How To Cure A Broken Heart According To Meghan Markle’s Acupuncturist

Yes, Meghan Markle's go-to acupuncturist Ross J. Barr says it's entirely possible to mend a broken heart the holistic way. He tells Grazia how

Updated on6th August 2020 at 12.29pm

If you thought that being broken hearted was something you had to labour through without help, think again. Ross J. Barr, the renowned London-based acupuncturist who counts Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex, as a client is well-known for his A-list roster of clients, charisma and most importantly of all his unparalleled skillset in the wellness arena - where he regularly treats patients suffering from a broken heart. Meghan was unlikely to be one of them, of course. The Duchess of Sussex became a client of Ross' when she moved to London while her relationship with Prince Harry was blossoming. Her affinity with holistic therapies and yoga likely paved the way for a meeting of minds. A friendship looks to have formed between Meghan, Prince Harry and Ross and his wife, Irish actress Eva Birthistle, and the couple received an invite to the Royal wedding back in May 2018.

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Not that Ross will ever talk about Meghan, or any client come to that: 'The good thing about my job is that there are no grey areas, you can't talk about patients full stop. It could be your family, my family or royalty. It's all confidential.' Get Ross talking about acupuncture, though, and he will happily bend your ear for hours - oh, and trust us, you'd listen for hours, too. Ross' passion for his subject is second to none and is evident when it gets onto the subject of treating a broken heart. Ross specialises in five element acupuncture, a form of acupuncture that traditionally in Chinese medicine was, aptly, reserved for royals. 'With five element acupuncture you take a lot more time to get to know the character and emotions of the individual,' says Ross, 'it's much more concerned with people's emotional and psychological attributes than their physical ones.' This makes five element acupuncture to perfect way to tackle a broken heart.

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How To Heal A Broken Heart With Acupuncture

Ross is called upon to treat a broken heart more frequently than you might think. 'It's one of the things I treat a lot,' says Ross, 'and from a personal point of view it's helped me through a few breakups over the years.' So how does it help? 'One of the first things that happens after a breakup, or a split of some sort, is the inset of shock. You feel like you're functioning on auto-piliot. You also feel heartbreak physically, there's an ache. There's also a darkness to it. In acupuncture there are specific points that you tackle, and you use these points to help bring the individual round from shock. A lot of the points are round the wrist area. Tackling these points on the body helps to recalibrate the heart and return it to its default setting - helping it to do the job it was designed for, keeping your body going.'

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For Ross, bringing the individual out of shock is key. 'The minute you are out of shock you start to feel better. Heartbreak happens suddenly and whilst you're in that state of shock you often feel irrational. You're running on adrenaline, overthinking things. Everything feels worse when you are in shock. There's a real change in feelings when you're out of shock, your perception of that heartbreak changes. You'll look back and realise it wasn't that bad but at the time it feels fucking terrible.'

The Heart Is 'The Empress' In Chinese Medicine

There are those who are quick to dismiss heartbreak as something you need to get over, but it's never as simple as that. According to Ross, Chinese medicine respects the heart's fragility and the need for us to treat it kindly. 'The heart is known as "The Empress" in Chinese medicine,' Ross reveals. 'It's the boss of all the organs. If "The Empress" gets shunted or has a shock, nothing else works properly.'

The idea in Chinese medicine is that you heal yourself, your heart, and the rest of your body can take care of itself

'That encapsulates the whole feeling of heartbreak - you can't eat, you can't sleep - those might sound like song lyrics, but all that happens because "The Empress" is not able to work the way she usually does. The idea in Chinese medicine is that you mend yourself, your heart, and then the rest of your body can take care of itself.' Ross goes on: 'Most of us have experienced heartbreak. It's that scattered and shattered feeling. After acupuncture patients often say that they feel like themselves again, that the pieces have been brought back together, and that their perception of people and events has become more rational. They've lost that "I'll never love again" form of despair.'

In June Ross launched a range of natural fertility supplements on online wellness superstore VictoriaHealth.com, and followed them up last month with his innovative Healing Patches, £15. These proved an instant sell-out. Well, a three-times-sell-out actually. The Healing Patches are perfect for persistent areas of physical pain, particularly period pains, and are a means of channeling Ross J. Barr's expertise at home if you can't book in at his clinics in London (Notting Hill and Wimpole Street, find all the details here).