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Conditions We Treat

Hallucinogen treatment in Colorado, without the scare tactics or the shrug.

Classic psychedelics and dissociatives like PCP and ketamine act on different brain chemistry and carry different risks. We treat hallucinogen use at all six Colorado offices and online, starting from an assessment rather than an assumption.

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Understanding Hallucinogens

One label, a very wide range of drugs.

Hallucinogens are not one drug. They are a wide group of substances that share a single effect, a profound change in how you perceive the world, and diverge on nearly everything else. Someone under their influence may see, hear, or even smell things that are not there, and may feel their relationship to their own surroundings shift in ways that are hard to put into words afterward.

They are also more common than the reputation suggests. In SAMHSA's 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 3.6 percent of people aged 12 or older, about 10.4 million people, reported using a hallucinogen in the past year, up from 2.7 percent, or 7.6 million people, in 2021.

What brings people here is rarely one experience. It is a pattern: use that keeps escalating, perception that has not fully settled, a mood that has not come back, or a dissociative like PCP or ketamine that has become genuinely hard to put down. All of that is treatable, and there is no threshold you have to cross before you are allowed to ask.

If you or someone close to you in Colorado is using hallucinogens and it has stopped feeling like a choice, you can call The Redpoint Center and speak with someone today.

Two Families

These two groups act on completely different systems.

Hallucinogens come from natural extracts and from labs, and they are swallowed, snorted, smoked, or injected. Clinically, none of that matters as much as which of these two groups a substance belongs to, because the group decides how it acts on the brain and what it is likely to cost.

Serotonin

Classic Hallucinogens

LSD, psilocybin, mescaline, and DMT. NIDA describes these as acting primarily on the 5-HT2A receptors that serotonin normally uses, which is why they reach perception, mood, behavior, and even the body’s regulation of temperature and appetite all at once. What people feel swings widely: intense connection and happiness for some, fear, panic, and confusion for others, sometimes inside the same few hours.

Glutamate

Dissociative Drugs

PCP, ketamine, dextromethorphan, and salvia. NIDA describes PCP and ketamine as disrupting glutamate at the NMDA receptor, which is what produces detachment: from your surroundings, from your body, and from your own sense of self, often with heavy lethargy alongside it. These are the hallucinogens with a recognized use disorder, and the ones people most often struggle to put down.

Signs and Symptoms

What a problem with hallucinogens tends to look like.

Someone struggling may show only a few of these, and the early ones are easy to file under a rough patch. What matters is the direction of travel rather than any single item on the list.

Pulling away

Self-isolating: fewer people, fewer plans, and more of life happening alone or with one small group.

Using at the wrong times

Use that turns up at risky or inappropriate moments rather than staying inside a deliberate occasion.

Consequences that change nothing

Something goes badly wrong because of it and the use continues anyway. This is the single clearest signal on the list.

Sharp mood swings

Excessive or intense shifts in mood, sometimes inside a single conversation, with nothing in particular behind them.

Money that stops adding up

Changes in finances or budgeting: spending that is hard to account for, or bills sliding down the priority list.

Anxiety and depression rising

Increased anxiety or low mood that keeps building between uses rather than lifting once the effects fade.

Paranoia that lingers

Persistent paranoia, or a pervasive fear and doubt that stays put long after the drug has worn off.

Routines coming apart

Changes in eating, sleep, or hygiene. Classic hallucinogens reach the body’s regulation of temperature and appetite directly.

Trouble concentrating

Difficulty holding attention on work, study, or a conversation, in a way that is new for the person.

Needing more for the same effect

NIDA notes that tolerance to psychedelic drugs can build quickly, so the amount required keeps climbing.

Cravings, and a rough stretch after

NIDA reports that ketamine used outside a clinical setting can bring cravings and symptoms of withdrawal.

Detachment that outlasts the dose

Feeling separated from your surroundings, your body, or yourself on days when nothing has been taken at all.

After It Wears Off

The experience ends in hours. The reason people call us often does not.

Most of what brings someone to treatment for hallucinogens is not the trip. It is what is still there weeks or months later, and how much of ordinary life it has started to take up.

The short-term effects are the ones people expect. The National Institute on Drug Abuse describes strong emotions ranging from intense happiness and a feeling of connectedness to fear, anxiety, and confusion, alongside physical effects that include headache, abdominal pain, nausea or vomiting, high blood pressure, rapid heartbeat, trembling, and diarrhea. NIDA also notes that impaired thought and perception can lead people to behave in unusual or dangerous ways, which is where a great deal of the real harm comes from.

What follows is less predictable. Disorganized thinking, mood swings, visual disturbances, anxiety, paranoia, and panic can all persist well past the last dose. Some people report recurrently perceiving the same images or scenes, and the same mood changes, that they experienced while under the influence. When those intrusions settle into a pattern they are called hallucinogen persisting perception disorder, or HPPD, and NIDA notes that episodes can recur even years after an experience with a substance. They arrive without warning, which is precisely why a clinician and a plan beat waiting them out alone.

Psychosis is the other risk worth naming plainly. NIDA states that the dissociative drugs PCP and ketamine can make symptoms worse in people who have schizophrenia and can cause short-term episodes of psychosis. Salvia, usually grouped with the dissociatives, works on a different system again, activating kappa opioid receptors rather than the NMDA receptor.

These drugs also rarely arrive alone. Anxiety, depression, panic, and mood disorders are common alongside persistent hallucinogen use, sometimes as what came first and sometimes as what got left behind. Treating one and ignoring the other is how people end up back where they started, which is why an assessment here looks at the whole picture rather than the substance in isolation.

If someone is in crisis while you are reading this, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is free, confidential, and answered around the clock.

In a Crisis

What to do when someone is in trouble right now.

Most frightening experiences pass with a calm room and someone steady nearby. A few do not. These are in order because the order matters, and none of it asks you to have decided anything about treatment yet.

  1. 1

    Get somewhere calm, and stay.

    Do not leave them alone

    Lower the noise and the light, move away from crowds, traffic, water, and anything high up, and do not leave them by themselves. NIDA notes that impaired thought and perception can lead people to behave in unusual or dangerous ways, and a steady person in the room is the most useful thing available.

  2. 2

    Call 911 if the body is in trouble.

    Medical emergency

    Chest pain, a racing heart, very high blood pressure, overheating, seizures, repeated vomiting, or someone who cannot be roused are medical emergencies rather than something to wait out. Say what was taken if you know it. That is not something anyone gets in trouble for, and it changes what the paramedics do.

  3. 3

    Call or text 988 if the crisis is psychological.

    Free, 24/7

    The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is free, confidential, and answered around the clock. It is the right number for terror, paranoia, or thoughts of self-harm that are not a medical emergency, and you can call it on someone else’s behalf.

  4. 4

    Then treat the pattern, not just the night.

    Where we come in

    An episode that frightened everyone is worth acting on, but it is not the whole problem and it does not have to be the reason you get in touch. When you are ready, an assessment sorts out what is actually going on and what level of care fits it.

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How We Treat It

No prescription fixes this one, so the work is behavioral.

Worth saying up front, because plenty of pages will not. There is no FDA-approved medication for hallucinogen use disorder, the way buprenorphine and naltrexone are established for opioid use disorder or naltrexone and acamprosate for alcohol use disorder. That is where the science currently sits rather than a gap in what Redpoint offers, and anyone implying a prescription solves this is overselling.

Medication still has a real role, just not aimed at the hallucinogen itself. Anxiety, depression, panic, sleep, and the perceptual symptoms that outlast use are all things our medical team evaluates and manages as part of the same plan, under our medical director.

The program is the treatment. Your plan is built from what our clinicians actually practice: individual and group therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavior therapy, acceptance and commitment therapy, EMDR where trauma is part of the picture, motivational interviewing, experiential work, and family systems therapy. The point is to treat the whole person rather than an isolated symptom.

That runs from partial hospitalization through intensive outpatient and outpatient, with virtual IOP where the drive does not work, across all six Colorado offices. An assessment sets the level. Nobody is expected to arrive already knowing which one they need.

  • Individual and group therapy
  • Dual diagnosis care
  • Medication management for co-occurring conditions
  • Family involvement
  • Relapse prevention planning
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Clinical Approaches

What each therapy is doing here.

CBT for the setup underneath

Cognitive behavioral therapy maps the chain that ends in using: the hour, the company, the reason it made sense last time. Then it puts a different link into it.

DBT for perception you cannot argue with

Distress tolerance and grounding skills are the practical answer to an intrusion or a flashback: something concrete to do in the moment, rather than a reason it should not be happening.

ACT for the fear it leaves behind

Acceptance and commitment therapy is built for symptoms you cannot reason away, and gets a life moving again alongside them instead of waiting until after they stop.

EMDR when an experience is still stuck

A badly frightening episode can behave like any other trauma. EMDR treats the memory itself rather than the coping that got built on top of it.

Motivational interviewing for the unsure part

Almost nobody arrives certain, least of all about a drug they still partly value. This works with the ambivalence instead of arguing at it.

Experiential therapy for getting back in your body

Dissociation is a disconnection from the physical self. Doing things with your hands and your feet is part of the treatment here, not a break from it.

What Else We Treat

Hallucinogens are rarely the only thing in the picture.

All conditions we treat

Alcohol Addiction

Alcohol use disorder, which is the most common thing we find sitting alongside another substance.

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Stimulant Addiction

Cocaine and prescription stimulants, and the class-wide risks that come with them.

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Meth Addiction

Methamphetamine specifically, the long crash it produces, and the flat weeks that follow.

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Marijuana Addiction

Cannabis use disorder, including the heavy daily use that often outlasts everything else.

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Mental Health Treatment

Bipolar disorder, trauma, and the conditions that need care in their own right, not just after the substance.

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Dual Diagnosis

Substance use and a mental health condition treated as one plan with one team, not two referrals.

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Anxiety

The anxiety and panic that often build around persistent use, and often predate it.

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Depression

The low mood that can settle in after heavy use, and the depression that was frequently there first.

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Cost is the reason most people wait, and it is usually the wrong reason.

We run your benefits before you commit to anything and tell you plainly what your plan covers, what it does not, and what the gap looks like. The check is free and takes a few minutes.

Verify Your Insurance (303) 219-0973

Accepted insurance

Employer and EAP partners

Don’t see your plan? Call us and we will check it, including out-of-network benefits.

Common Questions

Hallucinogen treatment questions, answered.

Can you actually get addicted to hallucinogens?
Some of them, yes, and the honest answer depends on which drug. NIDA reports that limited research suggests use of psychedelic drugs such as psilocybin and LSD does not typically lead to addiction, though tolerance can build quickly, meaning people need more for the same effect. Dissociatives are a different story. NIDA notes that using ketamine outside a clinical setting can lead to cravings as well as symptoms of withdrawal, and the DSM-5 includes diagnoses for phencyclidine (PCP) use disorder and for other hallucinogen use disorder. So the useful question is not whether hallucinogens are addictive as a class. It is what you are using, how often, and what it is costing you, which is exactly what an assessment is for.

What is HPPD, and does it go away?
Hallucinogen persisting perception disorder, usually shortened to HPPD, is when the perceptual changes from a hallucinogen keep turning up long after the drug is gone. NIDA describes people recurrently perceiving the same images or scenes, and having the same mood changes, that they experienced while under the influence, and notes that episodes can recur even years after an experience with a substance. We cannot give you a timeline, and anyone who does is guessing. What treatment can do is reduce the fear and avoidance that build up around the episodes, give you grounding skills that work while one is happening, and treat the anxiety or depression that tends to collect around them. That is often the difference between a symptom you manage and one that runs your week.

How does The Redpoint Center treat hallucinogen use?
On an outpatient basis, through structured programming rather than a prescription. Care runs at the partial hospitalization, intensive outpatient, and outpatient levels, plus virtual IOP, so you get real clinical intensity while continuing to live at home and, for most people, keep working. A plan usually combines group and individual therapy, grounding and distress-tolerance skills, relapse prevention, family involvement where it helps, and treatment for whatever mental health condition is sitting alongside the use. We treat this at all six Redpoint offices in Fort Collins, Boulder, Longmont, Greeley, Thornton, and Glenwood Springs. See all locations.

Is there a medication for hallucinogen addiction?
No, and it is better to know that going in. There is no FDA-approved medication for hallucinogen use disorder, unlike opioid use disorder, where buprenorphine and naltrexone are established, or alcohol use disorder, where naltrexone and acamprosate are. That does not leave you without options. It means the behavioral work is the treatment rather than a supplement to one. Medication still matters for what sits alongside the use: anxiety, depression, panic, sleep, or another substance use disorder. Our medical team evaluates and manages that side of it as part of the same plan.

Psilocybin is legal in Colorado now. Does that mean it is safe?
Legal and safe are not the same claim, and Colorado’s own rules draw that line carefully. Under Proposition 122 and the legislation that followed, the state built a regulated natural medicine program covering psilocybin, psilocyn, DMT, ibogaine, and mescaline, restricted to adults 21 and over and delivered through licensed healing centers with licensed facilitators rather than over a retail counter. The supervision is the point of the design. None of it changes what these substances do to perception, and none of it means unsupervised use cannot turn into a pattern that costs you something. If yours has, that is worth a conversation whatever the law says.

Do I need to detox before starting outpatient treatment?
Usually not, though that is a clinical judgment rather than something to settle on your own. Hallucinogens do not produce the kind of medically dangerous withdrawal that alcohol or benzodiazepines can, but heavy dissociative use can bring genuine cravings and a rough stretch after stopping, and if more than one substance is involved the picture changes. Redpoint provides outpatient treatment and does not run a detox unit. If your assessment shows you need medically supervised withdrawal first, we help you arrange it and pick your care up once you are stable.

Does insurance cover hallucinogen treatment in Colorado?
Usually a meaningful share of it, though this is one place a specific answer beats a general one. Coverage turns on your plan, your deductible, and the level of care, and behavioral health benefits differ enough between policies that quoting a number before a benefits check would be guesswork. We run the check for free and tell you plainly what we find, including what your plan will not pay for. Start a benefits check and you will know where you stand before committing to anything.
Not sure whether what you are describing counts as a problem? Talk to our team

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View All Programs

The level of care follows from an assessment, not from how bad things have to get first. Here is what each one involves, so the conversation starts somewhere concrete.

Intensive Outpatient

IOP

Structured therapy three days a week while keeping your daily rhythm.

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Partial Hospitalization

PHP

Full-day clinical care, five days a week, for those who need immersive support.

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Virtual IOP

Virtual

Same clinical rigor, accessible from anywhere in Colorado.

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Sober Living

Housing

Supportive housing that reinforces recovery skills between sessions and beyond treatment.

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Medical Model

Medical

Medical and psychiatric care built into treatment, led by our Medical Director.

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