Damariscotta is the sweetest! And pumpkinfest is so fun!

Aw cmon, black bears are just oversized raccoons. Raise your arms and yell and they’ll run terrified.

Have you been to Springfield in the last ten years? Tons of good restaurants, supposedly the highest lgbtq population in the state, right off the highway, and decent housing prices. The biggest complaint you hear about is literally folks drag racing dirt bikes down main lol. I wouldn’t personally send my kids there, but even with schools they’ve improved massively.

You can totally still get houses in that range in western mass, just smaller and not in Amherst or northampton. We have a 4 bedroom in a “good” town, on a cute cul de sac, and I don’t think we could get more than Zillow’s $400k estimate for it. Smaller houses in the same desirable town definitely go between $250-300k. Even in Amherst you can get a tiny house with no yard for $300k.

Amsterdam is the only place outside of clinical trials that are pretty full where you can get psilocybin assisted therapy. Mdma assisted therapy is closer to being legal in the us than psilocybin, but still in the clinical trial stage(and honestly looking like a miracle drug). Ketamine assisted therapy is legal here, but I will say, the only clients I’ve seen it make a difference for are the ones with severe depression and chronic SI. It seems to take away the SI, but still leave folks with moderate to severe depression. Only my personal experience, I’m sure others know of folks who’ve done it and made miraculous recoveries. The cost of enough sessions to make a difference is close enough to where I’d personally save for Amsterdam and give psilocybin assisted a shot instead based on the research for both. The MDMA assisted therapy is really looking like the best option of the three when legal, it seems to help everything under the sun.

Never say never, there’s quite the shortage in this state! A competent clinician with blue hair far exceeds an incompetent one with brown or blonde. However you have to be #blessed to find either with availability right now.

Nah! Therapists can look however. Even community mental health is more accepting than McDonald’s when it comes to appearance. Just wear the requisite cardigan and have a mug of tea on hand and you’re good.

This except the traditions and superstitions are meant for Lunar New year, and have just been copied by westerners.

Greenfield is fine. Heroin is a huge problem in western mass, but really no worse than anywhere else in Mass. Personally, I don’t love Greenfield because it feels out in the middle of nowhere. I prefer Holyoke and it’s central location. We don’t live in Holyoke anymore but that was because our house needed to be de-leaded for children to live there and we wouldn’t have been able to make that cost back. Any city has run down areas.

Amherst isn’t comparable to anywhere else. It’s a weird little bubble, and honestly only worth the high housing cost and taxes if you have school aged kids that will benefit from the school system.

Hatfield is kinda a good compromise town close to northampton but more rural, but housing prices have gone way up in recent years.

Honestly though, if you don’t seek out trouble you’ll be fine. Also, honestly, in this day and age everyone should carry Narcan, it’s free and you could save a life.

It’s incredibly disconcerting that you self disclose having worked for BHN and then talk about people like that. People like you shouldn’t work in MH. Also, SH is gross AF. People of color are treated like crap in SH. That poor girl that killed herself because the kids in the HS were constantly bullying her, and nothing has changed there. SH is so weird in that they shit talk Holyoke and think they’re so much better, as if the heroin epidemic doesn’t cross the river. It’s everywhere.

Also, if we’re labeling someplace the “apex” we should probably go by housing prices not egos, and Amherst and Northampton would win.

Do you know when this got extended until? I have clients that are confused and I didn’t happen to catch an end date.

Siano plumbing! He’s fast and awesome! My kids gummed up our drain with bathtub crayons and a different plumber tried some acids and couldn’t clear it and insisted they would need to cut a hole in the ceiling below and cut out pipes for $$$. Siano came in and cleared it in 15 minutes and cheap. He came highly recommended and was awesome!

Are they still doing them virtually?

Appeal it. They almost always reduce the amount even if they don’t throw it out, and $360 is insane.

The tufts offering is just newer, and it has switched operating groups. Theoretically it’ll get better. Their reimbursement rate is decent.

Ask folks to fill out the out of network form! It’s easy, and tufts has been approving all of them because barely anyone is in network with tufts public.