I Have PMDD, and This Sound Healing App Helped Me Have Calm, Less Emotionally Tumultuous Periods

PMDD is a psychological well being situation that impacts about 10 p.c of all menstruating folks, per the Cleveland Clinic. It is a extreme type of PMS characterised by shifts in temper, nervousness, power, and ache ranges within the 10 to 14 days main as much as your interval. Medical doctors aren’t precisely certain why it occurs, however it probably has to do with the steep drop within the hormone progesterone within the days earlier than menstruation, affecting your “feel-good” neurotransmitter serotonin, which regulates sleep, temper, and ache, per the Nationwide Institutes of Well being.

The standard therapies for PMDD embrace remedy, antidepressants, and life-style adjustments like lowering stress, getting higher sleep, and consuming a balanced food regimen with wholesome protein and fat, all of which I’ve applied. Whereas these strategies do work to maintain my PMDD in examine, I nonetheless generally want one thing extra to take the sting off every month (particularly if I am below a number of stress).

That is the place pure therapeutic modalities come into play. Enter: SOAAK, a sound therapeutic app that simply launched its new frequency composition known as “PMS Assist,” to assist folks handle the signs of PMS and PMDD. I would by no means tried a pure methodology for my PMDD, however when given the prospect to strive the app free for 30 days, I jumped on the probability.

Here is my assessment of the SOAAK app’s “PMS Assist” frequency, the app itself, and whether or not sound therapeutic labored to alleviate my most annoying (and generally debilitating) PMDD signs.

First, what’s SOAAK?

SOAAK applied sciences is a well being tech firm in affiliation RenuYou—an in-person pure clinic in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The corporate began about 9 years in the past when co-founder Henry Penix and firm president Laura Widney mixed their data of expertise and naturopathic therapeutic. When the duo’s in-person purchasers started asking tips on how to reap the advantages of sound therapeutic remedy within the consolation of their properties, the pair started working with scientists, medical doctors, and app engineers to create the SOAAK app.

Whereas the idea of a sound therapeutic app is pretty new, sound therapeutic remedy itself has existed for generations as a staple of Conventional Japanese medication. You will usually discover tuning forks, Tibetan singing bowls, or gongs utilized in sound tub therapies, to assist folks calm down and cut back a large number of bodily and psychological well being signs, in keeping with December 2020 assessment in Integrative Drugs (Encinitas). Even spa-like music throughout a therapeutic massage, or the sounds of nature, will be thought of sound remedy.

The SOAAK app has 30 totally different sound frequency compositions to select from based mostly in your wants. The preferred embrace:

• “Sleep properly” (for insomnia)
• “Anti-anxiety”
• “Temper enhance”
• “Focus” (for higher focus through the day)
• “Headache and migraine assist”
• And now, “PMS assist”

Every 20-minute frequency composition will be downloaded and performed at any time, very like a meditation. Every composition has quite a lot of tones set at totally different Hertz (Hz)—a measurement of sound. Essentially the most generally used frequency in religious therapeutic is 432 Hz, which has additionally been related to lowered coronary heart fee and blood stress, per an August 2019 assessment in Discover: The Journal of Science & Therapeutic. However there are zero to (principally) a trillion totally different Hz frequencies that may be mixed and customised to satisfy your want, in keeping with Widney.

You’ll be able to hearken to frequency compositions of their unique type, or layered below sounds of nature or music. Different app options embrace:

• A sequence of 21-day applications on varied psychological well being and motivational matters from scientists, physicians, life coaches, and extra. One instance is “Therapeutic Your Inside Baby” with psychotherapist Amy Van Slambrook.
• A well being biometrics part—the place you possibly can join your wearable gadget (like an Apple Watch) to maintain observe of issues like coronary heart fee, coronary heart fee variability, sleep cycle, and extra.
• A digital well being concierge—a chat the place you possibly can ask questions concerning the app’s frequencies, applications, and different self-care ideas. This instrument also can suggest frequencies based mostly in your present well being biometrics.
• A gratitude journal—the place you possibly can mirror in your day or expertise with a frequency.
• A twin audio function—which lets you play the frequencies whereas watching a video, listening to a podcast or audiobook, or listening to your personal music.
• A pacesetter board—the place you possibly can “gamify” your sound therapeutic expertise by seeing the way you match up with different prime app customers.

SOAAK App — $29.99

• Consumer-friendly
• Comes with 30 totally different frequencies
• Bluetooth pairing to your Apple Watch
• Can play and pause the frequencies once you want

• Doesn’t record the hertz (Hz) frequency info within the app
• Month-to-month fee will be dear for some

My 30-day SOAAK app assessment

I made a decision to start out utilizing SOAAK’s “PMS assist” frequency at the start of the month (my interval often hits on the finish of the month) to get the total impact earlier than and through that 10-day window.

After I opened the app on day one, I used to be greeted by my title on the prime, a weekly calendar, and a each day affirmation with the optimistic message,”I can adapt to any scenario that comes my means.” (You’ll be able to decide to have each day affirmations despatched to you through electronic mail or textual content, too.) General, I discovered the app very user-friendly and simple to navigate. Plus, it simply appears to be like high-tech and aesthetically pleasing.

I clicked on the “frequencies” icon on the backside of the web page, and scrolled till I discovered “PMS assist.” The outline of the frequency stated it helps assist “balanced feelings, hormones, ache aid, and decreased bloating.” As I started to play the unique model of frequency, it appeared like I used to be floating by way of outer area, however with decrease, extra grumbling undertones than I would imagined. (It did not sound as high-pitched and flighty because the stress-relief composition, for instance.)

I discovered myself gravitating towards the music model of this frequency—a guitar strumming sound with the frequencies taking part in beneath—which I listened to throughout my lunch break on the primary day (with an alarm set on my cellphone in case I dozed off, after all).

For the remaining days, I made a decision to both hearken to it at night time or in morning, in mattress with my cozy sleep masks on. I began by listening to them out loud, however found that sporting headphones affords a extra elevated expertise. Some days, I could not get round to listening to the complete 20 minutes, so it was good that I used to be capable of pause and play it each time I needed. I acquired into the routine of listening after which logging how I felt afterward within the gratitude journal.

Throughout my “good time” of the month, I discovered that SOAAK’s “PMS assist” frequency was a pleasing option to cap off or begin my days. I entered a meditative-like state, the place I used to be conscious, however my mind felt calm and sluggish. It felt much like once I hearken to binaural beats—i.e., beats set at two totally different frequencies and recorded utilizing two separate microphones, for a layered impact in every ear— which can have the potential to change brainwave exercise, per the Sleep Basis. (Nevertheless, extra analysis is required to substantiate any well being advantages.)

On some days, “PMS assist” additionally gave me a soothing, head-tingling sensation that I really feel once I watch or hearken to ASMR (a bodily sensation in response to visible or auditory stimuli, additionally known as autonomous sensory meridian response, per UCLA Well being). I undoubtedly added “PMS assist” to my rotation of enjoyable content material that I hearken to frequently, and really feel that it may assist me calm down even once I’m not within the throws of PMDD.

Then got here the true check: the ten days earlier than my interval.

Did SOAAK assist my PMDD signs?

One of many fundamental methods I do know I am headed into that pre-period time is once I begin having repetitive, intrusive ideas. They have an inclination to get caught on a loop, and are sometimes destructive self-talk in nature. When this occurred this month, I turned on “PMS assist,” irrespective of the time of day, along with my morning or night time ritual. I even performed it as soon as whereas strolling with my canine, and whereas cleansing my condo.

Listening to the frequency helped my mind instantly concentrate on one thing else, and the racing thought loop simply…stopped. Even when I attempted to get the ideas going once more, it was more durable to conjure them up. It felt nice to get speedy aid from one in every of my most annoying PMDD signs—particularly once I’m below extra stress. I additionally really feel like my nervousness normally was barely diminished after listening to it spontaneously.

Whereas I would not say “PMS Assist” relieved my bodily signs (like cramping, complications, bloating, and fatigue), it did assist take my thoughts off any ache for a short time till any medicines I took, like Advil or Midol, kicked in. (Although some folks could discover ache aid whereas listening; everybody’s totally different!)

General, I do really feel that SOAAK’s “PMS Assist” frequency composition helped me have a calmer, much less emotionally tumultuous time main as much as my interval. It actually wasn’t a cure-all (I nonetheless use my conventional therapy strategies), however it did assist, and I consider I can begin utilizing it along with remedy, medicine, and different stress-relieving strategies.

This leads me to a bigger query: Does sound therapeutic normally truly work? (Extra on this beneath.)

Does sound therapeutic remedy actually work?

There is not any stable proof to recommend that sound therapeutic remedy can treatment any illness. The research on sound therapeutic remedy for each bodily and psychological well being circumstances are restricted, have blended outcomes, and infrequently showcase quite a lot of outcomes. That stated, it could nonetheless be a useful supplemental remedy along with different clinically backed therapies, particularly to assist promote leisure.

On a broader scale, we do know that our nervous programs reply to sound—for the higher, and generally, for the more serious.

“Our autonomic nervous system has the tendency to reply and co-regulate to the rhythms round us,” says Ellen Vora, MD, a board-certified psychiatrist specializing in girls’s psychological well being, and creator of The Anatomy of Nervousness. “This implies, in instances of stress, our our bodies can choose up and sync with sounds round us—like noisy metropolis life or folks shouting, which have sure sound frequencies—inflicting us to really feel even worse.” These sounds can improve our coronary heart fee and even ship our nervous programs into fight-or-flight mode, she provides.

However after we hearken to extra enjoyable frequencies, like wind rustling by way of bushes, birdsong, ocean waves, or sure music, our coronary heart fee also can sync up (and decelerate) with this rhythm, enjoyable us, says Dr. Vora. This is also why the sound of issues like singing bowls elicit a chilled response. Dr. Vora says it may assist us transfer by way of pent-up feelings, or what she calls “emotional constipation.”

The truth is, a small July 2017 observational research within the Journal of Proof-Primarily based Complementary & Various Drugs discovered that members who listened to a low-frequency, Tibetan singing bowl meditation scored considerably decrease on nervousness and melancholy scales than previous to listening, suggesting it does have some psychological profit.

Backside line: Sound therapeutic remedy, within the type of sound frequencies, can’t essentially treatment or heal you, and extra scientific research are wanted so as to totally perceive its impact on mind chemistry. But when it brings you a way of calm, and helps you higher cope with issues like PMDD or PMS, it is innocent and will be price a strive, particularly along with care out of your physician.

And have in mind: In the event you’re having depressive ideas, ideas of suicide, or ideas of harming your self or another person, that is thought of a psychological well being emergency that requires skilled care. Name your physician and go to the closest emergency room as quickly as doable. You may as well name or textual content “988,” the Nationwide Suicide and Disaster Lifeline, for speedy assist.

Is there a future for sound therapeutic remedy?

Sound therapeutic remedy may very well be the wave (pun meant) of the way forward for holistic well being care. There is not any denying that apps like SOAAK are providing handy and simple choices to cease the results of stress and nervousness in its tracks, and enable you to lead a calmer existence. Although we nonetheless have an extended option to go in utterly understanding the impact of frequencies on well being and the human physique, I’ve a sense we’ll begin to see increasingly more sound remedy apps (and different holistic apps) crop up within the coming years.

Each Penix and Widney say they need to assist folks “reclaim their well being, and take their care into their very own palms.” Utilizing this app has actually made me suppose extra concerning the methods I can higher handle myself throughout my 10-day, pre-period section, and reclaim this month-to-month routine.

If you wish to strive SOAAK

You probably have PMDD, PMS, need to get higher sleep, or are simply plain curious concerning the results of sound therapeutic, obtain SOAAK as we speak on IOS or Android and begin a seven-day free trial. From there, you possibly can go for a month-to-month subscription of $29.99 per 30 days, or a yearly subscription at $24.99 per 30 days (or $300 per yr).