Our Alternative Mental Health Program Overview
Our programs include medical oversight by a collaborating physician. He will be assessing treatment needs, running lab tests including toxicity testing, and handling all medication concerns. The program is designed to the individuals specific biochemical needs and the results of the toxicity tests and other labs. A large part of the program is directed in this way. Once the neurochemistry is stabilized and the neurotoxins removed, the biochemical drug cravings are lessened and the moods and symptoms that created the need for medication are brought into balance. To support this process, we have life coaching and peer support, whole food and organic meals, residential housing in a luxury home, expert medication withdrawal protocols, acupuncture, massage, ionic foot baths, life skills, organic meal preparation tutoring, 24 hour onsite staff, educational courses, personal exercise training, weekend outings, cultural activities, Kangen purified water, organic farming (seasonal) and animal caretaking. We also provide aftercare programs including paid internship for our graduates. The average residential program is 8 weeks. Use this link for more info on treatment pricing and more.
Philosophy
Our belief is that real underlying causes do exist for why an individual may suffer from depression, anxiety, lack of ambition, or be incapable of handling emotional pain. Though prescription drugs do have a role in treatment, they often do not address the underlying problems, and carry side effects, making them less than ideal. We believe that many mood disorders are the result of inadequate nutrition, or the inability to metabolize proper nutrition because of a toxicity overload, mutated genes, or damaged enzymes. A balanced individual should be capable of handling even grave tragedies without those situations turning into chronic mood disorders. We not only address this balance with customized programs for nutrition and detoxification but also with medication tapering, life coaching, exercise, supplementation, acupuncture, and yoga.
Neurochemical Rehabilitation
The resident starts out with seeing the collaborating medical doctor. Then, lab tests are performed to identify things like liver, thyroid and kidney function, metabolic testing, differential CBC, and toxicity from heavy metals. This is the link for the lab test: lab tests. Testing for toxicity is done before, as well as during treatment and after a customized process of detoxification in order to properly determine effectiveness of the treatment applied.
Medication tapering: A gentle schedule for medication tapering is written which is on average carried out over an eight week period. This will allow time for the neurology to properly adjust and greatly lessens withdrawal symptoms. A comprehensive overview of each class of medication withdrawal can be seen by clicking here. During chelative and other neurotoxin removal treatments, an individual on anti-anxiety medications and anti-psychotics typically will start to sleep more and may even become drowsy, allowing for substantially less challenging withdrawal. We often find that it is not until a person has reduced their neurotoxicity that they can sustainably be off of psychiatric medication.
Our programs include medical oversight by a collaborating physician. He will be assessing treatment needs, running lab tests including toxicity testing, and handling all medication concerns. The program is designed to the individuals specific biochemical needs and the results of the toxicity tests and other labs. A large part of the program is directed in this way. Once the neurochemistry is stabilized and the neurotoxins removed, the biochemical drug cravings are lessened and the moods and symptoms that created the need for medication are brought into balance. To support this process, we have life coaching and peer support, whole food and organic meals, residential housing in a luxury home, expert medication withdrawal protocols, acupuncture, massage, ionic foot baths, life skills, organic meal preparation tutoring, 24 hour onsite staff, educational courses, personal exercise training, weekend outings, cultural activities, Kangen purified water, organic farming (seasonal) and animal caretaking. We also provide aftercare programs including paid internship for our graduates. The average residential program is 8 weeks. Use this link for more info on treatment pricing and more.
Philosophy
Our belief is that real underlying causes do exist for why an individual may suffer from depression, anxiety, lack of ambition, or be incapable of handling emotional pain. Though prescription drugs do have a role in treatment, they often do not address the underlying problems, and carry side effects, making them less than ideal. We believe that many mood disorders are the result of inadequate nutrition, or the inability to metabolize proper nutrition because of a toxicity overload, mutated genes, or damaged enzymes. A balanced individual should be capable of handling even grave tragedies without those situations turning into chronic mood disorders. We not only address this balance with customized programs for nutrition and detoxification but also with medication tapering, life coaching, exercise, supplementation, acupuncture, and yoga.
Neurochemical Rehabilitation
The resident starts out with seeing the collaborating medical doctor. Then, lab tests are performed to identify things like liver, thyroid and kidney function, metabolic testing, differential CBC, and toxicity from heavy metals. This is the link for the lab test: lab tests. Testing for toxicity is done before, as well as during treatment and after a customized process of detoxification in order to properly determine effectiveness of the treatment applied.
Medication tapering: A gentle schedule for medication tapering is written which is on average carried out over an eight week period. This will allow time for the neurology to properly adjust and greatly lessens withdrawal symptoms. A comprehensive overview of each class of medication withdrawal can be seen by clicking here. During chelative and other neurotoxin removal treatments, an individual on anti-anxiety medications and anti-psychotics typically will start to sleep more and may even become drowsy, allowing for substantially less challenging withdrawal. We often find that it is not until a person has reduced their neurotoxicity that they can sustainably be off of psychiatric medication.
Neurotoxin Removal Program
Customized Detoxification Therapy with Chelation - We perform testing of urine samples for heavy toxic metals and evaluate toxicity. Then, oral Chelators are used, Malic acid, NAC, DMPS, EDTA, DMSA, and other various methods such as Cilantro tincture, Chlorella, and Zeolite among other substances that conjugate neurotoxins to clean out an individual’s physiology so that cellular metabolism and neurochemistry may occur more normally. There are toxins and residues from food that we eat, from water that we drink, and from air that we breathe that are lodged inside of our bodies. In toxic environments, not any amount of nutritional correction will be effective, as toxins destruct synthesis of cellular metabolism, biochemistry, and neurochemistry. These toxic states leave individuals in weakened conditions and can lead to anxiety, depression or drug cravings, persisting infectious conditions, and have resulted in psychosis. Through using techniques for neurotoxin removal such as chelation and nebulized Glutathione, an individual can effectively and safely remove toxins from the body system, and also remove harmful toxins that were left behind from prescription medications, alcohol or drug abuse therefore cravings become eliminated.
Follow this link to find more information on our neurotoxin removal program.
Alternative Educational Institute for Mental Health
We are proud to say that we are a source of education. Through using materials written by Dr. Michael Lesser, Julia Ross, Joan Larson and other Orthomolecular pioneers of addiction in combination with courses created by medical journals most recently published, we educate about why mental health symptoms and addictive biochemistry can happen, and how these occurences can be treated successfully.
At the Alternative Institute for Mental Health, residents then becomes educated on clinical nutrition in order to become capable of creating ways that achieve balance of brain chemistry naturally. They realize how their mood can be related to the food they eat.
What we eat and how we do it is culturally ingrained, and bad food habits are difficult to break, particularly without alternative options. Alternative food options are hard to find in the present food industries, which often exchange health to make profits. Not only do we provide such alternatives, but we also educate the resident on how they can prepare foods which are mood balancing, well tasting, and surprisingly simple.
Residents learn how and why certain toxins impact the neurochemistry through peer reviewed medical journals, and other documented reliable sources. With their new found knowledge, they can relate it to their specific circumstances and own lab results. They then are educated about how they can purify the environment they are in from negative electromagnetic radiation. They also learn about water purification, cleaners that are non-toxic, hygiene products that are organic, and how they can develop a healthy home environment with Alternative Mental Health and a healthy lifestyle. Our goal is to encourage and empower individuals to make conscious decisions with their health and choose wisely among health care professionals. This is done so individuals can continuously produce the same results that they achieve during the program for the rest of their life.
Courses Available
The Brain Chemistry Diet
Clinical Nutrition Course
We proudly offer courses in clinical nutrition in order to teach a client how to use this knowledge of optimal health and use it. These courses are companion to “Brain Chemistry Diet” by Dr. Michael Lesser M.D. Then clients not only realize the importance of lab test results, but they also become educated about nutrients and why they are taking them. Doing so shows them an understanding of the reality that nutrients will help their condition.
These courses also explain why specific bad food decisions result in mood disorders or other problems, and how addictive biochemistry can be offset by eating whole foods. Additionally, the course describes personality types; strengths, how the person breaks under stress and pressure, and what approaches should be employed for achieving balance.
The Mind Body Connection
We strongly feel that clearing and strengthening your body is one very successful way of clearing your mind. Current research suggests mild exercise and also acupuncture supports overall balance and wellness. Sedona hiking is provided daily. The residents have a gym membership and are brought to the gym 7 days a week, and are joined by a personal trainer 2 days per week.
Yoga Therapy
Most of us are guilty of getting lost in our heads. For a person withdrawing from the effects of prolonged use of psychopharmacological prescription medications, this can be psychologically and emotionally painful, difficult and debilitating. We have found that one of the best ways to help you get out of your head is to help you become mindful of the nuances of your very own unique body.
Exercise, breathing techniques and yoga are ideal ways to get into and to celebrate being in your body.
Stretching and low-impact, cardio-vascular exercise help release the accumulated toxins in your body. These activities gently increase blood flow, causing built-up toxins to be pushed out of your small blood vessels into your larger ones. Once this happens, blood flows to your liver, where it is cleaned and detoxified, and your liver eliminates the waste products from this process through your excretory system.
Also, increased breathing causes a physiological change. People in a high state of anxious arousal often have short, shallow breathing. This results in carbon dioxide buildup, which is a waste product of oxygen exchange. Increasing carbon dioxide causes more feelings of anxiety. In all likelihood, this is one of the principle biophysical trigger mechanisms behind a panic attack. Deep breathing and increased rate of breathing during exercise help force stale air from your lungs, resulting in higher blood oxygenation. This physiological effect elicits a psychological effect. It relieves mental tension.
Orthomolecular Nutrition
Linus Pauling, winner of the Nobel Prize, coined the phrase “orthomolecular” in 1960 to articulate an idea of using the right molecules at the right time and in the correct amounts. His coexistent, Abram Hoffer supported and exhibited that optimal molecular concentrations from substances naturally occurring in the body were critical in maintaining optimum levels of mental health. Simply put; our underlying determination and ideology is that healthy food equals healthy minds.
In Western traditional culture, the food industries have persuaded us to consume food that has been altered to a nutritionally dead and excessively refined state from its original and raw state, so even if we eat until we are full, we are left malnourished. Manufacturers of processed food artificially color, sweeten and modify nutritionally dead food chemically, otherwise it would taste awful and unpalatable, to fool us into ingesting it. However, because of the human brain using more nutrients and blood oxygen than any of the body’s other organs, our brains, and our whole nervous systems, start to feel affected by biochemical deficiency of nutrients long before any noticeable physical effects emerge.
“As long as food processing continues to strip out essential nutrients, there will be no letup in the creation of chronic ill health – Abram Hoffer.” To start alleviating this ever-present problem, our program provides participants with diets full of whole and naturally organic foods, while eliminating sugar, caffeine, white flour, and white rice from individual diets.
Modern processing of food strips almost all nutrients from the food, and individuals who consume these foods regularly will be deficient in vitamins and nutrients. Psychosis is one common resulting symptom in those who lack basic nutrition. We mostly use prescription vitamins, generally pharmaceutical grade, combined with a whole food, organic diet. We have found this is the most corrective and rapid measure in treatment of psychosis, and disorders related to addiction. ... read more about orthomolecular nutrition.
Peer Support
Many staff members have experienced similar situations, can relate to residents and can talk about their own path to recovery with clients who are working toward more holistic and natural lifestyles. Clients are also given the opportunity to talk about their own experiences with peers, which are working at achieving similar results, in an environment of a collective community. Read More…
... Also, we participate in an outside anti-depressant peer support group that is the only one of its kind in the world. The group is open to individuals with other medication dependencies as well. If you require it, we also can provide one-on-one counseling with a licensed therapist.
All circumstances in your life, the way you feel about them and how you experience them, are influenced by neurochemistry. A fairly rapid change to having balanced neurochemistry along with biochemistry free of toxins, actually, feels different. Adjusting to this feeling takes a minute.
Resulting from the many crucial changes occurring within your body and your being, your circumstances in life and the way you care for these circumstances change when you are here with us. Therefore, to help you think about changes in a refreshed new light and align you with your plans of income generation from your passions that are deeply felt in life; weekly sessions are also provided with our counselor for life re-entry. That is, becoming ready to realize that just survival is not an issue, it is rather a matter of thriving in a righteously fulfilling manner, based upon your state of fundamental well-being in ongoing circumstances in your life.
Customized Detoxification Therapy with Chelation - We perform testing of urine samples for heavy toxic metals and evaluate toxicity. Then, oral Chelators are used, Malic acid, NAC, DMPS, EDTA, DMSA, and other various methods such as Cilantro tincture, Chlorella, and Zeolite among other substances that conjugate neurotoxins to clean out an individual’s physiology so that cellular metabolism and neurochemistry may occur more normally. There are toxins and residues from food that we eat, from water that we drink, and from air that we breathe that are lodged inside of our bodies. In toxic environments, not any amount of nutritional correction will be effective, as toxins destruct synthesis of cellular metabolism, biochemistry, and neurochemistry. These toxic states leave individuals in weakened conditions and can lead to anxiety, depression or drug cravings, persisting infectious conditions, and have resulted in psychosis. Through using techniques for neurotoxin removal such as chelation and nebulized Glutathione, an individual can effectively and safely remove toxins from the body system, and also remove harmful toxins that were left behind from prescription medications, alcohol or drug abuse therefore cravings become eliminated.
Follow this link to find more information on our neurotoxin removal program.
Alternative Educational Institute for Mental Health
We are proud to say that we are a source of education. Through using materials written by Dr. Michael Lesser, Julia Ross, Joan Larson and other Orthomolecular pioneers of addiction in combination with courses created by medical journals most recently published, we educate about why mental health symptoms and addictive biochemistry can happen, and how these occurences can be treated successfully.
At the Alternative Institute for Mental Health, residents then becomes educated on clinical nutrition in order to become capable of creating ways that achieve balance of brain chemistry naturally. They realize how their mood can be related to the food they eat.
What we eat and how we do it is culturally ingrained, and bad food habits are difficult to break, particularly without alternative options. Alternative food options are hard to find in the present food industries, which often exchange health to make profits. Not only do we provide such alternatives, but we also educate the resident on how they can prepare foods which are mood balancing, well tasting, and surprisingly simple.
Residents learn how and why certain toxins impact the neurochemistry through peer reviewed medical journals, and other documented reliable sources. With their new found knowledge, they can relate it to their specific circumstances and own lab results. They then are educated about how they can purify the environment they are in from negative electromagnetic radiation. They also learn about water purification, cleaners that are non-toxic, hygiene products that are organic, and how they can develop a healthy home environment with Alternative Mental Health and a healthy lifestyle. Our goal is to encourage and empower individuals to make conscious decisions with their health and choose wisely among health care professionals. This is done so individuals can continuously produce the same results that they achieve during the program for the rest of their life.
Courses Available
The Brain Chemistry Diet
Clinical Nutrition Course
We proudly offer courses in clinical nutrition in order to teach a client how to use this knowledge of optimal health and use it. These courses are companion to “Brain Chemistry Diet” by Dr. Michael Lesser M.D. Then clients not only realize the importance of lab test results, but they also become educated about nutrients and why they are taking them. Doing so shows them an understanding of the reality that nutrients will help their condition.
These courses also explain why specific bad food decisions result in mood disorders or other problems, and how addictive biochemistry can be offset by eating whole foods. Additionally, the course describes personality types; strengths, how the person breaks under stress and pressure, and what approaches should be employed for achieving balance.
The Mind Body Connection
We strongly feel that clearing and strengthening your body is one very successful way of clearing your mind. Current research suggests mild exercise and also acupuncture supports overall balance and wellness. Sedona hiking is provided daily. The residents have a gym membership and are brought to the gym 7 days a week, and are joined by a personal trainer 2 days per week.
Yoga Therapy
Most of us are guilty of getting lost in our heads. For a person withdrawing from the effects of prolonged use of psychopharmacological prescription medications, this can be psychologically and emotionally painful, difficult and debilitating. We have found that one of the best ways to help you get out of your head is to help you become mindful of the nuances of your very own unique body.
Exercise, breathing techniques and yoga are ideal ways to get into and to celebrate being in your body.
Stretching and low-impact, cardio-vascular exercise help release the accumulated toxins in your body. These activities gently increase blood flow, causing built-up toxins to be pushed out of your small blood vessels into your larger ones. Once this happens, blood flows to your liver, where it is cleaned and detoxified, and your liver eliminates the waste products from this process through your excretory system.
Also, increased breathing causes a physiological change. People in a high state of anxious arousal often have short, shallow breathing. This results in carbon dioxide buildup, which is a waste product of oxygen exchange. Increasing carbon dioxide causes more feelings of anxiety. In all likelihood, this is one of the principle biophysical trigger mechanisms behind a panic attack. Deep breathing and increased rate of breathing during exercise help force stale air from your lungs, resulting in higher blood oxygenation. This physiological effect elicits a psychological effect. It relieves mental tension.
Orthomolecular Nutrition
Linus Pauling, winner of the Nobel Prize, coined the phrase “orthomolecular” in 1960 to articulate an idea of using the right molecules at the right time and in the correct amounts. His coexistent, Abram Hoffer supported and exhibited that optimal molecular concentrations from substances naturally occurring in the body were critical in maintaining optimum levels of mental health. Simply put; our underlying determination and ideology is that healthy food equals healthy minds.
In Western traditional culture, the food industries have persuaded us to consume food that has been altered to a nutritionally dead and excessively refined state from its original and raw state, so even if we eat until we are full, we are left malnourished. Manufacturers of processed food artificially color, sweeten and modify nutritionally dead food chemically, otherwise it would taste awful and unpalatable, to fool us into ingesting it. However, because of the human brain using more nutrients and blood oxygen than any of the body’s other organs, our brains, and our whole nervous systems, start to feel affected by biochemical deficiency of nutrients long before any noticeable physical effects emerge.
“As long as food processing continues to strip out essential nutrients, there will be no letup in the creation of chronic ill health – Abram Hoffer.” To start alleviating this ever-present problem, our program provides participants with diets full of whole and naturally organic foods, while eliminating sugar, caffeine, white flour, and white rice from individual diets.
Modern processing of food strips almost all nutrients from the food, and individuals who consume these foods regularly will be deficient in vitamins and nutrients. Psychosis is one common resulting symptom in those who lack basic nutrition. We mostly use prescription vitamins, generally pharmaceutical grade, combined with a whole food, organic diet. We have found this is the most corrective and rapid measure in treatment of psychosis, and disorders related to addiction. ... read more about orthomolecular nutrition.
Peer Support
Many staff members have experienced similar situations, can relate to residents and can talk about their own path to recovery with clients who are working toward more holistic and natural lifestyles. Clients are also given the opportunity to talk about their own experiences with peers, which are working at achieving similar results, in an environment of a collective community. Read More…
... Also, we participate in an outside anti-depressant peer support group that is the only one of its kind in the world. The group is open to individuals with other medication dependencies as well. If you require it, we also can provide one-on-one counseling with a licensed therapist.
All circumstances in your life, the way you feel about them and how you experience them, are influenced by neurochemistry. A fairly rapid change to having balanced neurochemistry along with biochemistry free of toxins, actually, feels different. Adjusting to this feeling takes a minute.
Resulting from the many crucial changes occurring within your body and your being, your circumstances in life and the way you care for these circumstances change when you are here with us. Therefore, to help you think about changes in a refreshed new light and align you with your plans of income generation from your passions that are deeply felt in life; weekly sessions are also provided with our counselor for life re-entry. That is, becoming ready to realize that just survival is not an issue, it is rather a matter of thriving in a righteously fulfilling manner, based upon your state of fundamental well-being in ongoing circumstances in your life.
