Center for Conscious Alchemy’s founder and owner, Susan Borden, offers integrative, holistic mental health care through nonjudgmental, compassionate, individualized, accessible, and evidence-based interactions with clients and families. She fosters trust and therapeutic alliance as a foundation for a transpersonal and co-created approach to healing and wholeness. Susan has engaged in the compassionate use of expanded states of consciousness through extensive training and ongoing consultation in ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) at Polaris Insight Center. She also completed the MAPS MDMA-assisted Psychotherapy training. Her dedication to community building and affiliating with experts in the field, her personal journey with psychedelic assisted psychotherapy, a deep spiritual practice and connection to divine feminine, and her own yoga and meditation practice, allows her to be present in the moment for co-healing.

Susan’s personal research into the potential of psychedelic medicines has spanned many decades and has included an interest in the early history of psychedelic use for personal healing among researchers and therapists during the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. She has also benefited from training and mentorship from Harvey Schwartz of Polaris Insight Center and Steve Rosonke from Rainfall Medicine, who have been championing ketamine use in conjunction with psychotherapy.  Susan’s active pursuit of formal training was prompted by impressive results of MAPS’ clinical trials with MDMA in 2018, along with adjacent research on psilocybin at Johns Hopkins, the University of Minnesota, and elsewhere. Her enquiry and experience have convinced her that healing through psychedelic transcendence occurs in a crucible held by a trained guide or psychedelic-assisted therapist in a co-healing context directed by the client’s inner healing intelligence.

In addition to her training and education as a board-certified psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, Susan attended midwifery school and began her career as a labor and delivery nurse, including through the Indian Health Services in Zuni, NM. She has also worked as a licensed school nurse, overseeing school health policies and programs; as a health liaison for culturally diverse families and community healthcare providers; and as the founder of a drop-in clinic for unhoused teens. She currently offers psychiatric assessments, medication management that includes integrative options, and comprehensive education along with KAP and psychedelic-informed integration. Susan uses a trauma-informed approach to working with mental health concerns, and often focuses on early attachment and developmental trauma as underlying factors of psychological, emotional, and spiritual suffering as well as many other health conditions. She spends time with her clients and warmly welcomes dialog and supportive processing during appointments. Susan guides clients toward a more self-actualized, self-aware state, joining each client in co-creating an individualized pathway for empowerment. She is committed to making her services accessible, equitable, and justice-oriented, and to creating spaces for growth, accountability, freedom, and transformation.

In her free time, Susan loves spending time in nature with her children, family, and friends. And she extends a deep gratitude to YMCA Camp Icaghowan.