De-Escalating Psychedelic Crises - An Experiential Weekend Accreditation with PsyCare UK

Learn trauma-aware, embodied relational approaches to de-escalating psychedelic crises and transforming drug-induced distress and dissociative states.

Drawing on over a decade of experience operating in challenging circumstances, PsyCare UK are launching a weekend experiential accreditation for therapists, facilitators, healthcare or harm reduction workers, and those working with or in close proximity to people in psychedelic or drug-induced states.

This weekend workshop will cover a comprehensive approach to de-escalating psychedelic crises, including theoretical basis, preparation and integration, as well as the concrete experiential skills and approaches necessary to support someone in profoundly altered states of consciousness. 

Upon completion of the weekend training you will be issued with a De-Escalating Psychedelic Crises Certification by PsyCare UK

We will cover:

Crisis and Co-regulation

In recent years, the neuroscience of trauma has gone from a specialist concern for recovery workers, to a fundamental part of the public conception of mental health. Understanding what is happening in the human body during a crisis makes de-escalating situations possible, and also helps to avoid harmful attempts to “stop” or punish a crisis that has a survival value to the organism. In accessible and easy-to-digest terms, we’ll cover models of crisis, including Dr Stephen Porges’ Polyvagal Theory, and introduce the idea of co-regulation – how nervous systems influence each other, and what this means for “holding space” for others.

Prevention and Triage

As that frustratingly true maxim goes: “prevention is the best cure”. One way to reduce the chance of a crisis is to create an environment that supports safe behaviours and aids de-escalation. This can include outreach (making proactive contact), education (spreading harm reduction knowledge), and normalising seeking help. Triage is the next step: ensuring that you can identify when a case needs medical attention, or when it’s outside of your competence – and we will teach a method for assessing whether someone is a high-risk individual, with additional vulnerabilities.

The Container: Relationship, Safety and the Senses

Our approach is grounded in humanistic therapy, in that we believe that it is the relationship that heals. We will cover our approach to quickly building trust and rapport with individuals in crisis, and offer key ways in which you can demonstrate your warmth and unconditional positive regard to people who may be confused and in panic. Safety is key to managing panic, and we will support you to develop a trauma-aware lens that can identify and neutralise perceived threats for the client. The environment that we create also plays a vital role in holding this relationship, so we introduce sensory measures and how to physically create an environment that can support safety on a neurological level.

Handling Delusions and Aggression

Responding to delusional and challenging behaviour is often what pushes helping professionals well beyond their training and into uncharted territory. We will introduce a simple way to understand and respond to the client’s delusions or fixed beliefs as a survival mechanism, encouraging you to work within their narrative, concentrating on the emotions at play, creating safety, and introducing your own perspective. Aggression is often where the rules go out the window, and we will share our methods for working with clients who enter into meltdowns and dissociative rages.

Debriefing and Integration

After going through a crisis, either first-hand or as the crisis worker, it’s vital that the experience is given context and support. Experiences can become traumatising when we attempt to make sense of them in isolation, so we will introduce peer support methods for you and your colleagues, as well as introducing and giving concrete details on how to support your clients in the integration of their difficult or overwhelming experience.

When and where

Saturday 22nd - Sunday 23rd March 2024

Start: 10:00 

Finish: 17:00 

(including one hour lunch break, please bring your own lunch)

Limehouse Town Hall, 646 Commercial Road, London E14 7HA

All profits from this training will go to PsyCare UK, a registered charity (no. 1167203). To ensure this events is accessible, we have a limited number of concession tickets available for those undertaking the training for charitable purposes, or unable to meet the full ticket price. Please contact us if you feel you meet this criteria.

Feedback

“PsyCare UK is one of those services that should be at every event. They provide an amazing services which helps us to take care of our attendees at the highest level. Their staff are wonderful and highly trained to provide the best care to anyone who needs it. They work seamlessly with the medical team to provide the ultimate care package." - Will Hazlerigg, Co-founder and Director of Noisily Festival

“PsyCare UK’s facilities provide a well balanced, patient need centred space, with a high ration of team members to service users. The team is made of the most amazing band of individuals coming together to provide the most friendly, supportive, and professional resource on any festival site. PsyCare UK fully understands the difference between a person suffering emotional distress and a medical emergency. I cannot recommend PsyCare UK enough.” - Rich Chaplain, Ops Director, Hardcore Medical and Ambulance Service.

 “This course was AMAZING- so pleased I spent a full day on zoom (I rarely say that!). High quality production, great speakers, engaging exercises, - a really enlightening approach to this important work” - workshop attendee

“Brilliant day of very interesting and instructing talks. Feeling equipped to help in these situations. Brilliant MDT approach. Very grateful.” - workshop attendee

“I love how I felt included and I was part of the learning process. Our voices were all equally heard and all our questions answered. It was a blessing.” - workshop attendee

“This workshop has given me more confidence that I can help with a psychedelic first aid situation more than I could before I started the day.” - workshop attendee

FACILITATORS

PsyCare UK

PsyCare UK is a welfare and harm reduction charity, founded in 2008, who specialise in supporting people through difficult drug experiences at music festivals, especially those who have taken psychedelic drugs. Since our creation, we have supported thousands of people through challenging altered states, and last summer alone we guided 250 people through psychedelic experiences, and another 1000 people who had taken other drugs, such as MDMA and ketamine.
We are a member of the international nightlife harm reduction group NEWNET, contributed to the MAPS Manual of Psychedelic Support, and have delivered training and presentations to conferences and organisations such as Breaking Convention, HIT Hot Topics, Maudsley Psychedelic Society, Imperial College, Kent University and others. 

We are one of the most trusted names in the psychedelic harm reduction field and many of our volunteers have gone on to work, or conduct research, in psychedelic therapy. Our management team has decades of experience supporting people through the most intense psychedelic experiences, and this training will share our collective expertise with you.

Amanda Guzinska

Amanda Guzinska is a trustee and member of the senior management team of the welfare and harm reduction charity, PsyCare UK. Amanda has been involved in PsyCare for over a decade and has a wealth of first hand experience supporting people through challenging psychedelic and other drug experiences. She has coordinated trip-sitting provision at dozens of UK festivals and has years of experience managing the charity’s response to a wide range of difficult presentations, such as service users who are paranoid, agitated, aggressive, distressed, trying to harm themselves and those exhibiting sexual behaviours.

Amanda has given a number of talks, workshops and presentations on behalf of PsyCare, where she has trained festival attendees, students, volunteers and many more on how to support people through challenging drug experiences in festival environments and beyond. She has previously delivered training and workshops for the Psychedelic Society, Drug Science and Imperial, amongst others, which have been highly rated by attendees.

REFUNDS POLICY: Please note, we do not arrange refunds or exchanges. When possible we encourage reselling on Ticketswap.

ACCESS:  We do our best to include everyone in our events, regardless of health circumstances. If you have access requirements please email the event organiser directly to discuss. Many facilitators are able to offer reduced ticket prices for those truly unable to afford the ticket price. If this applies to you, do please get in touch with the event organiser.

For PSYCHEDELIC KNOWLEDGE AND RESOURCES please check out the Psychedelic Society website. 

Our facilitators have agreed to our code of conduct. Learn about our procedure for raising concerns

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