If you haven’t noticed, gardens are popping up in some unconventional
places – from prison yards to retirement and veteran homes to programs
for troubled youth.
Most are handy
sources of fresh and local food, but increasingly they’re also an
extension of therapy for people with mental health issues, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD; depression; and anxiety.
It’s called horticultural therapy.
And some doctors, psychologists and occupational therapists are now at
work to test whether building, planting, and harvesting a garden can be a
therapeutic process in its own right.
