I Bought This Touch-Therapy Device at the Height of the Pandemic—Here’s Why I Still Wear It Every Day To Soothe My Anxiety

A few years in the past, I used to be essentially the most careworn I’ve ever been in my life. I used to be barely sleeping, continually anxious, and felt like I used to be barely managing to tug off my very own survival mode as a way to perform at work and in my private life. Whereas just a few elements in the end helped me to reset my nervous system— together with just a few completely different types of remedy—I credit score the Apollo Neuro gadget for serving to me cope and restore a grounding sense inside my physique on a day-to-day foundation.

The Apollo Neuro gadget—aka, Apollo® Wearable ($300)—options touch-therapy expertise designed to assist sleep, leisure, focus, restoration, and, in my case, a respite from anxiousness. For the previous two years, this useful dandy gadget has soothed me throughout occasions of stress and helped me regain a way of calm after I want it most. Discover my full overview under.

What’s the Apollo Neuro wearable?

Whereas it would appear like a health tracker, the Apollo® Wearable doesn’t truly observe something. As a substitute, it sits in opposition to the pores and skin and makes use of distinctive vibration strategies to stimulate the vagus nerve and convey the mind-body connection again to a extra current state.

Apollo Neuro, Apollo® Wearable — $300.00

Initially $350, now $300

Contains: Medium bands (small and huge bands offered individually), Apollo gadget, micro USB charging twine, clip, free entry to the Apollo Neuro app

Supplies: Polycarbonate plastic (clip), neoprene with polyester overlays (band)

Battery life: 6-8 hours of steady use

Guarantee: One-year guarantee

Colours: 3

• Light-weight, unobtrusive gadget.
• Consumer-friendly
• Helps sleep, restoration, focus, temper, and extra.
• Analysis- and science-backed

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• Expensive
• Is usually mistaken for a well being/sleep tracker—it doesn’t observe something

The inspiration for the gadget comes from the biology of stress, how our our bodies react in “fight-or-flight” conditions, and the ability of breathwork behind each. From this science (and 60 years of biofeedback analysis), neuroscientists and physicians at Apollo Neuro developed a instrument that’s designed to alter respiratory patterns to a extra optimum 5 to seven breaths per minute.

“Most of us are respiratory at 12 to 18 breaths per minute each day,” Dave Rabin, MD, PhD, the co-founder and chief medical officer at Apollo Neuro says. “You’ll be able to induce states of preferrred respiratory patterns in our our bodies, just by delivering the rhythms that nudge the physique into these states via our contact receptors via your pores and skin,” he provides.

Merely put, the Apollo Neuro gadget vibrates to ship particular frequencies which might be supposed to affect the autonomic nervous system. This will help to shift the physique’s stress response from the sympathetic nervous system (struggle or flight) to the parasympathetic nervous system (relaxation and chill out.) Learn extra concerning the analysis and science behind all of it right here.

The way it works

Every Apollo Wearable gadget comes geared up with seven vibration frequencies designed to assist relieve signs of stress by bringing you to the current second and supporting a extra grounding focus. “The explanation why vibration frequencies can alleviate stress is similar purpose why your favourite music calms you down on a nasty day,” Dr. Rabin explains. “It’s as a result of, once we’re careworn, we’re respiratory at a really quick charge, our coronary heart charges are usually excessive, and we’re normally spending most of that point enthusiastic about the previous or future and never the current second.”

To make use of, merely clip the gadget on anyplace you want. (It is most ceaselessly worn on the wrist, nevertheless, the band can be clipped round your ankle, your shirt collar, even in your bra strap—wherever you wish to really feel your “vibes.”) As soon as it is on, you should use your smartphone to manage it via the accompanying app, which lets you set your “vibe” desire, the length, and the depth. That is it; the gadget will get to work, pulsing as a lot or as little as you want, reminding you to breathe, focus, and re-center your self, whether or not that is earlier than a giant assembly, after an intense exercise, or just as you go about your day.

My overview

After I bought the Apollo Neuro gadget, I used to be determined to really feel a way of peace. It was a 12 months into the pandemic, and I used to be combating debilitating stress that usually left me feeling exhausted and burnt out. I first discovered concerning the gadget’s advantages on Instagram and knew I wanted to strive it.

After I first started to put on it, I wasn’t certain if it was doing a lot of something, tbh. I felt the touch-therapy pulses in opposition to the within of my wrist however didn’t actually really feel a way of aid after the primary few wears. However as time went on and I started to put on it extra recurrently, I observed how completely different I felt after I wasn’t carrying it. When it was on my wrist, working its high-vibrational magic, I might really feel extra myself, much less careworn and extra soothed. This calming sensation was notably heightened throughout occasions of tension; With every buzz in opposition to my pores and skin, the gadget would blanket me in a grounding sensation that made me immediately really feel relaxed and restored.

What I like most concerning the gadget is how effectively it jogs my memory to be within the current second. Mindfulness practices comparable to breathwork, yoga, and meditation are supposed to promote a way of current thoughts, which analysis suggests will help calm the nervous system and relieve emotions of stress and anxiousness. Equally, contact remedy can “deliver us again into that preferrred respiratory state, which helps us be extra current and pulls us out of the previous and the longer term and into the current second,” Dr. Rabin notes.

With common put on and utilization, I discovered I used to be in a position to higher address the day’s stresses in addition to stay extra current inside my physique. Utilizing the gadget together with different mindfulness practices and remedy, I used to be in a position to navigate my stress in a means that in the end led me to expertise the aid I craved. Even two years after the peak of the pandemic, I nonetheless put on my Apollo Wearable as a method to deliver me again to myself and remind myself to breathe after I want it most.