MATTHEW BUTLER

The Villages High School football team searched for answers to no avail all Friday night long.

“My life was a wreck.”He eventually found psychedelic drugs, and he says they changed his life. Butler, who lives in the Salt Lake City suburbs, is among military veterans in several U.S. states helping to persuade lawmakers to study psychedelic mushrooms for therapeutic use. A string of cities have also decriminalized so-called magic mushrooms and an explosion of investment money is flowing into the arena. Oregon is so far the only state to legalize the therapeutic use of psilocybin, the psychedelic active ingredient in certain mushrooms. However, the proposal to study a broad range of psychedelic drugs passed easily this year.

The medicinal use of hallucinogenic mushrooms is making inroads in U.S. states as military veterans advocate for the therapeutic value of psychedelic drugs, including in conservative states like Utah, Texas and Oklahoma.

Matthew Butler spent 27 years in the Army, but it took a day in jail to convince him his post-traumatic stress disorder was out of control. Oregon is so far the only state to legalize the therapeutic use of psilocybin, the psychedelic active ingredient in certain mushrooms.