About Me
I’m Kathleen Manseau, a health care professional fortunate enough to live in the beautiful Methow Valley of Washington state. I love to sing and hike, and find joy in trees, flowers, rocks, and my son’s laughter. I also happen to have personal and family history of mental health challenges. Ketamine treatment has truly been transformational for me while following my own healing path; for this reason, I want to share this and similar approaches with others.
I am an Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner with national board certification in Family Practice, licensed with independent practice authority in Washington state. I was an ER nurse in Portland before entering the graduate nursing program at Oregon Health Sciences University. I have a Bachelor's degree in literature, a Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing, and a Master's degree in Nursing, and have completed the American Society for Addiction Medicine comprehensive course in medical treatment for opioid use disorder, the Professional and the Advanced training courses with the Center for MindBody Medicine, and the Polaris Insight Center ketamine assisted therapy course. I am a trainee of the Integrative Psychiatry Institute Psychedelic Assisted Therapy certification program.
I served as a primary care provider at Rural and Community Health Clinics in Okanogan County for 10 years, with a focus on opioid and other substance use disorders for 4 years after that. This is a rural-to-frontier area with very few clinical mental health resources.
Over those 14 years providing general medical and specialized addiction care, I learned that underlying many types of physical disease there is a complex web of emotional and psychosocial factors that can drive the development of or worsen "physical" illness or symptoms.
Nervous system conditions including un- or undertreated depression, anxiety, chronic stress, insomnia, complex chronic pain, and overuse of substances including alcohol, nicotine, opioids, and sedatives are all commonly encountered and treated in primary care. And these are all treatable, not permanent, conditions.
Productive treatment requires actively engaging in a variety of methods in addition to psychedelic medicine, including mental health therapy and conventional, naturopathic or East Asian medicine. There is no single treatment which alone will "cure" any of us. But for many people, utilizing psychedelic medicine - or other methods of accessing non-ordinary states of consciousness - can be an effective and even essential treatment to include in their healing journey.
If the time feels right, let’s discuss and explore whether this is the right treatment path for you.