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A
link to a written article by Servaas that was published in the Orthopaedic
Division Review Magazine of the Canadian Physiotherapy Association (September/October
2003):
http://orthodiv.org/odr/ODRFromTheBirdhouse.pdf
According
to statistics, 80-85% of the adult population in North America will suffer
back pain during their lives. Imagine it is you who suddenly experiences
discomfort in your back. Maybe it will strike you tomorrow or maybe next
week. The question then will be:
Is
there anything that you can do yourself to reduce the tightness, the spasm
or the pain ? Are you able to voluntary release your own contracted musculature
at will ? Or are you dependent on other people or machines to tell you
what is wrong with you ? Are you actually able to sense your own
body in that way, that you can also correct your own body so you
experience instant relief?
These
are interesting questions that are becoming more and more appropriate
when we gain more and more awareness about our own health.
When
working with the whole system and its reflex patterns, many health problems
suddenly become explainable, predictable and resolvable.
Especially when dealing with multiple health problems, it is the
somatic approach that easily and logically links most (if not all) problems
together. Conditions that are non-understood (and often non-treatable)
by the regular health care system will suddenly develop into conditions
with potential for improvement. Following are a few scenario’s and
cases that explain the above:
Breathing is the most primary movement of your spine. To be able to
breathe, your spine needs to be able to move along. Especially when
dealing with pulmonary dysfunctions like for instance asthma,
it is fundamental to initiate rehabilitation with a re-education of
the breathing pattern experienced form a first person perspective.
This pattern incorporates free spinal movement. When suffering back
pain, neck pain or any kind of condition that restricts spinal motion,
your breathing pattern will always be inhibited by the restriction in
spinal movement. When suffering conditions that inhibit a free and easy
breathing pattern, your spinal function will always be impaired. Somatic
Rehabilitation recognizes the intricate relationship between spinal
problems and breathing dysfunctions and resolves this dysbalance within
only a few sessions.
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Still very non-understood within the health care system. The majority
of back problems are nothing else but a subconscious habituated hard
muscular tension in the muscles of the back. This muscular force can
become so strong that it can cause a disc to bulge and compress for
instance on the sciatic nerve. However, this muscular force in the
lumbar region is part of a total body pattern of tightness. It is
not until this total pattern of tightness will be understood, sensed
and released that the lumbar muscles will normalize and freedom
of movement will return. A re-education of spinal movement and of
the breathing pattern from a first person perspective has to
be the primary goal in ‘Lumbar Spine Rehabilitation’. Muscle
groups that have been contracted for many years will instantly allow
a better relation between form closure and force closure within the
joints, discs and vertebrae’s, resulting instantly in a more
functional movement pattern, a higher quality of breathing and a lessening
of complaints.
Somatic
Rehabilitation recognizes the damaging effects of these reflexes
and reverses its patterns within only a few sessions.
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Combining manual therapy skills with the somatic concepts has been
a revealing method of help for people suffering phantom pain. It is
usually within the first session that most, if not all, discomfort
becomes very comprehendible and actually disappears. Because the change
is made through stimulation and education of the sensory-motor cortex
of the amputated body part (‘homonculus’), the client
will for the first time experience normal sensations within the
amputated region. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting further
research and therapy for amputees and phantom pain. When understanding
the somatic concepts, even phantom pain becomes resolvable!
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Everybody who has suffered ‘whiplash’ has been exposed to
a triggering of the Startle Reflex. It is not until this increase
in tension throughout your whole body will have been normalized that
proper rehabilitation can begin on the damaged soft tissues. When
this total body reflex is not ‘dis-engaged’, the body will
remain ‘stuck’ in the power of this reflex and there will
be little or no improvement with conventional rehabilitation. Somatic
Rehabilitation recognizes the damaging effects of these reflexes
and reverses its patterns within only a few sessions.
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When re-educating the muscles that coordinate eye-movement and when
re-integrating eye-movements within the rest of the body, general
organizational reflex patterns will become more efficient. A greater
somatic control and awareness leads to better general eye-coordination
and ‘eye-concentration’. Eye-movement seems to be often
impaired in cases of dyslexia and whiplash. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting further
research and therapy related to eye control, eye reflexes and eye
movement.
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Many people who have had ‘Open Heart Surgery’ will have
developed tension in the left side of their body. Tension ‘to
protect’ the heart. An easy way to recognize this is to observe
their gait pattern: many times you will notice that the left arm doesn’t
swing as easy as the right arm. When observing the system even more,
it becomes clear that it is often the whole left side that has become
tight, if not rigid. This tension originates at a subconscious
level, meaning that the person himself will not be aware of it.
To recuperate from the trauma to the heart, exercise programs are
recommended, usually walking programs. However, when there is tightness
within the left side of your body, your breathing pattern will be
impaired as well as there will be a subconscious pressure or tension
on the heart itself. In other words, in their achievement for gaining
better health, a subconscious tension is restricting their own body’s
function & freedom. It is not until this tension has disappeared
from the left side and balance will have returned within their system
that an activity like walking will become easier and the heart muscle
will be able to strengthen up. Somatic Rehabilitation recognizes
this pattern of tightness instantly and reverses its damaging
effects within only a few sessions.
It
is a very strong belief of The Somatic Health Center that many heart
conditions are directly related to Sensory
Motor Amnesia. When you have muscles in your body that have forgotten
how to move properly, it will also be the heart muscle that can forget
how to move properly. It will require a significant amount of
sensory motor amnesia within your voluntary muscles before any involuntary
muscles will be affected. This creates the philosophy and understanding
that a retraining of the whole body might normalize certain heart conditions.
Without medication. Without surgery. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting research and
therapy related to heart conditions.
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Somatics will bring out the maximum potential possible with the structure
it is dealing with. It is the experience of the Northwest Center for
Somatic Training that conditions like M.S. or Muscular Dystrophy easily
benefit with the somatic approach. It is the loss or lack of fundamental
human movement patterns that is disturbed in these conditions. Somatic
Rehabilitation focuses on nothing else but restoring as much as possible
of these core patterns for human movement. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting research
and therapy related to these conditions.
Wheelchair-bound
people have lost many asymmetrical movement patterns that are normal
when walking. Instead, their method of locomotion has become very symmetrical
(wheeling the wheelchair), which inhibits the development of reflexes
that are organized from within the neck area. On the other hand, fewer
muscles have to carry a heavy load, physically and emotionally. A stimulus
of asymmetrical movement patterns in especially the neck and a waking
up of the muscles that have become tight (sensory motor amnesia) can
often result in a return of freedom: easier and less effort while transferring
with more range of motion. Somatic Rehabilitation is designed to accomplish
the above and more within sometimes even as little as one session. In
non-complete lesions it is very well possible that new areas will be
actively activated during a period of Somatic Rehabilitation. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting research and
therapy related to spinal cord injuries.
A stroke often results in a loss of conscious control within your own
body. In regards to the physical component of a stroke, it is often
an increase in muscle tension that creates spasticity within the affected
side. When upgrading your system with the somatic concepts, you will
be able to connect at a higher level with the affected muscles. However,
all muscles are affected and are compensating within a certain reflex
pattern as well. Somatic Rehabilitation recognizes these patterns of
tension and is able to create a better understanding between the muscles
and you. This often results in an improvement in muscular control, a
better function (breathing, walking etc.) and a more balanced limbic
system as well. The Somatic
Health Center is very interested in assisting research and therapy
related to strokes.
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When coming out of a cast, joints have stiffened up and muscles have
atrophied. It is the experience of the Northwest Center for Somatic
Training that full movement can be restored in often as little as
one session. The
Somatic Health Center is very interested in assisting research
and therapy related to restoring mobility.
Many
other injuries or illnesses that are difficult to explain or difficult
to treat become easy and explainable when you will have developed the
‘somatic way of thinking’. Many neurological disorders, insomnia,
hemorrhoids, shortness of breath, falling/osteoporosis, reflex sympathetic
dystrophy, sexual dysfunction, circulatory problems, leg length differences,
high blood pressure, pelvic instability etc. are often nothing else but
symptoms of Sensory Motor Amnesia / Somatic Amnesia and its resulting
total body patterns of tightness. It is only when you will have created
the knowledge and understanding over these full patterns of tension that
you will start understanding the cause of local pathology.
Somatic
Workshops related to topics in the field of rehabilitation can be organized
in your area. Please contact The
Somatic Health Center for further details.
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