Gwyneth Paltrow Reveals How MDMA Therapy Transformed Her Bond with Mom Blythe Danner

Gwyneth Paltrow is disclosing how MDMA benefited her bond with her renowned mother Blythe Danner.

During the March 12 installment of her Goop podcast, Paltrow, 52, conversed with friend and writer Amy Griffin regarding her latest memoir The Tell (currently available from The Dial Press), which describes how MDMA therapy aided her in confronting previous trauma.

Griffin’s memoir, which is the March 2025 selection for Oprah’s Book Club, reflects on two decades when suppressed sexual assault trauma began to emerge for the high-profile investor, who has assisted in promoting brands such as Spanx, Goop, Bumble, and Hello Sunshine. After utilizing MDMA, she was able to face repressed recollections of being sexually assaulted by a middle school educator.

During the podcast, the author mentioned that hearing about Paltrow’s favorable experiences with MDMA years ago prompted her to pursue psychedelic-assisted therapy herself.

“I glanced over at you and said… what has changed about you?” Griffin recalls. “There was this tranquility about you. There was this serenity, and I always regarded you as a calm individual anyway, but I think there was this understanding, this serenity. There was a distinct difference because I hadn’t seen you in a few months. And you said, ‘I’ve just had some experiences. I’ve really been introspective and doing some work.'”

Paltrow then disclosed how MDMA helped enhance her connection with Danner, 82.

“That was when I informed you that I had undergone the therapeutic MDMA with the therapist… and I recall you also remarked, ‘Oh, your relationship with your mom is so gentle.’ Remember, you were like, ‘What, what changed? You know, you’re not irritated with your mom any longer.’ And I was like, well, I had this extraordinary experience, and I recounted it to you.”

In 2020, Paltrow initially revealed on Netflix’s The Goop Lab that she had taken MDMA with her then-boyfriend-now-husband Brad Falchuk. The actress characterized the assisted therapy as “a profoundly emotional experience.”

Paltrow recently demonstrated her closeness with the Meet the Parents actress in a TikTok shared on April 25, where she disclosed that she keeps a bottle of her mother’s fragrance in her bathroom.

“I’m a person who truly loves scent, and I’m significantly moved by it,” Paltrow explained while showcasing a large wall of perfumes. “This is the fragrance my mom used to wear. It’s discontinued. It’s Quadrille by Balenciaga, and I keep this little empty bottle because it still carries her scent from when I was a young girl.”