Allopathic, or traditional, psychiatry has a term it likes to use: biopsychosocial. It refers to the understanding that mental health is determined by biological, psychological, and social factors.
This holistic understanding of mental health, however, has been carved into different specialties by social workers, psychologists, psychotherapists, and psychiatrists, all siloed into their own specific treatment approaches.
For psychiatrists, who have 20 minutes to assess and treat a patient, a pill is generally the treatment of choice. So although psychiatry pays lip service to a holistic understanding of mental health, it has not addressed psychiatric illness holistically.
When I began to learn about functional and energy medicine as an integrative psychiatrist, I learned critical information that helped me to understand how social stressors affect mental health and how to intervene to restabilize patients who have withdrawn from their psychiatric medications. Read on for more insights and stories on this topic! Have a great week!
Understanding How Social Stress Affects Medication Withdrawal and Mental Health
And how to heal it holistically
Isabella, a 35-year-old woman, had just smoothly and successfully come off an antidepressant, mood stabilizer, and an antipsychotic in January 2020, when COVID-19 and job losses hit our country. She was furloughed from work and received unemployment paychecks for several months. During this time, she created a schedule to keep herself busy and productive. It is truly a miracle how well she had been handling the challenges of both her psychiatric medication withdrawal and the stressors of the pandemic.
Just recently, however, she got a call asking her to return to her job the next day. As a manager, she normally had over ten other employees to help her run the store, but this time she only had three people to assist her. She didn't have a protocol to follow and had to face customers' disappointments and criticism. In addition, the riots and looting associated with protests and marches posed real safety risks for her, the staff, and the store. After a few weeks of this, she found herself in tears and gave me a call.
I have encountered situations like this before and knew what Isabella needed to restabilize and restore her well-being. Her supplement regimen was bolstered and increased through an energy testing technique that facilitates the proper dosing of supplements for patients at any given time. In addition, we used both EET + Logosynthesis and the technique called Ask and Receive to reduce her stress and fear. By the end of our 1.5 hour session, she was already feeling stronger and much better.
Her regimen before going back to work:
And her regimen after going back to work:
Please note: these supplement regimens are applicable only to this patient. These patient-specific tables are not intended to provide you with direct medical advice, which should be obtained from your medical doctor.
You can see how social stressors increased many different supplements, even those that had been stopped. The changes reflect Isabella's physical needs for increased nutritional support after experiencing weeks of social stressors.
Her need for increased support in the midst of increased social stressors is simply a part of human biological functioning. When more work is demanded from us, our body hits the gas pedal, and we need more fuel to be more productive.
We also worked on the following therapeutic issues:
taking other customers’ disappointments and frustrations personally.
feeling unsettled and anxious when dealing with uncertainty, or lack of routine and structure.
It has been over a decade since Isabella had to deal with stressors without the buffering effects of medications. These additional social stressors are challenging her to activate old biological functions that have not been fully active for a long time.
Despite these additional challenges, I feel confident that Isabella will continue to flourish and thrive without a need to go back on her medications. This integrative approach will support her through this difficult period of her life, just as it did during her medication withdrawal. I have seen it happen in other patients; one of them was me.
Have a wonderful week!