as told to Jacqueline Froeber
In 2019, my best friend/business partner and I took our hit “fatherly wrong” live comedy act, “The Pump and Dump Show,” to the next level. After touring the country for six years and performing in front of thousands of mothers, we decided it was time to grow the show and bring in new artists. So, we basically “granted ourselves a franchise” and poured our heart, creativity, soul, and a lot of money into producing additional casts in Los Angeles and Chicago.
We were also in the process of finalizing an Off-Broadway deal with two Tony Award-winning producers to bring the show to New York. All the years of hard work and big dreams were about to pay off!
We were just days away from signing the deal with New York when the entire world shut down due to Covid. When lockdowns hit, we had to cancel almost 100 shows for 2020, and everything we had worked so hard for came crashing down.
Financially, the debt was insurmountable. It seemed as if the entire entertainment industry had been forgotten during the bailouts, and our show and our business slipped through our fingers like quicksand.
The pain was strong. I felt very affected emotionally, financially and spiritually. Like many of us, I was also trying to homeschool my daughter, which was a disaster. It would have been fun to add our attempts at Zoom to the show…but I no longer had that outlet. I was depressed.
That summer, my best friend called me and invited me to go camping with some other women, but with one request: “I want you to put on your big girl pants and take some mushrooms,” she said.
I had always been interested in psychedelics. I live in Denver and the popularity of “magic mushrooms” was growing. I had read about the possible benefits, but never thought to try them. As a mother and servant during the War on Drugs, I didn’t think I would ever try psychedelics.
But that weekend I reconsidered because of everything that had happened. Sitting on the shore of a beautiful lake in Colorado, I had the most amazing psychedelic experience. It looked like something out of a movie. I saw a grid on the earth. I felt connected to God. I saw the division of dimensions. But most of all, I felt love, joy, compassion and connection with everyone and everything around me.
My best friend and I talked about our family, our children, our husbands and how lucky we were. I fell asleep smiling and felt lighter than I had in a long time.
I woke up the next morning feeling like a million dollars. And I felt less depressed in a way I hadn’t felt before.
He had been taking an antidepressant for about four years. My doctor prescribed it to me (wisely) when I had a total hysterectomy to remove scar tissue and damage from stage 4 endometriosis. I went into surgery on hormones and came out with hot flashes; That’s how quickly my body plummeted toward menopause. The antidepressant helped me with the transition and mood swings.
Given the shock to my mind and body, I was grateful for the antidepressant. But I didn’t know how I was supposed to get out of this. I’m not really a pharmacology person and I didn’t want to be on the medication for the rest of my life.
I had heard that a microdose of psilocybin, the psychedelic component of magic mushrooms, could help with mood and depression. So I talked to my healthcare provider about stopping the antidepressant and trying microdosing. She thought it was a great idea. But there was just one problem: He couldn’t tell me how to do it. Although it was undergoing decriminalization in Colorado, it was not legal for healthcare providers to prescribe psilocybin and there were no official guidelines for dosing outside of clinical trial settings.
So I decided to experiment on myself and learn everything I could about microdosing. I had already read most of the literature available and found an unusual online course that I took on a whim. I learned to start with a very, very small dose and go little by little.
The first two weeks of microdosing I was very tired. Almost debilitatingly exhausted. The experience was far from my ultra-connected time at the lake. I struggled to do almost everything and struggled to stay awake. But then I leaned into what my body was feeling and gave myself permission to slow down. It was like my brain finally heard my body scream, “Take a nap! “You are very, very tired and you have been tired for a long time.” It was so loud and obvious that I couldn’t ignore it. That shook me out of my superhero complex and I started listening to what my body was telling me.
The fatigue disappeared as I constantly microdosed and all the pieces fell into place. I felt my hard edges soften. I felt more present, patient, and less reactive. I realized early on that I had to be intentional when microdosing. What was my “why”? Did I want to be more present for my daughter? Creative for a project? I set my intention and asked the medicine to help me. And most of the time it was.
In 2021, a year after starting microdosing, I was in a serious car accident. A drunk driver crashed into our family car going 70 mph on the wrong side of the road. Our car went through a metal railing, flew 30 feet, and landed in a ditch in the mountains. Dazed and hurt, my husband and I kicked open the doors and pulled my daughter and niece out of the car. It was a miracle that no one was seriously injured.
The aftermath of the accident was harsh. I was angry, upset and hurt. We could have died. While going through PTSD, I felt all the feelings of anxiety, grief, and trauma, but they didn’t persist. The feelings didn’t take over me like they did after other traumatic experiences I’ve been through in my life. Then a lightbulb went on: microdosing was helping me process what happened to us and then I was able to let those emotions go.
My daughter, however, was going through a very difficult time. He was 9 years old and I couldn’t find him a therapist. It was like they didn’t exist in 2021. No one answered the phone. Nobody called me again. I saw the light come out of his eyes and I was desperate to find someone.
I asked everyone I knew and one day a physical therapy guy said he knew a woman who was a therapist and good with kids. She was also a shaman, she said. For the next few weeks, I harassed her and begged her to see my daughter.
Shaman aside, it turned out that she was just a good old-fashioned therapist who was great with kids. After a psychotherapy session, my daughter said she felt better. She understood what happened. The light returned.
She continued to go and I also booked an appointment with the therapist/shaman. About 20 minutes into our first session we started talking about psychedelics. I don’t remember how it came about, but she revealed that she was a practicing psychedelic shaman and had been studying it for over 40 years.
And that’s how I found myself on the floor of his office with 3 grams of a magic mushroom strain called Penis Envy. She guided me through the psychedelic journey and the experience changed my life. He showed me what I experienced in healing, although microdosing was not unique. And that medicine should be administered in a community, not alone.
After the visit, I thought about the concept of community and the mothers and all the moms who came to our comedy shows and shared their own stories about parenthood with me. I thought maybe one day I could help other moms who could benefit from microdosing.
I was meditating one day after the trip and the phrase “moms with mushrooms” came to mind. I sat up straight. “That’s great,” I said out loud. I ran to my computer. Nobody owned the name. Maybe I could start that business after all. But what the hell was I going to do with a community of mushroom moms? I was still learning medicine. So I sat with that. I listened to my body and said, Yes. I could start a mushroom mom community. I could at least try.
I gathered a group of seven women who were interested and told them my truth: I really didn’t know what I was doing. I had taken a course on microdosing and had an idea of how I could help them learn to microdose in a way that was supportive. They all said yes too.
The next three months passed in a blur. During our last Zoom group chat, I was crying, everyone was crying. “I can’t believe it’s over,” I said. The moms looked back at me. “We’re not going anywhere,” said one mother. “What’s next?”
That was the moment I realized that Moms with mushrooms (MOM) It was one thing. I made it Instagram official in March 2021 and in August, NPR was doing a story about us. Today we have more than 3,000 moms who are part of our private monthly membership.
It has been a rollercoaster working with MOM while continuing to cultivate my own work with medicine. I have been very fortunate to learn from elders and other wise people in the community and to bring that knowledge to our group.
I am grateful for all the twists and turns that have led me to create this community where I can help support and empower women.
I’ve always known that life is fun. Not long ago, I didn’t think I could try magic mushrooms because I’m a mom. Now I’m helping other moms microdose. How fun is that?
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