The Dr Catherine Wauthier is a psychiatrist at the L’Espérance alcohol aftercare center in Thuin. MBut she is also a yoga teacher, a meditation instructor.
“I have been turning for 10 years to somewhat alternative practices, because I realized that patients came to get drugs and that sometimes it was more complicated to explain to them why I was not prescribing than why I was prescribing. […] I wondered, ethically, how well I was doing my job of prescribing benzodiazepines so that patients can sleep or calm down, or even antidepressants, when ultimately, I put a big lid on their emotions, their stress and maybe the need to have to rearrange their lives differently.”
In her alternative practices, she discovered much more open people, who spoke to her about psilocybin, LSD or ayahuasca.
Dr. Wauthier points out that in terms of danger to the person and the community, the drugs that top the list are alcohol, heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine. Then, further on, opioids and benzodiazepines. And while at the back of the pack, arrive psilocybin, Your MDMA ecstasy, l’ayahuasca or even theibogaïne, therefore considered to be the least dangerous.