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Video about the Integrative Learning Center

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Got #pain? Think there is nothing you can do about it? No so. #feldenkraismethod #bonesforlife #somaticeducation

7 Aug
 
Back_pain1

Somatic education approaches such as the Feldenkrais Method, Bones for Life, Alexander Technique and many others can make a big difference.  Read the science behind pain and three ways out of it.

 

http://toddhargrove.wordpress.com/2010/06/24/seven-things-you-should-know-about-pain-science/

 

http://toddhargrove.wordpress.com/2010/08/03/strategies-to-reduce-chronic-pain-part-one/

 

P.S. we have workshops that enable you to change your pain patterns.

 

http://integrativelearningcenter.org/workshops.htm

 

 

 

 

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The science of #pain. Share your personal understanding and experience. #Feldenkrais #bonesforlife #alexander #somatics

28 Apr

Reconceptualizeing Pain According to Modern Pain Science
 
An incredibly valuable article on the science or lack of science around chronic pain and solutions. 
 
This was my posted comment:

In my personal experience with chronic pain and in working with clients with chronic pain, the approach of lowering the excitation or alarm systems while finding small ways to actually move has a positive effect in most cases. This correlates to the above statement “If CRPS is an exaggerated protective response, then it seems sensible to devise treatment that aims first to find a baseline that is sufficiently conservative to not elicit the unwanted protective responses (to ‘get under the radar’), and second to expose the limb gradually to threat while continuing to avoid elicitation of the unwanted responses.”

Most somatic approaches such as the Feldenkrais Method, Alexander Technique, Bones for Life, Rosen, Body Mind Centering etc. specialize in this dance between lowering the threat threshold while introducing movement. I hope these approaches will be thoroughly studied for chronic pain in the future. To date, I believe studies are quite small involving somatics. In my practice, I know a client is improving–usually about the 3rd visit or so when they say something like– “I still hurt over here, but this week I felt incredible ease while I was walking.” This tells me the attention is starting to widen and less focused on pain. Pleasant sensations are starting to become part of the equation. The habitual loop in the CNS is changing.

What's your experience?

Cynthia Allen

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Weight of #War on Soldiers: Heavy Gear-Packs and #BackPain | #feldenkrais #physicaltherapy #somatics #bonesforlife

19 Apr
Colleague Stacy Barrows posted this on twitter and it is worth reposting.  The armed forces is looking for better solutions.  A few years ago we thought that were going to have a chance to work with Bones for Life and the issue of back pain but it was lost in the shuffle on both sides of the time/budget struggle.

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Shiny pictures, poor outcomes: Spine MRI, Back pain, and surgery #feldenkrais #Physicaltherapy

5 Apr

This is a great blog post.  As a culture we are confused about what it means to have pain and  how to find our way out of it. The result is many resort to invasive procedures with poor outcomes.  This post and the research it is quoting seems to suggest that the beginning of the cycle is the MRI itself. 

I believe I could have a full Feldenkrais practice just on failed spinal fusions alone. I have been thinking it begins with the person seeking out the surgeon who gives unrealistic outcomes. Yesterday a new client indicated she was told there was an 80% chance of success with a low back fusion (which research doesn't really support) but upon admission for the procedure, success had dropped to 50% (this is more like what current research shows).  By this point, she is of course committed and hardly anyone I know would  have the psychologically fortitude to think it through on the way into surgery and withdraw her/himself. 

However, the above post by Neil O'Connell suggests it starts with MRI results that scare people into thinking they have something awful that is causing their pain when in fact (as we have known for a long time now) those MRI results do not correlate with the pain itself.

It is hard for a person in severe back pain to believe but while it may take longer than one thinks they have time for or longer than it should, with dedication to one's own healing, confidence in one's own healing, and a good team to work  with, one can have much better outcomes than a 50% surgery success.  If the surgery doesn't go great, one will be doing the time for the therapy anyway but in a much more disadvantaged place to start from emotionally, physically and probably financially.  Back when knee surgeries were still in the early stage of success, Moshe Feldenkrais was given a surgical outcome for his knee of 50/50.  As a scientist he exclaimed, "That is no better chances there mere fate!  I will go the road of working with myself." and from there the Feldenkrais Method was on the road to being born.

Cynthia Allen
Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner
Bones for Life Teacher/Trainer
co-creator of the Integral Human Gait theory and teacher of Gait for Wild Human Potential workshops

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