Alternative Mental Health Treatments: Exploring Your Options
Therapy and medication are important tools in mental health care, but they aren’t the only ways we can support our well-being.
When people think about mental health treatment, psychotherapy and medication are often the first things that come to mind. For good reason. Both can play important roles in treating mental health conditions. However, mental health care has continued to expand, and today there are additional approaches that may complement more familiar forms of treatment.
You may have heard terms like integrative mental health care, complementary therapies, or alternative treatments. You may also have encountered treatments such as neurofeedback or ketamine therapy or practices involving mindfulness, breathwork, spirituality, or other mind-body approaches.
But what do these approaches actually involve? And how do you know whether one might be worth exploring?
Alternative, Complementary, or Integrative?
These terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but they don’t necessarily mean the same thing.
Complementary care generally refers to an approach used alongside conventional treatment.
Alternative care usually refers to something used instead of conventional treatment.
Integrative care brings different approaches together in a coordinated way, based on the individual person’s needs, preferences, health, and circumstances.
At The Lotus Center, integrative is generally the word that best describes our philosophy. We don’t believe everyone needs every kind of treatment. Additionally, exploring an additional approach doesn’t necessarily mean abandoning something that’s already helping you. Instead, we believe it’s valuable to understand the range of options that may be available and have thoughtful conversations about what is appropriate for you.
Here are a few approaches you may be less familiar with.
Neurofeedback: Helping the Brain Practice Regulation
Neurofeedback is a form of biofeedback involving real-time information about patterns of brain activity. At The Lotus Center, we offer Infra-Low=Frequency (ILF) Neurofeedback If you’ve heard the term neurofeedback but haven’t understood what actually happens during a session, asking questions or seeing the process firsthand can be a useful first step.
During a session, sensors placed on the scalp monitor brain activity. That information is used by specialized software to provide feedback to the brain through what the person sees or hears. The process is passive from the client’s perspective. You don’t have to consciously figure out how to change your brain activity or “perform” correctly.
People explore neurofeedback for a variety of concerns, and individual responses can vary. It is not a replacement for every other form of mental health treatment, but it may be considered as one part of a broader care plan. The main feature or benefit of Neurofeedback is that it has the potential to change long-held brain patterns or to retrain the brain’s responses. This would be especially useful for people who struggle with nervous system dysregulation issues such as generalized anxiety or PTSD.
Click here to learn more about ILF Neurofeedback.
Ketamine: A Different Approach to Mental Health Treatment
Ketamine has received considerable attention in mental health care in recent years. Originally used as an anesthetic, ketamine is also used in specific clinical contexts for certain mental health conditions. Esketamine, a related medication marketed as Spravato®, is FDA-approved for certain forms of depression and is administered under medical supervision.
The experience can be quite different from taking a traditional daily psychiatric medication, and there are different forms of ketamine treatment. Some forms of ketamine treatment may also be combined with psychotherapy. This is often referred to as Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy, or KAP.
At The Lotus Center, ketamine-based care begins with appropriate medical evaluation. Treatment isn’t right for everyone, and the type of treatment, preparation, medical monitoring, and integration support can all matter. If you’re curious about ketamine, one of the most useful things you can do is learn what the different forms of treatment involve and have a consultation with a medical provider to see which, if any of them, are right for you.
Click here to learn more about our ketamine therapy options.
Spiritual Care: Making Room for Meaning
Not every struggle we encounter feels like a medical problem. Sometimes we’re wrestling with questions.
Who am I now?
How do I make sense of what happened?
What do I believe?
How do I live with a loss I can’t change?
What gives my life meaning?
These questions can become especially significant during grief, illness, major transitions, or periods when our familiar sense of identity has been disrupted. Traditional therapy can be helpful with these questions, but additionally, spiritual care creates space to specifically explore questions of meaning, purpose, connection, identity, and belief.
And spirituality doesn’t have to mean religion. For some people, spirituality is connected to a religious tradition. For others, it may be experienced through nature, creativity, relationships, ritual, community, or a sense of connection to something larger than themselves.
At The Lotus Center, spiritual care may include individual conversations as well as experiences such as guided Drum Journeys that use rhythm, imagery, and reflection as invitations for personal exploration. There doesn’t always have to be a problem to solve. Sometimes there is value simply in creating space to listen inwardly.
Click here to learn more about our spiritual care options.
Mindfulness and Breathwork: Working With Attention and Experience
Mindfulness is often described as a relaxation technique, but relaxation isn’t necessarily the goal. At its simplest, mindfulness involves paying attention to what is happening in the present moment with greater awareness and less automatic judgment. That might mean noticing a thought without immediately believing it, becoming aware of sensations in the body, or simply recognizing that your attention has wandered and bringing it back.
Breathwork encompasses a range of practices that intentionally work with breathing patterns. Different approaches can create very different experiences, which is one reason guidance and appropriate screening can be important.
Both mindfulness and breath-based practices can offer opportunities to become more aware of our internal experience. These practices can sometimes become tools we carry into everyday life.
Click here to learn more about our approach to mindfulness.
How Do You Know What’s Right for You?
With so many approaches available, it’s tempting to ask: Which one works best?
But there may not be one answer that applies to everyone. A better set of questions might be:
What am I hoping to address?
What evidence exists for this approach for my particular concern?
What are the potential benefits, risks, and limitations?
How might it fit with the care I’m already receiving?
Does this approach feel consistent with my preferences and values?
It’s also worth being cautious of any treatment—conventional or alternative—that promises to work for everyone or claims to solve a long list of unrelated problems. Good care should leave room for questions.
Expanding the Mental Health Toolbox
Integrative mental health care isn’t about collecting as many treatments as possible. It’s about recognizing that people are different. One person may benefit tremendously from psychotherapy. Another may need medication. Someone else may find that neurofeedback complements the work they’re already doing. A person navigating grief may need a place to explore meaning rather than another strategy for managing uncomfortable feelings. And for some people, several forms of support may work together.
The goal isn’t to find the most unusual treatment. It’s to find appropriate care for the person receiving it. At The Lotus Center, we’re interested in expanding the mental health toolbox while remaining thoughtful about how and when different tools are used. If there’s an approach you’ve been curious about, start by asking questions. You don’t have to know whether something is right for you before learning more about it. Curiosity is a great first step.
Explore Integrative Care at The Lotus Center
The Lotus Center offers psychotherapy, medication management, ILF neurofeedback, ketamine-based care, spiritual care, mindfulness and breathwork, along with additional medical and wellness services. If you’re already a TLC client, talk with your provider about approaches you’re curious about and whether they may be appropriate to explore. You can also learn more about our services and Areas of Support.
