Ketamine Assisted Couples Intensive Retreat
December 4-6 2026
The Porches Inn at Mass MoCA, MA
A 3 day Group Ketamine Retreat for Couples for connection and communication
Accelerate your relationship growth and evolution!
Sapience, in partnership with The Couples Center of Pioneer Valley, is offering this 3-day Couples intensive Retreat in The Berkshires, MA
This retreat is for couples who want to:
Rediscover play, connection and joy in their partnership through the exploration of the Ketamine space
Undertake honest confrontation of self and develop curiosity toward partner
Move through defensive blocks and well-rehearsed projections
Transcend narratives about what is possible for “us”
Grow new emotional muscle and empathy
Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP) allows couples to support one another through a transformative healing process that can interrupt negative reactive patterns, increase personal accountability and enhance emotional intimacy in their partnership. In addition, KAP reduces trauma response, increases self-awareness and improves emotional regulation.
Using Ketamine has the powerful potential to create deeper and more rapid growth and healing in couples who have been stuck for some time. Sometimes described as a “lubricant” for the release of defensiveness and anxiety, Ketamine is a tool that can provide a steppingstone toward shifts that might otherwise take years to achieve.
The Couple’s Retreat includes more than 20 hours of interactive and experiential work for your relationship in a single retreat. Through didactic and experiential modules, and two Ketamine journeys, couples will learn to navigate the complex, vulnerable, and transformative terrain of emotional intimacy, and get to play and explore in the medicine. The Developmental Model of Couples Therapy is a powerful accompaniment to the facilitation of KAP. The model incorporates three main pillars: differentiation theory, attachment theory and neuroscience. The aim of the Developmental Model is to help each partner to understand the way that attachment, level of differentiation and hardwired conditioning are showing up in the ways they relate to each, both in the bedroom, and outside of it.
By learning more adaptive defense strategies and flexing new emotional muscle around vulnerability, truth telling and boundary setting, many of the destructive cycles that create, exacerbate or maintain sexual difficulties, emotional separation and suffering are diminished. Through Ketamine journeys, couples will learn to experience and express emotionally complex desires and feelings and hold space for their partners to do the same, enhancing the vitality in their connection.
The Developmental Model, coupled with medically administered Ketamine, allows each partner to more fully self-define and assess to what degree they are living in alignment with their own values, become vulnerable in the expression of their desires, identify defenses and choose more adaptive coping strategies to face their partner’s and their own feelings.
The Couples Retreat will be held at the cozy and historical Porches Inn, across from MASS MoCA, in North Adams, MA, a beloved destination for couples seeking a whimsical and warm getaway. Porches has been welcoming couples to its beautifully detailed 19th Century Victorian row houses since its inception in 2001. Couples will have a choice of eclectic accommodations and access to the Inn's amenities. Retreat activities will take place in Studio 9, an intimate state of the art venue, situated on the Porches Inn campus.
Join us for a deeply transformative journey.
Retreat Details
Dates: 12/04/2026 - 12/06/2026, a three day intensive
Location: The Couples Retreat will be held at the cozy and historical Porches Inn, across from MASS MoCA, in North Adams, MA, a beloved destination for couples seeking a whimsical and warm getaway. Porches has been welcoming couples to its beautifully detailed 19th Century Victorian row houses since its inception in 2001. Couples will have a choice of eclectic accommodations and access to the Inn's amenities. Retreat activities will take place in Studio 9, an intimate state of the art venue, situated on the Porches Inn campus.
Number of Couples: Our retreat is intended to be an intimate group experience, and we are limiting participation to 11 eligible couples
Sessions: Two Ketamine sessions, one low dose session done together, and one moderate-high dose, with partners holding space and witnessing for one another
Cost: $200 non-refundable application fee per couple due upon submitting the application.
The total tuition for the retreat is $4,300, and includes:
Medical and psych evaluation, Medicine prescriptions, Retreat Intensive curriculum and events, most meals
Applying couples will be asked to provide a credit card or other payment method on file and consent to charging payments as below
$200 at the time of application, along with providing card on file.
$2,150 due at the time of psych evaluation
$2,150 due at the time of medical evaluation
Room and board is not included in the cost. Porches is an historical inn and has beautiful accommodations; attendees at this retreat can receive 10% off of their stay by calling and asking for the “Sapience Therapy” discount for this weekend. There are also several other boutique inns in town.
Cancellation policy:
All deposits and fees are non-refundable, with the exception of a cancelled application due to being screened out by the organizers. Completed appointments, deposits and payments will be otherwise non refundable.
Complete acceptance is based on passing both the psychological and medical evaluations. By the completion of both evaluations, full payment for the retreat will have been collected.
Please note the payment method on file will be charged according to above-mentioned timeline.
A 50% refund may be requested ($2,150) for the tuition payment if cancelling 4 months/120 days prior to the retreat start date. Please note all fees are non-refundable beyond this date.
In case of medical emergency, we are happy to discuss offering a spot at a future retreat offering.
Application process:
Each partner must fill out an application form to be considered. Initial application fee of $200 is due at this time.
Upon receipt, psychological evaluations will be scheduled with Dr. Gilman. 2nd Installment is due at time of booking psychological evaluations with Dr. Gilman, which is $2,150.
This cost is non-refundable unless couple does not pass psychological or medical evaluations, as determined by Dr. Gilman and Dr. Scott.
After couple passes psychological evaluations, they will be scheduled for medical evaluations with Dr. Scott within three weeks. Upon completing the medical evaulations, 3rd installment of the deposit, $2,150.
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Donna Gilman, Psy.D. is a clinical psychologist and Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Couples Center of the Pioneer Valley, a comprehensive specialty treatment center serving couples regionally, nationally and internationally. She specializes in couples therapy, with concentrations in trauma-informed treatment, sex therapy, neurodiverse partnerships, affair recovery, non-monogamy, psycho-spiritual integration and LGBTQIA issues.
Dr. Gilman has taught advanced couples therapy, trained and supervised clinicians and clinical interns in private and community practice, graduate academic settings, and through an appointment with Tufts University, since 1995.
Although Ellyn Bader’s Developmental Model of Couples Therapy is the predominant model from which Dr. Gilman works, she integrates strategies from several models, including Internal Family Systems, Gottman, EFT, solution-focused and narrative therapy. She also integrates mindfulness-based techniques and is trained in clinical hypnosis and the integration of spirituality counseling. The majority of her clinical work today takes place in private and group retreat spaces.
Dr. Gilman is passionate about the facilitation and integration of Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP) with couples and individuals. She has completed KAP training with Sapience in Greenfield and has witnessed first hand the incredible healing that Ketamine can provide. In addition to reducing trauma response, increasing self awareness and improving affect regulation in individuals, KAP allows couples to support one another through a transformative healing process that can interrupt negative reactive patterns, eliminate gridlock, increase personal accountability and enhance emotional and sexual intimacy in their partnership.
Specialization in Trauma Treatment
In addition to KAP, Dr. Gilman is well versed in several trauma-informed and energy psychology modalities to transform and release trauma, such as Emotional Freedom Technique, Emotional Trauma Release, Somato-Emotional Release, Psychodrama and Gestalt work.
Couples and Sexuality
Dr. Gilman has a passion for working with couples around emotional and sexual functioning and intimacy, incorporating the three main pillars of the Developmental Model, differentiation theory, attachment theory and neuroscience. It is her goal to help couples navigate the complex, vulnerable and transformative, terrain of emotional and sexual intimacy issues.
She views emotional and sexual intimacy as different sides of the same coin, and understands that while most adults long for greater connection, few have the emotional muscle necessary to create and sustain intimacy. She sees her role as helping each partner to more fully self define, including assessing to what degree each partner is living in alignment with his/her/their own values, become more vulnerable in the expression of their wants needs and desires, learn to emotionally accept and manage difference, set and maintain boundaries, identify defenses, lower their reactivity, regulate their anxiety, and choose more adaptive coping strategies in order to face his/her/their own and their partner's feelings.
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Karen Scott, MD is passionate about the promise of psychedelic medicines to help people find psychological healing and facilitate personal and spiritual growth. She is board certified in internal medicine with 20 years of clinical practice experience, including working in hospital medicine as well as addiction treatment. She has post-graduate training in ketamine assisted psychotherapy, psychedelic integration therapy, and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, and holds a certificate in psychedelic therapies and research from the California Institute of Integral Studies. Dr. Scott believes that all people have within them the capacity for wholeness, and that access to this innate healing capacity can be facilitated by the use of consciousness technologies including (but not limited to) psychedelic medicines.
Dr. Scott is a long time practitioner of meditation, and holds with reverence the knowledge that all life is an interconnected whole. She aspires to embody integrity and compassion in all her actions. She believes that our natural state prior to trauma and adversity is inner peace, and that it is the birthright of all people to experience this peace in daily life
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Founder of Sapience Therapy LLC. Practicing Internal Medicine Physician. Trained in Ketamine assisted psychotherapy. Graduate of Center of psychedelic therapy and research program at California Institute of Integral Studies. Passionate about education and research in the field of psychedelic medicine. Focused in studying the neurophysiology and neuropharmacology of psychedelics.
She is the principal investigator in the first large scale KAP data project, studying safety, efficacy and treatment outcomes in multiple ketamine clinics across the country. She is a Yoga Alliance certified teacher of vinyasa and restorative yoga and is trained in trauma informed yoga. She holds a certificate in ayurvedic nutrition, mind-body medicine and guided imagery. Her focus in healing is aligning body, mind and spirit through holistic nutrition, movement, rituals and grounding.
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Ketamine is a dissociative anesthetic drug which, in sub-anesthetic doses, creates an altered state of consciousness which can vary from a mild state of relaxation and openness at a low dose, to a profoundly psychedelic or mystical state at a higher dose. Ketamine is used off-label in the treatment of depression, PTSD and other mental health conditions. Ketamine is known for its ability to engender neuroplasticity and facilitate increased cognitive flexibility. In this retreat, participants will utilize the neuroplasticity of the ketamine state to enhance their loving connection to self and partner. Each participant will have the opportunity to have two facilitated ketamine experiences themselves - one in a low dose together with their partner, and one in which partners take turns either taking medicine or “holding space” for their partner in the medicine, with robust staff support throughout.
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Not at all! Everyone facilitating this retreat has extensive experience assisting people in engaging in altered state work for the first time. In fact, the first time can often be the most transformative, if carefully facilitated, and this retreat is designed to maximize benefit in a fully supported, safe environment.
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During the low dose session, you and your partner will take the medicine together, and share the altered state experience, during which time you may feel less defended, more connected, more open and curious, and able to be present with each other in a more authentic way. During the high dose session, you will take turns taking the medicine, and acting as a sitter for your partner during their medicine experience, which most couples report is equally as intimate and intense as the shared experience. Each couple will have a dedicated staff sitter during all sessions as well. The higher dose experience can be quite deep and immersive, and those who desire to do so may choose a dose which can potentially facilitate a full mystical experience. The ketamine experience is different each time and can’t be predicted in advance; however each participant can feel confident in the fact that this robustly staffed retreat offers complete safety and support for each individual and couple to explore as deeply as they feel called to during this unique weekend.
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When used in a therapeutic, controlled environment, ketamine is not addictive. While ketamine addiction does occur, this is generally in the setting of street ketamine use. Unlike opiates or stimulants, ketamine does not tend to rewire the dopamine reward system in such a way as to cause craving or compulsive use. Our facilitators will ensure that the use of ketamine is done responsibly and within the therapeutic context of the retreat.
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If you have a mental health diagnosis, it's important to let us know in advance, so we can assess whether ketamine is appropriate for you. In many cases, ketamine has been shown to be helpful for individuals with mental health issues, but it’s essential that our facilitators are aware of your history to ensure a safe and supportive experience. You will be asked to complete a thorough medical/psychological intake screening form at the time of application, and will have thorough intake zoom sessions with Drs. Scott and Gilman prior to final acceptance, and your honest answers will allow us to create a safe and supportive experience for you.
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Yes, there are certain medical conditions that may contraindicate ketamine use, such as:
Severe heart conditions or uncontrolled high blood pressure despite medications
Aneurysm or history of hemorrhagic stroke
History of psychosis or schizophrenia
Active substance abuse disorder
Certain neurological disorders
If you have any concerns or significant medical conditions, please share them with us beforehand so we can determine whether this retreat is right for you. If you are not certain whether you may have a disqualifying condition, please reach out to our team at info@sapiencetherapy.com prior to paying for your intake sessions.
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Profound experiences can bring joy and delight, or uncertainty and change, or both. Our team is experienced in the full spectrum of possible post-retreat effects and will offer teaching on a variety of integration practices. We strongly encourage all participants to attend the post-retreat integration zoom session. Our facilitators are available for additional guidance as needed to help you integrate your experiences. Sapience offers low cost ongoing integration sessions if needed as well as resources for finding a therapist.
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First, both partners will fill out their own separate application, which covers the medical and psychological screening questions which might be potentially disqualifying. If you are able to answer “no” to these questions (and are being fully truthful) you will very likely be accepted to the retreat and may proceed to paying the deposit and intake fees.
If you answer “yes” to the medical or psychological screening questions, please still do submit the application, and feel free to reach out for confirmation that your answers do not disqualify you, prior to paying the fees. Please note that a “yes” answer to any of these questions does not necessarily mean that you are not eligible for this retreat. Most people will be eligible even with a “yes” answer; we simply invite you to check to avoid any lost deposit money, if you have any questions about your eligibility.
Once you have submitted your application, the following steps and payment instructions apply to each couple’s onboarding process.
You will place a credit card on hold and pay the $200 nonrefundable application fee (one per couple). This payment can be made here.
Your applications will be reviewed by the team.
Once cleared, you will be offered booking links to schedule your psych and med intake visits.
You will pay 2nd installment of $2,150 at the time of booking psych intake
You will schedule two intakes per couple, one with Dr. Gilman for psychological screening and one with Dr. Scott for medical screening.
You will attend the intake sessions. Questions about the retreat, overview of the process and other details will be provided at these appointments, at which both partners must be present.
If not accepted to the retreat after intake, no further fees are due; if one intake is not yet completed you will receive a refund of the fee for that intake.
Once medical and psych evaluations are done and accepted, you will be charged the 3rd and final installment of $2,150
Payments, by default, will be taken from the card on file and subject to an additional 3% processing fee. To avoid paying these fees, payment may be arranged via Zelle or check, to be received on the timetable above.
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All deposits and fees are non-refundable, with the exception of a cancelled application due to being screened out by the organizers. Completed appointments, deposits and payments will be otherwise non refundable.
Complete acceptance is based on passing both the psychological and medical evaluations. By the completion of both evaluations, full payment for the retreat will have been collected.
Complete payment including tuition and medication costs is due in full upon successful completion of medical and psych evaluations. Please note the payment method on file will be charged according to the above-mentioned timeline.
A 50% refund may be requested for the tuition payment if cancelling 4 months/120 days prior to the retreat start date. Please note all fees are non-refundable beyond this date.
In case of medical emergency, we are happy to discuss offering a spot at a future retreat offering.
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Participants will be expected to perform a rapid covid test at home within 24 hours of arrival. Participants are also expected to avoid large gatherings and take all precautions necessary in the 10 days prior to the retreat to avoid being exposed to Covid or flu. Masking will not be expected on site, but will be allowed if preferred by a participant.