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Anyone can experience anxiety, depression and stress at any point in life. While we all experience feeling anxious, stressed or down at times, these feelings can become so strong or overwhelming that they interfere with everyday life and become too big to cope with alone.

Well4ever in Putney can offer a range of treatments which can help to tackle anxiety, stress and depression. These include but are not limited to: counselling (recommended by the NHS as a way of addressing mental health problems), acupuncture, massage, homeopathy and craniosacral therapy.

Anxiety

Small levels of anxiety can help us respond to challenging situations, for instance preparing for an exam or job interview we may be apprehensive of. It is triggered by our inherent ‘fight, flight or freeze’ instinct, a useful survival mechanism from the days when our ancestors regularly confronted predators. Now however, perceived danger comes from sources we cannot always flee from or fight, like a traffic jam, an overbearing employer, a broken boiler. This makes managing feelings of anxiety much more difficult and if anxiety becomes persistent and does not subside once the apparent threat has disappeared, you may find it affecting your life in negative ways. It may turn trivial, everyday tasks into overwhelming and impossible events.

Anxiety may affect you strongly for a number of reasons ranging from being genetically predisposed, having learnt the behavior as a child or feeling a lack of control over your circumstances, to name a few. There are a number of ways to begin regaining the upper hand over anxiety. Seeing a therapist to talk through your feelings can help you to confront them, understand them and explore ways to cope and reclaim your life in the long term. Some studies have shown that acupuncture may reduce anxiety by acting on brain chemistry, for instance hormone production (eg. serotonin). A massage or craniosacral therapy may help you relax and allow you to feel connected to yourself. All of these and more are available in South West London at Well4ever in SW15.

Depression

Depression occurs in varying degrees of severity and can range from persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness and a loss of joy to feeling that life is no longer worth living. Depression can affect anyone at any time, regardless of whether anything in their life gives them ‘cause’ for depression. It can also develop as the result of a difficult of tragic event in your life, recent or in the past. Alongside the psychological impact, depression can affect how you feel physically, with common symptoms including constant tiredness, difficulty in getting out of bed, aching and sore muscles, difficulty sleeping, loss or gain in appetite, loss of libido.

If you feel depressed, just beginning to tackle the problem can help improve how you feel as you seek ways to cope.

Stress

Stress is a perfect manifestation of how the body and mind are linked. The autonomous nervous system is comprised to two parts: the sympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for switching our bodies into a ‘fight or flight’ response and is activated when we sense a danger or threat. Some examples of how it affects us on the physical level is a release of adrenaline, suppression of hunger, increased heartbeat and dry mouth. All of these occur to better enable us to handle a real threat, such as the need to run, be hyper vigilant and able to ignore other bodily demands such as hunger or cold.The parasympathetic nervous system, on the other hand, is active when the body is relaxed and should be our default mode.

Due to a variety of factors, the sympathetic nervous system can become the ‘default’ running mode of the body, causing an overall negative impact on the body. For example the ‘stress hormone’ cortisol can cause reduced immunity if it is present in the blood for too long and too frequently. Eventually, when the body must endure intense levels of physical stress, perhaps induced by the mind, the cells may start to ‘go on strike’ and refuse to continue functioning normally. Fortunately, it is possible to begin to work together with your body to regain a sense of control over your stress.

References:

  • British Acupuncture Council. Anxiety. Available.