0:00

Welcome back to doctor Wendy Walls Show on KFI AM six forty were live everywhere

0:04

on the iHeartRadio app. You know, I get really excited when I have

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a guest that has a bigger brain than me. I measured, actually his

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like four inches in circumference, bigger than mine. He has more degrees than

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you can imagine. I'm sure I would need a dictionary to translate some of

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his research papers, but it's always a thrill. My next guest is doctor

0:22

Dave Rabin. He's not only an MD, is he? When they have

0:25

a whole bunch of letters after their names, you gotta let go. Whoa

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not only a medical doctor, a PhD, A neuroscientist, a psychiatrist.

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Yeah, that's like up above a psychologist because they can give you the med

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stew He is co founder of something called Apollo Neuroscience. We're gonna talk about

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later, but a lot of his research has to do with ketamine an MDA

0:51

m A assisted therapy with his patients. Basically, he's a leader in a

0:54

psychedelic field. Welcome doctor Rabin. How are you great? Thanks so much?

0:59

Tracking me on your brain is like bursting out your ears. You're too

1:03

kind of So, you know, ketamine has been in the news recently.

1:07

Sadly, a beloved celebrity who suffered with addiction most of his life, Matthew

1:11

Perry from Friends, passed away and when the toxicology results came out, they

1:17

said he had an overdose of ketamine. All right, First of all,

1:19

let's go to the beginning. What is a psychedelic drug? What is ketamine?

1:25

Is it something like having to do with magic mushrooms. That's a great

1:27

place to start. And I think one of the most common misunderstandings that we

1:30

have is about what the word psychedelic means, because it doesn't actually just refer

1:34

to drugs. It actually refers to a state of mind. And psyche means

1:40

mind from Latin Dellos means to show or to reveal. So what we're really

1:44

talking about is entering states of mind or states of conscious awareness where we're revealing

1:49

parts of ourselves to us that are effectively not necessarily noticeable, things that have

1:56

happened to us in the past, past memories, parts of ourselves that maybe

2:00

we don't like, that we shoved underneath the surface because people in our childhood

2:04

told us that those you know, weren't the best parts we should be showing

2:07

off. And so in us with the psychedelic drug like ketamine or MDMA or

2:15

psilocybin, which are in trials now, and ketamine is the only legal psychedelic

2:19

medicine we have available for depression. These medicines are molecular tools that help us

2:24

to basically quiet our survival ego mind for a short amount of time so that

2:30

we can bear witness to what lies underneath the surface of our consciousness, and

2:36

so it reduces our defenses and we're able to act propers are unconscious. You

2:42

know. I teach undergrads, and when I'm trying to explain the difference between

2:46

the conscious and unconscious, I show one of those classic pictures of the iceberg

2:51

with just the tip above the ocean and the giant iceberg underneath, and I

2:54

say, that's our conscious up there above. That's why we're aware of our

2:58

thoughts. We think we know everything. That's it. The rest is going

3:00

on below surface. I know lay people like to use the word subconscious,

3:06

but as fancy people, we use the word unconscious. In the unconscious is

3:12

really the big motivators for our behavior. So you're saying psychedelics help us look

3:15

underwater and see what's there exactly, And you nailed it with that metaphor.

3:20

I think it's one of the best metaphors for consciousness because when you and the

3:23

most important thing is you can access psychedelic states of mind. And we all

3:28

have accessed these states of mind without drugs. So the most common way is

3:31

in dreams. Right. We know that when we dream, we're starting to

3:36

experience things about ourselves and about the world that we don't necessarily notice when we're

3:39

awake. And part of that is because our ego, our defensive mind that's

3:45

awake and active all the time during the day, feels safe enough to relax

3:49

and calm down, and then we can become aware and start to notice things

3:53

going on beneath the surface. So if you think about what psychedelic medicines are

3:57

doing, and what deep breathing intention breathing states are doing, a meditation and

4:00

yoga, they're all bringing us access to the same states which are effectively psychedelic,

4:06

like dreams. And ketamine is really interesting because it's only sixty to ninety

4:11

minutes as a therapy, but it gives people access to a very when used

4:15

properly, a very comfortable, safe, dream like state where they can start

4:19

to self reflect non judgmentally on themselves. And when you've been judging yourself for

4:26

maybe days, weeks, months, decades, being able to observe yourself without

4:30

judgment could be one of the most therapeutic things you've experienced in your entire life.

4:33

And I want to add this about dreams. My belief system on dreams

4:36

is that they're never literal folks. They're always metaphors. And everything in the

4:41

dream, whether it's the chair, the cigarette, you, the person they're

4:44

talking to you, is a piece of you. So I always ask you, like, well, if you were the chair, what would you think

4:49

of that? You know, if you are the other person you were talking

4:51

to, what you think? And that's one of the ways to access some

4:55

good what did Freid call it? The Royal Road to the unconscious dream material?

5:00

I years ago, when I was in psychotherapy psychoanalysis had EMDR. Look.

5:05

I opened my hands like this when I said, at EMDR, it

5:09

feels like it's opening a circuit board. And for those who don't know what

5:12

does EMDR stand for, it's I have to think eye movement disensitation in an

5:18

r and rabbit. I was something, and so the clinician just takes their

5:24

finger and goes back and forth, and you just watch it back and forth

5:27

like a tennis match with your eyes, and it somehow relaxes your consciousness and

5:30

you're able to access early memories. I actually, in EMDR remembered in a

5:34

non traumatic way some abuse by a dentist when I was six. And the

5:39

way I described the memory afterwards is I said to her, you know,

5:44

it feels like you know when you leave a restaurant and you go, oh my god, I forgot my purse and you run back real quick because it's

5:48

something important, but you just ran back to get it. The world wasn't

5:53

ending, just oh my god, I forgot my purse. That was Oh

5:55

my god, I forgot that memory, And there it is. So let's

5:59

talk about uses of you said, ketamine is the only legal psychedelic drug at

6:02

this point. What is it mostly prescribe for? So ketamine is only FDA

6:09

cleared at this point for treatment resistant depression, but it's used off label for

6:13

PTSD, and early studies have shown that is also effective when used properly for

6:17

certain anxiety disorders. Social anxiety disorders. So it has because the modern theory

6:25

of psychology and psychiatry around mental health is that most mental illnesses seem to stem

6:30

from one or multiple past traumatic or negative threatening experiences that we've had that have

6:36

shaped the way we see ourselves in the world. That we might have buried

6:40

deep down beneath the surface of the water in that iceberg metaphor right deep iceberg

6:46

part that might be and probably is maybe one hundred million times as big as

6:49

the part that's sticking up out of the surface. Then ketamine therapy in the

6:55

context of having therapists a therapist or two with you who understand how to help

6:59

provide this effectively safe space for you to bring up whatever comes up so that

7:04

you don't resist it, right, because if you were feeling and you have

7:08

the training, so when that memory came up for you, you have the

7:12

training to kind of address it and allow it and process it. But for

7:17

people who have those kinds of memories come up in an unsafe environment terrifying,

7:21

it's terrifying. It can be almost like reliving a nightmare, right or the

7:26

or the traumatic experience itself. And so the main caveat of psychedelic medicines.

7:30

The two main caveasts are number one, they're not for everyone, and number

7:34

two they are they need to be administered in the proper safe setting. Yeah,

7:40

you don't go home and do this. This is something in a clinical

7:43

setting with somebody observing and helping you through the situation. All right, when

7:46

we come back, we have to go to break. I want to talk a little bit about Matthew Perry, what little you may know about his situation,

7:53

because everybody wants to know inquiring minds, and also I know this is

7:57

a separate subject, but you know it's about a care about You have a

8:01

device actually that helps improve orgasms in women. Oh you guys, you got

8:07

to stay for this. You won't believe it. My guest, doctor Dave

8:11

Rabin, a medical doctor, psychiatrist, neuroscientist, one of the leaders in

8:15

psychedelic medicine. Doctor Rabin, can we talk a little bit about Matthew Perry's

8:20

death? Heartbreaking? They say it was because of Ketymine. I thought Ketymine

8:24

was safe. Yeah, it's a great question, and you know, I

8:28

think that it goes without saying that Matthew Perry's death was an absolute tragedy and

8:33

that as a medical community, we probably could have done a better job helping

8:37

him manage his addiction. Addiction itself is one of the most challenging mental illnesses

8:43

to manage today, and interestingly, psychedelic medicines used properly as we were talking

8:48

about earlier in the safe environment, are one of the best treatments that we

8:52

have for addiction. Now that is coming down the clinical trials pipeline. But

8:56

I think the main point to make here is that mean is actually one of

9:01

the safest met psychedelic medicines and the safest medicines for depression with the lowest risk

9:05

of side effects that we see across the board in depression treatment. So how

9:11

did he pass away from that? Because it has sedative properties, and ketamine

9:16

has actually been used for over seventy years, originally as an anesthetic agent to

9:20

prevent soldiers from going into shock when they're wounded in Vietnam. That's how it

9:26

originally started to be used. And it's used as a surgical anesthetic to reduce

9:30

pain and to help you don't get into hot tubs when you have an anesthetic.

9:33

Don't get into hot tubs with anything that sedates you or anything that's an

9:35

anesthetic and he had from what we can tell, probably some other low levels

9:39

of other medicines he was taking that were also slightly sedating on board. And

9:43

so you know, people can pass out in hot tubs without any drugs on

9:48

board, just by getting too hot. All of a sudden, you add

9:50

a sedative hypnotic medication or something that is slightly anesthetic in there, and you

9:56

got Whitney Houston, and you have a real problem. And I think that's

9:58

why we don't recommend in general, using any kind of sedative hypnotic drug when

10:03

you're in a hot tub, including alcohol, but also to have somebody with

10:07

you if you're taking any of those medicines and you happen to go into an

10:11

environment like that where you could pass out a sauna, a hot tub.

10:16

You know, most drownings unfortunately occur in three feet of water, right,

10:20

So we really need to be This is just a warning call, I think

10:22

to us to just be more careful and mindful about what we're putting into our

10:26

bodies when we're going into these seemingly benign situation. Yeah, I mentioned Whitney

10:31

Houston. I remember interviewing a doctor after her tragic death, and he looked

10:35

at the toxicology report and said there was a number of not only sedatives,

10:39

but respiratory depressants. And so even if you you know, for an average

10:43

person, if we happen to slide underwater, we have like an effect where

10:46

we are, you know, jerk and open up our mouths, and she

10:50

wouldn't have had the right that that tool available under those medications. So heartbreaking.

10:54

And one of the common side effects of ketamine that you know, we

10:56

always educate people on when they're using it under supervision is that ketamine, because

11:01

of the nature of its dissociate and anesthetic properties, it makes it a little

11:05

hard to move at peak doses. And that's why that's why people you know,

11:11

we make sure people are supervised when they're using it. But that's also

11:15

why it works great for surgery. So we want we always try to make

11:18

sure that people understand you may not be able to take care of yourself for

11:22

the next hour, so we need to be extra careful that during that hour

11:26

you're supervised, you're not doing anything potentially dangerous. And unfortunately Matthew Perry didn't

11:31

have that kind of supervision, and so you know, ketamine was unlikely to

11:35

be the cause of death, but the misuse of it might and likely contributed

11:41

to and probably with some of the other medications. Exactly, it's a combo.

11:45

Yeah, May he rest in peace. Now, I want to talk

11:48

a little bit about vibrations and our body. You know, one of the

11:52

things I teach in my health psychology class is it's interesting that while religion happens

11:58

to be in decline in an hour country, in western cultures, that religiosity

12:03

is highly correlated with better health and longer life. Well, partly because there

12:07

isn't a religion who preaches sex, drugs and rock and roll, so they

12:09

kind of clean living. But also the community benefits all kinds of things.

12:15

But there's also this chanting every religion in the world, whether you're going or

12:22

Hail Mary full of graziolad is with the you've got some kind of repetitive sound

12:26

that makes vibrations in your body. How does this relax somebody? So it's

12:31

a great question, and I think you know, religion. There's three important

12:35

things we can take away from religion. You mentioned all three of them just

12:39

now, right, So one of them is community. Right, part of

12:43

why religion is so beneficials because it helps bring us together. Number two,

12:46

it gives us something to believe in. It's greater than ourselves, hope.

12:50

Right. And we know from studies now of people who have had terminal illnesses

12:54

that if you believe in anything bigger than yourself, your chances of survival and

12:58

your experience of end of life is better quality of life wise. And number

13:03

three is the chanting and the vibrations and the singing, and all of that

13:09

comes together around what happens in our nervous system, which is it helps us

13:13

feel safe. Right. And this is going back to one of my favorite

13:18

topics and I think yours two, which is how we evolved as human beings

13:22

and animals is we evolve to keep each other and ourselves safe as a priority.

13:26

So if we feel threatened in our environment, our bodies don't function properly

13:31

because they take all of our available blood and resources and send it to heart,

13:33

lungs, skelet the muscles, motor cortex, fear center to get us

13:37

out of that threatening situation, to get to safety. And once we're in

13:41

safety, all of a sudden, we take all that blood and we send

13:45

it back to reproduction, digestion, immunity, metabolism, at sleep, rest,

13:50

and recovery, empathy, right, all the stuff that we want to

13:52

have active when we're not running from a lion. So training our bodies over

13:56

time with these three things. Belief, community, safety from other people around

14:01

us that we can trust and feel comfortable around. And vibration all help whether

14:07

you're singing it or whether you're feeling it through something like apollo or a hug

14:09

or a purring cat, all forms of healing. Vibration, they all help

14:15

to amplify safety pathways in the brain and body, which reduces stress and anxiety.

14:18

Now you mentioned the word Apollo. You have a company called Apollo that's

14:22

got a vibration device that someone can wear like on their wrists. They're opera

14:26

arm and what does it do? So we developed the Apollotechnology actually out of

14:31

my research into how psychedelic medicines work and when I was being when I was

14:37

training in psychedelic assisted therapy in over the last ten years, I was always

14:41

interested, why do these medicines plus therapy with just a few doses. We're

14:45

not talking daily dosing. We're talking, you know, three to twelve doses

14:50

over twenty weeks, right, so it's very few doses. And then there's

14:54

a break and people get better in the short term, and then they stay

14:56

better long term, even if they've never responded to any their treatments. So

15:01

to put it very clearly, some of the evidence that's coming out now around

15:05

MDMA assisted therapy, which is on the FDA's desk for clearance right now,

15:09

and with ketamine for depression, which is one of the only anti suicidal medications

15:13

we've ever discovered, incredible, right wow, and psilocybin for depression, which

15:16

is having similar benefits. These are showing in our trials some of the greatest

15:20

results in terms of outcomes that we've ever seen in the history of psychiatry.

15:24

But they also require you to take a psychedelic drug, which is not for

15:28

everyone, and that requires therapists to be there. I'm in control, freak,

15:31

I'm afraid of drugs, right, and lots of people are and lots

15:33

of people, boy, did I take de little vibrator out of your hand?

15:35

Test? Well, lots of people aren't good candidates for drugs too,

15:39

like many children, right and elderly folks. And so we thought, well,

15:43

if we can figure out the core pathways that are being activated by the

15:48

psychedelic therapy, maybe we can develop technology that activates those pathways on the go

15:52

for us and helps boost safety on the go. And so we figured out

15:56

in the University of Pittsburgh Department of Psychiatry that we could delivering vibrations to the

16:00

body that kind of feel like if you're familiar with holding a purring cat or

16:03

getting a hug, and that feeling, that feeling is something we can induce

16:07

for ourselves with breathing. And Apollo works by sending these soothing vibrations to the

16:11

body that induce that safe, natural, meditative breathing state on the go.

16:17

And so what is it? You wear it for how long? And it's

16:21

I mean, I'm holding it. It's a gentle vibration feeling. But how

16:23

does it actually work? So it works by you can wear it as long

16:27

as you want. It works anywhere in your body. It's a pod.

16:30

You can clip it onto your body. You can wear it through clothing or

16:33

overclothing. You can wear it on a strap. Most people wear it on

16:36

their chest or ankle or wrist, and you can wear it as long as

16:40

you want. It's basically music that you can't hear that your body is sensitive

16:44

to. That calms the body and helps you to just feel safe, in

16:48

control, clear and focused, so sleepy, Can you stay for one more

16:52

segment because I have a big question about is feeling safe always okay? Like

16:56

aren't we supposed to be scared to make some good decisions? And also I

17:00

promised you're going to hear how this can improve our relationships, especially for ladies.

17:04

My guest doctor Dave Raebin, a medical doctor, a psychiatrist, a

17:10

neuroscientist, PhD, more letters after his name than you could ever imagine,

17:15

basically someone you should trust. Earlier, you were telling us that you know

17:18

you have this device called Apollo. I should say where do people get this

17:22

Apollo thing? They can go online and do Apollo dot polloneuro dot com,

17:26

oh, Apollo neuro or wearablehugs dot com. Wearable hugs isn't that cute?

17:30

Dot com? And this is vibrating thing you can wear around. It puts

17:33

you in this state of relaxation, so you're not in a stress anxiety fear

17:36

state. My question is this didn't Mother Nature design some anxiety for a darn

17:41

good reason? And if we walk around too relaxed all the time, maybe

17:45

we're not making good decisions. That's absolutely true. And this is actually one

17:51

of the things that's most commonly not taught correctly, is that we did evolve

17:56

that system for a reason. But the evolutionary biology feel and Eric Candell,

18:00

who's also a famous psychiatrist and a neuroscientist who won the Nobel Prize in two

18:04

thousand, basically won it for discovering that there are only certain things we're supposed

18:11

to have our fear center fight or flight system turn on for. Oh,

18:15

and those are actual survival threats running from a lion, running from a lioner

18:19

predator, lack of food, lack of water, lack of air, and

18:23

lack of safe shelter. That's it. But all the interpersonal problems, don't

18:29

They all boil down to I'll be left alone in the jungle to die if

18:32

they all abandon me. And that's an assumption that we make that often increases

18:37

our chances of being left alone because then we act from a point of insecurity

18:41

rather than strength. And so when we act from insecurity, what do we

18:45

do we make more selfish decisions? Right? Wow, So that's called in

18:49

psychology, it's called misappropriation of threat, which simply put, is just interpreting

18:55

things as threatening when they're actually not right. And so that's what all these

18:59

meditations, soothing touch, soothing music, psychology, and psychotherapy techniques have all

19:03

focused on, is how do we teach people to understand the skills and practice

19:08

the skills of reminding ourselves that we're not under actual threat when we're not under

19:14

actual threat, so that we can allow our recovery system to do its thing

19:18

and keep us feeling good unless we're actually running from a lion. Because when

19:22

we're actually running from a lion, our bodies don't allow us to do anything

19:26

else. We are in that mode and we have to get out of there

19:30

before we can do anything else. And in today's time, we're not running

19:33

from lions. We are running from emails exactly, traffic, mud slides,

19:38

whatever it may be. You know, over Christmas, I was at a

19:41

Christmas party and I met a psychotherapist from Russia, and I saw, what's

19:45

the difference between what are the big issues in Russia compared to here? You

19:48

know, I love to find out And she said, well, first of

19:52

all, Russians think it's crazy that Americans always want to get rid of their

19:55

anxiety. Russians are like we need to be worried. We have anxiety,

19:59

we don't want to get rid of it. About how fascinating anyway, Let's

20:03

talk about relationships, love and how this Apollo device can even help your relationships.

20:11

So one of the biggest challenges that we face in feeling afraid or feeling

20:18

stressed is thinking, like you alluded to earlier, that we might not be

20:22

loved or we might not be accepted by our colleagues, our friends, our

20:26

peers, our families, and that can make us feel really unpleasant and uncomfortable

20:32

because we all as humans want to be loved, we want to be accepted,

20:36

we want to be connected to our community. It's fundamentally important, critical

20:41

for our healthy, happy survival, and for joy in our lives. And

20:45

we have huge parts of our brains that evolved, like the insolent cortex,

20:48

that are solely responsible for empathy and connecting with other human beings, and we

20:52

need to use those parts. So tools like Apollo we develop to try to

20:59

help re train us to remember how to use those parts of our brains again

21:03

through our sense of touch. And what's really interesting is that the two states

21:10

that are most vulnerable and therefore scary for us when we're not when we're feeling

21:15

stressed out, are sleep because sleep is when we're completely physically defenseless. So

21:19

we have to feel safe to get into deep and rem sleep states, which

21:22

is where we get all our physical and emotional mental recovery. And then sexual

21:27

and intimacy in relationships because oh, yeah, you've got to be relaxed.

21:32

You've got to be relaxed, and the room's got to be clean, Julio,

21:34

if you're listening, we need to clean the bedroom. Okay, it'll

21:37

work better. Yeah, Because you're really like allowing yourself to completely open up

21:44

and connect with another human being, and that's vulnerable. And especially if you're

21:48

a woman, you're you're often uh you know, and you're and you're interacting

21:52

and dating men. Right, men have more physical prowess, more strength,

21:56

meant there's a huge history of violence against women from men. We can't deny

22:00

it, right, that's just part of our unfortunate and unfortunate part of our

22:04

society, and that collective trauma exists. And so a lot of the tools

22:10

we use help around sex and intimacy and love and connection are really about just

22:15

helping women and men feel safe in their own bodies, and over the last

22:19

few years we figured out a way to do that for women for intimacy using

22:22

Apollo, which is really exciting. So Apollo has a separate setting, like

22:26

a vibe setting that increases intimacy for women. It does what's it called.

22:30

It's called the Love vibe, of course, and anybody who has the Apollo

22:33

app and the Smart Vibes sub brain of Apollo, which is where we the

22:40

Apollo as a device comes with eight eight vibes that you can select from which

22:45

allow you to access different states of anything from high energy and focus and socializing

22:49

to calm, relaxation, meditation. This is a special vibe that we released

22:55

to all of the subscription users that are members of Smart Vibes, which allows

23:00

people to access the more advanced and interesting states that we've discovered over the years,

23:03

and one of them is intimacy for women and helping women feel safe enough

23:07

in their own bodies to allow themselves to really connect with their partners physically,

23:12

mentally, emotionally. So would it be possible we can give one away to

23:17

a listener, of course, all right, listen to everybody next week. Next week, when I get one in my hot little hands, Cayla's going

23:22

to be taking your calls. We're going to open up the phone lines and

23:26

you can call in and win an Apollo device that has the Love Vibe on

23:33

it. It is always a pleasure to meet someone of your caliber, your

23:37

expertise, and you're well spoken, Doctor Rabin. Now where can people find

23:41

out more about you? Please come find me on my website at Apollo dot

23:47

Clinic or doctor Dave dot Io, and come find me on socials. I

23:49

love to hear from you and hear your thoughts. It's at doctor David Rabin

23:53

on Instagram and Twitter. You got doctor Dave dot Io. Look at that.

23:59

That's it. You are ol Man. Pleasure to meet you and thank

24:03

you for listening to The Doctor Wendy Wall Show.