By DaisyMae VanValkenburgh-Haftel, VETS Email Marketing Manager + HubSpot Administrator

The beginning of a new year always comes and goes with the same promise: reset, rebuild, start over. For some people, that’s motivating. For a lot of veterans I know, it can feel like a language spoken by someone who has never had to live inside a body that won’t stand down. When your nervous system is stuck on high alert, “fresh start” can sound less like hope and more like pressure. As if you should be able to will your body into being okay. 

That’s why I want to talk about the word we keep hearing lately: access.

It’s become a tidy little phrase in the psychedelic space, the kind people toss into captions and panels like it’s self-explanatory. “We need more access.” “Access is everything.” Sure. But what does that actually mean for a veteran trying to reach care in real life, in real time, while still carrying the day-to-day weight of symptoms, family responsibilities, work, finances, and the very normal fear of being disappointed again?

Because access isn’t just whether something exists. Access is whether you can reach it safely, legally, and with enough support to make it more than a one-time event.

What “Access” Actually Means

If you’ve never had to navigate the mental health system while also trying to hold down a job, keep a family steady, and survive your own symptoms, it’s easy to underestimate how heavy that is. The research, the phone calls, the uncertainty, the fear of getting it wrong. Veterans don’t need another maze. They need a pathway.

Real access includes the things that don’t fit neatly in a headline: 

Legal clarity: Most psychedelic-assisted therapies are still restricted in the U.S. That reality forces veterans into a confusing patchwork of laws and pathways that vary by location and chance over time. Confusion doesn’t just slow people down. It makes them vulnerable to misinformation and risky situations, especially when they’re desperate for relief.

Clinical screening and safety: Psychedelic-assisted therapy is not a casual decision. It involves medical and mental health screening, consideration of contraindications, and careful attention to medications and underlying conditions. Safety protocols matter. Ethical providers matter. This is not the place for shortcuts.

Affordability: Even when legal options exist, cost shuts the door for most people. The expense isn’t just the treatment. It’s travel, lodging, time away from work, childcare, and the ripple effect on a household that is already stretched. Right now, many veterans are effectively priced out of care that the public conversation treats like it’s right there for the taking.

Preparation and integration: This is the part too many conversations skip, and it matters. Preparation is about stability, expectations, and support before treatment. Integration is where the real work often happens after, when insights have to be translated into changes you can actually live with. Without integration, you’re asking someone to carry a heavy experience alone and “figure it out.” That’s not care. That’s abandonment with better branding.

Continuity and community: Veterans are not walking into these experiences as blank slates. Many are carrying trauma, moral injury, grief, identity shifts, hyper-vigilance, and years of being the person who holds it together. Healing is rarely linear. If there isn’t follow-through and community, too many people fall into the gap between the treatment and the rest of their lives. 

The Part Nobody Wants to Say Out Loud: The System Makes It Hard

There’s a reason access keeps coming up. The barriers are real, and they stack.

The legal landscape is complicated. The cost is high. The pathways are confusing. The standards aren’t consistent. And there are people in this space who will happily sell certainty to someone who is suffering. Veterans deserve better than being treated like a market. 

When access is limited, the burden shifts onto the individual. Veterans become their own case managers, researchers, travel coordinators, and advocates while they’re already carrying symptoms that make daily life feel exceedingly difficult. That’s the part that doesn’t show up in a press release. 

And for many families, it’s not just hard. It’s exhausting.

Families Are Not An Afterthought

Partners and spouses often carry the logistics and the emotional weight at the same time. They’re the ones watching the sleepless nights, the irritability that’s really fear, the shutdowns, the cycles of “I’m fine” followed by another crash. They’re also the ones trying to keep life moving while hoping something finally helps.

If we talk about access as if it’s just about the veteran, we miss a major piece of truth. Support needs to include families, too. Not as side characters, but as part of the reality of healing.

What VETS Means When We Say “Access”

VETS is not a treatment provider. We do not administer psychedelic-assisted therapy. What we do is build responsible pathways so veterans aren’t left to navigate this alone.

That means supporting eligible veterans in accessing legal, vetted care options where they exist, and surrounding them with wrap-around support like preparation, integration, peer community, and resources for spouses and families. It also means taking on the bigger fight: changing the system so access isn’t limited to the few who can afford it, organize it, and survive the paperwork and uncertainty.

Because here’s the truth: if access depends on exceptional personal resources, it isn’t access. It’s luck.

Why Research and Policy Are Part of Access, Not Separate From It

This is where VETS’ approach matters. If all we did was fund individual access, we’d still be leaving the broken system intact. Veterans would keep hitting the same barriers year after year.

That’s why we also fund research. Not because veterans can wait, but because veterans shouldn’t have to keep leaving the country or navigating gray areas forever. Research builds the evidence base that makes regulated clinical pathways possible. It helps establish standards, inform clinician training, strengthen safety, and make the case that veterans should be included, not excluded.

And research alone still isn’t enough. Policy is the bridge between evidence and availability. Advocacy is how this moves from “a handful of people who can get help” to “veterans can access safe, regulated care without having to become full-time logistics experts.”

If you care about access, you care about policy. Even if you’ve never called it that.

What “Better Access” Actually Looks Like

When we say we’re fighting for access, we mean concrete things:

A future where veterans can pursue these treatments through regulated, medically supervised pathways, with safety protocols and ethical standards that protect patients.

A future where affordability isn’t the gatekeeper.

A future where preparation and integration support are treated as essential, not optional.

A future where veteran-specific research is funded and veterans are represented in the evidence base.

A future where families aren’t left to carry the load alone.

That’s not a fantasy. It’s a blueprint, and it’s a lot of work ahead. 

What You Can Do Right Now

If you’re a veteran reading this, you don’t owe anyone optimism. You deserve safe options, honest information, and support that doesn’t disappear when the hard part begins. If you’re exploring this path, prioritize medical screening, trustworthy providers, and integration support. Slow is not failure here. Slow can be safe.

If you’re a supporter, your role matters more than you think. You can help fund wrap-around support that makes access real. You can support research that strengthens the case for regulated pathways. You can amplify advocacy that pushes policy forward so this becomes available responsibly, at scale.

Access isn’t a buzzword. It’s the difference between a conversation and a real option.

And veterans deserve real options. 

Help make those options possible. Donate today at vetsolutions.org/donate .