The 10-Day Reset: What Stepping Away From Microdosing Taught Me About Parkinson’s, Healing, and Access

By Joe Holmes

After more than seven months straight of microdosing psilocybin, I stopped. Not because it stopped helping, but because I couldn’t tell what was me anymore and what was the medicine. 

I had been taking it through everything. Work. Kids’ busy schedules. Managing stress. Parkinson’s day-to-day stuff. Even through my ibogaine treatment. Life never really slowed down. I just kept going. 

Things were mostly stable. I was functioning. But I didn’t have any real separation between support and baseline, and that started to bother me. 

If I’m going to talk about this stuff publicly, I don’t want to guess. I want to know what’s actually doing what. 

So I stopped for ten days, cold turkey. Like when I started, I kept a daily log so I’d actually pay attention and track it honestly. 

I figured my body would feel it pretty quick. I’ve taken days off here and there before, but never more than one at a time. Usually I notice a small difference on those days. But taking this for Parkinson’s still feels pretty unknown, and because of that I feel like I need to be more intentional and build something steady instead of just winging it. 

What I didn’t expect was how clear everything would get once I stepped away. 

The first couple days almost fooled me 

Day one felt good. Honestly better than I expected. My mood was lighter, energy was up, and my hip pain wasn’t bothering me much. I felt more like myself. 

Mostly I felt relief. Not relief from stopping, just relief from naming it. This wasn’t decline. It was a reset. That night I slept eight straight hours, which almost never happens. 

Day two was busy. I spent most of the day out and on my feet. Lots of walking, standing around for hours, running around with the kids. Just normal life stuff. I held up fine. A little sore, a couple headaches, felt worn out by late afternoon, but nothing that worried me. Pretty common for a day like that. 

I remember thinking maybe this wouldn’t be that bad. 

Then the old stuff started creeping back in 

By day three I could feel the shift. Nothing crazy, just noticeable. Sleep got choppy and I was waking up more. My body felt heavier in the mornings. Stiffer. Slower. 

Stuff I hadn’t thought about in months started showing up again. How cold affects me. How long it takes to get moving. How everything just feels a little harder. 

By day four it was obvious. The gym felt harder. Walking felt heavier. Everything took more effort. I caught myself managing the way I used to, pacing, resting, trying not to overdo it so I didn’t crash later. 

That’s when it clicked. The medicine had been helping way more than I realized. Not in some big dramatic way, just quietly in the background, taking the edge off the small stuff you only notice when it’s gone 

The symptoms came back, but I didn’t spiral 

Yes, symptoms came back a little. Stiffness, slowness, pain in my hips and legs, sleep getting broken up again. None of that shocked me. What surprised me was how much my baseline has improved. 

Before microdosing, when my body flared up, everything usually went with it. My mood tanked, my patience disappeared, and my thoughts got dark fast. It felt like the disease was always winning. This time it didn’t go that way. I was tired and sore and frustrated sometimes, but I didn’t spiral or lose my head. I didn’t feel swallowed by it. I could just deal with it. 

That was new, and honestly that mattered more to me than anything you could measure on paper. 

I could still show up 

I still did everything I normally do. Muscle activation therapy, meetings, kids’ stuff, travel. Life didn’t slow down just because I stopped microdosing.

If anything, it just reminded me how much the medicine had been quietly helping, because things took a little more effort than they had the last few months. Not worse, just heavier and more noticeable. 

Back in April, before I ever started microdosing, a stretch like this would’ve wrecked me. Bad sleep, pain, stress, travel stacked together like that used to spiral fast, physically and mentally. This time I was just tired. 

There’s a big difference between those two versions of me. 

The day I almost quit 

The hardest day was when we were traveling with the kids the week before Christmas. Bad sleep in a hotel, three kids, walking around the Stockyards most of the day, and by the time evening hit my hip and legs were achy and I just felt like shit. We already had ice skating tickets for that night and I honestly thought about ending the reset early for everyone’s sake. The walk to the rink felt like a lot, and my kids even told me I didn’t have to skate, but I needed to know where I really stood. 

I ended up getting on the ice and skating for over an hour, then walking back to the hotel completely drained. I wasn’t trying to prove anything. I just wanted the truth. And the truth was this: even when my body was struggling, I was still steady mentally. That hasn’t always been the case. 

By the end, I was just ready 

The last couple days weren’t dramatic. I was sore, tired, and honestly just done with the whole thing. Things leveled out a bit. Energy came back a little and the pain eased up some. It didn’t feel like relief. It just felt like I finished what I started. 

The timing honestly sucked. Week before Christmas. Three kids. Travel. Work. Not exactly ideal conditions. But waiting would’ve just meant guessing longer, and I’m done guessing. 

What this actually showed me 

I wasn’t trying to prove anything. I just wanted to see what changed when I stepped away. 

What I saw was pretty simple. The medicine had been helping more than I realized, mostly in quiet, everyday ways that let me live my life without thinking about every step.

But something else became clear too. Even off it, I’m handling this disease better than I used to. I don’t spiral as fast. I don’t get swallowed by bad days. I don’t feel defeated every time my body acts up. I’m steadier and more capable than I was before I ever started any of this. 

And honestly, this whole thing felt more personal than I expected. I thought I was just taking a break to collect some clean data. Instead it felt more like a fast. Like stepping back on purpose so I could actually see what this medicine has been doing for me, not just physically but mentally too. It gave me a different level of respect for it. 

So this isn’t about needing something to function. It’s about recognizing what actually helps. 

And here’s the part that still pisses me off. I knew this reset had an end. I knew I could start again. A lot of people don’t get that choice. They’re told the things that clearly help them have no medical value. They’re told their experience doesn’t count. They’re told to wait while their symptoms don’t. That’s not safety. That’s denial. 

This reset didn’t give me answers. It gave me clarity, respect for the medicine, and a stronger reason to make sure other people get the same chance I did.