by Jenita Richards
Kaia Roman, best-selling author of a memoir that follows her journey to put stress and anxiety behind her, also uses her neuroscience and mindfulness research and training in her entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley.
Working in the psychedelic medicine space, Kaia is able to use her own experiences to further champion this work. Her personal experiences with psychedelics makes her happy and excited for more people to discover this, but apprehensive in knowing that not everyone is able to do this in safe and supportive environments.
Her experience at Beond with ibogaine was able to highlight these positive experiences she wants for others foraging into this space. Being able to have this first hand experience gives her a perspective others in the research space who have not had psychedelic journeys. She is happy to be able to give this personal advice to others battling with anxiety, depression and addiction.
A recent guest on her podcast was an ibogaine expert with 40 years of experience, who had never had their own experience with ibogaine. This shocked her because she feels it’s so important to have that experience to close the gap between the science and the journey that’s so difficult to scientifically explain.
“If ibogaine can get rid of a heroin addiction…what can it do for me?”
Kaiawas diagnosed with multiple issues that have caused her to live in chronic pain and has found delicate, more conscious ways to navigate the environment around her. Where western medicine failed, natural endeavors prevailed.
Her chronic psoriasis went away completely after her ibogaine experience. Although it was only for two weeks, she had never experienced that before. Looking at ibogaine outside of the addiction space opens up how important and useful this plant and its many uses can be for an array of people and symptoms.
Kaia has tried both ibogaine and its raw source, iboga. Both experiences were not only different in how they were consumed, but the settings they were had in. The iboga journey had her in the jungle consuming a large amount of raw root bark – 32 pills worth. She didn’t have much support and there was no integration before or following.
The ibogaine experience at Beond was the polar opposite. She was made comfortable by the friendly and experienced medical staff, given anti nausea medicine and a high focus on integration and preparation.
The weeks it took to recover from the harsh impact on her system from iboga is nothing in comparison to the immediate rejuvenation after taking ibogaine. The similarities of insights and positivity in both experiences were quite similar, however.
“I felt like I was that 4 year old little girl, if that trauma didn’t happen.”
The healing of inner child healing that is common with ibogaine is no different for Roman. She was able to comfort her 4-year-old self post some sexual trauma she had experienced. This helped her to integrate her child-self with her adult-self and assure the younger her that she is safe. That they are both safe. This clarity and sharpness from this ibogaine experience has lasted since her taking it in July. Roman’s been able to focus the high energy levels that she’s always had on things that really matter to her. On things that align more with who she is in the world.
The beauty of being able to heal our inner child and feel this new sense of safety is unmatched.
Roman’s goal was to find whatever healing she needed to come through so she could get to a point of extending her best self to the world. The integration provided by Beond was crucial to being able to apply the profound experiences to her life outside of the supportive space. The risk of reverting back or feeling even worse after without this integration is high for many outside of a supportive system.
“We’re not supposed to heal by ourselves.”
Kaia Roman’s ibogaine journey is a class on how crucial it is to have professionals around you during a psychedelic experience holding a safe space for personal growth. As someone who has done psychedelics in different environments, she champions for the research to continue with an emphasis on safety and integration.