EDGEWATER ACUPUNCTURE - Blog

EDGEWATER ACUPUNCTURE

What To Do For An Acute Injury

2/23/2021

First, what is an acute injury?
It is a fall or bump, like a sprained ankle, that causes swelling or bruising at the site of the injury. Make sure the injury is a strain or sprain, not a break. If you choose to ice the injured area, keep it to the first 24 hours after the injury then switch to heat. There is no evidence ice helps the injury heal faster, at all. Swelling is your body’s way of healing and letting you know that something is wrong. It is normal to have swelling after an injury . Use heat to keep the blood and circulation moving at the site of injury. Ice tightens everything up and prevents blood circulation. If you can bear it, then light stretching can help the injury to heal. Too much rest or total rest will cause muscle atrophy. This causes the injured muscle to become weak. Also, this depends on how severe the injury is! There is a difference between a rolled ankle or a torn tendon.

Techniques to try:
Epsom salt soak

Light stretching - use pain as your guide! Over extending will hurt rather than help.
Wrapping the injury with an ace bandage if you need one
Acupuncture
Natural anti-inflammatories like ginger or turmeric
Arnica gel and pills

Please like this post if you found it helpful. Let us know what your favorite way to heal your body.

3 Ways To Beat Fear & Anxiety

2/9/2021

1) Use logic to slow the anxiety spiral and then find a helper.

Many times putting your irrational fears into words and having a friend talk you through them can help reduce their power. Shedding light on darkness can make a huge difference.

2) Don’t forget your physical body

Sometimes anxiety can show up as physical symptoms. Think headaches, stomach aches, or chest tightness. Take care of your mind and your body by getting regular exercise and practicing mindfulness or breathing techniques and acupuncture. Even when you aren’t experiencing anxiety symptoms practicing these techniques on a regular basis can make managing the symptoms easier when they do show up.

3) Check your sleep

Not enough sleep or poor quality sleep can be an anxiety trigger for a lot of people. Use an evening routine to calm your body down in the evenings to prepare for sleep. Avoid screens or social media surfing 2 hours before bedtime. Try to go to sleep at the same time every night. Keep your bedroom dark, cool and quiet.
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Help For Headaches

1/26/2021

There are many origins for headaches and it is one of the most common complaints treated with acupuncture. During your visit, the acupuncturist will ask you where you feel the headache and how frequently you have them. Depending on the location and how often you have a headache will determine how they are treated. If you are getting headaches quite often the acupuncturist will go over the cause of the headache for example sinus issues, head injury, neck or jaw pain, stress or tension headaches, or migraines. Less talked about causes of headaches can include change in barometric pressure, food allergies, drug side effects, alcohol, skipping meals, lack of sleep, dental problems, or extended periods of screen time. For example, if the headache is located in the back of the head or next to the eye, the acupuncture points would be on the bladder meridians. If the headache was located on the side of the head, the acupuncturist would focus on the gall bladder meridian.
To support headache prevention, aim to stay hydrated by drinking half your body weight in ounces per day. Another area to maintain balance is to get enough sleep! Another remedy to try at home is to place pressure on the back of your head with the tips of your fingers while moving your head up and down and side to side. Doing this for at least thirty seconds combined with neck rolls will help relieve the discomfort of a headache. Other strategies to alleviate headaches would be stress reducing activities such as meditation and mindfulness, acupuncture, exercise, or a hobby such as knitting or crochet. Keeping the body properly fueled by eating regularly while reducing the consumption of alcohol will also alleviate the frequency of headaches.
Please like this post if you found it helpful for you. Share with a friend who suffers from headaches!

What is TMJ? Plus 3 Stretches to Help Jaw Pain

1/12/2021

TMJ stands for temporomandibular joint. It is the joint at the right and left of your jaw, just under your ears. When people say they have “TMJ,” they mean pain and stiffness in the jaw joints and in the jaw itself. What causes this pain? Commonly, when people are very stressed, their muscles tend to become tense and tight. In addition to jaw pain, this muscle tension can cause chronic muscle tightness in the neck and shoulders and lead to headaches. Usually, a tense neck and shoulders accompanies jaw pain. It is common to tense up the neck and shoulder muscles without realizing it! Teeth grinding and clenching is another unconscious stress reaction. Is this you? Being intentional helps to recognize stress and let it go.

You can manage TMJ and jaw pain at home with the use of heating pads, warm compresses, deep breathing, acupuncture, meditation, stretches and self-massage.
Here are 3 stretches you can do for relief.

Chin Tuck. With your shoulders back and chest up, pull your chin straight back, creating a “double-chin”. Hold for three seconds and repeat 10 times.
Massage. Press up on the big muscles on the side of your jaw and slowly open your mouth.
Relaxed Jaw. Place your tongue on the roof of your mouth, just behind your front teeth. Slowly allow your jaws to come apart while keeping your jaw muscles fully relaxed.

One thing to not do is chew gum. Chewing gum can exacerbate the pain and discomfort felt in the jaw.
What difference does this make for you? Please comment below because I would love to know.

All About Neuropathy

12/15/2020

What is neuropathy? Neuropathy is a stabbing, burning or tingling sensation. It can be caused by diabetes, spinal stenosis, chemotherapy, shingles or nerve damage.

Western treatments may include surgery, but generally neuropathy is treated with drugs. Some patients cannot tolerate the side effects of drug treatment or it may be ineffective and they seek out alternative treatments like acupuncture to help the neuropathy and manage the side effects of the drugs. In many cases patients are able to reduce the amount of drugs they are taking and sometimes even stop taking them, completely managing their condition with acupuncture.

Treatment outcomes with acupuncture

In general, the more severe the case the more acupuncture treatment a patient is going to need. Your acupuncturist will discuss your general health, how severe the pain is, how large the affected area is and how long you’ve had the condition. From the acupuncturist’s assessment you will be given a custom treatment plan. Patients who follow the treatment plan exactly get the best results.

Supportive treatment at home includes quitting smoking, getting regular exercise and good sleep habits. Acupuncture can help support you in lifestyle changes like quitting smoking, getting better sleep and starting an exercise routine. Sleep is critical with any chronic condition because when we are sleeping is when the body is healing. Walking, yoga, chair yoga and stretching are great exercises to begin with at home.

Make sure you get yourself some good shoes and treat your body well. Compression socks might be helpful too.

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Accountability Buddies

12/1/2020

Think about the people you spend the most time with. Are they adding to or subtracting from your life? Is there anyone who, after you interact with them, you feel consistently drained or negative? Everyone has bad days, but do you have someone in your life who is always complaining?If you have energy vampires around you, maybe consider addition by subtraction. Sometimes boundaries have to be set for people you interact with to keep them from sucking your emotional energy.

Most of us do not have unlimited energy and we need to be careful how we give our energy away and who we give it to. Be selective with who gets your time. We are the average of the 5 people we spend the most time with. We don’t have control over who we must interact with like family or co-workers or a boss.

The people we spend our time with are important. Its helpful to surround yourself with positive, supportive people especially when you are trying to make a life changes. Having an accountability buddy, someone with similar goals that you can check in with can help you reach your goals. Having a buddy with similar goals can also help protect you when you fall down. When you are also in charge of keeping someone else accountable it helps you stick to your goals, too.

Its also good to take some time to reflect on what kind of friend you are. Are you supportive of your friends? Are you there for them when they need you? Do you emotionally dump on them without giving in return? As women sometimes we have difficulty being direct or asking for what we want. Are you being passive aggressive or are you not feeling heard? There is always room for self-reflection and improvement for all of us.

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Why Drink Water

11/17/2020

I get it. Water tastes bad and it is boring. But before you pour some sugary flavor into your water or drink another diet soda, let me share some awesome things about water. First of all water is plentiful and it is free. It is readily available and it has zero calories. 60% of your body is water and 90% of our blood is water- that is alot of water! The benefits of drinking water, besides keeping you alive, is it helps your skin look fantastic, flushes out toxins, maintains our body temperature and helps digestion. Water also helps maintain blood pressure, helps with asthma and allergies and prevents muscle cramps and soreness.

Are you drinking enough water? Signs of dehydration include thirst, dry mouth, headaches, irritability, trouble concentrating and muscle cramps. Aim to drink ½ your body weight in ounces, more if its hot outside.

To adjust your taste buds, get used to drinking water by diluting other drinks until you get used to it. Once you adjust your taste it is actually delicious. If you are trying to get off of soda try seltzer, a squeeze of lemon or lime or some fresh mint leaves. Comment below with your favorite way to drink water!

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How To Start An Exercise Routine

9/29/2020

Most people start an exercise routine for weight loss, but there are many other benefits. Try to look at exercise as a gift to yourself and weight loss being a nice side effect. It will take the pressure off and make it more fun, and more fun means you are more likely to do it and stick with it.

If you are focused on weight loss, remember all the other reasons exercise is beneficial, this will help you stick to your goals. Exercise relieves stress, lowers the risk of chronic diseases and also provides some much needed “me time”.
Keep it simple and make it fun. Be sure to wear good socks and shoes and make an appointment with yourself. Put it in your calendar. Do it first thing in the morning, on your lunch break or even after dinner. It can be as simple as going on a walk or doing some yoga. If you’re walking or running, consider listening to your favorite music or an audiobook. You can even call a friend to catch up! Other ideas include the tons of videos and classes on YouTube or Zoom for everything from dancing to kickboxing. Aim for 3x a week, but for the first month, just aim to make it a habit. Comment below with your favorite form of exercise!
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1 Weird Immune Boosting Tip

9/8/2020

Actually I’m going to give you more than one because I love to over-deliver for you all. I’m giving these tips not because of Covid-19 but because we can all benefit from making sure our immune system is working optimally. Regular colds, flus and other pathogens are always out there, do what you can to keep your body’s defense system in tip top shape. This doesn’t have to be complicated, try these simple things:

Adequate sleep. For most people this is 7-9 hours a night. To get good sleep shut off your phone and news sources 2 hours before your bedtime and make sure your room is cool and dark.
Regular exercise. Aim for at least 30 minutes 3 times per week. Work up a sweat.
Supplements: fish oil, vitamin D, vitamin C all help to boost the immune system. In my house we do an extra dose at the first sign of any sniffles.
Super foods: live, probiotic and fermented foods like sauerkraut. Avoid sugary yogurt.

What difference does this make for you? Please comment below because I would love to know.

Book Discussion: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

7/28/2020

The most productive use of time and energy is finding something important and meaningful to you to focus on.

We have limited time and energy, use it on what is actually important to you.

Every life has problems, make those good problems.

Finding meaning in your life will give you the motivation and energy to power through your problems.

There is so much information and resources available we don’t know what to give a f*ck about anymore.

The desire for a more positive experience is in itself a negative experience. Acceptance of your negative experience is a positive experience.

Accepting your life as great is the number one thing you can do for your happiness.

Life is short, everyone is going to die including you. You only have a limiting amount of f*cks to give.

Learn how to focus on prioritize your thoughts and energy on your personal values. This is very difficult.

Figure out what your personal values are.

When a person has no problems, the mind automatically finds a way to invent some.

It’s ok for things to suck some of the time.

Problems don’t stop, they are either exchanged or upgraded.

Happiness is found in solving problems, not avoiding them because they are inevitable.

We get extremes of information from the media, especially social media and this skews our view of reality.

Comparison is the thief of joy - Teddy Roosevelt

The person who believes they know everything learns nothing.

People who are terrified of what other people think about they are actually afraid of all the negative things they think about themselves being reflected back at them.

Comment below with your biggest takeaway!