Venture Counseling Manhattan, KS

09/30/2026

Marty says that it's good to take time to stop and smell the flowers!

08/21/2026

This pic popped up on the memories from my personal FB page a couple days ago.

It was my "first day of school" photo from when I left the office to head to Washburn for my first day of grad school!

That day, I didn't even know for sure if I would be officially admitted to the social work program; I had simply convinced them to take a gamble on me and allow me to take a couple classes provisionally, with no promise of being admitted officially in the spring. My joke at the time was they were saying, "Well, we don't know if we'll let you in officially, but we'll take your money!" Ha ha

[Spoiler: I did get admitted officially, whew!]

Anyway, seeing that picture causes me to feel thankful for the opportunity back then, and grateful for what I'm doing now! I'm not sure if that version of myself would ever believe that the present version of myself would be doing things like being licensed to do legal natural plant medicine therapy in Colorado and things like that, but here we are!

And I'm so grateful for it all!

08/04/2026

I also had a great time! Really enjoyed the conversation and being able to share about this powerful work. Thanks for coming out!

Wow, we had a great time with Dave Cook of Venture Counseling Manhattan, KS!

I got some great information about plant medicine and what it takes to get a potentially life changing session in Colorado.

(I’m leaving out the word of the treatment so the algorithm does push this down)

08/03/2026

Figured i should share this from the business page, too!

I'm looking forward to our visit in the morning!

THIS WEEK!! 🧠
We will be doing an interview discussing legal natural plant medicine aka psychedelic aka "magic mushroom" therapy and EMDR and Intensive EMDR therapy.

We will be chatting with Dave Cook, LSCSW, LCAC, NMIT

What questions do you have? I’ll ask them at the end.

07/14/2026

If you look closely, you may be able to see that my left arm is a bit sun burned! Ha ha

I arrived back in Colorado this afternoon for my Natural Plant Medicine Therapy (aka psilocybin aka "magic mushrooms") practicum. I'm up on Saturday! (Is gonna get weird!)

This will wrap up my training and when I get back, I'll be fully able to offer this as a therapy option! To the best of my knowledge, that will make me the first Kansas-based* therapist to hold the license. I'm stoked!

Give me a shout if you want to give it a try.

https://www.venturecounselingmhk.com/psychedelic

*I'm aware there are a handful of therapists based in Colorado who hold the license and also a Kansas therapy license. But, I'm still happy to claim the distinction as being the first Kansas-based therapist! 😀

07/12/2026

"I feel like I've done 9 months worth of therapy in two days!"

I've been working with someone this weekend doing Intensive EMDR therapy.

Part of why I love this model is comments like that. It's just so much more efficient time-wise. The other part is, we just have so much flexibility.

Over the weekend, we did some work in my office, and some at this place. And more today walking through a field of wildflowers.

While I can't guarantee that it'll feel like 9 months worth of therapy in two days, I can promise that we'll have a lot of dedicated time to spend working on whatever you need to work on and that you'll surely be much further down the road than you were when you started.

https://www.venturecounselingmhk.com/intensives

06/11/2026

[Be sure to note the limitations of the case report.]

And wow! If all this plays out, it's amazing!

TL;DR- A woman with suspected Alzheimer's disease was given large doses of "magic mushrooms" and experienced significant reversals of the symptoms!

Vulnerable moment: Both of my grandfathers died with dementia, so that is something that has always freaked me out. You'd better believe that if I develop that in my (hopefully much) later years, I'll be giving this a try.

I'm not going to promise to cure anyone's dementia, but if you are interested in psychedelic therapy I will be able to start scheduling that by late July!

A large psilocybin dose briefly improved advanced dementia symptoms in an isolated case study but experts warn of the dangers and ethical concerns.

06/02/2026

Today I had to take off and go to Lawrence to finish up a Basic Life Support class, which is a part of getting my Natural Medicine Facilitation license in Colorado.

It got done earlier than I'd anticipated, which gave me the opportunity to engage in some self care. Namely, running trails at Clinton Reservoir.

As I finished up, I noticed this sign for another kind of basic life support.

If you or someone you know are thinking of su***de or hurting yourself, please call or text 988.

And if I can be of any assistance, give me a shout! Or for anyone in the Manhattan area, mhkmentalhealth.org is another great resource to search for therapists and other mental health providers.