Is Yoga Good For Depression?
To people struggling with depression, yoga tends to be successful. The author-leading Dr Chris Streeter of the Boston University School of Medicine, associate professor of psychiatry and neurology, claims that treatment has far less side effects and possible drug reactions than mood-altering drugs. A minor complaint— temporary muscle soreness— was the most common complaint recorded in the sample, and one participant felt pain while practicing respiration at home. Evidence shows that yoga is a treatment for physical and psychological illnesses. A small new research from the University of Boston now indicates that taking yoga lessons twice a week can lead to depression, due in part to deep breathing.
The study in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine included 30 people between 18 and 64 years of age who were either not on antidepressant drugs or at least three months of age at stable dosing. Half of the participants were scheduled three times a week for a 90 minute yoga class and four 30 minutes each week at home. The other group engaged in two group classes and three home sessions each week. After about three months, a depression-screening test was used to lower the majority of people in both groups by at least 50 percent. Not unexpectedly, more yoga was better; those attending three classes a week had lower scores of depression than those taking two weekly ones. But as many participants pointed to the difficulty of the larger time commitment, the researchers suggest that the program also offers substantial benefits, two classes a week.
Yoga Therapy and Depression.
Depression perceptions vary from person to person. Depression can establish a result or no definable cause of difficult circumstances. Likewise, the illness could be over months or over decades intermittently. Symptoms can also manifest in various ways–for example a debilitating and constant sense of depression may affect one person, but another person can experience emotional numbness or lack of interest in life.
For many patients, drugs are a critical technique that can sometimes save lives and physicians also prescribe therapy or other psychological therapies. Yoga therapy offers an additional treatment which can be adapted to the individual needs of the patient, while also empowering them with a tool they can immediately take into their everyday life. This is particularly pertinent considering that people can sometimes wait months for access to talking therapies.
An estimated 10 – 30% of people diagnosed with depression are treatment resistant, defined in the NICE guidelines as people who have not responded to courses of two different antidepressants. In cases such as these, yoga therapy can step into the gap and provide support while an appropriate pharmaceutical response is found.
Why Choose Yoga at Peak Performance Float?
We believe yoga is an essential tool to maintaining and enhancing your overall well-being. Peak Performance Float yoga classes are small, caring and full of friendly people which help to create an intimate environment to relax and restore your mind and body.
Learn more about our amazing yoga teachers here, check our weekly yoga class schedule here, and sign up online for a class here. Your body, mind and spirit will thank you for it! New students enjoy two weeks of unlimited classes for $25. Save with packages and memberships!
