The Importance of Wellness Routines.

The Importance of Wellness Routines

Moving into the end of the year, most of us are throwing our wellness routines to the wayside as we take on more social obligations. We’re pulled out of our day-to-day routines, and we begin to feel more wear and tear on the body; aches and pains in our joints, back pain, frequent headaches, brain fog with scattered thoughts, seasonal weight gain, and fatigue with irritability.

We find ourselves feeling sluggish and disconnected from our normal state of mind & body. It can feel like our body is failing us. All while trying to hold it together for the next event!

Imbalances in the body are caused by what we call the 3 T’s: Toxins, Trauma, and Thoughts (Stress!)

Overflowing fresh water into a glass on a glass surface

TOXINS

Processed foods, chemical exposures from cleaning supplies, prescription medications, toxic skincare and cosmetic products, molds, and air pollutants. These are just a few of the toxins that we encounter daily! It should be no mystery as to why our body isn’t feeling well. Most of us don’t think about the amount of toxins that enter the body. This buildup of junk creates dis-ease seen in the form of unruly skin breakouts, weight gain, and muscle aches with spasms. Furthermore, these toxins must be processed by the liver before they can be removed from the body (either through the bowels, urine, and skin). Talk about toxin loading on the body!

THOUGHTS (STRESS)

Our negative ideas and thoughts can create imbalances in the body. Or, in other words, stress! Research now shows us that today, we are experiencing 300X the amount of stress that our grandparents experienced. Our thoughts create stress within the body; stress in turn causes us to carry our shoulders up to our ears, breathing becomes shallow with less oxygen going to muscles and organs, tension builds in the back of the neck and carries into our head leading to frequent headaches. Stress that is left unchecked can contribute to many health consequences including high blood pressure, sugar cravings, weight gain, inflammation, and trigger undesirable behaviors. Prolonged stress can lead to anger outbursts, mood swings, overeating and undereating, drug or alcohol misuse, social withdrawal and depression, and an upset stomachs.

TRAUMA

Trauma is the most recognized cause of body imbalances. We think of major traumas caused by slips, falls, car accidents, and old injuries. However, there are daily microtraumas as a result of our habits that lead to imbalances. Carrying a heavy purse or bag around for hours while shopping, sleeping on our stomach with our head and neck kinked to one side, looking down at the computer for a long period of time, staring at our mobile devices in bed while looking down, crossing our legs at work all day, sitting on the job… all day, or walking around with a misalignment in our hips, back, and spine that ultimately leads wear and decay of our joints.

How the 3T’s Create Dis-ease and Imbalances in the Body:

The collective buildup of Thoughts (Stress), Toxins, and Trauma in the body is similar to filling a glass with water. When the glass of water becomes too full (the body becomes overloaded), the water begins to spill over the top and out of the glass. This spillover effect is similar to how the body becomes overloaded with toxins, stressors, and microtraumas and those effects begin to spill over to other areas in the body. This spillover effect is essentially the breeding ground to the creation of imbalances in organs, cells, and tissues. As the body becomes bombarded, it must work harder, and on overtime. Sounds exhausting, doesn’t it? Not only do we feel fatigued and run-down, but it creates a spillover of unwanted breakouts in the skin, organs become dysfunctional and ill (high cholesterol, inflammation, headaches, blood-sugar imbalances, cravings), muscles become tight and sore. Symptoms begin to appear, and our body is starting to really feel like it is breaking down.

The Importance of Starting a Wellness Routine

Don’t worry, there is hope! The reality is, stress is not going to go away. Instead, we must learn to adapt to it! This is where wellness routines can actually help fight the effects of the toxins, traumas, and thoughts. Time for some much needed self-care.

At West Health Spa, our goal is to remove interferences that prevent the body from healing. By helping our guests develop consistent wellness routines, we stand to help our guests reverse and remove stress, toxins, and trauma.

Our signature facial treatments provide our guests with top quality skin cosmeceutical ingredients from nature’s pharmacy. The use of botanical products and enzymes serve to nurture and heal skin. Best of all, we get glowing skincare results without the use of harsh skin-damaging chemical peels and product-rich toxins that promote cellular aging. From our signature facials to exfoliating, hydrating oxygeneo treatments, we use the body’s innate healing mechanisms to promote optimal skin health and healing.
Our luxurious, vegan wax treatments give you a superior waxing experience that ensures hair follicles are properly removed without damaging your complexion. Our complete waxing treatment focuses on gentle exfoliation, essential oils to calm red, irritated skin, and herbal blemish creams to prevent post wax breakouts.
Every massage treatment is handcrafted with your health in mind. We don’t believe in using cheap oils, creams and butters that don’t promote true detoxication and healing. Walking down the halls of our spa, our guests immediately comment on the calming scents from our luxury health-inspired treatments. From an Alpine Arnica deep tissue massage that uses ingredients from nature’s pharmacy for reducing pain and inflammation, to our Blue Eucalyptus Purifying massage that tunes into healing and repairing the adrenal glands from fatigue and burnout. Our Steam Canopy treatments serve to detox the body of unwanted chemicals that are stowed away in muscles and tissues. Ultimately, we are achieving better health and body function through ultimate relaxation.
Chiropractic Treatments serve to find the root cause of muscle, joint, organ, and tissue imbalances. Our Chiropractic Physicians are looking for subluxations (when a bone moves out of position and causes interference in the brain-body connection). With the use of Xray analysis, chiropractic testing, and a full understanding of your case history, we can begin removing traumas, body stress, and promoting the removal of toxins from the body. While we are phenomenal at helping our community with aches and pains, the true benefits of chiropractic come when we are able to determine what is causing your health condition. From there we can begin to remove unnecessary medical procedures and promote the body’s natural ability to correct and heal itself.
Functional Medicine is the biological approach to identifying and addressing the root cause of dis-ease. Functional Medicine is an individualized approach to disease reversal utilizing nutritional science, genomics, and epigenetics. While diet and exercise may be a starting point for healing, many conditions and concerns stem from bodily imbalances and nutritional deficiencies that require correction to begin true healing. Problems we help solve include fatigue, difficulty sleeping, depression, anxiety, poor digestion, leaky gut, weight loss resistance, hormone imbalances, and chronic inflammation.

Just like we prioritize routine maintenance checks in our vehicles (like balancing the wheels or servicing the oil), our bodies continually need maintenance and balance checks to make sure we aren’t trenching through life while stacking more toxins, stress, and microtraumas on our bones, joints, organs, and tissues. The longer we ignore those maintenance checks, the more time, money, and energy you’ll invest in those items later when you’ve lost your optimal state of health.

Your Routine is the Key to Achieving Your Wellness Goals

Consistency in your wellness routine is going to help you achieve your best self. We can’t expect change to happen overnight (especially if you’ve been living in a compilation of toxins, traumas, and stress for years). But what we can do is take one step forward.

I encourage you to stop throwing away your health when times get tricky and tough. There is a lot you can do on a daily basis that can help propel you toward the healthiest version of yourself. But, instead of just defining your health goal, I want you to define the wellness routine that coincides with the health goal. Routines are a series of actions regularly followed with the goal of achieving a desired outcome.

For example:

If your goal is to get physically stronger this year, your wellness routine should be to start routine chiropractic care. Chiropractic can help your muscles, ligaments, joints, and tissues function correctly, leading to a stronger core, properly engaged muscles, and increasing the body’s flexibility. As you begin to feel stronger and have more energy, you will find yourself making the decision to start going back to the gym.
If your goal is to lose weight but you have tried endless diet and exercise routines, then your wellness routine should be to start learning what part of your body is working against you. Functional medicine is an incredible resource where a physician can work closely with you to understand what cellular functions and processes in the body need additional support. Is digestion an issue? Fatigue? Cortisol imbalances? Blood-sugar fluctuations? When your body is starting to work for you and not against you, you can begin feeling more like yourself!
If your goal is to build a brightening dull skin and prevent aging, your wellness routine should consist of receiving holistic facials, regularly. Our skincare specialists at West Health Spa are here to help you understand more about your skin, while helping you achieve your skin health goals without toxins, chemicals, or harmful chemicals that create more imbalances on the skin’s surface. There are routines you can set up at home between your treatments to support you between your spa-sessions. Your skin will thank you.
If your goal is to reduce muscle pain, inflammation, and imbalances while relaxing and reducing stress, your wellness routine should be built around West Health Spa’s signature massages. Each massage is unique and will help you unwind while restoring health and vitality to your body.

The power in any new routine comes from consistency.

We truly believe that your body has an incredible ability to heal itself. There are so many different journeys to choose from at West Health Spa that can help you remove toxins, traumas, and stress. Our goal is to help you feel your best by encouraging your body’s natural ability to heal through ultimate relaxation. To book your first treatment, call us at 352-331-3649 and our Spa Associates can help you find which service is right for you.

In True Health,

Dr. Karen West