Finding Your Psychedelic Medicine for Your Cancer Journey

After 20+ years of living with cancer, 11 surgeries, 7 months of chemotherapy and countless other medical procedures, I received a terminal prognosis. 

The anxiety was crushing. Not just worry—full-body, existential terror: I’m going to die. The depression was suffocating. My oncologist could manage my tumors. But no one in the medical system seemed equipped to address the psychological avalanche of living with a death sentence.

That's when I started learning about psychedelic medicines. The research on psilocybin for end-of-life anxiety. The promising data on MDMA for trauma. The ancient wisdom of plant medicines helping people find peace with mortality.

But I had no idea where to start. Which medicine? Which practitioner? What's legal? What's safe? Who do I trust?

I felt utterly alone in trying to figure this out.

I reflected on all of these questions during my recent podcast conversation with Angela Amirault, a psychedelic-assisted therapist who has practiced in the US and Canada. When she described her process for helping people ‘find their medicine’, it brought me right back to those early, confused explorations.

"What medine do you feel called to?" Angela asks her clients. "What do you feel drawn to?"

But here's what I've learned: before you can answer that intuitive question, you have to answer some much harder ones first. Questions about legality. Questions about guides. Questions that shape what medicines are even available to you.

Let's be honest about the real path to finding your psychedelic medicine for your cancer journey. It's messier than anyone admits.

The Legal Question You Have to Ask First

Before anyone can explore which medicine calls to them, they need to conduct a brutally honest assessment: What is your tolerance for legal risk?

This is the sad reality of accessing psychedelic medicines in 2025. People seeking relief from suffering must first ask themselves whether they're willing to break the law to find healing.

Are you comfortable accessing medicines in legal gray areas? Can you travel to states or countries where certain substances are legal or decriminalized? Do you have the financial resources to pursue only legal options? Are you willing to step outside legal boundaries for your wellbeing?

These shouldn't be questions that suffering people have to ask. But here we are. Alas. 

In the United States, where Angela has practiced in the past, the legal landscape is a patchwork of contradictions and complexity. Psilocybin is legal in Oregon and Colorado, decriminalized in some cities, and criminally prohibited elsewhere. Ketamine occupies a strange middle ground—legal when prescribed, accessible through clinics, but still controlled. Cannabis remains federally illegal while being available at state-licensed dispensaries in many places. MDMA and LSD can only be legally accessed within clinical trials. Ayahuasca and peyote are federally illegal, but can (sometimes) be accessed legally through religious freedom exemptions. And these laws are constantly evolving, making it challenging to know which psychedelics are legal in which locations.

In Canada, where Angela currently practices, the situation differs. Cannabis is federally legal nationwide—available through licensed retailers and eligible for medical designation for people living with cancer. Ketamine remains accessible through medical practitioners. Psilocybin and MDMA can be accessed through Canada's Special Access Program (SAP), which allows patients to apply for legal access to otherwise prohibited substances for medical purposes. But even with the SAP pathway, Angela notes the frustration: "You have to fill out paperwork and basically explain where you're at medically and asking permission. It's just very degrading for people who are already suffering."

The particularly heartbreaking Canadian reality: some patients have been approved for Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) but denied access to psilocybin through SAP. As Angela explained, this had led to legal challenges: "The government will allow them to die, but won't allow them to live using this plant."

Beyond North America, a few countries have created legal frameworks for psychedelic access—the Netherlands permits psilocybin truffles, some Latin American countries never criminalized traditional plant medicines, and a handful of nations are exploring regulatory pathways. But in most of the world, these medicines remain illegal.

What's accessible to you depends entirely on geography, financial resources, and risk tolerance.

Some people living with cancer will not access illegal medicines. That's a completely valid boundary. Angela acknowledges this directly: "For some folks, it's like 'I just can't do anything illegal. I can't purchase the medicine. I don't want to do anything underground.'"

For those people, the realistic options narrow considerably. In the US, ketamine becomes the most accessible option—available through clinics in most states, though rarely covered by insurance. In Canada, cannabis offers federally legal access, with ketamine and SAP applications as other possibilities.

Others are willing to explore less conventional paths. To work with underground guides. To participate in ceremonial contexts. To travel to where medicines are accessible.

Neither choice is wrong. But they all involve tradeoffs. And you need to know your boundaries before you can meaningfully explore which medicine is yours.

The legal reality shapes—and often determines—which doors are even open to you.

Finding Your Guide: The Choice That Determines Your Options

Here's something I didn't understand initially: the question of "which medicine?" often comes after "which guide?"

Your choice of practitioner fundamentally shapes which medicines become available to you. A ketamine clinic offers ketamine. A psilocybin-focused therapist in Colorado works with psilocybin. A psychedelic church or indigenous practitioner might work with psilocybin or ayahuasca or peyote. An underground guide might offer several options.

The guide you choose determines the medicines you can access.

So how do you find the right guide?

I need to be transparent about my own bias. As someone navigating complex cancer treatment, I would strongly prefer to work with legal psychedelic medicines within the medical system—guided by a licensed therapist, with my oncologist's knowledge, supported by medical infrastructure.

But I also recognize this medical model isn't realistic for everyone. It can be expensive. It's geographically limited. And it unnecessarily restricts access to medicines that humans have used safely for millennia.

If we want broad, safe, affordable access to these medicines, we need a much wider definition of "guide" beyond licensed therapists operating in clinical settings. As Angela emphasizes, requiring academic degrees in therapy would "block all kinds of different indigenous practitioners from being able to do the work who have thousands of hours" of experience.

Your guide might be a therapist. Might be a trained trip-sitter. Might be an indigenous practitioner carrying traditional knowledge. Might be an experienced friend who has walked this path.

So what should you look for in finding your guide?

Angela offers clear questions: What are their protocols? What happens if you have a medical or spiritual emergency? How will they support you if something difficult comes up? What are the boundaries around touch and physical contact?

But most fundamentally, Angela encourages you to ask about your own needs for safety: "What do you need to feel safe? What makes you feel unsafe?"

Angela emphasizes that the credentials matter less than the person's ability to create and hold a safe space. And she encourages you to trust your gut about whether someone can witness your vulnerability without trying to control your experience.

And she wants you to ask the practical questions. If something goes wrong—medically, psychologically, or emotionally—what's the plan?

Your guide shapes which medicines you can access. Your guide creates the conditions where healing becomes possible. Choose thoughtfully based on what makes you feel safe. 

Finding Your Medicine: What's Calling to You?

Only after you've clarified your legal boundaries and identified potential guides can you meaningfully ask: which medicine is mine?

Different medicines have distinct personalities—though they manifest differently for each person. Angela shared her own experience working with the three medicines she uses most in her practice, while acknowledging these energies might feel completely different to others.

Cannabis, Angela describes, feels feminine, holding, gentle. "I feel like it's a ‘her,’" Angela told me. "If you're in the space, it feels like this wonderful holding." Some clients describe it as being "held in a womb." It's deeply embodied, working through the body. For Angela, cannabis creates a safe container where difficult emotions can finally surface and be processed.

For the cancer community specifically, cannabis has long been familiar for managing nausea and pain—but its potential as a psychedelic medicine for psychological healing remains underappreciated.

Psilocybin, in Angela's experience, feels ancient and expansive. "When I've tried to have conversations with psilocybin in the medicine space, sometimes I just feel like I’m a puny human," she laughed. It has a trickster energy—showing you what you need rather than what you want. "It felt like this big ancient structure of organisms that we're part of." Angela sees psilocybin can facilitate profound connection to something larger than yourself, pulling back the veil on ordinary reality. 

Ketamine creates what Angela calls a "space journey"—disconnective, sometimes dark and often cosmic. Being synthesized rather than plant-based gives it a different quality. "It's unlike a plant medicine. It's a molecule. It's a chemical," she noted. For Angela, ketamine "allows us to observe our patterns or our experiences in a different way." Sometimes it's narrative-driven, sometimes not. "Sometimes people just have super strange, weird experiences on it. And that doesn't mean it's not working."

But these are Angela's experiences. Yours may be completely different. And there are many other medicines beyond cannabis, psilocybin or ketamine—there is MDMA, LSD, ayahuasca, ibogaine, and more. Each with its own character. Each calling to different people for different reasons.

So how do you choose?

"I ask clients, what do you feel called to?" Angela explains. "What do you feel drawn to? Because it's that intuitive sense."

After explaining the options, after discussing what's accessible, after clarifying intentions—Angela trusts people to know what's right for them.

Sometimes people arrive certain they want psilocybin, but after learning about other options realize cannabis or ketamine might better serve what they're actually seeking.

Sometimes they realize: not yet. Maybe not ever. "I don't try to convince people," Angela emphasizes. "This isn't a sales call...If someone realizes they're not ready, that's valuable information."

Angela empowers her clients to trust their intuition.

Why No One Should Navigate This Alone

When I first started seeking psychedelic medicines, I felt so lost. The legal landscape was confusing. The information was scattered. I didn't know who to trust or where to turn.

That isolation is exactly why Healing Cancer Journeys exists.

We can't change the legal reality—not yet. We can't eliminate the impossible choice between healing illegally or suffering legally. But we can provide clear, honest information about your options. We can connect you with others who have walked this path. We can help you ask better questions as you search for your guide and your medicine.

The questions are hard. The choices are complicated. The legal landscape is unjust.

But you don't have to figure it out alone.

Let's journey together.

To connect with others navigating psychedelic medicines in their cancer journey, reach out to community@healingcancerjourneys.org