Mental Emotional Issues

If you are dealing with anxiety, depression or other mental health challenges, you are not alone. The good news is that there are solutions that are often very helpful in relieving mental suffering.

We are, as a society, dealing with epidemic levels of anxiety, depression and other mental health issues. I see it in my practice every day – more and more people are coming in looking for natural, drug-free treatment approaches to their mental health challenges.

Chinese medicine has many tools to help balance your mind and overcome depression and anxiety. These include acupuncture and herbal medicine as well as qi gong exercises and breathing techniques. They are, when skillfully used, very effective in helping relax body and mind to treat anxiety and depression. They also correct the underlying imbalances that contribute to challenging mental states in the first place, while also giving you greater resilience and strength to deal with the ups and downs of life.

My experience treating anxiety and depression is that they usually respond well to treatment. Often, my patients will experience relief or at least an improvement in their pyschological state by the end of their first acupuncture session, though sometimes it can take a few treatments to see lasting effects. It is rare, though, that patients don’t feel noticeable improvement within the first two to four weeks.

The key to this lasting improvement is the holistic approach of Chinese medicine, which looks at body and mind as two aspects of one system. From the Chinese point of view, we need to have a healthy and balanced body to have a healthy and balanced mind, and vice versa. I always treat whatever pattern of disharmony is appearing, along with whatever symptoms it’s causing in both body and mind.

As a new patient, I will ask you to complete an intake that includes your symptom picture and health history along with a detailed analysis of other factors that can affect our mental health – sleep and exercise patterns, diet and nutrition as well as stress levels. I then create a treatment plan that can include acupuncture, herbal medicine along with lifestyle, qi gong exercises and dietary suggestions.

How does Chinese medicine work to improve our mental health? Both depression and anxiety, for example, don’t allow energy to flow well in our bodies, leading to both physical and mental tension. They also sap our energy, leaving us depleted and exhausted. Once this happens, we have fewer reserves to deal with the next challenge that life brings and negative mental states will affect us more quickly and deeply. In this way, it can become a negative feedback loop, as habitual stress and depression sap us of vitality and resilience, leading to more stress and depression, and so on.

Acupuncture helps as it very powerfully frees up this stuck energy and helps to restore its proper, healthy flow. Herbs can also help the freeflow of energy while also calming our minds and boosting our energy and vitality. The combination of the two modalities means that our mental state becomes more relaxed while our bodies and mind become stronger and more resilient.

Anxiety and depression can feel like they will last forever when we are in their grip, but please don’t believe this. It simply isn’t true. There are Chinese medical treatment approaches that can be very effective in leading a happier, more relaxed life. If you’d like to find out how I can help you, please reach out or book an appointment in either my Collingwood or Meaford clinics using the buttons below.