For the places words have never reached.
Some wounds live beneath language. The Deep Descent is designed to meet them there.
What is The Deep Descent?
The Deep Descent brings together two of the most powerful trauma modalities available — ketamine-assisted psychotherapy and EMDR intensives — in a clinically rigorous, somatically grounded container held by Ashley Hartman.
Ketamine works by creating a temporary window of neuroplasticity — a loosening of the fixed patterns the nervous system has built around old pain. In this window, the defenses that have been necessary relax just enough to allow real contact with what has been protected. Psychotherapy inside that window goes places it simply cannot reach outside it.
EMDR intensives extend the standard 50-minute session into a half-day or full-day container. More time. More depth. More room for the nervous system to move through what it has been carrying — without the weekly interruption of ordinary life pulling you back before the work is complete.
Together, they create conditions for the kind of integration that changes not just how you think about your history, but how you live inside your body now.
The mind can understand for years without the body ever feeling it. The Deep Descent is where the gap finally closes.
A Two-Person Clinical Team
The Deep Descent is held by Ashley Hartman in clinical collaboration with Sarah Tisser, NP, who manages all medical intake, prescriptions, and medical oversight for ketamine work.
Ashley holds the therapeutic container — the preparation sessions before, the psychotherapy during, and the integration work after. Sarah ensures the medical side is handled with care, precision, and full attention to your health history.
You are held by two trained practitioners. Nothing is improvised.
Knowing the Difference
Two containers. One medicine.
Ketamine-Assisted EMDR Therapy
The Deep Descent — Ongoing
Ketamine-Assisted EMDR Therapy is the ongoing form of medicine-supported EMDR work. It is the same clinical approach used in the three-day Intensive — Attachment-Focused EMDR, Internal Family Systems, somatic integration, and the careful clinical use of ketamine — delivered across months in a sustained therapeutic relationship.
It is for those who want the depth of medicine-supported work without the intensive format. And it is for those who have completed an Intensive and want to continue the work in a longer, slower arc.
This format is well-suited to::
- Adults with complex PTSD or developmental trauma who want sustained, ongoing work rather than a contained intensive
- Those who have plateaued in weekly talk therapy and are ready for a depth modality, but want to pace the work over months rather than days
- Clients who have completed a Ketamine-Assisted EMDR Intensive and want to continue the work in an ongoing therapeutic relationship
- Adults whose schedules, finances, or clinical needs make an intensive the wrong shape — even when ketamine-supported EMDR is the right modality
- Clinicians, therapists, and other helping professionals doing their own deep work
This is not appropriate for active substance use disorders, untreated psychosis, certain cardiovascular conditions, or anyone in acute crisis. Medical fit is determined by the prescribing psychiatric provider.
Ketamine-Assisted EMDR Intensives
The Deep Descent
A Ketamine-Assisted EMDR Intensive is a three-day depth protocol for adults whose healing has reached the limits of what weekly therapy can offer.
It is the careful integration of Attachment-Focused EMDR, Internal Family Systems, somatic integration, and the clinical use of ketamine as a medicine that softens the nervous system’s protective architecture — allowing trauma material that has stayed buried to finally come into reach.
This is not a retreat.
This is not a wellness experience.
This is clinical work, held in a therapeutic relationship, with a trauma-trained therapist who has spent over a decade in this terrain.
This work is designed for adults who are:
- Living with complex PTSD or developmental trauma that has not fully resolved in years of weekly therapy
- Carrying treatment-resistant depression or anxiety rooted in early attachment wounds
- Stuck in the gap between knowing and feeling — psychologically aware, doing the work, and still waiting for something to actually shift
- Holding high-functioning trauma responses — perfectionism, hypervigilance, chronic over-functioning, the inability to receive care
- Ready to invest in focused, intensive work rather than another year of weekly sessions
This format is not appropriate for active substance use disorders, untreated psychosis, certain cardiovascular conditions, or anyone in acute crisis. Medical fit is determined through a clinical screening with the prescribing psychiatric provider.
What to Expect
- Consult. We meet. We talk about where you are, what you’re carrying, and whether this is the right container for you. Ashley will be honest.
- Preparation. One or more sessions to orient the nervous system to the work ahead. Set intentions. Build safety and trust in the container.
- Medical Intake. Sarah Tisser, NP completes the medical evaluation, reviews your history, and where appropriate, prescribes the ketamine.
- The Session. The descent itself. Ashley is present throughout — holding the container, tracking your experience, offering therapeutic support as needed.
- Integration. The session opens a door. Integration is how you walk through it. We meet to process what emerged, anchor the insights, and bring them into your daily life.
You might be ready for The Deep Descent if…
You have done years of therapy — good therapy — and still feel like the deepest layer hasn’t been touched.
Your body holds something your mind has already processed, but the charge hasn’t shifted.
You are ready to go somewhere new. Not braver, not more prepared — just ready.
Talk has taken you as far as it can. You are looking for something that goes further.
A Note on Safety
- The Deep Descent is not for everyone, and Ashley will tell you honestly if it is not the right fit.
- Ketamine-assisted psychotherapy is contraindicated for certain medical and psychiatric conditions. The medical intake with Sarah Tisser, NP is a genuine clinical evaluation — not a formality. Your safety is the first consideration, always.
- This is not a recreational experience. It is a clinical one, held within a therapeutic relationship, with preparation and integration as non-negotiable parts of the container.
The Deep Descent is a private pay offering. Pricing is available during the consult conversation and reflects the full arc of care — preparation, the session itself, and integration.
This is not a transaction. It is an investment in the life that is waiting on the other side of what you’ve been carrying.