Peggy Van de Plassche sits down with Tracey Tee, founder of Moms on Mushrooms (M.O.M.), for a powerful conversation on the intersection of psychedelics and motherhood.
Tracey shares her deeply personal journey into microdosing, revealing how psilocybin has not only empowered her but also fostered a supportive community for mothers seeking healing and growth. They explore the reasons behind choosing magic mushrooms, the importance of education and connection, and real-life stories of transformation.
This episode challenges outdated narratives, aiming to destigmatize psychedelic use among moms while highlighting the profound benefits of microdosing for mental clarity, emotional healing, and personal evolution. Tune in for an insightful discussion on breaking barriers, reclaiming wellness, and embracing the magic of mushrooms.
Read Transcript:
[00:00:00] Peggy Van de Plassche: Good day, and thank you for tuning in to this new episode of The Microdose Diet. I am your host, Peggy Van Der Plasche. Today, we will chat about all things mushrooms. Yes, magic mushrooms. And not for anybody, for moms. So my guest today is Tracy T. Tracy is the creator and steward of Moms on Mushrooms, aka MOM, M O M.
And it is a private community platform focused on educating, advocating, and connecting mothers. around the use of psilocybin mushrooms, ACA magic mushrooms. So Tracy and I met at Wonderland last year on the microdosing panel. She's a very special guest. If you go on Amazon and you look at my book, the microdose diet, you will see that she wrote a review.
And actually, she doesn't know that, but her review is at the back of my book. So that's how special you are, Tracy, for me. So thank you so much for being here today. And let's dig right into it. With moms on mushrooms, you really have the finger on the pulse of woman's interest in magic mushrooms.
What do women want to know? What's their interest in mushrooms? What do you see?
[00:01:26] Tracey Tee: That's such a good question. First of all, can I just say not to sound so wooey and psychedelic, but I just love that mushrooms brought us together. The minute I saw you on our panel, I was like, she is She's the one for me.
And here we are. Now I'm on the back of your book. That is such an honor. Thank you. So I think that we are come to a time in history where women are realizing that the old ways of doing things. I'll speak to some others specifically. Mothers are realizing that the old ways of doing things aren't necessarily working.
Or if they do work, it's finite, it's not sustainable. And it's not it's not I think we're waking up to the idea that as a culture, a Western culture, we've put a lot of band aids on a lot of issues and it's gotten us really far. It's gotten us really far economically. It's gotten us far politically.
It's gotten us far in terms of how we've advanced in the society. But as people, as humans who have hearts as women and as mothers who raised children, I think what we're realizing is that there's a lot more at the root that we've ignored. And so I believe that this medicine has made a reappearance in such a big way at this time.
And I believe that the re the openness and the curiosity around it. Is colliding because we have got to find a better answer to what is essentially better mental health. But I think better mental health is a much broader conversation. It goes beyond clinical diagnoses or a label that you put on yourself.
It goes down to actually truly figuring out who you are and what you care about, as Laura Dawn always says, who you are and what you care about, what your values are and how you live those values without fear of Other people judging you without comparing yourself to social media. How do you live your life without all of these distractions that are bombarding us and expectations.
And in the middle of all of that is, is mothers raising little humans. And so I think we're just at a time where we're realizing simply we need help. And and it sounds like mushrooms might be a. A good helper.
[00:03:44] Peggy Van de Plassche: Yeah. And I, I like that you connect to authenticity because I think that's really something that women are realizing that following, the conditioning, what they're supposed to do, but also this idea of, you mentioned social media, comparing oneself, the judgment, the pettiness, but doesn't really bring anyone.
Up and when you are the most important job in the world, which is raising little human, like the bar is very high. And you know that I told you that when we met, it is because I saw that moms were microdosing psilocybin that I felt it. confident and comfortable enough to try. That was for me the ultimate check.
If moms are doing it, that means I can do it, and I knew many, investors, tech CEOs, whatever, were doing that. But what if it's the mom factor, because
[00:04:45] Tracey Tee: you got a lot more at stake, you have a lot more at stake. And if a mother is willing to bypass legality, stigma fear, misinformation, and she's willing to bypass all of that for her own health which in and of itself is a grand gesture, right?
We've grown up and we've been told if your mom were, you can do only certain things for yourself as a mother. And then if you do too much, you become selfish. You're not a good mom. You don't care about your kids and that's, it's all inverted. So when a mom does all those things and then does it with a schedule one drug, yeah, it does.
Cause you, you figure she's probably done her research, or she's, if she's at the end of her rope and is willing to go this distance, then. Yeah, there might be something there.
[00:05:28] Peggy Van de Plassche: It's not mutually exclusive. She did her research and she's she did the same way. I did my research because I was just like, okay, that's not working.
And the solutions offered don't make any sense. So they don't make any sense. Ecosystem you're in at some point, you're like, no, doesn't make sense. The solutions you're given, you're like, no, doesn't make sense. So you have no choice than to take matter in your own hand. And that's why your organization is so important because you provide to this extremely important individuals.
The. Education, the connection, the advocacy. So that brings me to my second question, which is really what is the best advice you want to share with moms who are, like watching, listening, and they're questioning what mushrooms could bring into their life.
[00:06:31] Tracey Tee: The best advice I would give is empower yourself with knowledge.
Don't take my word for it. Don't take some Instagram ads word for it. Just take some time and teach yourself and learn about this medicine, about how it works in your brain. Give yourself access to some of the science. learn from wisdom keepers and people who have been working with this medicine for generations and make your own informed decision.
Decide how it feels in your body, whether this is calling to you or not. Because the truth is when we listen and we feel from our heart and our gut, like we will know the right course of action. And that's essentially the only way you can be a mom. Like none of us know what we're doing. At the end of the day, you just have to be like.
What is right for me, what is right for my kiddo, and I, and you have to trust that you know best, right? And the same goes with what we put in our bodies. So just empower yourself with knowledge, and then make an informed decision, and take your time. You're not gonna, this isn't gonna change your life in three days.
Nothing will. Nothing in life is gonna change your life, except for God. God can change your life. But besides that, you are, it's going to take some time. So the second question is, are you actually ready to change? Do you actually want to change? And that's a much more difficult question to answer than people think.
And if you're ready to change, I believe that psilocybin magic mushrooms can aid you in that, but you're still doing all the work. You're not just laying back and saying, okay, mushrooms changed me. It's never going to happen. And I think we've been conditioned to believe that is the case because the medications that we have been working with to help our mental health, the loft, Prozac, whatever SSRIs, SNRIs.
They're very passive. You sit back and you wait for something to wash over you, and then you wait for your mood to change, but that's not what this does. So just learn about it, and see if you feel into
[00:08:32] Peggy Van de Plassche: it. I love two things you say. First is Don't believe what I say. Do your own research, which is a pendant to trust yourself.
And I think we're coming into an era where it's the anti guru era where 20 years ago, people like you and I would have said, I'm telling you this is what you need to do. And you don't need to do more research. You don't need to trust yourself. I'm telling you top to bottom, visibly command and control mindset.
And I think that pyramid is changing, which is also so important in the healthcare environment where you're coming and saying, this is what you have. Which I would say 50 percent of the time on top of that is not the right diagnosis. And this is what you need to do. And absolutely don't trust yourself and absolutely don't empower yourself.
So you are actually teaching, telling, showing women. No. What you've been told, what you might have believed until now. Is not true. You know what is best for you, not someone or
[00:09:52] Tracey Tee: you will know. And so yeah, you're absolutely right. So much of this is unlearning how we made decisions. And then again, when I say ask yourself if you're ready to change, the second question is check your bias, right?
Check the bias, those knee jerk, like reactions. Oh, I need someone to tell me, Oh it's wrong. Check where that is coming from. And then maybe give yourself permission. To sit with it yourself and come up with your own decision and that might surprise you what you decide. Yeah. Because we are so programmed to just like you exactly said, the age of the guru is over and I almost didn't stop.
I almost didn't start moms on mushrooms because I didn't want to tap into that energy. I didn't want to be. The next person telling everyone to take shrooms. That's not what I'm interested in at all. And in fact, I think sometimes people get irritated with us because we're just like, we're not going to give you a protocol.
We're not going to tell you what to do. We believe in you so much. We know you can figure it out. We're here to hold space for you. We're here to keep you safe. We're here to keep you informed and provide you. I'll do the research and I'll feed, I'll say, maybe check out this podcast, maybe read this book, maybe watch this thing, read the scientific paper.
But ultimately, no one is going to make this choice on anything in your life but you, and I think that is the way, and I do think this age that you speak of is also like decidedly feminine. It comes from a very different point of view and it's a little crunchy out there for all of us right now because no one's used to this kind of thinking.
[00:11:28] Peggy Van de Plassche: Yeah. It's going from something that was very. Autority team very controlling to something more collaborative and nutrient nourishing. Sorry. And that's something that is surprising everyone. But I think you know, we're ready for that. So you and when I say you must offer a lot of educational content and you mentioned how important it is.
a membership and a community. And I find, the educational part, obviously, we understand that very well, what it means why is it so important to have access to these resources? And I'm really thinking like the community, that membership that you offer.
[00:12:12] Tracey Tee: Yeah, thank you for asking that.
The membership is probably one of the things I'm most passionate about and it's probably comes off as the biggest enigma for mom because when I started working with this medicine, I had very clear downloads of Yeah. I was just shown very clearly, at least in my world, how I think that this is supposed to go.
And what I was shown is that I was shown the web and that none of this is supposed to be done in a silo or alone. And that the real. The real juice comes from talking about it and working with this medicine and community and you know that and I know that and anyone who works in the psychedelic space understands that community is everything.
And so I created the Grow, that's the name of our membership, as a place. To just start talking about your experience as a mother working with this medicine, or to be able to just ask questions and hear other people's experience. And again, it has, I actually really try to, I do my best to actually not answer posts or not post because I don't want to be the authoritative voice.
I, I, and it's so interesting to watch moms. tentatively try to trust each other versus waiting for someone to give an answer versus everyone weighing in. And that goes back to this collaborative community, gather around the campfire and share your thoughts and trust that your thoughts are worth sharing.
And that's what the, that's what it's about. So it's just a place for. If you're curious about mushrooms or psychedelics even in general but you don't know where to go, you can come to the grow and like circle the pond and just observe, you can dive in and ask questions, and I think the community has done a really great job of itself, like not being judgmental, just being open minded and supportive, and if you're a seasoned psychonaut, What a beautiful place to offer some of your advice and some of your wisdom.
So that's the community. And where it goes from here is really interesting because again, we're so conditioned to the like button and to emojis and all of this Like external dopamine confirmation, where in fact, like, all I want to do is just get people talking to each other because I think we can figure it out ourselves.
We don't need some dude in a coat telling us what to do.
[00:14:27] Peggy Van de Plassche: Exactly. Dude or lady in a coat. I don't think a coat in general, but inset to your point is very patriarchal, this authoritarian command and control. What I love with your membership is also that it's. It's very affordable, like women who want to have access can, without breaking the, what do you say, the piggy bank do you want to give a bit of information on that?
So maybe the list is better.
[00:14:58] Tracey Tee: It's 2. 22 a month, and you're right, I wanted it to be extremely accessible. We really priced it at the point where it just keeps the trolls out, right? And there is something to be said about having a little bit of skin in the game, and also I'm not meta, so it is an expensive platform to run.
So that just helps keep some of the lights on, and it allows you to commit to something a little bit and, put some value behind it, but 2 a month. And that is because not everyone can drop 5, 000 and go do a luxury Costa Rican psilocybin retreat for two weeks or go out to the Amazon rainforest and do ayahuasca or even, our courses are expensive because we work with very trained people.
We put a lot of time and energy into it. You get a lot of attention and there is a cost because I, we, I pay. Our moms very well. But so we just wanted the this membership to just be very affordable. And God willing someday there will be a million moms in there and maybe as a collective in our small little corner of the world, we can start to redefine what social media means and have, we have a chance with the grow to do social media the way I think it was intended in the beginning and try to do it with some context.
Cause you know, we, Especially women in their 40s. We were there at the beginning. We were older. We didn't grow up with it. So we just have, we have a different perspective. So we can just say, okay, that never worked. This is what I hate. I'm going to try to do it different.
[00:16:26] Peggy Van de Plassche: Yeah. Yeah. So when People can find you.
So you have a website. You have so tell me everything. Yeah, really. You can just come.
[00:16:36] Tracey Tee: Yeah. We can just, you can just go to moms on mushrooms. com. Everything is there. We're on Instagram at Moms on Mushrooms official reluctantly. I would much rather just be on the grow all day. And then, yeah, if you go to our website, you'll find our three and a half month courses.
You can find some self paced instant download courses again, microdosing and for taking large dose journeys. And then you can find out information about joining our membership. And anything else we're up to, but yeah, keep it simple. And hopefully in the future we'll have more in person ways to gather, but we're, we are in at least eight countries now.
We have a bunch of beautiful subgroups inside our membership. So we have a big Canadian community, Australia, Sweden. England, Ireland, France. And so there's lots of ways to connect with moms locally as well.
[00:17:30] Peggy Van de Plassche: So one question, what are the support moms are looking for the most? Do you have, I don't know, any success stories or anything that you would like to share with our viewers?
That's such a good question.
[00:17:46] Tracey Tee: What is the support moms are looking for the most?
[00:17:50] Peggy Van de Plassche: What do you see the most recurring questions of the most recurring? Is it about, finding The product, is it about, is it more of a logistic? Is it more of a benefit? Is it more, I don't know, the potential downside? What do you see the most I won't say triggering,
[00:18:10] Tracey Tee: yeah. Like why do people find themselves to us? I would say there's probably three equal things, maybe four. Number one is I'm on one, if not several SSRIs and it's not working. I'm not happy. I don't remember the last time I've been happy. I'm taking these drugs. I don't even know what they do. I don't know how to get off.
And something in my soul is saying there needs to be a change. So that's number one. Number two is perimenopause and menopause are kicking my butt and I don't want to go on drugs. What else is there? And In this transition, I'm finding myself facing things that I didn't know that I was going to think about.
And I'm having a little bit of an existential crisis while my body is also not recognizable and I need help. So that's number two. Number three is postpartum. I just had a baby. I maybe had a traumatic birth. I'm overwhelmed. I don't want to go on medication. Can this help? And number four is I want to deepen my spiritual journey.
I've been on the path. And this just feels right in my body and I want to learn more. Okay.
[00:19:24] Peggy Van de Plassche: And have you seen, because you've been at it for quite some time, have you seen, and I don't like to put it success story because it means that the story is finished, but have you seen great progression from some women to your point who have been able maybe to wind down?
Antidepressant. Oh, I out of their postpartum d
[00:19:50] Tracey Tee: Yeah. Yeah. So we just had our two year birthday. So still pretty new, but yeah, we've been at it for a little while. Yeah, we see success stories every day. We are constantly running our cohorts for three and a half months. And we only have 10 women in a group at a time.
So it's very intimate and small group work. And I think the best thing that I can say is you just see people's lights come back on. And so we. Very often, women take themselves off all their medications successfully and feel free and better. They just intuitively get themselves on a better health like regimen.
We've seen women go back to church and really find their connection to their local community, their church, to God, to Jesus. We see women. I think probably one of the most amazing things is I can have fun with my kids again. I'm not afraid to be present. I prioritize myself. It's just not such a struggle.
And so that's always beautiful to hear. And then the other one is just, I know who I am now. And maybe that might even be, Oh, wow. Yeah. I'm ready to acknowledge that I have a drinking problem. I'm ready to look at my marriage at a different way. I, or I just, I'm ready to face my traumas, either big T or little T traumas.
And I'm like, I feel empowered to do it. And we're just back there go. So
[00:21:12] Peggy Van de Plassche: I think the empowerment. Is probably the overarching, success story and whatever it means for each of them. Tracy, thank you so much. First, thank you for what you're doing. Because you're changing the world one mushroom at a time.
And one more at a time. One more at a time. It's really making a huge difference. Thank you for spending time with me today. Thank you again. For that quote. And for our listeners, I will obviously put in the comments all the information to find mums on mushrooms. I'm sure you can google it and find it, but just in case I'll put everything.
Do you have any parting thoughts for the people who have been spending maybe 20 minutes, 25 minutes with Fiona?
[00:22:00] Tracey Tee: Yeah. I would just say if you're interested in psychedelics in general, again do some research, check your bias and push back, push past the fear a little bit and see, lean into what feels right actually in your body.
And if it doesn't feel right for you, that's just as okay as if it does feel right for you. And if you feel called to work with alternative medicines, just make safe informed decisions, but But know that there's a lot of fear and misinformation out there. And people like yourself are working really hard to change that.
And it's worth listening to.
[00:22:32] Peggy Van de Plassche: Fabulous. Thank you again, Tracy. Thank you for everything you're doing. And really it was a delight to have you today on the show.
[00:22:38] Tracey Tee: I love you to death and anytime you want me on, I will be happy to. Thank you for everything you are doing to be careful what you wish for. Thank you so much.
Have a great day.
[00:22:49] Peggy Van de Plassche: You too. Bye.
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