In The NoCo

What a veteran journalist learned from trying psychedelic therapy – and how it made his life better

By In The NoCo,

Published July 25, 2025 at 5:40 AM MDT

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A man wearing a 5280 hat and a backpack smiles at his camera with a hiking trail in the background. — Robert Sanchez is a writer for 5280 magazine who wrote about the burgeoning psychedelic therapy industry in Colorado. He also delved into his own treatment.

Colorado recently hit a milestone: The first licensed psychedelic therapy clinic opened in June after voters here said magic mushrooms should be legal. So lots of reporters have written about the licensing process, interviewed therapists, and written about whether psychedelic mushrooms have real value in helping people recover from trauma, PTSD or other issues.

Our guest today is one of those reporters, but he took things a bit further.

Robert Sanchez is a longtime writer for 5280 in Denver. He decided to try out psychedelic mushrooms and see if what the experts said about their therapeutic value held up.

Robert walked through his journey with In the NoCo’s Brad Turner. Read Robert’s full article from 5280.

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In The NoCo

KUNC's In The NoCo is a daily slice of stories, news, people and issues. It's a window to the communities along the Colorado Rocky Mountains. The show brings context and insight to the stories of the day, often elevating unheard voices in the process. And because life in Northern Colorado is a balance of work and play, we celebrate the lighter side of things here, too.

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Ariel Lavery

Ariel Lavery grew up in Louisville, Colorado and has returned to the Front Range after spending over 25 years moving around the country. She co-created the podcast Middle of Everywhere for WKMS, Murray State University’s NPR member station, and won Public Media Journalism awards in every season she produced for Middle of Everywhere. Her most recent series project is "The Burn Scar", published with The Modern West podcast. In it, she chronicles two years of her family’s financial and emotional struggle following the loss of her childhood home in the Marshall Fire.

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Brad Turner

Brad Turner is an executive producer in KUNC's newsroom. He manages the podcast team that makes In The NoCo, which also airs weekdays in Morning Edition and All Things Considered. His work as a podcaster and journalist has appeared on NPR's Weekend Edition, NPR Music, the PBS Newshour, Colorado Public Radio, MTV Online, the Denver Post, Boulder's Daily Camera, and the Longmont Times-Call.

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