Being a professional athlete isn’t necessarily what you’d call a casual career. For these competitors, wins and losses determine if you can afford to put food on the table, and flawlessness is oftentimes a requirement. These conditions make prioritizing mental health almost impossible, especially when one is dealing with something like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), a diagnosis that demands precision. Living with OCD almost caused Braden Smith, offensive tackle for the Indianapolis Colts, to retire—then he tried psychedelics.
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OCD “occurs when a person gets caught in a cycle of obsessions and compulsions” that are unwanted, intrusive, and overall draining, according to the International OCD Foundation. Smith recalls having to wash his hands several times and worrying that he’d be cursed if he upset anyone around him as a child.
Last year, he began his journey with his faith, ultimately leading him to deal with religious scrupulosity. This subtype of OCD causes individuals to become “overly concerned that something they thought or did might be a sin or other violation of religious or moral doctrine.” Smith told CNN Sports that he put himself on trial everyday as he considered that God could hear his thoughts—he recalled the difficulty of taking phrases like “Loving God with all your heart, mind, body, and soul” literally, making him reel as he failed to live up to the impossible standard presented by the Bible.
These fixations caused a complete collapse in the 29-year-old, causing constant “mental breakdowns” before games and distraction during them. He began questioning whether God approved of his career because of its seeming purposelessness and violence. During one drive to end a game, his mind told him that he could win, but only if he sold his soul to the devil. He knew then that he had to get help.
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Smith’s journey with psychedelics
After confiding in another teammate with the same condition, Smith was allowed to take the last five games of the 2025 season off to get better, and he went to treatment. After slow progress, his health team recommended that Smith travel to Mexico to try ibogaine and 5-MeO-DMT, psychedelic drugs. The substances are banned in the US, hence his travel to have them administered.
He took the psychedelics in a five-day treatment, starting with the ibogaine, taking a day-long break, then the DMT.
“It opened doors into my mind,” the offensive tackle told CNN. Smith said that he gained greater self-awareness, which allowed him to reduce the thoughts in his mind to just that: thoughts.
“These are obsessions. These fears, they’re not real.”
He said that the ibogaine gave him a “blank slate” with which to rewire his brain, whereas his mind was previously rigid. The substance, despite having promising research results, has not taken off due to risks of serious cardiac effects, as well as nausea and tremors.
There have been many studies suggesting that psychedelic drugs have positive impacts on mental health. RFK Jr. and a group of policymakers are currently on the frontlines for veterans’ right to access psychedelic therapies to treat depression, PTSD, and anxiety. Magic mushroom therapy has been legalized in Oregon, Colorado, and New Mexico. Still, psychedelics are a contentious topic in the States as of now.
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Smith plans to return to football for the 2026 season after the last year and a half of healing. He still has a ways to go, but he “is in a much stronger position to be able to cope with the challenges thrown his way and continue his faith journey.” As psychedelics continue to be considered a legitimate source of medicine, stories like these show that even the physically strongest of us need this field of research.