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I am Andrew Feldmar.[br]I am a psychologist.

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I have practised psychotherapy for about 40 years in Vancouver, Canada.

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I belong to the Canadian Psychological Association and right now I'm involved in a study

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with the help of MAPS.[br]Ingrid Pacey, a Vancouver Psychiatrist, and myself

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are starting a study about the effectiveness of MDMA as an adjunct to psychotherapy.

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So why MDMA? Why are we studying MDMA?[br]Well, studies that have been already completed

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way before it became an illegal substance and now recently with a change in the attitude of the times

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it looks like MDMA allows one to enter into a state of consciousness where suddenly maybe for some people

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for the very first time in their lives they find themselves without shame.

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They find themselves with an open heart, where maybe for decades their heart has been closed

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and they haven't even noticed it.[br]So it allows for connection.

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The major effect of PTSD is inability to make meaningful connections.

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Judith Lewis Herman, a Harvard psychiatrist, actually argues that all the syndromes listed

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and catalogued, in the Diagnostic Statistical Manual that the American Psychiatric Association uses

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all of it really boils down to PTSD.[br]

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So if we can make headway with an efficient way of relieving people

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from the after effects of trauma or traumas then in a way we alleviate the entire field of mental distress,

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not just what is now strictly believed to be PTSD.

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Interview courtesy of "From Neurons to Nirvana: The Great Medicines" by Oliver Hockenhull.

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Film to be released later in 2012.

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The Multidsciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies[br]maps.org