Psilocybin for Grief: What the Research Says

Research shows that psilocybin therapy may offer a new approach to addressing grief and its related mental health symptoms.

Grief is a distressing and complex experience that can have a profound effect on both mental and physical health.

There are a number of traditional treatment options available to support grief symptoms such as talk therapies, bereavement support groups and psychiatric medications, however, these do not work for everyone.

Emerging studies now show that psychedelics such as psilocybin may offer an alternative therapy option, addressing emotional processing, acceptance and changes to cognitive networks.

Understanding Grief and Bereavement

The internal, emotional experience of grief is personal to each individual, however, it is a natural response to bereavement.

Processing grief can be incredibly difficult, as it requires the brain to adapt to and accept loss, causing symptoms of depression, anxiety, anger, irritability, sleep loss, and preoccupation, among others.

A typical response to bereavement is acute grief, causing temporary dysregulation that reduces with time and without intervention.

Some people, however, may develop prolonged grief, where symptoms do not subside. This type of grief can include extended symptoms of depression and anxiety, or experiences of existential distress or complicated grief, and may require treatment.

Complicated grief is now a recognised condition that can present as rumination, intense emotion or sadness, excessive avoidance, distress, and poor mental health, as well as shock or emotional numbness.

Grief can also manifest as grief-related major depression, where the acute experience of loss develops into clinical depression, observed in up to 7% of bereaved individuals two years post-loss.

As well as having an impact on our emotional wellbeing, research shows that grief can have a physical impact on the body, demonstrating that the related stress can cause increased levels of cortisol and systemic inflammation.

More recent studies also suggest that grief shows a measurable impact on brain network connectivity, causing changes in networks related to cognitive control, emotional regulation and reward processing.

Why Researchers Are Exploring Psychedelics

Traditional approaches to managing grief and mental health conditions have shown limited effectiveness in research.

For example, studies show that up to 30% of people with major depression do not respond to traditional treatments.

With a need for innovative options, research is now investigating whether psychedelics such as psilocybin could hold promise for addressing poor mental health and related grief-symptoms including end-of-life anxiety and existential distress.

Research shows that psychedelics offer a new way of approaching the treatment of mood disorders through the support of emotional processing, improved emotional regulation and physical impacts on brain connectivity.

While traditional psychiatric medications focus on targeting systems in the brain that regulate mood-related chemicals, psychedelics work by impacting the connection between brain networks.

This helps to facilitate increased emotional insight and processing, supporting people in forming new, healthy patterns of thinking and behaving.

What the Research Says About Psilocybin

Psilocybin is one of a number of psychedelic treatments now being researched for mood and stress or trauma-related disorders such as major depression, end-of-life anxiety and existential distress.

In a study of patients with major depressive disorder, researchers found that psilocybin induced rapid and lasting changes in depressive symptoms for up to 12 months following one or two doses.

Equally, studies have found that patients with major depression saw greater reductions in symptoms when treated with psilocybin compared to the depression medication escitalopram, and people with treatment-resistent depression saw major reductions in symptoms following one psilocybin treatment.

A further meta analysis of studies investigating psilocybin for mental health concluded that the therapy “has an outstanding capacity to reduce the symptoms of anxiety/MDD and mood disorders”.

As well as depression, both end-of-life anxiety and existential distress share similarities with grief.

For example, research shows an overlap between the psychological distress of people in bereavement and advanced cancer patients, including existential distress, spiritual distress, caregiver distress and grief.

In patients with life-threatening cancer, psilocybin treatment has been found to produce substantial and long-lasting decreases in depression and anxiety.

Studies also suggest that psilocybin may support the reduction of symptoms of mood and trauma-related disorders by improving emotional flexibility and enabling new perspectives on emotions and trauma.

How Psilocybin May Support Grief Processing

Psychedelics have a unique impact on the brain, altering brain networks and facilitating neuroplasticity.

In depression, research shows that the neurons in our brain are stuck in rigid pathways that contribute to unhelpful thinking patterns and behaviours such as rumination, negative emotion and fear-learning mechanisms.

A number of studies have now demonstrated that psilocybin induces brain changes that enable the growth of new neurons and loosen these rigid pathways through altered brain connectivity.

These brain changes affect networks that enable self-reflection and emotional processing, such as the default mode network (DMN) and the frontal cortex of the brain.

Research suggests the compound creates a “critical window” of plasticity following treatment that promotes “openness, cognitive and neural flexibility, and greater ability and acceptance of emotional experiences”.

This period is when new neural pathways can be formed, and along with professional psychological support, can help with solidifying healthier patterns of thoughts and behaviour.

In a landmark study, researchers found that these brain changes can be seen after just one psilocybin treatment.

Using advanced neuroimaging, the researchers found anatomical and functional brain changes from one-hour post-treatment up to one-month after, along with increases in cognitive flexibility, psychological insight and wellbeing.

The study also found that the level of emotional insight experienced by an individual during treatment predicted wellbeing benefits one month later.

These emotional insights are correlated with the altered state induced by psilocybin, and research suggests the “mystical” experiences often produced by these altered states link to long-term wellbeing outcomes.

For example, in individuals in palliative care, mystical-type experiences from psilocybin treatment were considered to be of “high value” and helped to relieve death anxiety in 69% of questionnaire participants.

What We Still Don’t Know

While there is currently promising evidence that psilocybin may offer an alternative treatment approach for mental health conditions, there is limited research and trials directly investigating psilocybin for grief.

Anecdotal evidence and open-label trials suggest that the compound may hold benefits for processing grief, but further research and human studies will be needed before we fully understand the potential benefits of psilocybin therapy for grief.

Psychedelic therapy can also increase vulnerability, requiring a need for informed consent and awareness of the potential for challenging experiences and of the lack of research on potential negative effects.

When considering psychedelic therapy, it is vital to work with the guidance of a registered healthcare professional.

Frequently Asked Questions

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