'I felt more joy than I thought possible'

I had a mystical experience that included a big multi-coloured light and sound show.

Steve remembers his first dose of the hallucinogenic drug, psilocybin, vividly.

Some scientists are calling it a major step towards a revolution in the treatment of depression after his experience in a clinical trial. The trial is complicated by the fact that the drug is illegal. It is a Schedule 1 controlled substance and its use is strictly regulated.

A Schedule 1 drug is not used for medical purposes. This trial, which scanned the brains of participants after they had been treated with drugs, showed an amazing picture of the effect. The brain scans showed more connections between different brain regions.

The researchers say their findings show how hallucinogenics break a depressed person out of a rut of negative thinking and make them more flexible and connected.

How does it feel to have your brain reintegrated by drugs?

Steve told the radio station that words like the ones they are using are just not enough.

I felt joy like I had never experienced before with the first dose.

He said the second dose was very dark.

More than 30 years ago, Steve was diagnosed with depression.

Traditional antidepressants did not work for him.

Existing drugs increase the levels of a chemical in the brain. Since the 1960s, low levels of the chemical messenger that relays signals from one part of the brain to another has been associated with depression.

The lows and highs of Steve's life were numbed by the antidepressants, but they also made him feel that his life was worthless.

There was no joy in my life when I was taking those drugs.

You end up living like a zombie.

Steve had to come off the drugs. He continued his long-term regime of meditation, yoga and running that he says has helped him to manage his depression all these years.

He called to volunteer after hearing about the new trial on the radio.

I had to wait a year, and the selection criteria were very difficult.

It was important for participants to show that other antidepressants had not been successful in treating their depression, and that they did not have other conditions that could make the use of psychedelics particularly risky.

Steve was given his first dose of the drug under the supervision of a professional therapist.

He said it felt wonderful and he felt more connected to himself.

It took from not knowing myself at all to knowing what my place was in the larger scheme of things.

Brain scans show what Steve felt.

The brains of participants were shown before and after a dose of magic mushroom juice.

The images showed that the brain regions of different people communicate more with each other than before.

Steve said that he had no sense of his brain beingscrambled, but that there was a lot more going on there than he could ever have imagined.

His second experience with the drug was more difficult than the first.

I had to wrestle with my suppressed feelings.

The second session was more useful because I had to deal with things that I had not dealt with before.

Prof Nutt is campaigning for these illegal drugs to be reclassified for research purposes in order to make trials like his less legally complicated - and to enable what he says could be a revolution in the treatment of depression.

Both Steve and Prof Nutt stressed that the drug is not a panacea.

The treatment was combined with professional therapy in the trial. There is ongoing work at the Centre for Psychedelic Research that is focused on developing and testing new therapeutic protocols, ways to combine drug treatment with therapy in order to treat depression in a new way.

The drug is part of a healing process. Steve said it exposes you to different possibilities.

He says that the real work begins after the experience and needs the guidance of a therapist to make it meaningful.

It is one thing developing a drug, but we need protocols to help people like me.

I don't expect to experience anything like it again, but I would not change the experience for anything.

Steve talked to Victoria about the drug trial on the Inside Science show.