Students will be able to hear about alternative ways to stay healthy fall semester from a local acupuncturist.
Tara Welty will speak Wednesday about healthy fall habits in Chinese medicine that students should adopt fall semester such as diets and sleeping patterns. In the "Staying Healthy in the Seasons" event, Welty will discuss the importance of working with nature and the dietary habits students should adopt during the autumn season.
Tara Welty has been an Oriental medicine practitioner since 2000, and in May 2016 she opened a new office, Tara YG Wely L.Ac., located at 8 N. Court St.
Oriental medicine includes the practice of acupuncture, Chinese herbology and Asian bodywork therapy, according to the National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine.
She first became interested in oriental medicine when she was a kid and learned about herbs from her mother.
Welty said Chinese medicine is based on taoism, which, according to BBC, is a philosophical system that advocates a simple and natural life without interfering with natural events in order to achieve harmony.
“The general idea is that if we follow the patterns of nature, it creates health,” Welty said. “And when we go against those patterns, it creates disease.”
Mary Moffat, the operator of the Athens Center for Integrated Arts which is hosting the event, said Welty will focus on the transition between seasons and what to eat and how to adapt without getting sick, and the theory of acupuncture. Welty said that because of the modern world, people do not have to pay attention to seasonal patterns anymore. People can purchase raspberries to eat in off-season January, whereas before the modern era, people could only eat what was in season.
“That’s sort of the blessing of modern living,” Welty said. “But the difficulty is, the Chinese always believe that when you disconnect from nature, you disconnect from one of the … greatest forces of harmony and energy that’s out there.”
Moffat said the purpose of the event is to bring new educational ideas to Athens in a simple, workshop format.
“I know people are interested in acupuncture, but they’re hesitant to go to somebody because they think needles, or they think what’s it about doesn’t really work,” Moffat said. “Because I’ve had many treatments, I know it does work.”
Ashley Fistek, a junior studying early childhood education, said she thinks the event sounds interesting.
“I don’t really know too much about it, but I thought it would be a cool thing to experience once and maybe I’d like it,” Fistek said.
She said if students don’t adopt healthy habits in the fall, it could affect the rest of their year.
“It’s not just needles. It’s about the whole body,” Moffat said. “It’s very different than western medicine.”
Welty will discuss the dietary habits students should adopt during the fall season, and how it differs from what students usually eat to try to be healthy.
“I have a lot of patients who come in and they’ll say, ‘I’ve been eating salad every day,’ ” Welty said. “But when we move into cooler weather, we need more warmed, cooked food. It’s actually easier to digest and helps builds us up more.”
Welty will also talk about when the fall season actually starts. She said in older generations, fall was considered to occur in August. She said she considers the fall season to already be half finished.
She added that berry season has ended, and people should be eating more fall fruits, such as apples, plums and pears.
Welty said she hopes attendees will realize they actually know more about their health than they think, and she hopes they will come away with new advice that they can try in their own life.
“Chinese medicine is very common sense,” Welty said. “And sometimes in the world of health, it’s so complicated these days and easy to lose track of that.”
