In his timely book, now published, Ronald R. Parks, MPH, MD, examines the impact of COVID-19 or other forms of crisis, loss, or tragedy on individual mental health.
There was no security from a devastating infectious pathogen, quickly crossing permeable national boundaries. The self-conceived bubble of safety and autonomy had burst into the reality of living in a global interconnected population. The impact of one individual potentially effects the health and wellbeing of all on the planet.
If you prefer to listen, a podcast version is available as you go to the full post article.
Does COVID-19 have favorite human hosts that are its preferred place to infect, live, and thrive? If so, what will be the key to the prevention of future infection and recurrences of the sometimes deadly respiratory virus?
Control of such a highly contagious viral illness is unlikely, especially in the short term, as universal compliance with social distancing in our society appears to become more attenuated with time, partisan political ideas, and the degree of confusing information.
The current COVID-19 pandemic is a wake-up call to understand all the contributing factors, and steps needed to protect ourselves and future generations from recurrences and the devastation.
Hopefully, soon, COVID-19 will peak and subsides. Its rapid spread and lethality have had a devastating and tragic effect on the most vulnerable people and the vital infrastructure of our society.
When the final analysis is done, what will be learned and taken away as practical ideas or as more profound wisdom? Some useful areas of interest and inquiry may focus on
with massive destruction and disruptions of lives. The full impact of the storm forced people and communities into survival mode. The process of recovery, the rebuilding of homes and lives begins as the storm moves and resides. For some people, the aftermath of the storm is a time of reflection, self-assessment, prospect taking, and possibly personal transformation.
With her new waitress job, she was able to move into a small rental cottage near a scenic local river. It was the first time she felt some security. She now had a place to call her own, where she could store her meager belongings. Her daughter settled into a new school.
have well proven their value in holistic mental health work for mood, anxiety, addiction, and health issues. Meditation can be an essential tool for happiness and mental health. Enhancement of longevity and decrease in brain aging has also been demonstrated as an added benefit. In many other areas, there are proven benefits as in work, school, athletic performance, sleep, and creativity. The mere awareness in meditation – that thoughts and emotion are of a changing and transient nature – is enlightening for those felt imprisoned by harsh negative thoughts and emotions.
“Hurricanes, Depression, and Recovery” article is a story of one person’s tragedy from severe depression and hurricane losses. Experiencing a larger force of nature brought him not only to a deeper understanding of his life but to healing and recovery. The hurricane calamity also affected the multitude of people living in the same destructive path. The devastating hurricane or a storm can be compared to depressive illness: both need a path to recovery. A story presents one man’s journey of despair and loss, to redemption and healing.
by Ron Parks, MD & edited by Shan Parks
Take the steps for your emotional, mental, and physical health.The failure to get positive results can be from following an inappropriate program for your needs. Consider exploring some complementary or alternative options that can bring positive improvement. The goals of broadening your personal program would be for you to regain optimal health, fitness, and well-being.
The following 10 step can begin your journey:
I encourage you to seek more information. Participate in making choices in any areas concerning your health, especially when there are needs for treatment or intervention. Being proactively involved is essential to improving your health.
Find educational materials or services that may be available from either your current health care providers or in your community. Other sources of information may be from trusted and reliable media sources as the Internet, blog sites, or from printed materials.
Get the help you need. Consultations with other medical or health care practitioners especially those with a more holistic and integrative orientation are recommended.
Rather than a narrow focus, addressing only a few symptoms or one aspect of the entire person— an active, validating, caring, and holistic approach helps the whole person. Selection of a broader, integrative program is essential, in my opinion, for optimal progress and improvement. Click on the following: Integrative psychiatry, medicine, and holistic therapies
The goal would be to eliminate or reduce any contributors that interfere with you being successful with your health and well-being goals.
Significant, “co-occurring” problems in your current life or from unresolved past issues, if unrecognized, may interfere with your health recovery or with your ability to make progress towards your health goals.Some areas that may be missed or ignored, in your health care evaluations or program, that may need attention, are:
Embracing a healthy lifestyle will decrease health problems and offers you the opportunity for improved health and longevity. Awareness and support of the mind, body and spiritual dimensions are essential for wellness, healing, and prevention of illness.
Receive the benefit of support from a holistic practitioner, a group, an educational program, a teacher, or a coach. You are entitled to have the guidance and services needed to feel better and to do better!
Get advice from a holistically oriented nutritionist or health coach. Instead of using prescription and over-the-counter medications which are frequently used to treat symptoms – when drugs are not indicated (check with your holistic health care provider first) – consider natural alternatives and the taking of nutritional supplements such as vitamins, minerals, digestive enzymes, amino acids, essential fatty acids, and herbs. Research first and get good advice from a trusted resource or a holistic health care provider.
Different types of exercise are encouraged per preferences and ability. Extensive research on exercise has confirmed its value in reducing risks of:
Only exercise to your capacity. If you are just not sure where to start or if there is any potential for stroke, heart attack, or other adverse consequences — get an exercise prescription or advice from a health care provider or a personal trainer.
A variety of exercises in your program will give you the best overall training effect and prevent boredom:
Any active movement is helpful and beneficial. There are calming, stress reducing, focusing exercises — like meditation, which can be a fantastic addition to you and your program.
Avoid getting into sleep debt or sleep deprivation (not getting enough sleep). Sleep disturbances have been associated with significant medical problems:
A good start is to reduce stress, over-stimulation, and activity overload. Do meditative or deep relaxation exercises. Improve moods, reduce anxiety and worry. If there is significant mood or anxiety problems, see an appropriate healthcare professional or therapist for assessment and treatment if indicated. See Dr. Parks’ articles at http://ronparksmd.com/ on related topics. If daytime sleepiness or history of loud snoring occurs, see a sleep specialist — as a sleep disorder as sleep apnea may need to be recognized and treated. See, Sleep Disorder article.
These may compromise your recovery or interfere with reaching your health goals. Sometimes imbalances in the body can result in illness or health compromise. Lab work or testing may be indicated as diagnostic tests for:
Overload, sensitivities, or reactivity, to or with toxic environmental substances and chemicals can impair health or hinder recovery. These may be present in air, chemical fumes (perfumes, pesticides, industrial chemicals), soil contamination, or in use of certain pesticides or food additives. There is a growing concern about the use of genetically modified foods. Visit American Academy of Environmental Medicine.
Toxicity in the environment can include “toxic” or irritating relationships, excessive noise, intrusiveness, or disruptions by others as in your workplace or where you live.
Other toxic situations may be the lack of a quiet sleep or rest place, excessive electronic or radio-frequency disturbances and exposure (TV, radios, cell phones, microwave).
Consult with reliable sources of information and with an integrative health care provider who has expertise in the areas of environmental health.
Study, reflect and apply the wisdom from the great world spiritual, religious philosophies, and practices. Allow your personal faith to be an important part of your transformation into a more positive state of health, well-being, and illness recovery.
When stuck, for example, in states of depression or despondency — when traditional mental health service used alone have not helped — surrounding oneself with an inspirational support group can bring about a release from stifling patterns of personal thoughts and beliefs. Shifts can occur towards a better emotional and spiritual attunement and adjustment to life’s demands and conflicts.
Positive outcomes happen in many different types of religious or spiritually oriented support or practice groups. Finding healthy activities – that bring joy, purpose, fulfillment, meaning, and gratification to your daily lives – can open the doors of the spirit and promote health.
What would your first step be to improve your health or recovery?
A friend and colleague invited me to experience saltwater flotation in his Asheville program called Still Point Wellness. “Still Point” not only has a saltwater flotation tank but highly skilled massage therapists, which includes Esalen Massage, yoga therapy, massage workshops, and a Somatic Psychologist. I had experienced a saltwater flotation tank session many years ago when visiting a yoga retreat center earlier in my career as a holistic internist and psychiatrist. My memory of it was pleasant and very relaxing. I was eager to give it another try, especially with my interest in integrative strategies and modalities for health and wellbeing.
There is new hope with the advances in neuroplasticity, neuroscience and its technology to identify, modify or change neuro-circuitry, behavior, responses and reactions. Progress in better understandings of the psychology of the human mind and behavior have contributed to greater success in overcoming what was known previously, which in the past was considered hopeless and beyond the reach of those who had been affected by unrelenting, disabling conditions. The study of other healing methods and traditions, as the 12-Step-Programs for addictions, also has led to more successful integrative treatment programs.
As in the first two steps of 12-Step-Programs, for addiction recovery, there must first be the acceptance of the disease as such, and realization of the impossibility of recovery without profound change. Pursuing treatment on a superficial level for an addiction or any other persistent or chronic illness often fails, such as making limited attempts to make cosmetic changes in one personal way, learned habits, or in the expectation that medication will help. To the person afflicted, life has become unmanageable, and the individual “me” admits to being powerless to make the deep changes needed for recovery. The nature of the illness often has led to feeling hopeless, helpless and powerlessness.
If there comes a realization of the powerlessness to change the existing status quo, the opportunity exists to embrace the insight that there are the greater potentiality and possibilities beyond a person’s individual ways and self-identity. When one can’t find any viable alternatives from the repertoire of prior failed actions and behaviors – one has “hit the wall” or “rock bottom” – survival is threatened, the need to tap into a greater “well of resourcefulness” hopefully becomes apparent. After running out of the “customary” choices for survival, there has to be a willingness to let go of the old and embrace options out of the larger sphere of positive possibilities – turning one’s life over to a “higher power.”
The idea for acceptance of a higher power is confusing to some that come to 12-Step-Programs, who may associate this with earlier life negative religious experiences or associations with an abusive authoritarian or dominating figure, especially if there has been traumatic abuse. Gaining flexibility to explore and invest in behaviors or practices to bring about recovery and transformation is what is needed. When stuck in an inflexible state of a rigid self, one needs to shift from an unproductive personal belief about power and control existing in the limitation of individual development and programming since birth, to the realization that there is much more: a greater potentiality, a higher resource beyond the personal limitations and rigid entrapments.
Arriving at a place of great despair, a “dark night of the soul,” there is a need of letting go of the established, old limiting “ego identity.” Embracing spiritual attunement becomes the only viable option, with an acceptance that there is a greater field of possibilities and potentialities, where love, acceptance, and inclusion prevail. Embracing the essence of being – the higher power – allows for profound empowerment and motivation for the steps required for transformation – restoration of “sanity” as identified in the 2nd of the 12 Steps.
is the experience of personal awakening, beyond the constriction and restriction, set by the trained and programmed part of the mind (the ego) – to a higher level of perception, realization, and functioning. A new developing integrative addiction treatment program in Asheville, NC – Center for Spiritual Emergence (see their website) – describes spiritual emergence as a “natural opening and awakening that many people experience as a result of coming to terms with the difficulties of life, through an established faith tradition, as a result of systematic spiritual practices or through unexpected peak experiences. Spiritual emergences gently allow one to experience and embrace their natural connection to the transcendent domain, forever changing their limiting self-concepts into a more integrative, awakened self”.
as presented by Lawlis in his well-done book – Psychoneuroplasticity Protocols for Addictions (Lawlis et al. 2015) is portrayed as an evidence-based science with restorative, rehabilitation, and transformational tools and applications. PNP is founded on 
developments in neuroscience, neural therapies, rehabilitation medicine, addiction and other integrative approaches to mental health treatments. Though the book focuses on evidence-based treatment approaches for addiction, it is very applicable to the care of other mental health issues and problems and supports the value of integrative approaches and therapies. Brain plasticity is based on the understanding of brain activity, neuronal circuitry, and the ability for the stimulation, modification, retraining, and growth of nerve cells and their complex networks.
can be a disabling condition and a major interference with life and productivity and can act as a barrier to recovery from other mental health condition, including addictions and other health problems. The following can contribute to anxiety or panic like conditions:
Resulting impairment can become chronic with only temporary relief, if any, from drugs or use of substances that could be harmful to one’s health and well-being. Studies of brain waves often will show high-frequency beta waves in localized regions of the brain suggesting increased activation and the need to retrain and repair the brain’s neural networks to more relaxed frequencies and a healthier state. Mental health professionals sometimes will label people as having other mental health conditions or personality disorders, like borderline personality disorders, because they have not been able to grow and mature emotionally. The behaviors and personality may be related to earlier life abuse, persistent severe anxiety, and feelings of being overwhelmed – resulting in resistance or the inability to resolve severe chronic anxiety that blocks healthy development around their families, social network, and peers.
can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which can either be of a simple type where there has only been one major traumatic event or complex where there have been multiple accumulative traumas. A person’s life development can get stuck in a time-relation to an earlier trauma. Integrative type treatment protocols and therapies focusing on treatment of trauma, as those presented by Lawlis (Lawlis et al. 2015) have the potential to bring relief by relieving the emotional connection to trauma memories and supporting positive brain changes and plasticity . The use of neurofeedback type treatments as the BAUD (bioacoustical utilization device) can disrupt the reconsolidation of traumatic memory and has been shown to relieve symptoms of PTSD (RESET Therapy). Relaxation or stress-reducing therapies, music, meditation practices, breathing techniques, nutritional diet, neuro-biofeedback and skill development can be a part of neuroplasticity enhancing protocols. Other sensory or trauma-focused therapies as EMDR, are also utilized to form new and healthy neuro-circuitry and response patterns.
can interfere with recovery and be due a multitude of factors including:
With depression there may be associated: ruminations and obsessional thought, as seen in OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder); anxiety; loss of productivity; feelings of loss of control; loss of interest in things; a downward spiral of increasing depression and development of suicidal thinking, which can lead to loss of life or complication with other medical illness. If suicidal thinking occurs, immediate help should be sought from mental health professionals.
The brain, if studied with EEG brain wave studies in identified areas of the brain, will show a pattern of under activation and low voltage waves. Neuroplasticity focused protocols look for healthy interventions to bring these areas of the nervous system back online and restore responsive feelings, energy, joy and happiness without the individual resorting to using potentially dangerous drugs or chemicals. Intervention may include therapies as noted above including:
can interfere with recovery. These can present as periods of irritability, rage, heightened anxiety, obsessiveness, sleep disturbance, periods of dramatic increase in activity and hyper focus alternating with times of fatigue, depression, loss of motivation and loss of interest in things. These patterns are sometimes labeled as being in the Bipolar Spectrum (see Dr. Parks article) but can also be related to PTSD and prior accumulative trauma. Many of the above-noted treatments and others are considerations to correct altered behavioral pattern, skill deficits, dysfunctional brain patterns, and neuro-circuitry.
