This week is Mental Illness Awareness Week, and brain function is on our mind.
What would you do to be able to retain your brain to help it function better? A Little Rock doctor, Becky Whetstone, has a solution for you. She has brought a user-friendly neurofeedback brain training system to Arkansas – the first of its kind. It can help with anything from anxiety to depression, OCD to ADD and ADHD, addiction and more without taking any pills.
A marriage and family therapist, Dr. Becky Whetstone, says neurofeedback session can help the entire family. She brought this technology to Little Rock due to the lack of Arkansans’ awareness of neurofeedback training. Sessions take place at the Brain Change Center in the Plaza West Building in midtown Little Rock, or you can rent a machine by the month for easy, at home sessions. “I went to a trauma conference in NYC with five of the most world-renowned trauma experts and they said you’ve got to incorporate neurofeedback in your practice to help people who are traumatized,” she said.
Some of Dr. Becky’s patients have been using the technology, like Lily Payne. “You’re just hearing the soft sounds of bells birds while you sit,” Payne said. “It’s really zen music in the background.” Payne started using it three weeks ago and says it is working. She and her husband use the machine for about 30 minutes daily. “I am using it for depression, anxiety, and OCD,” said Payne. “It’s really helped with my depression.”
Neurofeedback training is well researched and known in the mental health community as a way to help train the brain after trauma. Dr. Becky explains, “As we go through events in childhood that are even as little as something that hurts our feelings or where we’re not feeling good enough in a situation, all of these are traumatizing events,” she said. “When dealing with those events, the brain adjusts itself to keep us from suffering and sometimes it will numb us, bring about depression, or make us fearful.”
Traumatic events disrupt the brain’s ability to function at optimal levels. Neurofeedback helps these disruptions. “We hook people up whose brain has adjusted in a way that’s not working for them,” she said.
Dr. Becky says that the NeurOptimal system at the Brain Change Center is so easy to use, you can hook yourself up with very little training. “You don’t need a trained expert to hook you up and you don’t need a diagnosis whatsoever,” she said. “It’s a very user-friendly form of neurofeedback that’s less intimidating.”
“I want to continue in this path because I can tell a huge difference in my overall personality and communication with my husband,” said Payne.
Brain training is safe and helpful for the entire family. NeurOptimal technology is FDA safe test approved. For more information, visit brainchangecenter.com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.