Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP)
KAP serves clients who have done the work yet remain stuck, offering a new
doorway and a different kind of access to move things forward.
“I’d done so much work. Years of therapy, different modalities, different therapists. I understood my trauma. I could talk about it calmly. But I couldn’t feel any different. My nervous system was exhausted and stuck. KAP felt like the first time something actually reached the part that had been holding out.”
What Is Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP)?
Ketamine is a legal, well-established medication — used for decades as an anesthetic — that at lower, carefully dosed levels produces a temporary shift in consciousness.
In that state, the usual grip of depression, anxiety, and rigid thought patterns tends to loosen, and the brain becomes more open and flexible than it normally is. Ketamine-Assisted work pairs that medicine, provided under medical supervision, with real psychotherapy around it — so the experience becomes more than a biochemical event.
That's the part that matters. The medicine can open a window, but a window on its own doesn't change your life. The therapy is what turns a powerful experience into lasting change. The work happens in three phases: preparation, so you go in with intention and a sense of safety; the medicine session itself; and integration, where we make meaning of what came up and anchor it into how you actually live.
My role is on the therapy side — preparation and integration.
I don't prescribe or administer ketamine; that's handled by a licensed medical provider you work with alongside our sessions.
How KAP Works:
The Three Phases
Phase 1: Preparation
Preparation is where we lay the foundation. Before any dosing happens, we spend time getting to know each other and building the working relationship that holds the rest of the process. This is therapy first, ketamine second. In these sessions we talk through what's bringing you in, what you've already tried, and what you're hoping might shift. We work with your expectations, set intentions for the dosing, build internal resources, and make room for any fear or ambivalence you're carrying about the process. This phase usually takes two to four sessions, sometimes longer if you're working with complex trauma.
Phase 2: Dosing
The dosing itself happens with the prescriber I've matched you with, in a calm, medically supervised setting — not in my office. You'll typically lie down, often with an eye mask and music, and the medication takes effect within minutes. Ketamine produces a non-ordinary state of consciousness: a softening of your usual mental defenses, some distance from the inner critic, and access to thoughts, memories, and emotional material that normally stays out of reach. You stay in control throughout, with the medical team overseeing your safety. The entire experience usually lasts about 2-3 hours, 30% of that being within your medicine journey.
Phase 3: Integration
Integration is where what happened during dosing becomes change in your actual life. The medicine creates an opening; integration is what walks you through it. In these sessions we reflect on what came up — images, memories, emotions, insights, body sensations — and use EMDR, IFS, and somatic work to consolidate the shifts and anchor them into how you live. Integration usually continues over several sessions after each dosing session.
Is KAP right for me?
KAP isn't reserved for any one kind of person. It tends to help people who've felt stuck — who've done real work already and sense there's something underneath the layer they've been able to reach so far, or who simply feel ready to approach their healing from a different angle.
What matters far more than your background or how "together" your life looks is your openness to the experience and your willingness to do the integration work, because that's what turns it into lasting change. If you're curious whether it's a fit, that's exactly what a consultation is for. I am happy to answer what feels questionable.
I don't provide the medicine myself. Instead, I match you with a prescriber I know and trust to handle the medical side safely.
My work with you is the preparation beforehand and the integration afterward — the parts that give the experience meaning and help it take root. Those sessions can be held in person at my Pasadena office or via telehealth, whichever works better for you.
Risks and Safety to Consider when working with KAP
Risks and Safety
Ketamine is a powerful medicine. Used carefully, in the right clinical context, it has one of the strongest safety profiles of any psychiatric intervention developed in the last decade. Used carelessly — without proper preparation, supervision, or integration — it carries real risks.
Physical Safety
Ketamine’s physical safety profile is well-documented. A licensed prescriber will conduct a full evaluation before approving any treatment. Certain conditions may rule out KAP or require additional caution, including uncontrolled hypertension, certain cardiac conditions, active psychosis, certain substance use disorders, and pregnancy.
Psychological Risks
Without adequate preparation, ketamine can produce acute distress during dosing or destabilizing experiences. These outcomes are largely preventable. The preparation phase exists specifically to assess readiness and build internal resources.
Concerns About At-Home Ketamine
The KAP market has expanded rapidly, and many services now operate as telehealth-only with minimal therapeutic support. For clients with complex trauma, the lack of integration consistently produces the same pattern: profound experiences that don’t translate into lasting change, and sometimes destabilization.
Questions
Find answers to common questions about Ketamine-Assisted Therapy and how it works.
Yes, I have an extensive network of trusted providers who prescribe ketamine and whom I have established relationships with. After our intake I will match you with a few options suited to your goals.
No. Some clients come to prepare for something ahead of them; many come afterward to make sense of something that already happened. Both are valid starting points.
Difficult experiences are common and often turn out to be the most meaningful once they're worked through. That's much of what integration is for. If an experience left you destabilized in a way that needs more than integration, we'll address that directly and get you appropriate support.
Yes. Ketamine has been an FDA-approved medication since 1970 — originally as an anesthetic, and now used off-label for the treatment of depression, anxiety, PTSD, and other conditions. Used in a clinical setting, prescribed by a licensed physician, and administered as part of a structured therapy protocol, KAP is fully legal in California and across the United States.
It's different from what most people expect, and different from any recreational drug experience you may have heard about. The acute effects last roughly 45 to 90 minutes, depending on the dose and route of administration. During that time, most clients describe a softening of the inner critic, a sense of distance from their usual mental defenses, and access to thoughts, memories, or emotions that normally feel out of reach. Some clients have visual experiences; others don't. Some feel deeply quiet; others feel emotional or activated. There's no "right" experience — and we'll have talked through what to expect long before your first dosing session.
The medicine is roughly the same, although format can vary (sublingual vs intramuscular vs IV infusion). Almost everything else is different. Telehealth-only services typically offer a brief virtual evaluation, a prescription mailed to your home, and minimal therapeutic support. KAP, as I practice it, includes structured preparation sessions, in-person dosing with a trained therapist present throughout, and integration work that uses EMDR and IFS to help the experience translate into lasting change. The research is clear that outcomes track with the quality of the surrounding work, not just the medicine itself.
Possibly, with specific care. KAP isn't categorically off the table for clients with a history of substance use disorder, but it requires more careful clinical attention — and in some cases, another modality is the better starting place. We'll talk through this honestly during preparation, and the prescriber will weigh in on whether KAP is clinically appropriate for your specific situation.
A typical KAP arc includes two to four preparation sessions, a series of dosing sessions (often four to six, sometimes more for complex presentations), and ongoing integration sessions throughout. Many clients continue therapy after the active KAP series ends, working with the openings the medicine helped create. The exact number depends on what you're working on and how your system responds — we'll have a clearer sense after the first few sessions.
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