If you’re struggling with addiction, it’s easy to think it’s all just about getting over the physical toll that substances take on your body. Or maybe your focus instead is on the mental hurdle of succumbing to the desire to numb unwanted emotions or feelings. However, addiction impacts both your body and mind. That’s why we emphasize the mind-body connection in our addiction treatment process here at Defining Wellness Centers, as it allows us to not just address symptoms but to facilitate whole-person healing. One of the ways we do this is through vibroacoustic therapy.
Unpacking the Mind-Body Connection
The concept of the mind-body connection may seem abstract. What goes on inside your mind may feel wholly separate from the inner workings of your physical body. But when you think about it for a moment, it’s clear how mental health affects physical health in some common ways. For example, has your stomach ever started to bother you after feeling anxious? Maybe your heart began to beat faster as well. Or, if you were nervous or embarrassed about something, have you ever started to perspire? These situations are examples of the mind-body connection in action.
Your mind-body connection means that thoughts, feelings, beliefs, or attitudes can both positively and negatively affect your biological functioning, according to the University of Minnesota. On the other hand, what you do with your physical body (eating, sleeping, exercising, etc.) can influence your mental health positively and negatively. Your body and mind actually have a complex, interrelated relationship.
This unique connection is not just experiential or anecdotal. Research actually backs it up. A study by the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis shows that parts of the brain that control movement are also involved in brain networks responsible for thinking and planning. These areas also control involuntary bodily functions like blood pressure and heartbeat. Other studies have found that our mental state, such as when we’re stressed out, can influence organ function, decrease immunity by diminishing white blood cell response, and affect the speed in which our body heals.
Addressing the Body and Mind in Addiction Treatment
Considering how the body and mind are very much intertwined, addressing the mind-body connection in addiction treatment and recovery is key to achieving lasting healing and sobriety. You cannot expect to heal if you only address the physical symptoms of addiction yet leave your mental, emotional, and spiritual health untreated. A whole-person treatment approach will factor in how mental health affects physical health related to addiction and how physical health affects mental health.
For example, if you’ve been struggling with anxiety or depression, not only are you in a poorer mental state to navigate the rigors of addiction treatment, but you may also be struggling with headaches or fatigue as a result of your mental health. This only makes your recovery journey even more challenging. And when you think about how trauma impacts the brain, the lingering effects of trauma can make negative thoughts and emotions more challenging to cope with in a healthy way. That’s why addiction treatment centers like Defining Wellness aim to focus on treating the root causes of addiction, which are usually based in trauma or mental health issues, in addition to your physical symptoms.
At the same time, addressing your physical health in the addiction treatment process can make the mental health aspects of recovery more doable. Incorporating physical fitness and nutrition into addiction treatment helps to improve your energy and endurance, boost your mood, and simultaneously reduce stress. Exercising and eating healthy can also lower cravings, increase your self-esteem, and improve your overall well-being. All of this combines to help you stay the course to face the challenges of treatment and recovery, without falling back into relapse.
Understanding Somatic Therapies
One of the primary ways that holistic addiction treatment centers address the mind-body connection during treatment is through somatic therapies. This form of therapy is based on the idea that your body holds and expresses experiences and emotions, according to Harvard Health Publishing, meaning that trauma or unresolved emotional challenges can get trapped inside. When you participate in somatic therapies, your treatment team will work with you to release any pent-up, hurtful emotions inside your body through various techniques, such as:
- Body awareness, which helps you recognize areas of tension
- Pendulation, which guides you through challenging emotions to a relaxed state
- Titration, which helps you note and address physical sensations that arise during traumatic memories
- Resourcing, which equips you to recall special people and places that evoke feelings of safety and calm
Yet among the various somatic therapy techniques, vibroacoustic therapy can often be one of the most impactful. But what is vibroacoustic therapy and how can it help you overcome addiction?
What is Vibroacoustic Therapy?
Vibroacoustic therapy (VAT) is essentially holistic sound healing treatment. When you’re struggling with addiction, your body’s nervous system is likely out of balance due to addiction’s root causes, such as the lingering effects of trauma or mental health issues. That means you struggle to manage these stressors effectively. Vibroacoustic therapy helps to restore balance to your nervous system using pure tone vibrations, called pulsed frequency sine waves, to encourage relaxation, a sense of calm, and more. Different frequency ranges (measured in hertz) can promote whole-person healing in various ways, such as:
- 40 Hz stimulates blood circulation, reduces muscle spasms, and improves sleep
- 50 Hz alleviates symptoms of asthma, cystic fibrosis, and COPD
- 52 Hz relieves lower back pain and menstrual cramps, as well as softens scar tissue
- 68 Hz reduces neck and shoulder muscle tension
During the vibroacoustic therapy process, you sit on a special recliner embedded with a transducer to deliver the vibroacoustic sound waves. These sounds and vibrations combine to create an immersive experience that impacts both the body and mind together. Not only can you experience clarity and euphoria, but you can also achieve relaxation and restore calm as your nervous system (which controls your fight-or-flight response associated with trauma) resets.
The Benefits of Vibroacoustic Therapy for Overcoming Addiction
When you’re struggling with addiction, your body and mind are impaired. You may be irritable, stressed out or easily angered, for example. Your addiction symptoms may have led you to feel anxious or unable to concentrate and stay on task; on the other hand, you may also struggle to make good decisions. Considering the context of your addiction challenges, the relaxing sounds of vibroacoustic therapy can provide a number of benefits for your recovery journey, including:
- Reducing stress, anger, and agitation
- Alleviating anxious feelings
- Stimulating your ability to focus and concentrate
- Reducing muscle tension and inflammation
- Improving sleep quality
- Increasing feelings of happiness
- Lowering blood pressure
- Supporting your lymphatic system, which eliminates toxins from your body
- Promoting better emotional well-being
Additional Mind-Body Connection Therapies in Addiction Recovery
What makes vibroacoustic therapy so impactful is its ability to integrate well into other therapies that emphasize the mind-body connection in the addiction treatment process. As a result, you can experience holistic treatment that addresses your mind, body, and spirit. Some additional mind-body connection therapies we use here at Defining Wellness Centers include:
EMDR Therapy for Anxiety
EMDR, aka eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, is a therapy that encourages you to focus briefly on a traumatic memory while simultaneously experiencing bilateral stimulation, typically through eye movements or rhythmic tapping. But just how does EMDR work? That process of eye movement or trapping can help reduce the vividness and emotion related to traumatic memories, according to the EMDR International Association (EMDRIA). While in addiction treatment, you may not seek out EMDR for anxiety, but it’s true that EMDR helps resolve unprocessed traumatic memories in your brain, improving co-occurring mental health issues like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and anxiety disorders. EMDR can also help you heal the root causes that are driving your addictive behaviors in the first place.
Daily Meditation
Regularly practicing meditation and mindfulness can help you clear your mind so you can focus and remain in the present moment. Our therapy team partners with you to provide guided meditation for anxiety, depression, or other issues. This meditation for mental health process may involve doing a self-scan of your body’s physical sensations, repeating specific phrases, or concentrating on a question for a certain amount of time. As a result, you’re able to achieve better mental clarity, as well as overcome emotional barriers in the recovery journey.
Breathwork
Rooted in practices that date back thousands of years, breathwork therapy involves various breathing exercises and techniques aimed at controlling your breathing for the benefit of your physical, mental, and emotional health. These exercises typically involve breathing deeply or holding your breath for extended periods of time. The benefits of breathwork in addiction recovery include reduced anxiety and stress, greater mental focus, and improved emotional regulation.
Achieve Whole-Person Healing at Defining Wellness Centers
When you participate in addiction treatment that addresses your body and mind, you’re more likely to achieve lasting recovery. At Defining Wellness Centers in Mississippi, we utilize both evidence-based practices and mind-body connection approaches like vibroacoustic therapy to treat you as a whole person. If you’re ready to heal your addiction and your whole self, call our team today to get started.
