mind and it’s not in a controlled environment, you can easily go down a deep dark hole
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: things worse.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. If you have, if you, if you’re using that analogy that you just said, if you put miracle grow on your lawn and it’s full of weeds already, you’re just gonna get more weeds. You know, it’s not not gonna help a healthy lawn come through. You have to get in a place where you get rid of some of those weeds and, and now the grass can start coming in.
Right.
Sam Peterson: We gotta, we gotta use the bright red blood to let the green grass grow.
Scott DeLuzio: [00:31:00] There it is
Sam Peterson: hmm
Scott DeLuzio: now. Now you’re talking to the grunt in me.
Sam Peterson: yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s the all the infantry guys are just like, oh,
Scott DeLuzio: It’s like everyone,
Sam Peterson: say more in Big Ben.
Scott DeLuzio: they’re, they’re coming outta the, out of the woodwork now, just to, to hear the rest of this conversation. But one, one thing before we get into like psychedelics and all the other things that you, you were just mentioning there one thing that you mentioned a couple times, the culturally, culturally competent talk therapy,
Sam Peterson: Yeah.
Scott DeLuzio: if I can get that all out in, you know, one go, describe what that is because the, some, some of the listeners may not be familiar with that, that term. Yeah.
Sam Peterson: what I mean by culturally competent talk therapy is someone who has experience working with veterans and first responders. Why is that important? Because. Not everybody who gets into the therapy field can handle all of the trauma. Some people get in it for like marriage and family counseling.
Some people get in, get into therapy to talk to kids. It takes a special kind of [00:32:00] therapist for to, to handle some of the violent shit that we say. You know, I, I just, I had a patient not too long ago. He was, you know, on the teams you know, in in cag and he’s like. Yeah, man, I, I didn’t mind killing people.
Like I don’t have PTSD from that, I have PTSD from watching my buddies get fucked up.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: I could kill someone really easily if you say that to a normal therapist who, who’s not, indoctrinated, if you will, into, I. This kind of line of thinking into this warrior mindset. You, you can traumatize your therapist. Dude, and I have, I have, I have heard horror stories of, and this has never happened in any of any of our programs. Thank God. ‘Cause we don’t hire these people. But you know, where we’re like a cop will tell. You know, stories of like a shootout to a therapist and it traumatizes the therapist.
They’re like, oh, well did you feel bad for killing that person? Like, no, absolutely not. I’d
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Right.
Sam Peterson: if you lined up like 14 of these dudes, I just pop ’em in the head once, like once [00:33:00] one a piece, line ’em up, knock ’em down. That’s totally fine. And that
Scott DeLuzio: Kind of.
Sam Peterson: mentality freaks people out. It freaks some people out anyway.
So you need to be in an environment where you can express this deep, dark shit. And not, you know, end up on an M1 hold where you’re going to the ho the psych hospital
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: end up on another FBI watch list,
Scott DeLuzio: Right, right. Yeah. You don’t want to end up in a padded room and you know, having all that, that kind of kind of stuff going on either. So,
Sam Peterson: jackets cha, my nipples man.
Scott DeLuzio: So I, I, I’m glad that you got to explain, you know, kind of the, the process that you guys work through. And it is that like a, the typical process starting with the ketamine then, then the the magnetic stimulation and then, then going through it, is that. Pretty much the same for most people, or do you kind of prescribe different things for different people?
Sam Peterson: Different strokes for different folks.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: sure. Not everybody needs the whole, you know, the whole kitten caboodle. We do. [00:34:00] do go, that we do tend to go that way for like our more acute patients or if someone’s got tricare. We have one of the best TRICARE programs in the country. I, I dare I say the best. So, you know, Tricare reimburses quite a bit more for transcranial magnetic stimulation than the other than the other. Major insurance carriers.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: what we do is, instead of pocketing that, we give away a bunch of our treatments for free. So if someone comes in and they have Tricare and they qualify for TMS, which is typically three failed antidepressant medications, we throw in the six sessions of ketamine and however many TMS sessions, we throw that many hyperbaric sessions in for free.
So typically that’s 30, anywhere from 30 to 60 free hyperbaric sessions. you know, we’re, we’re giving away, you know, tens of thousands of dollars in treatment to, to veterans who, who really need it.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, no, that, and that’s awesome that, that you [00:35:00] guys are doing that because there’s, there’s some folks out there who don’t have the means necessarily to do that. And the, you know, the VA isn’t jumping on board right away with, with all of these things. So, I mean, some of them, they, they. Yeah, I mean, they’re, they’re getting there slowly but surely, but, you know, hopefully, you know, you know, in the next few years they’ll, they’ll get more on board with, with other things.
But you did mention some of the psychedelics too, and I, I just wanna kind of preface this with you know, for the, the listeners that, you know, some of the, some of the things that are out there, you know, may or may not be legal and, and, and all that. So keep all that in mind. You don’t wanna. Find yourself in jail or anything like that by doing these things that that may not be a a hundred percent legal, you don’t wanna make your situation even worse.
So, you know, but there’s, there’s movement on these things as far as you know, the legislation and, and things like that to make them legal and so that they can be used you know, more freely than they are right now. So, what, you know, tell us. Yeah. Well.
Sam Peterson: here, here in [00:36:00] Colorado, it’s psilocybins Legal. Oh
Scott DeLuzio: Oh, is it? Okay?
Sam Peterson: yeah.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Sam Peterson: You can, you can they just ga they just issued the first clinical licensure for for psilocybin in the state a few weeks ago.
Scott DeLuzio: Oh, wow.
Sam Peterson: it’s rolling out pretty fast
Scott DeLuzio: Okay. Yeah, and I, I know Texas is doing something too. I don’t know. Yeah, I don’t know the the details on all that yet, but that, that should be.
Sam Peterson: with Ibogaine?
Scott DeLuzio: I’ve, I’ve heard of it. I don’t know all the, the particulars of it. This, this is all a new world to me. So I, I’m, I’m like, I’m one of those kids, like you were talking about that I, I grew up in the DARE program.
I, you know, I was in high school, I was one of the ambassadors for the DARE program. I go to talk to the little kids and, and other grades and stuff. So I was all, you know, a hundred percent, you know, in on that. And I, you know, I still am. I don’t do drugs or, you know, anything like that. Like, I, it’s, it, you know, so I, I, I don’t really know much about this.
Sam Peterson: you just don’t have any experience. That’s
Scott DeLuzio: I have none. None. Exactly. So, you know, I’m curious. I, I wanna know more about like what’s, what’s going on, [00:37:00] what developments are being made and you know, what, what the research is saying too.
Sam Peterson: Yeah, well, the research is saying that that fucking lion lied to you,
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Big time.
Sam Peterson: You know what? Ecstasy doesn’t put holes in your brain. You know, it does. The benzodiazepines, they, they prescribed you for your your PTSD. Those will put holes in your
Scott DeLuzio: Sure.
Sam Peterson: Long-term use of those will definitely hurt you.
And they are almost, they are very, very difficult to get off of. Yeah, I mean there’s, there’s so much to talk about in psychedelics. I think like a good place to start you know, how can people with this in a safe manner and what. are some of the contraindications? So what are the, what are some of the flags that say like, Hey, you shouldn’t do this shit. So the first thing you know, if you’re going to engage in these sorts of things, make sure it’s a reputable source. You know, you do need to check online or come, come to a place like Colorado where this is legal. And there [00:38:00] are clinical practitioners that are performing this because there is a level of support that’s needed.
This is not a magic
Scott DeLuzio: Mm-hmm.
Sam Peterson: You will have, you can have a very powerful experience. That very powerful experience can be either positive. Or it can also be very challenging, a very negative experience,
Scott DeLuzio: which can also be
Sam Peterson: but you have to be ready for that. There, this is
Scott DeLuzio: something.
Sam Peterson: should just jump into, especially if you know someone like yourself.
You don’t have a lot of, you don’t have any experience with these altered states of consciousness. They are very different. you. You will see a lot of different, a lot of different things depending on which one of these substances you interact with. So ensuring that you’re going to a reputable a reputable source like Heroics, har Hero Hearts Project.
Great example of doing it right. Taking, taking guys down who have PTSD. Making sure that they’re healthy, that they’re mentally able to do so, and then putting them into more of a ceremonial framework. And that’s a much [00:39:00] safer framework. It really prepares the mind to engage in this, especially when you’re doing it in a group. so I would say for anybody who, who’s interested in this stuff, check out heroic hearts. They, they do a great job. I love Jesse and that team and. Making sure that you’re doing this in a facilitated manner with a no shit babysitter. Like I’m not talking about, you know, your friend or your uncle Fred, who’s like, oh, don’t worry, I’ll just do ’em with you and we’ll just do it at the house.
Not a great
Scott DeLuzio: No. Right.
Sam Peterson: Let’s talk contraindications. I. If you have a traumatic brain injury, you need to be very, very careful about doing large doses of psychedelics. When you do large doses of psychedelics, it increases the electrical output of your brain by several fold, by like two standard deviations.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: this was, this was a documented in LSD study I believe it was back in 2010. You could see the images like on the on the internet of what happens under an MRI When you’re, when you’re on LSD. [00:40:00] If you have a TBI like a serious TBI and you do that, you are passing a, a dramatic amount of electricity through a short, all of that inflammatory process that’s going on.
The brain gets in the way. You’re asking for a disassociative panic attack,
Scott DeLuzio: Got it.
Sam Peterson: That lasts anywhere from five to 12 hours. But it’ll feel like it lasts forever.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
I could be miserable.
Sam Peterson: there’s quite a bit of time dilation that can go on.
Scott DeLuzio: Sure.
Sam Peterson: and that’s not to scare anybody away. There, there are serious applications for this medicine, for these medicines. But we just need to be aware of, of what’s going on. Another thing that people need to know, if you’re taking SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, they will not work. So like, like psilocybin LSD MDMA will be far less effective. There’s a lot of knock on risk with doing that as well.
So people need to understand that they’re like, s SSRIs have a blocking function for those drugs. So yeah, I, I think that’s, that’s kind of hitting the high [00:41:00] notes.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Sam Peterson: you know, someone’s interested and you don’t have access to these, know, to these like trusted sources where you can go down and do it in a ceremonial fashion and you still. Are really, really desperate to get the benefits. I, I recommend starting on a microdose and let’s, let’s just start with psilocybin because that is, the one that gets the most headlines about, about microdosing. First of all, understand the genus of the mushroom you are taking much like marijuana, mushrooms, if. Have a panoply of different effects. Something like a penis envy that’s more of a body high would be something that would benefit someone with depression more especially at a microdose versus like a golden teacher strain, which would be better for someone with anxiety. It’s more of a head high.
More of increases like visual acuity and colors more. But like, [00:42:00] you really gotta understand what you’re doing and start low. And, and when I say low, I’m talking sub 200 milligrams. So that’s like a double zero capsule that’s full of a powdered mushroom also. If you are engaging in these things and you’re doing it, you know, on your own, first of all, have a trusted source and two. Don’t just eat mushrooms. Stop doing drugs like a fucking pilgrim, like grind them up and put them into like double zero capsules and weigh them. You need to understand how much of a substance you are putting in your body. That is the smart way to do it. Now, I wanna be clear. I’m not advocating for, for anybody to do illegal drugs or any of that, but a harm reduction, o, as a harm reduction option, you should always understand what you are doing and how much you are doing.
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Sam Peterson: And ensuring that if you are gonna do it in a non, ceremonial space, in a, in a in a non guarded space, [00:43:00] that the, you’re in the proper set and setting to engage with these things. Anytime you’re doing psychedelics, they can act as a magnifier. So if you go into these experiences in a negative frame. That frame is going to be projected and magnified. So being very, very cognizant of, of those things can help reduce potential harm.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, I, I think, you know, going back to your, your point, it’s, it’s probably best if you do it in that kind of more in a, in a setting. Yeah. Ceremonial or, or some, some setting that’s with a trusted you know, group of people who who can guide you through. That because like you said, those experience, your experiences may vary and you wanna make sure that you’re not doing it alone.
That you’re, you’re not sitting there by yourself and, and then all of a sudden you’re having this really bad negative experience and God knows what you might end up doing and, and that, that’s probably not the best place to be. And you know, [00:44:00] again it’s. It’s all at this point still, you know, working its way through and people are still trying to figure out where, where it’s gonna fit into the whole scheme of things as far as, you know, future treatment goes.
But you know, there’s, there’s been some, some progress on that front and you know, I, I know the, you know, the VA is starting to look at it as, as well as, as a potential option for, for folks. They move slow as molasses, so I’ve really, really not like
Sam Peterson: in an ice
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, exactly. I’m not, I’m not really holding my breath, you know, thinking that that’s gonna be something that happens anytime soon.
But you never know. They, they’ve come up with some surprises before too, so,
Sam Peterson: well, we’ll see how this administration handles things.
Scott DeLuzio: We’ll see, you know, it seems like they’re, things are moving quickly with the, the administration. You know, whether you think that’s good or bad, that’s a, that’s another conversation for another day. But, you know, my, my my, my point is that, you know, things are, are changing, things are moving, and, and I, I think [00:45:00] eventually this will become something that is more mainstream and hopefully that will, get people away from some of those more harmful medications that you were talking about that really eat the holes in your brain. And, and that’s not where we want to be either. So,
Sam Peterson: No, we, we want, we want to take medications that we don’t have to take all the time, and
Scott DeLuzio: yeah.
Sam Peterson: rather than contract your state of consciousness. And rather than making your entire world gray,
Scott DeLuzio: Right, right.
Sam Peterson: you know, one of the common, common side effects that’s reported from selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, SSRIs.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, exactly. For the folks who are listening, they want to get in touch with you, find out a little bit more about what you guys do and you know, maybe even you know, use some of your, your services. Where can they go to find out more information and, and get you know, access to to you guys and, and reach out for, for more support.
Sam Peterson: Yeah, so if people are looking for me, the easiest place to find me is on LinkedIn, Sam j Peterson. It’s got a headshot of this [00:46:00] mug. I’m pretty damn responsive on that platform. The best place to find more information about our clinic and some of our programs is www.mindspadenver.com, so mind spa denver.com.
I don’t pronounce my Ds very well, so, it’s not, it’s not mind spa. It’s mind.
Scott DeLuzio: Mind as in like the thing that’s in your head? Yep. Got it.
Sam Peterson: mine isn’t the thing that’s in your brain. So yeah, check, check out our website. We’ve got quite a bit of information on our programs. And there are a number of ways to get in touch with, with our clinic on the website there, whether it be our phone number or if you’re interested, you can fill out you know, our new patient paperwork and make an appointment with one of our providers.
Scott DeLuzio: Excellent. Well, I will have links to all of that in the show notes for the listeners so they can reach out and find out more information and, and get, you know, hopefully get the support that they need. You know, whether or not they’re, they’re finding it through the VA or they’re, they’re you know.
Doing it on their own, however it is that they’re, they’re trying to get support. You know, I, I think it’s important to [00:47:00] know that there are options out there that exist beyond the walls of the va and that there are peoples out there that exist beyond the walls of the va are support to folks. And you know, especially
for people who are sitting there thinking to themselves, I’ve tried everything. I, there’s, there’s no hope left for me. ’cause I’ve tried it all. I mean, if you haven’t tried this, there’s, there’s no hope left for me. ’cause I’ve tried it all. I mean, if you, you know, the, whether it’s the ketamine or you know, the hyperbaric, I’m, give it a try and yeah.
Reach out. So,
Sam Peterson: that’s, that’s one of the things I want people to know is like. The, that’s the whole reason I do this is like, if you’re in that deep dark hole right now,
Scott DeLuzio: yeah.
Sam Peterson: is hope. You don’t have to feel this way all the time. We have the ability to treat these issues. We have so many tools. It’s not even, I didn’t, I haven’t even gotten into some of the other things that, that are possible.
Like personalized, [00:48:00] EEG guided TMS, that’s a, you know, conversation for another
Scott DeLuzio: Sure.
Sam Peterson: There is so much that we can do to, to help. Get you outta that space. Help heal and rewire the brain. You, the traditional medical establishment has not done a lot of us any favors, and you don’t have to be bound by the outcomes that someone within that establishment is throwing in your face.
Scott DeLuzio: right. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, a lot of it is profit driven decisions that get made and they don’t make money if you’re not a patient. So, I mean.
Sam Peterson: Yeah, the best the best customers are recurring
Scott DeLuzio: That’s right. Yeah. They, they figured out the recurring revenue model a long time ago, I think. And you know, the rest of the world’s just waking up to it.
So,
Sam Peterson: another, that’s another podcast.
Scott DeLuzio: so. Yeah, I think we’ll, we’ll end it here. So, so Sam, thank you so much for, you know, sharing your story, your background, and what it is that you guys do now. I, I think it’s, it’s awesome work that you, you’re doing. I think we need more people out there like you [00:49:00] to continue doing this type of work and raising awareness for folks to let them know that there is hope, that there are other options out there.
So thank you.
Sam Peterson: Yeah. Appreciate that man. It’s you know, we’re just, we’re just trying to make this system better.
Scott DeLuzio: Absolutely. All right. Thank you.
Sam Peterson: you. Cheers.