Nature's way
What exactly is the definition of horticultural therapy? If someone enjoys gardening on their own or if the residents of a community set aside a plot of land to tend to in their free time, do these activities qualify? According to the American Horticultural Therapy Association, it is "a process utilizing plants and horticultural activities to improve social, educational, psychological, and physical adjustments of persons thus improving their body, mind, and spirit." It offers broad benefits to people young and old dealing with a range of mental, physical, or social problems, from school dropouts, drug offenders, and sufferers of domestic violence, to the mentally ill or senescent.
Horticultural therapists prescribe activities to suit the needs of the patient. For instance, activities for the mentally ill seek to aid with cognition, independent behavior, and social development to help them towards normal lives; for stroke victims, therapy emphasizes reviving sensation and promoting mental calm in order to help the person rehabilitate their body; nursing home residents are shown ways to reinvigorate themselves and discover new interests and pleasures.
Huang observes one important difference between horticultural therapy and other kinds of alternative therapies such as art, music, and dance: in horticultural therapy, the media employed-plants-are themselves living creatures. By nurturing a living thing, the therapy recipient becomes aware of all of life's continual changes, from the sprouting of new buds and the growing of new leaves to flowers blooming then eventually fading. Having the responsibility to cultivate and tend to another life gives us strength and a sense of self-worth.
However, when a horticultural therapist encounters a patient who finds caring for plants unappealing, there are still other options available. Veteran Canadian therapist Mitchell Hewson provides an example of a model who experienced severe depression after a bout with breast cancer forced her to have a mastectomy. Depressed to the point where she was no longer eating or sleeping well, she found little to hold her interest. Her therapist noticed that she was only going through the motions in class and that she seemed increasingly melancholy and withdrawn. So he changed tactics, shifting the focus of the classes to flower arrangement. With the emphasis now on color, beauty, and design, her interest suddenly awoke, and within a very short time, she was showing remarkable talent and skill. Once the pride that she had previously reserved for her beautiful figure became invested in her newfound floral artistry, she finally began to emerge from her funk. Before being released from the hospital, she often visited a floral shop nearby, and eventually went on to open her own successful shop.
Already in existence for over 40 years in the West, horticultural therapy has four major applications: curative, rehabilitative, social, and educational. Curative applications are most often used in medical institutions, rehabilitative most often refers to helping people recover from injury so that they can continue working, social deals with improving quality of life, and educational involves learning about life cycles and nature.
In Taiwan, all four basic varieties have wound their way into the establishment. In the medical system, for example, Taipei's Chung Hsing Municipal Hospital, the Far Eastern Memorial Hospital in Banqiao, Chang-Gung Memorial Hospital in Keelung, and the Mennonite Christian Hospital in Hualien, as well as various convalescent centers, have integrated horticultural therapy into treatments for mental patients.
Mother Nature supplies the sunlight and rain to make plants flourish. Horticultural therapists find a way to bring nature's innate healing power to those ailing in either body or spirit.