New in town

The school year’s back, and with it come tense shoulders from hunching over keyboards, anxiety from juggling a variety of activities and headaches from too much, um, studying. Yeah, that’s it, studying. Now, you have several choices of how to deal with these afflictions, with most of them involving popping pills or six-hour “Breaking Bad” marathons to unwind. Fortunately, there’s another option: Alternative and Complementary Care Natural Healing & Wellness Solutions — or just ACC, for short — a new full-service natural healing and wellness center in downtown Lansing.

“The goal is to provide the necessary tools to help people heal and live healthier lives through non-invasive and natural therapies,” says owner Karen Kraft. “Whether you have minor issues such as tight muscles, headache, or general fatigue, or you’re dealing with a serious and chronic illness, we try to provide natural solutions to help each person’s individual situation.”

With imaginatively named nooks named the Buddha Room, the Peace Room and the Pyramid Room, ACC offers many services, including a variety of natural healing methods such as massage, hypnotherapy, reflexology and acupuncture. It also features classes such as yoga, t’ai chi ch’uan and qigong, and coming soon there will be workshops on raw food cooking and the basics of the human body’s energy system. If you prefer to do your holistic healing at home, ACC carries a wide range of supplements, natural body care products, essential oils, crystals and gemstone jewelry.

Kraft, a massage therapist and reiki master, has a unique, personal insight into natural healing: in 2005, she was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma. After six months of chemotherapy she went into remission, but four years later she was diagnosed with the same disease for a second time. Another bout of therapy again removed it only for it to return for a third time. This time, she spent her time in the hospital and months of recovery researching natural remedies for cancer and cancer prevention. She says that she would never undergo chemotherapy again.

“In the long run, the natural route is not very expensive, it lasts a lifetime and it doesn’t harm your body,” Kraft says. She started writing her business plan for a holistic wellness center while still in the hospital, and the result is ACC, which opened last month.

“People are tired of the side effects of the drugs that their doctors are prescribing and want to learn how to heal themselves,” says Kraft. That’s what we’re here for.”

Alternative and Complementary Care Natural Healing & Wellness Solutions617 W. Ionia St. LansingMon.-Fri. 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. 517-708-8510massageandwellnesslansing.com