# Stress and Anxiety Source: https://www.corepointclinic.com/conditions/stress-anxiety Acupuncture and massage therapy are commonly used to help manage stress and anxiety at CorePoint. Initial acupuncture visits are one hour and cost $220. Stress and anxiety live partly in the body, and the body is what CorePoint can actually reach, with acupuncture and massage therapy, for the person whose shoulders live somewhere near their ears, whose jaw aches by evening, whose sleep has gone thin. A first acupuncture appointment takes an hour and costs $220; an hour of Swedish massage is $125. Read the next section before anything else, because it draws a line this clinic takes seriously. ## What this care is, and what it is not Acupuncture and massage at CorePoint support people who are stressed and anxious. They do not treat anxiety disorders, depression, or any other mental health condition, and they are not a substitute for a therapist, a psychiatrist, or your physician. If anxiety is interfering with your work, your relationships, or your health, if you are having panic attacks, or if you have been white-knuckling it for months, talk to your doctor or a licensed mental health professional, whether or not you also book here. And if you are in crisis or having thoughts of harming yourself, call or text 988, the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, right now. It is staffed around the clock. Many patients use bodywork alongside therapy and medication, with everyone informed. That combination is exactly how this clinic wants to be used. ## Stress is not only in your head Sustained stress recruits the body. Muscles brace as if for impact, breathing turns shallow and high in the chest, jaws clench through the night, digestion gets strange, and sleep frays at both ends. Those physical loops can keep running even on days when the original stressor takes the day off. This is the territory where hands-on care has something real to offer, because muscles and nervous systems respond to direct, unhurried attention. ## The sleep connection Sleep deserves its own paragraph, because stress and short nights feed each other in a loop consensus medicine describes without controversy: anxiety makes sleep worse, and poor sleep leaves the next day's stress louder. Some people book a session as a deliberate off switch at the end of a hard stretch, precisely to interrupt that cycle before a weekend. If sleeplessness is the dominant problem rather than a side effect, say so at the intake, since in Chinese medicine that detail changes how treatment is planned. Tell your physician too. Persistent insomnia deserves medical attention in its own right, not just a quieter evening. ## What an acupuncture session offers here An acupuncture visit at CorePoint is an hour of enforced stillness in a quiet room, which for some stressed people is itself a novelty. Dr. Tina Navarifar takes a wide-angle history first; in Chinese medicine your sleep, digestion, and mood are read as one picture rather than as separate complaints. Fine, single use needles are placed, the lights go down, and you rest with them for twenty to thirty minutes. Falling asleep on the table is common enough to be unremarkable. Is it the needles, or is it the protected hour of quiet? The research on acupuncture for stress and anxiety is mixed, and claiming a proven mechanism would outrun it. What many patients report is simpler: they feel calmer walking out than they did walking in, and that state gets easier to find again once they have visited it a few times. Follow-up sessions are 45 minutes at $185. ## What massage contributes Massage goes after the physical residue of stress directly. A Swedish massage, $125 for the hour, works the whole body with flowing, moderate pressure and is the classic choice when the goal is to downshift. Deep tissue, at $145, suits the person whose stress has set up permanent camp in specific spots, usually the neck, the jaw margins, and the ridge between the shoulder blades. Dr. Navarifar has done this work since 2008, and she performs every massage herself. Tell her what kind of week it has been. The session should match it. If you are new to both options and unsure where to begin, massage is the lower commitment introduction, and the front half of any first acupuncture visit is conversation anyway. Neither choice locks you into the other. ## Alternating the two Some patients keep a rhythm: acupuncture one week, massage a few weeks later, adjusted around deadlines and life. There is no required cadence here; every visit is priced on its own, and you book the next one when you actually want it. Because a single practitioner sees you every time, she notices when your baseline shifts, for better or for worse, and says so out loud. Worth saying just as plainly: no table treatment removes a stressful job, a caregiving load, or a hard season. What a good session can do is interrupt the body's bracing pattern long enough for you to remember what your shoulders feel like when they are not guarding. For many people that interruption, repeated, turns out to be genuinely useful, and nothing larger than that is on offer. Two practical notes. Stress that expresses itself as headaches has its own page at [headaches and migraines](https://www.corepointclinic.com/conditions/headaches-migraines). And if a racing mind is keeping you from booking anything at all, a phone call is a smaller first step than an appointment. ## Related care at CorePoint The two services all of this rests on: - [Acupuncture](https://www.corepointclinic.com/services/acupuncture), one hour initial visit for $220 - [Massage therapy](https://www.corepointclinic.com/services/massage-therapy), Swedish at $125 or deep tissue at $145 for an hour If your body has been carrying the week for too long, [book a session](https://www.corepointclinic.com/book) or call (949) 377-4707. ## FAQ **Can acupuncture help with stress and anxiety?** Many patients find acupuncture helps them feel calmer and more relaxed. Initial acupuncture visits are one hour and cost $220. **Does massage help with stress too?** Yes. A one hour Swedish massage, which costs $125, is commonly used to support relaxation alongside acupuncture. Medically reviewed by Dr. Tina Navarifar, DC.