Original subtitles

Dena: They made me feel like such a bad mom. Steve: You're not.

You made the biggest choice a mother could make,

and the hardest one.

You did what you knew

was best for your babies at that time,

and you should never, ever, ever apologize for that,

feel guilty for that,

feel any kind of shame for that.

Ever.

Steve: I've been a lot of things in my life.

I've been a bank robber and a prisoner,

but being a shaman is my calling.

Ayahuasca is a schedule‐I narcotic,

the same as heroin and LSD,

but it's not a drug, it's medicine,

and in my church, it's a sacrament.

We can do in two days

what conventional therapy may take years to do,

but only if you are willing to step in to the pain.

♪♪

Steve: Like I said, keep your intentions on point.

Good job. Good job.

♪♪

Steve: Nicholas Mutts is my stepson.

He is our last child in a line of 6

between me and Teri.

He's not my biological son.

He is my stepson, but I love him like my own.

There's nothing I don't trust Nik with,

including my brew.

We always want to make sure our edge here is clean,

especially after doing that much mixing.

Nik has been on a path of being an assistant shaman

for the last five years.

He has worked with me in the lab,

always cleaning up, always doing the shit jobs.

There we go.

But you know what?

He showed me that he really does want this.

Nik: I've always been someone that wanted

to help people growing up.

Even whenever I was in elementary and such,

I was always the kid that tried to help anyone

and everyone when they needed a hand.

And Steve encouraged me whenever I was like,

"Hey, I want to do this."

And he was like, "Well, if you really want to do it,

just keep practicing, keep putting your effort into it."

Feel that lid.

That's what it should always feel like. Excellent.

Now is the time for Nik to move forward

in his own self‐development and his own self‐progression.

He's got to be comfortable within the medicine.

Tonight, we're going to be introducing Nik to ayahuasca

for his first really deep journey.

It's important for Nik to drink so that he has an understanding

of what people are going through,

you know, when he's helping them through their journeys.

♪♪

Steve: Well, Nik, it very much pleases me

to be about to give you

your first full cup of ayahuasca.

You got to make your own presence known

among the different spirits and entities.

That's part of the path to becoming a shaman.

Thank you for the opportunity.

You a little nervous?

I would be, too.

Peace and progression.

Peace and progression.

♪♪

Good job.

♪♪

Steve: From Teri, I feel, of course,

apprehension, you know?

You can just imagine if that as your child

laying there motionless.

It's easy to let your imagination run wild.

"Is he okay?

Can I reach over and hug him

and feel him like he was in the cradle?"

And she also knows, logically, she can't.

Right now, Nik is on a path of independence.

[ Insects chirping ]

Nik: After having my first cup,

I could sort of feel like a little bit of a wave going on.

Visually, things kind of started to rock a little bit,

kind of like a blast of imagery just flying by,

just a lot of things going on.

Like, I could feel that I'm physically there.

I can still feel the cot under me,

but I feel sort of weightless, in a way,

kind of like a spider being on its web.

♪♪

At one point, I could have swore

I saw Steve's face kind of just smirking at me

a little bit from the background.

♪♪

Steve: Nik has the heart and the spirit

and the soul to do this.

But I also know that he's gonna have

to prove himself worthy and responsible

because, one day, I'm gonna have to leave Nik,

and that's why I'm willing to invest the time it's gonna take

to make Nik a master shaman,

and to eventually give him the reigns of the church.

♪♪

♪♪

Nathan: It's so difficult to explain

when you wake up from an overdose

because you know that they've just revived you,

you know that you [bleep] up big time.

I was like, "Damn, Nate.

Come on. Like really? Like, again?"

♪♪

About four years ago,

I tried opiates for the first time.

It was in the form of heroin.

That relationship ended with that drug

about two years ago,

and that's when I started taking Subuxone,

the medication they give you for withdrawal symptoms.

But, you know, with the Subuxone,

it's pretty much like putting a Band‐Aid on a bullet wound.

You know, there's still this huge hole underneath there

that needs to be dealt with,

and if anything, you know, I'm not dealing with that one.

I'm, you know, continuing to take something

that's artificially making me content and happy.

I just want to be able to just leave it behind

when I leave from this place

and just not go back to it again.

♪♪

Ryan: When I first came to Aya Quest about two years ago,

I was on my last straw.

I mean, I hit rock bottom.

I was using crystal meth, and I had overdosed,

and I would constantly beat myself up

and just have these thoughts in my brain

that would just eat me alive.

I haven't done drugs since I've done ayahuasca.

Mother Aya showed me that I was worth more

than what I thought.

I wanted my mom to come to Aya Quest

because she's got a lot of her own stuff

that she needs to work on.

♪♪

[ Sighs deeply ]

I was injured at work in 2006, and I'm in a lot of pain.

♪♪

I have steel rods in my back and my legs don't work,

and I've almost committed suicide

'cause of the pain.

I have a lot of intentions for coming here ‐‐

physical healing and mentally.

I've been trying to change myself and my issues

for years and years and years,

but I've had not much success on my own.

♪♪

I hope this will be the answer.

♪♪

Hey. Come on in.

‐Hey. ‐I'm Walter.

Nice to meet you, Walter.

How you doing, dude?

Teri: Thank you all very much for coming.

The first thing we are going to do today is,

we will be taking all car keys and cell phones.

If you would all like to get your things and follow me,

we will go down, and you will see

where you will be spending the next few days.

You all can come on in.

‐Wow. ‐Find you a bed.

Wow‐ee.

Teri: With this group, we have Sheila and Ryan,

we have Nathan, and we have Dena.

I've been dealing with depression and anxiety

for about 16 years now.

I was raped when I was 14.

It was a family member.

So, I can't trust anybody else now.

♪♪

I'm looking to heal from the mistrust

that I feel from all of the things

that have happened in the past.

[ Voice breaking ] Wow.

I didn't expect to get this emotional.

I really didn't. [ Inhales deeply ]

♪♪

Everybody, I'm Steve Hupp,

chief shaman of Aya Quest Native Americas Church.

How are y'all doing tonight?

‐Good. ‐Good?

Ryan, this is like old times here

seeing you across the chair here from me, you know?

And who is this beautiful woman to your left?

‐I'm his mother. ‐I couldn't have told a bit.

Let me shake your hand, Sheila.

‐I love you. ‐I love you, too.

And thank you for all your ‐‐

I love you really for all you've done for my son.

Well, thank you.

Now, just to let y'all know, the reason you had

to give up your car keys was because

of this gentleman right here.

He changed my whole rules when it come to car keys

'cause in the middle of his first night journey,

he went out to get a pack of cigarettes from his car

and drove away. Really?

Pretty much in his underwear and everything.

What? And I mean, was gone.

Scared me to death, man.

Had me pacing for ‐‐ 'Cause, you know,

I don't want to call the cops on him,

but at some point, I have to because, yeah,

you're out here tripping and driving.

[ Laughter ] I can't let this go.

But anyway, he made it home.

Everything worked out for the best. Really?

And we journeyed the second day, and guess what?

Everything worked out, everything went fine.

But sometimes, if you're in a deep experience,

you can kinda get overwhelmed, and that's what happened to him.

He had a flash, and he just wanted to run.

He ain't the first one.

That's why we kind of keep you

all locked up and sequestered a little bit.

♪♪

Teri: We're gonna give you a cup,

we're going to wait about 20 minutes,

and we're going to give you a second cup after that

and nothing for 2 hours.

After that, as long as you are

handling the experience in a good way,

I will pour you more.

♪♪

Nathan: You know, my nervousness was at its peak.

I started to feel overwhelming anxiety,

like, "What is this going to be like?

Is it going to take me to a different world?

Am I going to have a horrible time?

Like, am I going to end up freaking out?"

Dena: I'm scared.

I'm not really 100% sure

that ayahuasca is going to help me.

Hopefully, it brings me an amazing experience.

Sheila: I was very nervous,

very fearful of going on a bad trip

and not coming back.

♪♪

Steve: Ayahuasca's a hallucinogenic tea

made with plants from the Amazon,

and it is the strongest psychedelic known to man.

But this isn't like LSD.

Ayahuasca's a portal to your inner self,

your subconscious.

And through that portal, you're going to meet a goddess

we call "Mother Aya".

When your journey first takes off,

you may feel euphoria until ‐‐

Boom! ‐‐

the spike hits,

and the purge begins.

You may laugh, you may cry,

and you may do both at the same time.

You may puke or shit.

But each of those purges are a physical manifestation

of an emotional release.

That's when you truly find healing.

♪♪

[ Sighs ] As soon as I drank,

I felt this wave of calm just come down my body.

My parents were both, you know,

pretty involved with drugs.

They weren't suitable to be parents,

so I actually lived with my grandparents.

My dad spent most of my childhood in prison.

He actually ended up dying of a drug overdose.

So, I always told myself growing up, like,

"I'm never, never gonna do drugs."

My son's mother ‐‐ I met her through a friend.

We were ultimately together for five‐and‐a‐half years.

We have one son. Love him to death.

He's 5 now.

I had taken a couple months off from work to watch our son.

I was there with him full‐time.

So, when I came home and she wasn't there

and my son wasn't there, it really made me feel horrible.

You know, it just made me feel like I was just a babysitter.

She just packed all of her stuff, she left,

she didn't say, like, you know,

"I'm leaving" or anything like that.

I just came home, and everything was gone,

including my son.

It was really rough, and I didn't know

how to cope with that, and that led to severe drinking,

and then after that, into the opiates.

When I lost my son's mom, I remember crying,

bawling the whole night.

My grandmother, Nancy,

she sat there with me the whole night,

and, you know, just having somebody in that way

it's just, like ‐‐

it's ‐‐ it's just such a beautiful thing.

Sometimes I think to myself, you know,

for everything that she's done, like,

I shouldn't be feeling this sad.

And I tell her all the time,

"Don't feel bad that I feel negative.

Like, you've...

you've already done, like, so much."

So, yeah, that's where we're at with that.

[ Sighs ]

Tell me about your first O. D.

I was driving,

and I went out while I was driving

and I crashed my car.

♪♪

♪♪

You can tell Sheila is in a lot of pain

and a lot of discomfort.

Mother Aya can work with physical pain,

she can work with psychological pain,

and she can work with spiritual pain.

The entities that she works with and through

have a way of healing that I really can't explain.

All I know is, is I set the arena,

I ask Mother to come and join us,

and I get out of the way.

♪♪

Sheila: I laid down and asked Mother Aya

to take the pain from me so I could relax more,

and she came right away.

She was letting me know, "I'm here.

It's about time you got your butt here,

and we got to get to work now."

♪♪

When Ryan was about 11 months old,

his dad's drinking got worse.

One day, he smacked him so hard

he knocked him out of the chair.

And one night, he was really, really intoxicated

when he came in about 3:00 in the morning.

He put the pillow over my head and raped me.

♪♪

When I opened my eyes,

Ryan was standing at the end of the bed.

Instantly, my heart just busted into a tiny million pieces,

that he had seen that.

♪♪

Ryan: Most of the part that I remember from it

was him laying in bed crying and just screaming,

talking about he just wanted to die,

and he just jumped up and kicked me in the chest

and this crazy, crazy shit.

I didn't leave my husband for a long time after that.

I couldn't. I didn't have a job or money.

But he did it again... a few years later.

That was the day I decided I had to leave him.

I didn't want to leave my kids there.

They wouldn't come with me.

My heart was broken.

In my house, we had rules and bedtime,

and they had chores.

At their dad's house, there was none of that,

and he bought them cigarettes.

It was just a free‐for‐all.

Ryan was 17 when I left.

By this point, he was doing drugs and drinking a lot.

Ryan: I definitely resented my mom.

I had felt like, "Why in the hell is she doing this to me?"

And I‐I just couldn't grasp it.

I was just, I guess, just like, "Screw this.

I don't want no part of it."

Sheila: I have three kids,

and they're all three drug addicts.

I have tons of guilt from that.

Guilt will [bleep] you up,

and I think the guilt and shame are a big cause of my pain.

♪♪

Steve: Nathan is here because he was

an opiate addict on Subuxone.

Subuxone is a drug used to keep the dope‐sick away ‐‐

to keep the physical withdrawal symptoms at bay,

to help the mind be a little more clear

so they're not so focused on

"Where's my next fix coming from?"

But it is not a cure,

and that's why you got to get to the root of the problem.

Please have a seat there.

I chose the arena of reflection for Nathan

because I felt Nathan had to deal with some very deep guilt,

and we had to get him to look at himself,

to let this pocket of shit go out of his head

because that's what was helping him

cling to to this addiction,

and I wanted Nathan to see that

and I wanted him to look at himself

from many different angles where he couldn't turn away.

Steve: For right now, I just want you to sit there

and kind of take in all the different reflection,

all the different areas and angles

that's coming in for you.

Now, does addiction run in your family or...

Nathan: Yeah, my father passed away of a drug overdose.

Okay, what would your son be able to say to you

to keep you working towards sobriety?

'Cause you've been that son.

Yeah, my son does have a huge impact.

You know, even at 5 years old,

very encouraging, very loving person,

and that's why I don't want this

to be in the picture when he's older.

Like, even now, so I don't want it in the picture.

When did your opiate problem start?

So, yeah, that was four years ago,

in October.

Tell me about your first O. D.

I was driving, and I crashed my car.

What about the second time?

The second time, I was in my house,

and my grandmother saved my life.

She had gone to bed, and she came out and she, like,

obviously saw that I was on the floor

and I wasn't breathing.

So, she gave me CPR and called the ambulance.

Wow. She resuscitated you.

She did. That's correct.

You harbor some guilt

where your grandmother was concerned

that she had to resuscitate you because I guarantee it,

that was brutal on her. Yeah. Yeah.

And I'm sure it was hard to watch her cry...

Yeah.

...because I'm sure it really jacked her up.

I want you to forgive yourself for that guilt,

because I'm sure she has already forgiven you.

She ‐‐ She has.

But I feel from you that you haven't quite

forgiven yourself for that

because your demeanor totally changed

when we went into that event.

Mm.

For right now, I want you to sit here

and just meditate in the glow of these lights,

and I want you to just focus on the person

that Nathan is trying to become.

I want you to focus on

if Nathan could paint the perfect Nathan,

what would that Nathan look like?

Mm.

Steve: Nathan's body language and demeanor told me

that his self‐esteem is in the basement.

He couldn't stand to make eye contact with himself.

Even his whole aura seemed to shrink

at this one mention

of this one day in an addict's life.

This is what must be brought to the surface to be purged.

There's no drug to turn to. Mother ain't going to let you.

Mother's going to hold up this mirror and say,

"Look at yourself

and love yourself even with all your flaws,

and that's when things will start to get better."

The first thing I saw, I would consider them to be demons.

Their faces were all kind of nasty and grimacing

and had, like, gnashing teeth.

♪♪

Nik: If you could, I'd like for you to have

a seat right here, Miss Dena.

Steve: I would not let Nik as my assistant shaman

every become a one‐trick pony.

He has to be well‐rounded,

and the first thing you got to do is be patient

and learn how to communicate.

We judge nothing.

For this ceremony, I want Nik to work with Dena

to make to make a negative sigil

for her to identify what she needs to let go,

and that's not going to be easy for her.

We have to do it in such a way

not to shut this wounded soul down,

but to help this wounded soul heal.

Steve wanted me to do a little bit

of an exercise with you here.

You're going to want to make a list of things

that you don't like personally about you.

And it can be as personal as you want

or just simple things that you feel

kind of hold you back in life.

Okay.

♪♪

Dena: My very first memory in life ‐‐

I was probably 3 or 4, and I remember waking up

to the babysitter's son molesting me.

I was raped when I was 14, and I kept it to myself,

and I didn't tell anybody for years and years.

I got really good at internalizing things,

hiding them.

I was in an 8‐year‐long relationship

with a man that I loved very, very, very much,

and we were married for four of those years.

He saved me from a lot of heartache.

But I kept swinging back and forth

between the depression and the extreme happiness.

It's like I couldn't breathe.

It was a roller coaster

of happy, sad, happy, sad, happy, sad.

And I didn't know what to do,

I didn't know how to explain it to him.

I could tell that he wasn't there anymore,

like emotionally and physically.

Like, he just wasn't there, and I said as much.

And he was like, "I think we need to get a divorce.

Like, I'm not happy anymore."

And that was it.

It hurt.

[ Voice breaking ] It hurt a lot.

I was very suicidal.

Um...

There was a couple of times, actually,

that I got my van up to very high speeds,

and I was going to wreck it.

[ Chuckles ]

♪♪

I eventually moved out and moved in with my dad,

and I left my two boys

with their father in North Carolina

because, honestly, I don't feel like

I could have done the best job at raising them.

I want my children to have

the best life that they can have.

[ Sniffles ]

So, I'm here to make sure that that happens.

♪♪

‐How we all doing? ‐Good.

Steve: I'm proud of each and every one of you.

All of you have already laid a very strong foundation

for a very powerful experience tonight.

Tonight, the medicine's a little stronger.

So, remember your tenets ‐‐

just is, accept and allow, and relax.

You all get to a point

where you want more this evening,

just like last night, you know ‐‐

as long as you're within reason, absolutely.

Steve: To see a mother and a son sitting here beside me...

‐I know. ‐...this is just huge.

How do you feel this morning when you got up?

I had a lot of pain.

It started in the night.

Hopefully, we can adjust that tonight.

Sheila: Mother Aya was very kind and compassionate

and loving with me last night,

and I think tonight, shit's going to get deep,

and it's probably not going to be pretty.

♪♪

Nathan: I drank off the brew.

I started to really almost, like, throw it up,

and I went outside with Walter, you know,

smoke a cigarette before we got started.

And I think I got about halfway through my cigarette

before the bush in front of me

started to really, you know, start going.

It was moving, and I sat there to myself, and I said,

"Holy shit, we're gonna be in for a ride tonight."

At that point in time,

I had some pretty intense visuals.

Everything was swirling around on top of me.

I was hearing...

The first thing I saw, I would consider them to be demons.

There was massive amounts of them,

and their faces were all kind of nasty and grimacing

and had, like, gnashing teeth.

And I think that those were

all the negative things inside of me.

I had this one scene where I saw Subuxone.

The thing was huge, like, I saw in my head ‐‐ gigantic.

And I saw something puncture

right through that piece of medication.

That's when I started to, like, see the shackles,

and I started to hear the mantra, "This is slavery.

This is bondage. This is not for you.

[ Echoing ] This is slavery. This is bondage.

This is not for you."

And it was at that point that I started

to kind of feel, like, "Wow. Holy cow.

Just let it go. Just let it go."

And at that point, I really let it go.

Just let it go.

I had really just purged out some very negative stuff.

I felt amazing.

[ Sniffles ]

[ Exhales sharply ]

Sheila: I went 90 miles an hour

to get him to the hospital last time he O. D.'d.

He kept saying, "I'm dying. I'm dying.

I'm dying."

♪♪

Steve: I got you. I got you. Just come on down.

Sheila's here for physical healing,

spiritual healing, and psychological healing.

Steve: Come on in.

‐And if you would, sit ‐‐ ‐Which end is my head?

Your head's right here.

We want to try to get your head right here.

Oh, I see it.

Teri: The plan for Sheila tonight ‐‐

we have a chakra bed that we're going to use

to get her chakras realigned and opened.

There you go.

Your chakras are energy points

for different aspects of your physical body.

I hope that she gets the spiritual healing

to release and let go, and I hope she finds peace.

We put this focus on the ceremony

to Mother Aya as removing our guilt.

Okay, I'm going for it.

Because carrying that guilt is not working for you.

See, it's not just Ryan.

I've got three drug addict kids ‐‐

all three of my kids.

Not just me,

but other people always put it on the mother.

"Well, if you would've whipped them more,

if you would've..."

Were you there? Yes, you were.

Was it all on you? No, it was not.

There was a whole synergy of things.

One, you were in a toxic relationship

with a person of predatory instincts

and predatory desires.

That wasn't your fault either.

You got children who are alive

because you got them there in a [bleep]‐up situation.

I went 90 miles an hour to get him

to the hospital last time he O. D.'d.

I was afraid... very afraid.

But he kept saying, "I'm dying.

I'm dying. I'm dying."

And...

[Voice breaking] telling me how sorry he was...

Okay. ...for making my life miserable

and putting me through Hell.

I just kept punching him, saying, "Don't die.

Don't die. You got those little girls."

♪♪

What I want you to do, sweetie...

as you're laying there, for your sacral chakra,

I know you went through some abuse,

and I want you to focus on letting that go

and letting Mother Aya heal the wounds from that.

That should not be a part of who you are.

You still have three children.

You have beautiful grandbabies.

So, what I want you to focus on also ‐‐

being healthy

and letting Mother Aya heal the wounds.

Don't be afraid to speak about your guilt,

your fears, your hopes.

Don't be afraid to offer that motherly advice that you have.

Don't be afraid to issue that ass‐chewing, neither.

All the guilt and all the self‐hatred

and all the self‐loathing in the world

ain't going to change one minute of that past.

But letting go of all that shit

could definitely change every minute of your future.

Mm.

I'm all for that.

Now, Sheila, we'd like you to sit here

and just be at peace, meditate...

Okay. ...kind of take in all

the energy coming to you.

Like that.

♪♪

Sheila: I felt the ayahuasca hit me,

and all of a sudden...

I left my body.

I saw these different shapes and patterns.

A lot of little moving parts and gears,

and then I would hear a woman's laughter.

[ Laughter ]

♪♪

I was... the universe.

♪♪

And then I felt my face.

I was feeling around, like, "Whose body is this?"

It wasn't mine,

and I had no pain

for the first time since 2006.

I got the urge to touch my toes,

which I'm incapable of doing

'cause I have steel rods in my back,

and a little piece of me was like, "Really?

You think you're going to touch your toes?"

And I bent completely in half,

and I didn't just touch my toes,

I, like, stayed there.

I was just thanking Mother Aya constantly.

She took away the blockage

that I have to healing myself in that moment.

[ Whispering ] I can sit, like, Indian‐style.

♪♪

When I split up with my kids' dad,

my oldest son was big enough to decide

where he wanted to stay,

[Voice breaking] and he wanted to stay with his daddy.

And it broke my heart.

♪♪

Steve: Dena is here because she has lost ‐‐

How would you say? ‐‐ trust in her own instincts.

Tonight, we're going to talk about some real painful stuff.

I want the tears of her pain to be on that sigil.

Steve: Come on up. Come on up.

That's what we're gonna use to energize this sigil

before she lays it in the fire and watches it disintegrate.

♪♪

I had instructed Nik today to have you prepare

a negative sigil ‐‐ some of the things you wish

to remove from yourself if you could.

Could you kind of explain a little bit

about what you put together here

before we set it off to the fire?

This one is anxiety... Okay.

...and fear and indecision.

Okay.

It takes me a long time to make decisions anymore.

I've made so many bad decisions

that I'm absolutely terrified, you know?

The consequences of a bad decision

are so, so much heavier now.

Which adds to your anxiety...

Yeah. ...which feeds this whole

circle of shit? ‐Mm‐hmm.

‐Which is based on fear. ‐Mm‐hmm.

If you're scared to act and you're scared to bust a move

because all the decisions seem so big and so large

and that each one is life and death

and all the above, where do you enjoy your life?

Exactly.

Can I ask you where your bad decisions started?

[ Voice breaking ] I gave my ex‐husband

custody of my babies.

♪♪

He's much more stable than I am.

The swinging between the depression and anxiety,

it's not healthy for children,

and they needed to have

the best opportunity that they could have,

and I wanted to make sure that they did.

So, I decided that he was the best option.

And [Sniffles] so many people judge me for it.

Teri: They're not in your shoes.

So, you made a beautiful choice in a time of instability

not to drag your kids through that muck.

You sacrificed yourself for that,

and you let your tears flow on that sigil

because we're gonna turn that loose

to the universe, as well.

They made me feel like such a bad mom.

You're not.

You made the biggest choice a mother could make,

and the hardest one.

You're working on you right now,

and when you get yourself right,

then you're going to be right with them kids

and you're going to be right with him.

Regardless of how it made you feel,

regardless of how it made you hurt,

regardless of what everybody else was saying to you,

never, ever, ever apologize for that,

feel guilty for that,

feel any kind of shame for that.

Ever.

I really needed to hear that.

I don't even celebrate Mother's Day.

‐You will from now on. ‐Yes, you will.

Now I would like you to take that sigil.

I want you to think about it ‐‐

everything we've talked about.

[ Sighs ]

Now let that shit go in that fire.

♪♪

[ Sniffles ]

♪♪

[ Chuckles ]

♪♪

Teri: I think at that moment, it just really dawned on her

that she had made the right decision,

and for her to realize

that I think was a very powerful moment of healing.

And I wanted her to know I do understand that feeling,

and I think instead of being condemned for it,

she should be congratulated for it,

because that took strength that a lot of people don't have.

Teri: When I split up with my kids' dad,

my oldest son was big enough to decide

where he wanted to stay,

and he wanted to stay with his daddy.

[ Voice breaking ] And it broke my heart.

♪♪

But I let him do it 'cause it's what he wanted.

I know what that feels like.

So, don't you ever, ever let them people

tell you ever... that you did something wrong

'cause you didn't.

With ayahuasca running through me,

I was getting a very relaxed sensation.

When I closed my eyes,

I immediately saw what looked like space,

like stars and galaxies and bright colors

whizzing by really quickly.

And I saw a woman, and she was beautiful.

And as soon as she made eye contact with me,

she disappeared.

And then I saw ribbons of color

and, like, every color in the rainbow.

It was beautiful.

I felt a lot of love.

There was a lot of... "ahh" feeling to it.

[ Chuckles ]

♪♪

It was nice.

♪♪

♪♪

Nathan: Ayahuasca was definitely worth it for me.

I woke up in the morning, and I felt great.

I didn't really feel the need to put anything in my system.

I had felt like I had really released

some very, very negative energy ‐‐

I guess is the best word to say it ‐‐

through the purge.

Sheila: I feel great today.

Some people say that ayahuasca is a drug.

It is not a drug.

It's a medicine.

It's an antidote that the universe uses

to help you overcome

your personal issues.

How are we doing, Sheila?

Good. [ Chuckles ]

Really, really good.

I started walking down to the van

to get my clothes, and I thought,

"I wonder if I can run?"

And I ran.

Then I ran up the hill.

How long has it been since you done those things?

Oh, I can't remember the last time I ran.

Everything went so good with last night,

and she seems to be doing so amazing ‐‐

not feeling any pain,

and I think that in itself is a true gift.

I mean, it's just an amazing medicine.

It really is.

Mother Aya has worked a miracle with you.

I think I got a new lease on life,

and I'm gonna go with it,

and I get to hang out with him some more.

And I'm envious of you, and I'll tell you why.

I never had a relationship like this with my mother.

Mm.

Never.

And I regret it.

♪♪

Sheila: I've told Steve and Teri many times,

"I am eternally grateful for you

and for what you're doing in the last few years

since Ryan did the ceremony."

When I see him playing with his kids,

I have this gratitude for Steve and Teri

that he's here,

because I don't think he would be here

if it wasn't for them and Mother Aya.

♪♪

Dena: I like it here. I like this house.

Ryan: Oh, yeah. It's beautiful.

It is.

It is definitely that.

Dena: The biggest lesson that I've taken away

from this journey is,

I'm not as bad a mother as I thought I was.

[ Voice breaking ] That's huge for me.

And I can't wait to see their little faces

and squish them and give them kisses all over.

I love you guys so much.

Steve: Hello, hello.

I look around at the people that I see gathered here before me,

and I see completely different people

that walked through that door.

Each of you are gonna have to go through

some trials and tribulations.

Some of that old thought patterns

will creep in.

It's called life.

Now you have the awareness to catch it

before it becomes a tidal wave,

because it's much easier while it's a small trickle

than to allow it to gain momentum.

Ayahuasca for me... [ Chuckles ]

It's hard to put it into words, really,

but love.

"Love" would be the best word for it.

I've died twice, I've been beat up,

dragged through Hell and back,

and it's helped me immensely.

And if it can do that for me,

then it [Voice breaking] could do it for a lot of people.

♪♪

Steve: Thank you all so much. Thank you.

Nik: In the future, I do hope to become a full‐fledged shaman

because I just simply feel like this

is something that can really be helpful for people.

Safe travels, everybody.

It's really nice watching people just kind of change

from the day they walk in to the day that they walk out,

kind of like watching a caterpillar

turn into a butterfly.

♪♪

Sheila: When I came to Aya Quest,

I was in a lot of pain

and I struggled to get up the hill with my walker.

Now I've ran up and down the hill,

and that's a miracle.

Great doesn't even come close to how I feel.

"Magnanimous" or some big word.

Nathan: Leaving here, I really do feel lighter.

I'm really grateful for this experience

because it showed me a lot of things that, you know,

I otherwise wouldn't have noticed about myself,

and I'm just excited to get back home

and really see where the rubber hits the road ‐‐

really put my nose to the grindstone.

Steve: Many people get caught up in the idea

that they went through the worst of anybody.

And I got news for you ‐‐ most of the people I've met,

they ain't went through the worst of anything ‐‐

that they went through their worst.

You know, that's why I'm so open with my story.

It ain't such that I, you know,

want to be a Billy Badass bank robber.

I want to let people know

"I'm the biggest [bleep]‐up at this table, not you.

And if I got here...

you can, too."

♪♪

♪♪

Three months after ayahuasca, I feel much better.

I've gotten engaged.

I'm feeling really good three months later.

♪♪

I actually had an amazing experience.

I had zero pain.

The ceremony gave me so much hope

that I know it can go away,

that I can be healed.

♪♪

♪♪

As far as the medication goes, I've been able to get myself

on a much lower and more manageable dose.

Living in the moment is definitely

a huge thing, you know?

Not worrying too much about the past is just something

that I really struggled for the longest time

to, you know, being able to do.

So, you know, again, so grateful for the experience.