April Pride

Of Like Minds
  • 5.0 (18)
  • Alternative Health
  • Weekly

The podcast for women changing their minds with psychedelics is hosted by April Pride, a trusted voice at the intersection of psychedelics and women’s health. Whether you're curious about microdosing, integration, or harm reduction, Of Like Minds with April Pride podcast offers clinician-approved guidance, personal stories, and expert insights to help you intentionally navigate personal transformation with psychedelic medicine. aprilpride.substack.com

  1. 4d ago

    138. Intuition vs Manifestation: Why Asking Comes First with Isik Tlabar

    Intuition vs manifestation: which comes first? Intuition coach Isik Tlabar explains why asking comes before chasing, and how breathwork and small questions build trust.April Pride talks with Isik Tlabar, an intuition coach, breathwork facilitator, and author who trained as an architect in the UK before finding her way to ecstatic dance, cacao ceremonies, and intuitive reading. Isik explains how her coaching moves from ego to soul to vision to one doable next step, why she uses breathwork for grief and life transitions, and how she works with the fear that sits between who you are and who you are becoming. April adds the research: interoception and a London trading floor, Kahneman and Klein on when gut feelings can be trusted, how fast breathing lowers blood CO2 and shifts your state, a University College London study on why people choose certainty, and what the Enneagram research does and doesn't support. The conversation closes on the idea that trusting your intuition works like trusting a person: it is built on a track record, one low-stakes question at a time.What we cover:• The difference between intuition and manifestation, and why the order matters• How breathwork creates an altered state, and what the evidence shows• Working with fear, divine timing, and the Enneagram• How Isik's self-paced Intuition Course is built• How to practice intuition every day, starting with small questionsTimestamps:0:00 Welcome, disclaimer, and why you ask whether you trust a guide2:00 What intuition is: a navigation system, and why logic is muscle and intuition is fascia4:00 From architecture in Istanbul and London to intuition coach8:30 Interoception, Kahneman, and Klein: is intuition a trainable skill?9:30 Ego, soul, and innocence: how Isik coaches11:15 Why breathwork helps with grief and life transitions12:15 How breathwork creates an altered state14:00 Daily breathwork versus deeper shamanic and biodynamic sessions14:40 Research check: CO2, altered states, and what breathwork studies show15:50 Working with fear between the ego and the soul19:15 The Enneagram, and what the research says20:15 Divine timing and why we want certainty22:10 Intuition vs manifestation: why we do it backwards23:40 The snake study: why we pick the known bad outcome24:20 Inside the Intuition Course: three parts25:40 The caterpillar phase: when an old structure falls away27:20 How to practice: start with lunch, not Canada28:30 Cycle seasons, menopause, and rebirth30:15 Research check: where the four-seasons framework comes from30:40 Closing: intuition as a track record, and where to find IsikMentioned in this episode:• Isik Tlabar's Intuition Course (self-paced, about two and a half hours): https://www.isiktlabar.com/intuitioncourse• Isik Tlabar on Substack: https://substack.com/@isiktlabar• Trust Series Week 4: How to trust your intuition again: https://aprilpride.substack.com/p/trust-your-intuition-shame-self-trust-week-4• Kandasamy et al., Scientific Reports, 2016, interoception and trading floor survival• Kahneman and Klein, American Psychologist, 2009, conditions for intuitive expertise• Havenith et al., Communications Psychology, 2025, CO2 and circular breathwork• de Berker et al., Nature Communications, 2016, uncertainty and stress• Hook et al., Journal of Clinical Psychology, 2021, Enneagram systematic reviewThis show discusses psychedelics and altered states and is intended for audiences 21 and over. Nothing in this episode is medical advice. Faster, deeper breathwork styles are not right for everyone; check with a licensed provider if you have a heart condition, seizure history, or other health concern.Connect with the show:Full show notes on Substack: https://aprilpride.substack.com/p/intuition-vs-manifestation-isik-tlabarWebsite: https://aprilpride.comSubstack: https://aprilpride.substack.comInstagram: https://instagram.com/aprilpridecreates

  2. Nov 3

    137. Is MDMA safe after age 70?

    A psychotherapist and his wife discuss 25 years of using MDMA together, testing it safely in today's drug supply, and what it taught them about grief. 🔵 Episode Summary Is MDMA safe after 70? Charley and Shelley Wininger have used it together more than a hundred times over twenty-five years, and they joined me to make the case that it belongs to midlife and beyond at least as much as it belongs to a festival crowd in their twenties. Charley is a licensed psychoanalyst and mental health counselor in Brooklyn, practicing since 1989, and the author of "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA." Shelley is a retired critical care nurse. Neither of them treats this casually. We get into how they source and test MDMA, including a newer complication in drug checking that most listeners haven't heard of yet, and why the medications most people over sixty five are already taking change the entire experience and need a doctor in the conversation. We also talk about what it's actually done for their marriage, a chapter Charley reads aloud from his book about mortality, and what happened when Shelley used MDMA with a group of forty people in a park nine days after her son died. We are living through what public health researchers call an epidemic of isolation, and the Winingers' argument is a simple one: the antidote they found was not a program. It was each other, said plainly, a few times a year, for twenty five years. 🔵 Key Takeaways Testing isn't one step anymore; it's two, maybe three. A reagent kit confirms MDMA is present. A fentanyl test strip checks separately for fentanyl. A newer class of synthetic opioid, chemically different from fentanyl and in some cases far more potent, won't show up on a fentanyl strip at all.Roughly one in five women in their forties and fifties are on an antidepressant, and that share keeps climbing after sixty (CDC/NCHS, 2015–2018). These medications don't clear quickly, and timing MDMA around them is a conversation for a prescriber, not a solo decision.A serotonin-recovery practice some people use after MDMA carries a real risk of serotonin syndrome if timed too close to the dose itself; harm reduction guidance calls for a minimum 24- to 48-hour wait.Grief, not a diagnosis, is often what actually brings people to this medicine. Shelley's story is offered as one data point on that, not a treatment claim.A twenty-five-year, 200-person community built on sober potluck dinners is the throughline of the Winingers' argument that MDMA's real value for this age group is connection, not escape. 🔵 Timestamps 0:00 Welcome and tonight's topic: MDMA after 70 0:00 Charley and Shelley's origin story, and the "useless medicine" years 2:00 The isolation epidemic and sourcing MDMA through community 3:00 Testing MDMA safely: what's changed in the drug supply 4:00 Why Shelley tried MDMA, and what it gave her that nothing else had 5:00 Charley reads "Senior High" from his book, and the mortality conversation 7:30 Medications, contraindications, and talking to your doctor first 14:00 Community, chosen family, and 25 years of potlucks 15:30 Shelley's story: a grief circle in the park, nine days after loss 19:00 The closing question every couple should bring into the room 🔵 Guest Charley Wininger is a licensed psychoanalyst and mental health counselor based in Brooklyn, in practice since 1989, and the author of "Listening to Ecstasy: The Transformative Power of MDMA" (Park Street Press). Shelley Wininger is a retired critical care nurse. Together they've used MDMA more than a hundred times over twenty-five years. Follow Charley on Substack. Psychedelic Salon at Town Hall Seattle: 2026-27 Schedule Follow April on Substack Visit aprilpride.com Original Substack post Hosted by April Pride IG: @aprilpridecreates - https://instagram.com/aprilpridecreates YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aprilpridecreates

  3. Oct 16

    136. What Does 5-MeO-DMT Do to Trust?

    Psychedelics & Trust is a 12-week Substack series created and written by host April Pride, who is microdosing psilocybin while writing. In this episode, she reads her Week Two dispatch, which happened to be the week of her first 5-MeO-DMT experience, which she approached with the intention of exploring where her self-trust broke down, the brain science behind why distrust can feel like knowing, and why distrust is a prediction that can be revised. Topics include how 5-MeO-DMT differs from N,N-DMT, synthetic versus toad-derived 5-MeO-DMT, what the StepWise protocol is, and how fear conditioning, extinction learning, and estrogen may shape the way we trust. Additional Resources Who was Amanda Fielding? From the Mac to the Mystical Bill - from The Pattern Project Read the full Trust Series and show notes on Substack: https://aprilpride.substack.com Psychedelic Salon at Town Hall Seattle - 2026-27 Schedule Follow April on Substack Visit aprilpride.com Hosted by April Pride IG: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@aprilpridecreates YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/@aprilpridecreates

  4. Oct 6

    135. A Medical Doctor Gives His Opinion on Psychedelics and Grief

    Can psychedelics help with grief? This is what we explore in the audience Q&A from Psychedelic Salon on grief, recorded live at Town Hall Seattle with Dr. Sunil Aggarwal. It picks up where last week's main conversation left off, and the questions that night ranged far wider than a single loss: grief on scale, watching genocide unfold on a screen, a bereaved parent talking through her own research, a retired nurse asking about her own brain, a psychologist 25 years into practice still figuring out where the guardrails are. Two threads run through the whole hour. The first is that psychedelics don't reduce grief's pain so much as expand someone's capacity to hold it. A mother who traveled to Jamaica for a psilocybin retreat after losing her son put it more precisely than either of us could: she still misses him every day. What changed was room, for meaning and joy alongside the missing, not instead of it. The second is that the details matter enormously: brain injury history, medical risk factors, whether someone is in a clinical setting or a festival, whether the substance under discussion is MDMA, psilocybin, or ayahuasca, and Sunil is careful never to flatten those distinctions into one answer. We also get specific: on dosing, on the early and mostly preclinical evidence for psychedelics and brain injury rehabilitation, on how facilitator training is being built in real time with no single accredited path yet, and on whether grief is something science can actually measure (it is, and researchers like Holly Prigerson at Weill Cornell have built the scales to do it). None of this is medical advice, including the parts where Sunil and I get specific about dosing. If you don't have a Dr. Aggarwal to call, the takeaway that closes this episode is the one to hold onto: start with your hospice's bereavement line if you have one, or a grief-informed therapist if you don't. Subscribe to April Pride on Substack for weekly conversations on psychedelics, nervous system health, and integration. 0:00 Introduction and what this Q&A covers 2:00 Grief witnessed through a screen: genocide and collective loss 4:30 Training the next generation of psychedelic facilitators 8:00 Does psilocybin make grief hurt less, or just more bearable? 9:00 Grief and psychedelics with a brain injury history 15:00 A therapeutic psilocybin dose for grief, and the fear of losing control 18:30 Processing grief with psychedelics outside a clinical setting 21:30 Choosing between MDMA, psilocybin, and ayahuasca 24:30 Is grief scientifically measurable? 🔵 Additional Resources The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief, Francis Weller. Referenced by an audience member; lays out the five gates of grief beyond death."Psychedelics for Brain Injury," Dr. Aggarwal's 2023 open-access review in Frontiers in Neurology, for anyone who wants the fuller preclinical picture.

  5. Sep 29

    134. Can Psychedelics Help With Grief?

    This episode is about psychedelics and grief, and it starts from an unusual place: not death, but everything else grief actually is. Loss of a future you thought you had. Loss of an identity, a marriage, a body that no longer works the way it used to. That's the frame Dr. Sunil Aggarwal and I set for this final Psychedelic Salon of last season, recorded live at Town Hall Seattle. Sunil isn't a hospice tourist to this topic. He's a physician at Seattle's AIMS Institute who has spent years fighting, in federal court, for his own terminally ill patients' right to try psilocybin. He was the first doctor to petition the DEA for Right to Try access on their behalf. We talk about the neurobiology of why a guided psychedelic experience can shift a story you've carried about a loss for years, a bereaved-parent retreat in Jamaica that's now the subject of a real qualitative study, and the distinction Sunil keeps returning to, containment versus integration. Containment is what most of us default to. Put the loss in a box, keep functioning, call it managed. Integration is slower, and it's the only version of the two that actually changes your relationship to what you lost. Not less pain. A different relationship to the pain. We also get into what the research does and doesn't support, from the fast-tracked synthetic psilocybin analogs now moving through the FDA to the early, mostly preclinical evidence on psilocybin and brain injury. And we close on the one resource almost nobody uses: every hospice in the country is legally required to offer 12 months of bereavement support, to anyone in the family, whether or not you were ever a patient there. Subscribe to April Pride on Substack for weekly conversations on psychedelics, nervous system health, and integration. 0:00 Welcome, disclaimer, and the topic of this Salon: grief 0:45 Meet Dr. Sunil Aggarwal: hospice, palliative medicine, and medical geography 2:20 The Right to Try fight to get psilocybin to dying patients 5:00 Who controls psilocybin's Schedule I status, and why the FDA's fast-tracked analogs won't change access for most people 6:30 April's own experience with grief, and the parents who come to her after losing a child 8:30 How Sunil recognizes grief in a clinical setting, and what anticipatory grief looks like 11:30 Containment versus integration 12:20 Inside the Jamaica grief retreats for bereaved parents 17:20 The neurobiology of psilocybin, the default mode network, and reframing a loss 19:10 How to integrate a psychedelic experience afterward 22:20 The bereavement benefit almost no one uses 23:40 Key takeaways and what's ahead this season Dr. Sunil Aggarwal is a physician at Seattle's AIMS Institute, where he leads an integrative oncology and palliative care practice and directs the clinic's psychedelic-assisted work with ketamine and psilocybin. He holds an MD and PhD from the University of Washington School of Medicine, where his doctoral work was in medical geography. Aggarwal was the first physician to petition the DEA for Right to Try access to psilocybin for terminally ill patients, litigation that produced a Ninth Circuit ruling finding the DEA had erred in denying that petition, a first for the agency. His clinical and legal work sits at the center of the current fight over who gets access to psychedelic medicine, and under what conditions, before federal rescheduling catches up. @sunil1007 @aimsinstituteseattle 🔵 Additional Resources Jamaica Grief Retreats, led by Dr. Dingle Spence, the group retreat program for bereaved parents discussed in this episode. Findings published as "Relief for Grief: Report from a Psychedelic Retreat for Bereaved Parents in Jamaica," Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, 2022. The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief, Francis Weller. AIMS Institute, Dr. Aggarwal's Seattle clinic.

  6. Sep 22

    133. Psilocybin and Seniors: Cost, Potency, and What to Do When Nothing Happens

    133. What If Nothing Happened During Your Trip? Someone in the room had done everything right. Careful preparation, a trained guide, two booster doses of psilocybin. Nothing happened. No altered state. In this episode, learn what that means and what to do next. This is the audience Q&A from the Psychedelics and Seniors Salon at Town Hall Seattle, the companion to episode 129, with Abbie Rosner, Scott Paul Wright, and Dr. Emily Whinkin. What you'll learn - What a session that produces no visible shift does and does not tell you - Why expectation is treated as a clinical variable in psychedelic medicine, not a soft one- Why microdosing protocols build in days off, and what those days are for - How much psilocybin content varies between mushroom varieties and within a single grow - What a legal psilocybin session in Oregon costs and what the price actually covers- What Seattle's 2021 psilocybin resolution protects, and what it does not About the guests Abbie Rosner is the author of Psychedelics and the Counterculture of Aging, based on interviews with 36 older adults, and writes ELDEREVOLUTION on Substack. Scott Paul Wright is a filmmaker and screenwriter and the director of the documentary The Next Chapter, who took his first psychedelic journey at 68. Dr. Emily Whinkin is a naturopathic physician and integrative mental health specialist licensed in Oregon and Washington, and a board-certified Fellow of the Psychiatric Association of Naturopathic Physicians, who runs a monthly virtual integration circle for older adults. 0:00 Introduction 1:30 Should family members journey together 2:20 Medical disqualifiers and cardiovascular risk 3:30 Intergenerational trauma and encounters with ancestors 5:30 Grief that does not resolve in one session 8:00 What microdosing does, and how many Americans are doing it 9:40 Microdosing for creativity, and the pause 10:40 Psilocybin research for Alzheimer's and dementia 11:40 Microdosing, decision making, and why protocols include days off 13:40 Adjusting a microdose for mushroom potency 14:50 Cardiac conditions, atrial fibrillation, and valve issues 17:50 When a journey feels unimpactful, even with booster doses 19:00 Expectations as a clinical variable 20:00 What a legal psilocybin session costs and what it covers 23:00 Seattle, cultivation, and what decriminalization means 24:00 Integration circles and the isolation data 25:20 LSD compared with psilocybin, and the MM-120 anxiety trial 27:00 Mental health contraindications 28:20 SSRIs, SNRIs, and psilocybin 30:00 Ketamine compared with psilocybin 31:00 Cognitive benefits, neuroinflammation, and telomeres Follow April Pride for trusted information on psychedelics for women Substack Instagram YouTube Psychedelic Salon Learn more about April's services, events, and more at aprilpride.com

  7. Sep 15

    132. The Acid Queen, Rosemary Woodruff Leary: An LSD Muse and Fugitive

    Rosemary Woodruff Leary sat in a jail cell for a month rather than testify against her husband. While she was inside, Timothy Leary gave a ten page interview to Playboy about what LSD does to a woman's body and did not mention her once. She was his editor, his translator, the person who read the room for him, and the organizer who coordinated his 1970 prison escape across the Weather Underground, the Black Panthers, and the Brotherhood of Eternal Love. She called herself The Computer. Then he turned on her, pointed the FBI in her direction, and she spent twenty four years underground as Sarah Woodruff, running an inn in Provincetown with a go bag by the bed. Susannah Cahalan found her the way forgotten people usually get found. She was working through four hundred boxes of Timothy Leary's papers at the New York Public Library when she noticed a much smaller collection almost nobody had opened. Key Takeaways Rosemary Woodruff Leary served a month in jail rather than testify against Timothy Leary before a grand jury investigating Millbrook, and the Playboy interview that made him famous ran while she was inside. She was the coordinating point between the factions who organized Leary's 1970 prison escape, working with the attorney who also represented the Weather Underground and the Black Panthers. She called herself The Computer. Leary later decoded their letters for investigators and offered her mother money for her location. She spent twenty four years underground and could not hold any job requiring a Social Security number. She died at 66. Cahalan connects that directly to going without health insurance for the years she was a fugitive, which is the harm reduction point of the episode and has nothing to do with the drugs. Rosemary told students explicitly that psychedelics are not for everyone and that there is a shadow side, a position Cahalan argues is more relevant to the current renaissance than anything Leary said. LSD remains a Schedule I substance under the federal Controlled Substances Act. The April 2026 executive order directs faster federal review of psychedelic research; it does not reschedule anything. Timestamps 0:00 Introduction 2:38 Ketamine, the NMDA receptor, and the sense of self 3:18 Humphry Osmond, asylum architects, and where set and setting came from 4:38 Finding Rosemary in the New York Public Library archive 5:38 Signs, synchronicity, and the I Ching 6:38 What Rosemary changed in Susannah 9:26 The women who carried the archives while the men made headlines 10:26 Millbrook, the grand jury, and a month in jail 13:06 The Playboy interview she was in jail for 14:41 The prison escape, the FBI, and the letter that ended it 16:05 Twenty four years underground and what it actually cost 18:47 Cape Cod, a new name, and a secret affair 20:47 Invisibility after a certain age 22:32 A contradictory woman 24:32 The warning Rosemary gave about psychedelics 27:32 The Robot, overuse, and why integration matters Guest Spotlight Susannah Cahalan is a journalist and the number one New York Times bestselling author of Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness and The Great Pretender. Her third book, The Acid Queen: The Psychedelic Life and Counterculture Rebellion of Rosemary Woodruff Leary, was published by Viking in 2025 and named a Best Biography of 2025 by The Guardian. She spent years in archives at the New York Public Library and in Rosemary's family's hands to reconstruct a life that survived mostly in other people's footnotes. Additional Resources The Acid Queen: The Psychedelic Life and Counterculture Rebellion of Rosemary Woodruff Leary by Susannah Cahalan (Viking, 2025). [LINK] The 2026 to 2027 Psychedelic Salon season [LINK] April on Substack: https://aprilpride.substack.com Visit April Pride: https://aprilpride.com Instagram: https://instagram.com/aprilpridecreates YouTube: https://youtube.com/@aprilpridecreates

  8. Sep 8

    131. Can psilocybin help with menopause?

    131. Can psilocybin help with menopause? A live audience of 300 at Town Hall Seattle asked Dr. Trish Singh and Kelly McGinty, C-FNP, co-authors of Mycelopause: Uncovering the Magic of Menopause with Psilocybin, the questions that don't come up in a doctor's office: whether psilocybin is safe after hormone-positive cancer, how it interacts with SSRIs, whether hormone therapy can start after 60, what's actually legal in Seattle in 2026, and where a sensitive beginner should start. This is the full audience Q&A from the Psychedelic Salon on psychedelics and menopause, with host April Pride adding current research, legal updates, and corrections throughout, including New Mexico's first-in-the-nation psilocybin treatment equity fund and King County's 2026 entheogen motion. The expanded written answers, with sources, are on Substack: aprilpride.substack.com The Psychedelic Salon returns to Town Hall Seattle October 8. Tickets and all resources mentioned are in the show notes at the Substack link. This episode is for listeners 21+ and is not medical advice. Questions about your own medications or medical history belong with your provider. What you'll learn:Why psilocybin's serotonin mechanism matters for women with hormone-positive cancer histories, and what hasn't been studiedWhat decriminalization actually permits in Seattle and King County in 2026, and where regulated legal access existsWhat current research says about combining psilocybin with SSRIs and how often high-dose sessions are spacedWhether hormone therapy can start after 60, and why psilocybin can't replace HRTWhy a quality dose sometimes does nothing, and where sensitive beginners should startAbout the guests: Kelly McGinty is a certified family nurse practitioner and Dr. Trish Singh is a licensed psilocybin facilitator in Colorado's regulated program. They guide therapeutic psilocybin experiences together and co-authored Mycelopause: Uncovering the Magic of Menopause with Psilocybin.Timestamps: 0:00 Introduction 2:00 Psilocybin after hormone-positive cancer 4:00 Legal access in Seattle at any age 6:30 Psilocybin, menopause, and the restructuring metaphor 9:00 Access, equity, and who research leaves out 13:00 SSRIs, dose frequency, and serotonin syndrome 16:30 Fear of a first psychedelic experience 18:45 HRT after 60 and whether psilocybin replaces it 21:00 When mushrooms don't seem to work 23:30 Developmental trauma in guided journeys 28:00 Beginner varieties for sensitive systemsResourcesMycelopause: Uncovering the Magic of Menopause with Psilocybin by Dr. Trish Singh and Kelly McGinty.The Next Chapter, September 13. A thirty-minute documentary following men and women over sixty through a psilocybin retreat in Mexico, with a panel afterward featuring Kelly McGinty and Dr. Trish Singh. RSVP here: https://kinema.com/events/The-Next-Chapter-jaazqeWomen in the Wild, April’s micro- and low-dose gatherings. Apply here:https://form.typeform.com/to/ZW4Pq1ikListen on Substack: https://aprilpride.substack.com Visit April Pride: https://aprilpride.com Instagram: https://instagram.com/aprilpridecreates Psychedelic Salon: https://www.aprilpride.com/psychedelic-events-for-women/psychedelic-salonSubscribe to April Pride on Substack for weekly conversations on women, midlife, psychedelics, nervous system health, and integration: https://aprilpride.substack.com

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About

The podcast for women changing their minds with psychedelics is hosted by April Pride, a trusted voice at the intersection of psychedelics and women’s health. Whether you're curious about microdosing, integration, or harm reduction, Of Like Minds with April Pride podcast offers clinician-approved guidance, personal stories, and expert insights to help you intentionally navigate personal transformation with psychedelic medicine. aprilpride.substack.com

Information

  • Creator
    Of Like Minds
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    138
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Of Like Minds
  • Show Website
    April Pride

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