A Naturopathic Doctor on Chronic Fatigue, Stress, and Restoring the Body's Balance
By Dr. Lienna Wilson, Licensed Psychologist | Vagus Vitality
Many people living with chronic fatigue, ongoing stress, or autoimmune symptoms know the frustration of being told their lab work looks normal. For Dr. Mathew Richards, a naturopathic doctor at Transformative Medicine, those symptoms are not a dead end. They are a message worth decoding, and the nervous system is often where he starts listening.
To learn more about this topic, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Richards, who draws on acupuncture, botanical medicine, clinical nutrition, IV therapy, and trigger point injection therapy in his work with patients facing chronic fatigue, autoimmune concerns, mental health challenges, and stress. I asked him how the nervous system fits into that work, how the mind and body shape each other, and what he recommends to someone just getting started.
When Labs Look Normal but Fatigue Persists
Dr. Richards sees many patients with chronic fatigue who have already tried a long list of solutions. “The conventional lab work is often fairly unremarkable, yet the debilitating symptoms persist,” he says. Rather than treating normal results as the end of the conversation, he treats symptoms as information. “Symptoms are a sign, a message from the body that something isn’t quite right,” he explains. “What is the body trying to tell us?”
In his view, a nervous system under prolonged strain loses its ability to communicate clearly. “Over time, the nervous system becomes ‘frazzled,’ and the messages are not relayed properly,” he says. That breakdown can take several forms: “an incorrect message being sent, an improper interpretation of that message, or a message that is not being turned off when it should.” His goal is to help the body reset that balance “by supporting its own natural healing ability.”
Stress, Inflammation, and the Immune System
The vagus nerve is the main nerve of the parasympathetic nervous system, the branch behind what Dr. Richards calls the colloquial “rest and digest” state. It reaches the heart, the lungs, and much of the digestive tract, which is why he sees its function as foundational. “Supporting proper function of the vagus nerve is necessary to find a healthy balance in all aspects of health,” he says. “This impacts the immune system as well.”
That link between the nervous and immune systems is well described in the research. Scientists have identified what is called the inflammatory reflex: the vagus nerve senses inflammation in the body and relays it to the brain, and the brain responds through the vagus nerve to help keep the inflammatory response in check (Tracey, 2002).
Dr. Richards describes autoimmune conditions as a kind of miscommunication. “Autoimmune conditions are often a result of a confused immune system receiving and projecting messages improperly,” he says. “This, in turn, affects the nervous system and stress pathways, and the cycle continues until removing the trigger(s) and making an intervention.” Even then, finding the cause is not always the whole answer. “Even when we find the cause(s) and remove them, often additional help is needed to reset the nervous and immune systems.”
The Mind and Body as One System
Many of Dr. Richards’ patients come to him with anxiety and stress, and many have heard some version of the same dismissal. “Too many of us hear ‘it’s all in your head,’” he says. He points to psychoneuroimmunology, the field that studies how the mind, the nervous system, and the immune system influence one another. “Our thoughts affect the body, and the body affects the mind,” he says. “One is intimately connected to the other.”
That is why he avoids treating mental health in isolation. “If only one part is addressed, the other will be left out of balance, and true health cannot occur,” he says. “All aspects of health must be addressed, which includes mental, emotional, biological, relational, and spiritual.”
Acupuncture, Injection Therapy, and Chronic Tension
Dr. Richards is trained in both acupuncture and trigger point injection therapy, and he uses them to help interrupt the cycle between chronic stress and the body. He approaches acupuncture through the lens of Traditional Chinese Medicine, in which pain is understood as a disruption in the smooth flow of qi, or energy, through the body’s meridians. In his experience, emotional stress also tends to show up physically, as chronic muscle tension and strain that can keep the body in a guarded, on-edge state.
“Injection therapy and acupuncture help to remove these blockages,” he says, allowing energy to flow more freely so that “the body can restore itself to proper balance.”
Food, the Gut, and the Body’s Second Nervous System
Dr. Richards emphasizes that the body has two deeply connected nervous systems. The enteric nervous system lines the wall of the gut and can run much of digestion on its own, while the brain, spinal cord, and the nerves branching out from them make up the other (Furness, 2012). “Like yin and yang, one is not complete without the other, and one affects the other,” he says. The vagus nerve is one of the main lines of communication between them, and most of its fibers carry information upward, from the gut to the brain (Bonaz et al., 2018).
That connection makes what we take in especially important. “There are a few things that we take into our body that literally become part of us,” he says. “Breath, water, and food, among a few others.” In his practice, he encourages patients to eat foods as close to their natural form as possible. “I often see that striving to eat foods in their whole, natural form allows the body to heal from stress and traumas of all kinds,” he says. He also cares about how food is grown, raised, and harvested, and he poses a question worth sitting with: “Are we being good stewards of this beautiful Earth?”
Neurofeedback and Adaptogenic Herbs
When asked about tools for supporting the nervous system, Dr. Richards points first to neurofeedback, a technique that gives people real-time feedback on their brain activity so they can learn to shift their own brain patterns. He sees it as a complement to approaches that work on a conscious level. “Many of the things we do to affect chronic stress and trauma are on a conscious level: cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), mental health counseling and therapy, self-help books, reframing, etc.,” he says. “Equally important is addressing the subconscious brain.” He considers neurofeedback a valuable option for patients dealing with anxiety, depression, PTSD, ADHD, and related conditions, an area where research continues to grow.
He also recommends adaptogenic herbs for supporting a healthy stress response. “Adaptogens are natural substances that interact with the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis,” he explains, referring to the hormonal system that governs how the body responds to stress. Examples include ashwagandha, rhodiola, and schisandra. Research suggests adaptogens may help ease stress-related fatigue and support mental performance under pressure, with effects linked to the HPA axis and other key regulators of the stress response (Panossian & Wikman, 2010). As with any supplement, they are best chosen with a clinician who knows your health history and any medications you take.
One Simple Daily Practice: Gratitude
Asked to name a single daily practice, Dr. Richards chooses something that reaches beyond the physical. “If I could only recommend one daily practice, it would be to do something that fosters a state of spirituality and gratitude,” he says. For some people, that might be prayer or meditation. For others, it could be “writing a gratitude journal, a letter to a friend, walking in nature, singing, or providing a service for another person.”
What matters most is finding what works for you. “Whatever ways help you experience gratitude, all can make a significant difference in your life, in the way you respond to stressful situations, and how you see yourself and others,” he says. Research supports the idea: in a well-known set of studies, people who regularly wrote down things they were grateful for reported greater well-being than those who focused on daily hassles or neutral events (Emmons & McCullough, 2003).
For Dr. Richards, nervous system health is not a single intervention but a thread that runs through every part of care, from how he interprets a patient’s fatigue to the food on their plate. His work reflects a simple but important idea: the body is always sending messages, and healing often begins with learning to listen to them.
About Mathew Richards, ND
Dr. Richards is a naturopathic doctor at Transformative Medicine. Originally from Utah, he attended naturopathic medical school in Toronto, Canada. He initially planned to be a musician, and after serving a mission in Paraguay he realized his calling was in natural healthcare. He is passionate about whole food nutrition and finding balance in all aspects of health. Dr. Richards is experienced in acupuncture, botanical medicine, clinical nutrition, IV therapy, and trigger point injection therapy, and he focuses on autoimmune concerns, chronic fatigue, mental health and stress, metabolic imbalances, and musculoskeletal conditions. He can be found at transformative-medicine.com.
Note: Acupuncture, trigger point injection therapy, neurofeedback, and herbal supplements are typically offered by a trained clinician as part of a broader care plan. Adaptogenic herbs can interact with some medications and are not right for everyone. Nothing here is a substitute for individualized medical care. If you are dealing with persistent symptoms, talk to your doctor about what is right for you.
References
Bonaz, B., Bazin, T., & Pellissier, S. (2018). The vagus nerve at the interface of the microbiota-gut-brain axis. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 12, 49. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2018.00049
Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: An experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(2), 377–389. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.84.2.377
Furness, J. B. (2012). The enteric nervous system and neurogastroenterology. Nature Reviews Gastroenterology & Hepatology, 9(5), 286–294. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrgastro.2012.32
Panossian, A., & Wikman, G. (2010). Effects of adaptogens on the central nervous system and the molecular mechanisms associated with their stress-protective activity. Pharmaceuticals, 3(1), 188–224. https://doi.org/10.3390/ph3010188
Tracey, K. J. (2002). The inflammatory reflex. Nature, 420(6917), 853–859. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01321