How Psilocybin Released My Mother’s Tears

Waving goodbye to our husbands, my friend and I flew off to Jamaica where ingesting magic mushrooms — psilocybin — is legal. Yes, psilocybin is a psychedelic. And no, neither of us had ever tried magic mushrooms before.

Why would two women in their early seventies do such a thing? I can’t speak for my friend but as a born and bred neurotic, I sought to heal more. I’d already found relief from taking medication prescribed by a psychiatrist since 1985. That medication (along with talk therapy in the beginning) continues to take a major edge off of my formerly…