Face Body Soul Clinic

Hi everyone,

I haven’t been inspired to write here for quite some time but now I feel compelled to do it! It to advise you how to improve our immune system. Due to the uncertainty and the news, related to the spread of Corona virus, called the biggest health threat of our time, fuelling panicking. Yes, the scary virus is here and we can’t ignore it, while at the same there are some things we can do. We need to keep calm and to prepare well. Strengthening our own immune system is the best approach.

Stress is the biggest enemy of the immunity, so we need to address it and reduce it to the possible minimum. The well-known methods are good diet, appropriate work/rest balance, enough sleep. How many of us could have this ideal balance, especially now when we are told how many already are or are going to be sick, meaning that the healthy ones would need to do even more work. Adrenals are the glands helping us to deal with stress so their health is of utmost importance! Good rest naturally nourishes them but supplementing some Magnesium could do even more. Some people would go further, taking the so called adaptogens – herbs or mushrooms with medicinal properties. I personally haven’t used them, so just research the web for them. I will advise you on everything I know that it works.

Meditation is a very good de-stressing technique as we all know. So is tapping, listening to calming music (plenty of it on the Internet) watching or listening to comedy. Religious people shared with me that praying helps removing their fears. So, do whatever gives you calm mind. A calm mind would make better decisions than a stressed mind!

The alcoholic drink many people would take every evening in order “to unwind and relax” actually damages your immunity in a long run. Being just sugar, alcohol feeds candida albicans and gives it a very high rise. Sometimes it reaches such overgrowth that it breaks through the brain barrier and slows down the brain functions, which are too many and too important to ignore. Candida contributes to forming the phlegm, which according to the Traditional Chinese medicine gets stored mainly in the lungs, after getting produced by the digestive system. When working on preventing a very serios flu, we need to strengthen the lungs by improving our digestion.

 

Nutrition:

Hollands and Barratts do not pay me to advertise their products, but as I have been using them for many years, I know they are the medium range in quality and price. If you can afford higher quality products, do it.

For enhancing your immunity you can use the Hollands and Barratts tablets of Magnesium and Zinc, good to take in the evening as Mg will help you sleep. Vitamin C goes well with the Iron sold in liquid form, preferably to be taken during the day. You see the recommendation for dose on the bottle and do not exceed it, you only need to supplement your system, not to overload it.

Amino acids are the building blocks for all hormones and contribute to immunity, so some supplementation could be helpful. This is valid especially for the diabetics, who have difficulties digesting proteins, which are made of amino acids. Some people would prefer the powder form of the protein supplements, offered to the body builders. You don’t need to reach the dosage for them. Remember that any protein supplementation will put some pressure on your kidneys, so adequate intake of water is needed to accompany it. You will find information about the normal daily intake to be in the range between a litre and two litres a day. I personally am happy when I can drink 1.5 litre.

The good oils are needed for all purposes of metabolism, so you can take one spoon a day of the ones Hollands and Barratts sells.

Keep the good fibre intake in order to make sure you evacuate regularly and this way to  get rid your body of all the waste products efficiently,  to prevent further multiplying of bugs. I recommend raw cabbage as it’s vitamin C content is high. Pickled cabbage is especially efficient for good digestion.

Always keep some lemons in the fridge. Vitamin C is water soluble, so you can make a drink by squeezing half lemon in a glass of water. It helps digestion of proteins, hence its use with fish and with meat. Note: heat kills vitamin C, so when you put lemon juice in hot water, you lose the vitamin C.  Always wash the lemon with soap before cutting it!

Garlic and onions are good for cold and flu when eaten raw. Squeezed garlic with some salt, lemon juice and olive oil could be added to salads, sandwich spreads etc. Of course, you need to eat them in the evening when not going out. You need to give some to your partner, this is the only way they won’t smell it on your breath. If you keep a bunch of parsley in your fridge and you eat some of it in the morning the bad breath will disappear. When you get bad breath after having eaten raw garlic, this means it has worked and has killed lots of bugs. I am sure you don’t get the same effect when you take garlic tablets, so don’t’ waste your money on them. People seem to be more used to eating raw onions in salads, but remember that their bug-killing efficiency is highest when freshly cut and chopped.

Ginger and turmeric tea are warming and will help with feeling cold and with the shivers at he beginning of cold/flu. They will induce sweating, which is the way body gets rid of bugs and toxins and also cools itself. I firstly heard about turmeric in the 90-s in relation to its traditional use for colds. I buy it from the Asian shops in packages large enough to share with friends and I use it regularly in my cooking. It is one of the ingredients of curry powder. When I feel cold or shivery I poor some hot water over a pinch of turmeric powder and drink this tea. The taste could be quite unusual for you, so you can add some enhancers to it. I would normally combine it with a few slices of ginger. I make my ginger tea strong, but people who are not used to it can take it slowly, starting with 2-3 slices of ginger in hot water. Gradually, you can reach the point of tolerating double amount of ginger boiled in the water for a few minutes.

Cayenne pepper is known to be very hot, so you can use it in very small amounts (on the tip of the knife) in your food for warming your body. It will give you burning sensation in your mouth, but don’t’ be scared of it. As long as you don’t overdo it, cayenne pepper will not cause any damage. Strong sensation in the stomach after taking any of the aforementioned herbs and spices may indicate some problem in the stomach, which needs investigation.

Tea Tree essence is anti-viral, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal and this is why every household needs to have it at home. Gargling with 2 drops of T-tree in a cup of water every evening after coming home from work would be good prevention. The good care for your mouth and throat, where the infection meets the first line of defence is of utmost importance! Remember that essences do not dissolve in water, so you need to stir well for dispersing them well.

The aroma therapy essences are well soluble in oils and spirit (Vodka). You can prepare your own massage oil by adding three drops of Lavender essence in a soup spoon of base oil. For cold/flu and cough this could be massaged over your trachea and to the sides of the top of your chest, forming a crest. Lavender is preferably used in the evening as it will also help you sleep. For clearing your breathing, the well-known essence is Eucalyptus, best inhaled. I recommend putting a few drops of it on a tissue and inhaling it without touching your nose with the essence. The other methods, which I will describe are with using hot water which evaporates the essence dropped in it, but they will give you reduced effect. Put two drops in the water of a burner for refreshing the air of your room/office. Make sure you add water and essence throughout the burning time of the candle. You can also inhale the evaporations of some boiled water in which you put a few drops of essence.

The inhaling of an essence from a tissue could be used with T-tree and Lavender as well, again, making sure you don’t’ touch your skin with the neat essence. T-tree is considered much harsher than Lavender. If you are a real fan of aromatherapy you can place a few tissues or cotton buds with some essences in different places in your room/home/office. Only be aware that the neat essences can damage the furniture and should be out of reach of children, as well your nose, eyes.

Chamomile tea in the evening is good for calming and relaxing. If you boil it for a few minutes, it will make a soothing gargling, but not a drink.

Peppermint tea is also calming and a good digestive aid. Traditional Chinese Medicine considers is cooling and this makes it good for the times you may feel hot. Sometimes the body produces extra heat (I call it empty heat), when overworking, as it is when we are stressed. If you have proper fever, Peppermint tea will not be enough to bring it down, but it will give you good feeling.

I am afraid, if your get very high fever, you will need to consider calling the doctors. Fever is the natural way of the body to fight infection, but there is a point when it could be damaging to the body and needs to be curbed. I am not taking the doctor’s job here, but it is a common sense to try and lower it if it reaches 39C or higher.

Hydration is very important, dehydration could lead to fever. Fluid in the body is used to expel the bugs in all possible ways, so make sure you drink plenty. As I mentioned above, 1.5 litre could be enough, you can go above, but it is not desirable to go below this amount. Just to remind you that ordinary tea and coffee are diuretics, so only herbal teas count towards the fluid intake. It is best to drink water, but in case you dislike the taste so badly that it puts you off drinking it, add something to your water, preferably a few drops of lemon juice. Always wash the lemon with soap and water before cutting it. It goes without saying that you always wash your hands before handling food. You can prepare a bottle to take with you at work. It is not only cheaper, but much healthier than the different flavoured waters in the shops.

Exercise is good for you! The ones who are already on a program I would advise to take it easy, as over-working your body with exercise can add unwanted stress. Just keep up at the level you are and don’t worry about progressing. Avoiding a heavy illness is a progress by itself!

If you are intending of starting a program now, take it easy too. Preferably, start with power walks and small runs in the park/common, followed by good stretching and a hot shower to wash out the toxins from the skin surface. Staying indoors afterwards is also highly advised.

The habit of many professionals to shower in the morning and then go out in the cold or the “wind” of the air conditioning of the public transport and offices in London is very damaging to the immune system. My vote is for the shower/bath taken last thing in the evening. You wash the grim of the day, you warm your body after the exposure to the aforementioned “wind” and you sleep and rest well for the next day. In the morning you can do a quick rub with a wet soapy flannel to refresh yourself. This acts as a sports massage before the event – waking up the muscles, improving the blood circulation to the brain, which improves its functions. Your skin will be grateful, too.  You need only ten extra minutes in the morning and may well end up with no need for a large morning coffee. Coffee is a strong stimulant and it also exhausts the adrenal glands in a long run, especially if overused. If hot shower/bath before bed prevents you from falling asleep, take it earlier in the evening, when you are not going out afterwards. If you have difficulty falling asleep frequently, this needs to be specially addressed. As a first step towards sorting it out I recommend reducing your stress level.

Treatments that I can offer are very supportive of the immunity. Booking only after consultation on the phone with me.

 

Here are some links for the tapping videos I recommend, in case you are interested.

Boost your immune system https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDn85B6Nkkk&list=RDCMUCiHZMZejDS4RIxDdBwoie9A&index=2

Healing from inside https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6Ua7T01cdY&list=RDCMUCiHZMZejDS4RIxDdBwoie9A&index=3

You are gonna be OK https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP70Et2d3Lw&list=RDCMUCiHZMZejDS4RIxDdBwoie9A&index=4

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunstroke, or heatstroke as it is called in the medical literature, can affect everybody, not only the children and the elderly. I read that on the Internet after a mild form of it knocked me out of my usual volunteering for Cancer Research at the London marathon. I had a terrible headache, some light-headedness and nausea, my muscles were achy and I felt shivery, all these symptoms making me think I had a cold. But at the end of the day, I heard about the young athlete who died during the marathon, my attention was drawn to the effect of sun and heat on the human body and it dawned on me that I actually had a mild sunstroke! The previous day I had done some sunbathing on the common, tempted by the chance to absorb some sunshine after the long winter. I had some water on me, I had covered my head and left for the shadows soon after twelve at noon, so I thought I had done all well. But, as it happened, after the long winter, this first hour and a half exposure to the direct scorching sun, proved to be too much for me. Born and raised in Bulgaria, where the summers were extremely hot, it would have never occurred to me that sun could cause me a problem. Well, it is obvious to me now that after over twenty years in the not-that-sunny London, gone are the days, when I could sleep for two hours on the sunny beach and only get nicely tanned, not burned. Things have changed, the sun also has changed and we need to consider this. Besides, the sudden changes of temperatures do not allow for the body to adapt.

I went on Internet in order to check if I was self-diagnosing right and I found some information I didn’t know before, so I decided to share it. But then the temperatures went so low, that I postponed publishing it for the summer. As this Bank holiday brought another heat-waive to Britain, here is what I have found for you on: https://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/heat-stroke-symptoms-and-treatment#2-3

Symptoms of Heat Stroke

The hallmark symptom of heat stroke is a core body temperature above 104 degrees Fahrenheit ( 40 C).But fainting may be the first sign. Other symptoms may include:

• Throbbing headache
• Dizziness and light-headedness
• Lack of sweating despite the heat
• Red, hot, and dry skin
• Muscle weakness or cramps
• Nausea and vomiting
• Rapid heartbeat, which may be either strong or weak
• Rapid, shallow breathing
• Behavioural changes such as confusion, disorientation, or staggering
• Seizures
• Unconsciousness

First Aid for Heat Stroke

If you suspect that someone has a heat stroke, immediately call 911 or transport the person to a hospital. Any delay seeking medical help can be fatal.

While waiting for the paramedics to arrive, initiate first aid. Move the person to an air-conditioned environment — or at least a cool, shady area — and remove any unnecessary clothing.

If possible, take the person’s core body temperature and initiate first aid to cool it to 101 to 102 degrees Fahrenheit. (If no thermometers are available, don’t hesitate to initiate first aid.)

Try these cooling strategies:

• Fan air over the patient while wetting his or her skin with water from a sponge or garden hose.
• Apply ice packs to the patient’s armpits, groin, neck, and back. Because these areas are rich with blood vessels close to the skin, cooling them may reduce body temperature.
• Immerse the patient in a shower or tub of cool water.
• If the person is young and healthy and suffered heat stroke while exercising vigorously — what’s known as exertional heat stroke — you can use an ice bath to help cool the body.

Do not use ice for older patients, young children, patients with chronic illness, or anyone whose heat stroke occurred without vigorous exercise. Doing so can be dangerous.

If emergency response is delayed, call the hospital emergency room for additional instructions.

My advice on preventing even a “mild” sunstroke/heatstroke:

1. Always keep hydrated – a bottle of one and a half litre of water is a minimum on a hot day. Avoid too much coffee/tea as they are diuretic and can dehydrate you. Alcohol does the same. Cold drinks cause the body to work harder in order to raise their temperature to its own temperature of 37C. The people in Eastern cultures use hot drinks in hot weather, this causes perspiration, which cools the body. Remember, one of the symptoms of heatstroke is lack of perspiration!
2. Keep out of the sun between 11.30 am and 3.30 pm when sunbathing. Some people like sleeping till late when they are on holiday, so they would arrive at the beach at nearly lunch-time, which is the opposite of what we have to be doing for the best benefits. Consider this: getting up early enough to get the benefit of the morning sun before 11.30 am, then hiding from the scorching sun lunch-time when you can eat your food slowly and let it be digested well, then perhaps going back in bed for an afternoon nap, then going to the beach again for a long swim, letting your skin absorb naturally the micronutrients from the sea.
3. Always cover your head when sunbathing.
4. Applying sunscreen will protect your skin from burning, fast ageing and skin cancer, but it is not a guarantee against sunstroke/heatstroke. The opposite is valid, too. Not applying sunscreen does not necessarily mean you will get sunstroke. But, it feels horrible if you get them together. So, the length of time of your sunbathing is also important. When I was taking school-kids to the beach, my instructions were to expose them to the sun for five min on each side (20 min altogether) on the first day. It is a text-book rule that darker skins can take longer in the sun without burning, but this can increase the risk of sunstroke. I think this is what happened to me.
5. Allow your skin to tan slowly and gradually by using the benefits of the sun in small portions, but regularly. Get a pair of shorts and a vest in your bag for work, put them on when you finish work and walk to the nearest park/common/garden for half an hour on a sunny day. This could bring you more benefits than exposing yourself heavily to the sun for one or two days, risking to get (almost) ill afterwards. And, you will be well prepared for your summer holiday at a beach.
6. Sunbathing when hungry or after a large meal could also contribute to getting a sunstroke/heatstroke.
7. Getting up and walking around from time to time while sunbathing can decrease the risk of sunstroke/heatstroke, especially if there is a shadow, or a breezy area where you can stay for a while. When sunbathing near water, it is easier to get cooled from time to time, but this could also contribute to the temptation to stay longer in the sun.

Here are a few tips for treating burned skin. If you get home with skin red like a boiled lobster, apply thin layer of natural yogurt on it. It will take the heat form the skin and will dry in a few seconds. Leave it there for a bit, to allow your skin to absorb some of the fat from the yogurt, which will help your skin heal. Applying any oil now will make the healing of your skin more difficult.  Shower with warm water only, tap dry and if your skin is still screaming, use the yogurt again. Strong chamomile tea, cooled and poured over the burned skin will calm it down. You can also tap it on the skin with some cotton. Neat lavender essence heals well burned skin, but it would give you painful burning sensation first. So, use it later for skin recovery, after the redness is already gone.

 

Easter to me is the symbol of reviving of the whole nature for a new life-cycle and we, the humans are part of it. My Easter wish to all of you is – Happy new beginnings!

One good new beginning could be your striving to get back in a good shape after the winter “hibernation” via detox and exercise. The most athletic of us have never stopped it. Other people started with the New Year. But for many of us, Easter is the right timing for this new beginning. The temperatures are raising (fingers crossed!), days are longer, the sun is encouraging more action! Blooming flowers and trees are inspirational! Going for a run to the park or going to the gym for a class or a bit heavier exercise seems a very natural idea and doesn’t take a great deal of persuasion and willpower.

My advice to people who start exercising program after some time of being “lazy”has always been to do a detox first, or to include some of my treatments(see description) in their program.

Here is the recipe of a high-protein cottage cheese and eggs appetiser

Ingredients:

1 pot of cottage cheese (600g)

4 hard boiled eggs

Half large cucumber

Some peppermint leaves

3 cloves of garlic (optional)

2 table spoons of plain yogurt (optional)

4 tea spoons of oil (olive, flax seed or better 1 tea spoon of each)

Pinch(or two) of salt

Enough to make 6-8 appetisers.

Preparation:

You need a bowl large enough to allow stirring of all ingredients

Wash and chop a small bunch of peppermint leaves and throw them in the bowl. Peel the eggs and chop them in the bowl. (if you want a very high protein content, chop the whites of three more hard boiled eggs in the bowl). Wash and peel the cucumber and chop it finely. In case you and your guests can afford eating raw garlic, peel and squeeze the garlic gloves in the mix. If you want to ask them first, you can leave adding the garlic immediately before serving. Add the oil and the salt before adding the cottage cheese and stirring the mixture well. It is going to be quite thick and it is good for appetiser on its own or on bread as a snack. To make it a dip, you may want to add one or two table spoons yogurt.

I found this “appetiser” very good thickener for some of my vegetable soups and the mix makes for a high protein meal, usually in the evening.

A bit more about raw garlic: The use of raw garlic is best in the evening, as it contributes to lowering the blood pressure and to good sleep. Raw garlic is a natural bug-killer and taking it in the evening could be good prophylactic against the variety of bugs we encounter throughout the day. Peppermint and parsley help with the bad breath in the morning and the peppermint toothpaste is quite efficient, too. So, it is only a question of getting organised, rather than avoiding a very good natural remedy.

 

It doesn’t cease to amaze me how people always want to get “more”for the money they pay, or perhaps, to put it more politically correct – to make the best of the money they paid!

What do I mean?

Having worked as a complementary therapist for over twenty years in London, I have met clients from all walks of life, within a very different range of income. What I have been detecting throughout the years was that a very high proportion of the clients have the perception of the treatments they receive as some goods they buy on the market. As massage is officially classed as “service”, they think they have to make the best of the money paid for the service.  They seem to forget that this is a treatment,  which the therapist performs on the client, according to the consultation they have done prior to treatment and according to the therapist’s knowledge, experience and expertise on human anatomy and physiology and how the environment affects us. Of course the client will tell me what they think they need most from this treatment and how they like it, this is an intrinsic part of the consultation and I will take it into consideration. But the trouble starts where the client thinks primarily about their “entitlement” of having something because they pay for it.

What do I mean?

Nowadays it is largely popular clients to ask for “deep tissue”,which is sometimes is also called “sports” massage, in the meaning of massage for the muscles, not only for skin.

Firstly, I need to clarify that both types of massage are very different and they do not have to be listed together as the same thing on the spa lists. Sports massage is to be performed on athletes prior to a sporting event, aiming to bring blood to the skin surface and to make it readily available to the muscle underneath it. It cannot be measured in hours (only in minutes). I doubt any spa has to take care of athletes prior to their participating in a sports event, people who look for a “sports massage” in a spa would be amateurs after participating in a sport event, or lay people who have overdone some practising in the gym. I assume the name has become popular as the training courses (I did one twenty years ago) were called “Sports massage” courses, and we focused more on the “deep tissue” or “remedial” massage, the treatments suitable after sports or any exertion. Sports massage/deep tissue massage course was the next level after completing the Swedish massage course, which is for treatments at skin deep level.

Recently I found out that a category “invigorating “ massage is on the list of a company providing visiting therapists in London. Again, the invigorating treatment should last 15-20 min maximum. Invigorating techniques could be used at the end of the Swedish or the “deep tissue” massage, in case the goal is to wake up the client who has been falling asleep during the relaxing part of the treatment. I personally don’t do it in order to prevent my clients from catching chill after their treatment. Again, most of my clients are not athletes nowadays.

So, “deep tissue” and “sports” or “invigorating” massage are completely opposite and it is not to expect  sports massage to last one hour.

Back to the clients who think that “deep tissue” massage is the best value for their money and that they get “more” benefits as the therapist seems to use more pressure. Here I need to disappoint you – not always the deep tissue massage gives you the best benefits.

For twenty years in London I have massaged thousands predominantly female professionals, some of them very athletic, most of them with a very sedentary life-style, some of them in between of these two categories. Occasionally, I had for clients some male athletes to whom I was recommended due to my own sports background and my remedial massage practice at the time. I know the difference of how muscles feel (under my hand) due to suddenly strenuous exercise, due to regular exercise or due to none exercise at all.

When somebody comes to me asking me for “deep” massage, only because they have heard of it and because they think it is the best deal for the money they pay, I try to find out what exactly the problem is. I know they think it is going to best help their painful body, but I also try to educate them a bit on how the body works and to offer them the best known to me solution to the problem, my holistic massage. It incorporates some manual lymphatic drainage, which opens the pathways of the toxins elimination form the body by speeding up the function of the lymphatic system, followed by deep tissue remedial massage techniques, which then release even more toxins in the circulation, and use of aroma oils, which enhance the capability of the body to manage the aforementioned processes as well as the immunity.

What shocked me recently, after I came back to private from my work for NHS, was that my offer would be very rarely accepted by the clients who had come to the spa with “deep tissue” massage in mind. (Perhaps the corporate managing of the industry nowadays has removed the clients TRUST in the therapist, that the therapist would do their best to give give them individually tailored treatment, suitable for their needs?)

If a client thinks they would get the most for their money by having” the most”, which in their view is ”deep tissue” massage because the therapist uses the most strength and physical energy, I would not argue with them. I would do the treatment according to the client’s request because I also want the client to feel happy that they received the best treatment. They are sent home knocked out, they feel very “relaxed”, actually tired, as the toxins in their circulation are so much, the client feels exhausted and sleepy. Nothing wrong with feeling sleepy after a massage, perhaps even this is an achievement for a professional in London who doesn’t get enough sleep during the week anyway. But, the toxins released into the circulation would take long to get excreted and the client may feel painful body till the middle of the week (the healing crisis).

Besides, due to feeling lethargic and tired in the working days following such treatment, the client may keep awake by increasing their coffee intake without even noticing it. This can lead to increasing the amount of alcohol taken in the evening to bring them down, or just staying up late and not getting enough sleep, so more or stronger coffee is needed the next morning, back to the vicious circle of stress. They could also be exercising heavily in the gym in order to “burn it out”, while still working hard in the office, putting on themselves an amount of stress so large that the body “forgets” to excrete the toxins and the congestion of the whole system gets even worse. So, a week after their deep tissue massage, the client may feel knackered, instead of getting better. They need another treatment. Some may even get to think that the money invested in their “deep tissue” massage was wasted as they cannot see the positive effect of it. Again, I could argue with this, there was a positive effect from it, only it was happening so slowly that there was no time for smooth getting back into the stressful lifestyle. This is where I give you my example of how “less” could be “more”. My holistic treatment, which is not all “deep tissue” and may look to you “less” of a treatment as less pressure is applied to your body, could also give you less toxin to excrete at once, while opening the pathways for the toxins to get excreted faster. At the same time you fell relaxed and your sleep is improved, so the “healing crisis” is not that hard on you. When you come for your next treatment, the capacity of your body to excrete is already increased and the positive results from the treatment are tangible.

Of course, everybody has the right to be treated according to their view of how this is to be done, and this is how I do my work. My question is: why don’t you relax, trust me and believe I will do the best for you and we can work in synergy, which will multiply the positive effect?!

(to be continued)

 

The participants in London Marathon were from all walks of life and they got to run it for many different reasons. Some people started running for losing weight and later they got “hooked” on the endorphins produced during exercise. Endorphins are natural painkillers and create euphoric feelings this is why they are also called “feel good” chemicals of the brain.

As the weather dramatically has changed to better since the Marathon, I can see many runners outdoors, which inspired me to write this entry.

Running is the cheapest exercise (make sure your running shoes are good, though). It is good for everyone who does not have low back problems or knee problems. If you have aches or pains in the aforementioned areas, it is good to find out first what is causing them. A check with your physiotherapist is a good idea before you embark on a running programme.

Building up the muscles:

If you only have the aches due to weakened muscles, it is good to do some work on those muscles first. The best exercises for core muscles (in the abdominal and lower back area) you can learn in yoga or pilates classes. You can strengthen your quadriceps (in front of thigh), as well as gluteals (in the buttocks) and respectively your lower back just by walking the stairs. You step with a flat foot on the next step and this way your body weight is taken up the step by your quadriceps and with the participation of your gluteals.  This is how you train these groups of muscles without having to go to the gym. If you feel this exercise is very easy, you can start taking two steps at a time. Later, you can add some weight to your body weight, a rucksack on your shoulders, for example. Of course, you can start running and do the stairs exercise at the same time, just make sure you begin with small intensity and progress gradually. You need to feel you are putting some effort when doing it, then it would be beneficial. Once the exercise feels too easy, it is time to add more intensity (more stairs, more weight or more sessions). Remember: Everybody in a normal health could run a Marathon, but it sometimes starts with just walking.

Muscle wasting:

I was glad to see people well over sixty entering the massage hall after the Marathon, with strong looking muscles and no injury, apparently they had trained wise. But I also remember very vividly one thin girl, who had some deterioration of the muscles on one leg and she said it was due to an injury, that happened a month prior to the Marathon. In order to heal it, she had stopped practising and her run on the actual Marathon was the first one after a month break! The willpower did it for her, and I was happy she didn’t have another muscle injury during the Marathon. But it could have easily happened as she had some muscle wasting on both her legs.

In my long practice I have observed many people from different age groups, who had some level of muscle wasting. A few causes for that could be listed, but for shortness, I can just say: the culprit is stress, especially when it is prolonged.

Stress and exercise:

Many stressed people think that by heavy exercise they can counteract the stress in their life and this way they would achieve balance. And then they wonder why after going three or more times a week to the gym, or to run, they still don’t lose the fat, don’t  seem to be building up muscles, still have the cravings for sweets and still feel stressed. This is because too much exercise can add to the stress and then the body reacts by secreting even more of the so called “stress hormones”, the ones that help us deal with stress, so people still feel stressed.  Although the stress hormones are good for us, secreted when we need them, having them constantly circulating in the body could be damaging. Cortisol is the well- known reason for the slimmers on diet and exercise to get to a point when they cannot lose weight any more, while keeping the fluid retention, and not building muscle, perhaps even losing it, despite the right for the purpose diet.

De-stress first:

I always advise my clients: take de-stress and detox first before you enrol on an intense exercise programme, never mind you are otherwise healthy. And, while you are on it, keep having some treatments to maintain stress levels low and the detox process up to speed.

Most of my treatments are good for this, but especially Manual Lymphatic Drainage (with added ear acupuncture optional). MLD helps speed the liver to clear the waste. After they have done the job, the stress hormones turn into waste, left to stay in the body for too long turns them into toxins. When your liver is clogged and you start intense exercise, it creates waste with a higher speed. Your liver is already slow, how could it became faster when you load it further? This is what MLD can do for your liver and your whole body – free it from some toxins, speed up the lymph flow so the new waste could be processed faster and then the muscles will work better, the whole body will function better, your make regular and smooth progress.

Detox helps:

Also, the season people normally embark on an exercise program is usually Spring, when weather is changeable and the bugs are around. When we get attacked by an infection, our immune system needs lots of strength and energy to fight it, so during such a period rest is a must. Extra fluids are needed and the food should be easy to digest: predominantly carbohydrate with easily digestible proteins (hence the chicken soup), lots of ginger tea with lemon.. If you still have to go to work, just do the bare necessity and then rest, forget about your exercise programme for a while. If any fever, wait until it is gone, then have my MLD treatment. Your immune system has killed lots of bugs, which form a bigger than the usual load of waste and MLD treatment would help the excretion and prevent them to turn into toxins. Resume your exercise programme starting from much lower level of intensity comparing with that prior to illness.

Well-done ME!

I am so proud of myself that I managed to go and provide massage for some of the London Marathon runners for Cancer research! Never mind the chill!

It was such an inspirational event!

I worked in a hall with twenty five massage tables in it and perhaps forty enthusiastic massage therapists, most of them bright young things, knowing their trade and demonstrating the best of it!

It was humbling experience meeting so many people from all walks of life, who had just finished a 26-mile run, arriving at the massage hall limping or with stiff cold limbs telling us they were “All right” and enquiring if we had painful hands massaging so many people in one day. Yet they were the actual heroes of the day! They have raised 2 million for Cancer research!

I am only glad I could join the team, it was a team work with so many others doing the many small things which made this so well organised event happen! Myself and the colleague I paired up, we stayed and worked after most of the other therapists had packed and gone. We treated the last arriving marathon participants yet they had been running for over eight hours! So, it was a marathon for all of us!

WELL DONE US ALL!

 

Here are a few tips:

Sleep:

Make sure you get enough sleep. Human needs vary between seven and nine hours a night for different individuals. Find out how many hours sleep you need and calculate what time you need to go to bed in order to wake up on time in the morning. Keep in mind that the best hours for sleep are before midnight. Some people get themselves in the habit of having a glass of alcohol, which is to help them sleep. This is a no-go if you haven’t started it and if you have, think how to get rid of this damaging habit. It is the old wives’ tale that a glass of warm milk in the evening helps you sleep. As it is heavy to digest, milk makes you feel full and this can have a calming before sleep effect, but in a long run, milk reduces the absorption ability of your gut, this way making you more lethargic. Besides, the calcium from milk is harder to absorb than the Ca in the green leafy vegetables, so, the milk myth is out!

Getting good quality of sleep is another important factor and it could be more difficult to achieve, again, different for each individual. Here my treatments could be needed as well as more serious changes in the daily routine. General principle is to manage to relax and detach from the day’s problems in the evening. While it can be easy for some people, some others will need to work on it.

After a good night sleep, the appetite feels normalised and the cravings get reduced. So, in order to lose weight, start sleeping (well and long enough)!

Diet:

Quantity of your food should be enough to get you through the day, but forget about that little extra you were allowing yourself during the festive season.

Remember that you can lose up to two kilos in two weeks only by avoiding biscuits, all other pastry and bread with gluten, yellow cheese and fatty meat products as well as deep fried food.

So, put yourself on a diet of cooked brown rice (or quinoa) with vegetables and lean meat or fish, drink plenty of hot herbal tea or just water, avoid alcohol and sweets, and in two weeks you will see the difference without starving yourselves.  Doing all the above is going to reduce the pressure on your digestive system and by starving yourselves for animal fat your liver will be very thankful for the raw olive oil, or other raw oils you will use. Avoiding gluten will free your gut from the glue stuck inside of it and will make it easier for the absorption of  the nutrients  and you will naturally feel more energetic. Remember, the fibre from the vegetables also helps this but in this season it is good to eat them cooked (not to pulp, leave then slightly crunchy).

I can prepare individual detailed dietary advice, in case you are very keen on starting a holistic programme.

A 100g serving of quinoa provides:
368 calories	14g protein	6g fat	64g carbohydrate	7g fibre

The above is copied from http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/, where you can find many recipes with quinoa. My favourite chef Jamie Oliver also offers some, so I am not giving you mine, they are too simple.

Ever since quinoa has been proclaimed as the best source of protein of non-animal origin all the chefs and shops use it to replace the rice in their old recipes. It has become very costly to buy. This is why I am very happy to mix of brown basmati rice and quinoa for a base of a salad or a meal.

A mix of rice and lentils is also a very good vegetable source of protein. It is worth cooking once for a few days, they keep well in the fridge. The salads in the shops are freshly made only on the first day, they spend a few days on the shelves and some of their ingredients lose their nutrients a few hours after they have been chopped. The good thing of preparing them at home is that you know what exactly is in them. A tip: you can always keep a small bottle of oil and some salt at work so you can add them immediately after eating your lunch.

The Western world has been promoting very much the high in proteins diet (remember Atkin’s diet?) as a way of keeping up with the demands of modern life. But it has become clear that consuming a lot of meat, or predominantly meat, can create high acidity in the body, which can lead to many diseases, including cancer.  So the healthier alternative offered by the advanced nutritionists about twenty years ago was getting more proteins from non-animal sources. I firmly believed in this this and followed it. I have been using the principle of balanced diet ever since I started advising my clients on their diet fifteen years ago. Now, I want to remind you: let’s not get into the other extreme! If you were raised eating meat, you should keep eating some, but make it a once or twice a week max, and you also eat some neutralising the acidity food (like celery) and plenty of vegetables for fibre. Not chargrilled or deep fried.

Here is a story for you: When I moved to this country about twenty years ago, I was used to a diet I used to call then ”the poor people’s diet”(in comparison to the “rich” variety of foods I encountered in London). It was made of plenty of bread (wholemeal, the cheapest), lots of potatoes, rice, dried beans, lots of yoghurt, lots of white cheese, (known as Feta here), once a week chicken, meat or fish, a bit of nuts and seeds, and plenty of vegetables eaten raw when in season or pickled in the winter. Although it is typical to the nation I originate from to eat deep fried and very fatty foods, my mum was avoiding them and we would have only occasionally fat meat in winter. I also recall we grew up regularly having at home apples, walnuts, almonds, grapes, cherries. Water melons in the summer were very cheap, so we would have them almost every day. Perhaps the “poor people’s diet” at home had made me strong enough to survive my first few years in London, when I was having toast for breakfast, chicken and cheap white bread for lunch and dinner every day when I was working or toast plus a packet of biscuits when not going out of the house to work. All of these washed down with plenty of coffee to speed me up. The gluten of my very starchy diet had impaired my absorption of nutrients and this was making me very slow, hence the desire to speed up. The lack of fruit and vegetables in my diet had made me so unhealthy, my fitness level went down to almost zero, I was not able to work! This triggered me to enrol on my dietary advisor course so I could design a better diet for myself first. I was still living on a budget, but I learned to boil some rice and to add to it either stir-fried vegetables or sardines from a tin. Get the ones in brine (salty water) or in spring water and add your own cold oil to them. Some people are tempted to buy tins with olive oil, but after the heat these tins go through, the goodies of the oil are not there any longer and you are paying additionally in vein.

Carrots, cabbage and onions are still the cheapest vegetables, which have many benefits for our health! Celery is a very good addition to this stir-fry and it is a very good buy as it will last you for a few.

In addition, using my knowledge and expertise as a PE teacher and a coach, I designed my own gym programme, and I stuck to it religiously. I was also getting some treatments from my colleagues. All these lead to my full recovery then and I reached a point when I was ready for the very demanding job I landed on.

Nowadays, my so called “poor peoples’ diet” is in fashion in the West! It can be quite costly if you always buy the ready-made meals in the shops of London, though!

But, there is a way to make it more affordable. So, in order to lose weight , start cooking!

Exercise:

By all means, do some exercise! Just try moderation at the beginning! Because even walking a few stops instead of getting on the public transport is exercise! All you need to do is either to get up fifteen minutes earlier, or to allow some time after work for this. I hope you have comfy shoes!

With exercise it is also individual: some people prefer it in the morning before work as it invigorates and refreshes them. Some people prefer it in the evening as it tires them enough to get a good night sleep afterwards.

Figure out which type you are and get organised for doing it. From my observations, people procrastinate as they are anxious about the many “other things” which will not be done, when they invest time in exercising. Just remind yourselves this benefit of exercise:  after the initial period of some tiredness, exercising will gradually make you more energetic. This will allow you to fit more things in your schedule, so the “other things” will get done.

My preference is for exercising in the evening as this will get you rid of the stress and negativity accumulated during the working day. Taking a shower immediately afterwards will remove the toxins excreted by sweating, this way not allowing their re-absorption. If you are inexperienced or you are starting exercise after a long break, allow time for rest after each exercising session. You will also notice that with exercising, your previously “crazy” appetite normalises, so you can allow yourself eating very little on the evening of exercise.

So, in order to lose weight, start exercising (moderately)!

Rest/Relaxation

I am putting this separately from Sleep, because it is about different thing. Taking a rest different from sleep is like saying to ourselves that we are worth it. We not only recover from the physical effort, we also relax from the tensions of the day in a very purposeful way. We stop the detrimental effects of stress on us. The better you rest, the more balanced your appetite, your metabolism, your mood.

The ancient techniques such as Qi Gong, Tai Qi, Yoga have gained high popularity nowadays. There is a good reason for that! They are very good for stress relief, for rest/relaxation and for exercise at the same time!

From my modest personal experience:

Yoga was very good for me. Initially I felt annoyed to find out they were teaching me how to breathe. But the feeling at the end of my first session was so good, I wanted to get more of it! I recommend Yoga to everyone! Many men in this country think it is for women only, but they forget that the top yogis in India, where this art comes from, are men. Participating in a group is the best way to start. I only stopped my Yoga classes for a technical reason and afterwards I discovered Pilates, which seemed to be a good option for me at the time. Later, I found a Pilates teacher who was including some yoga in the sessions, so a mix of these two can also be found.

Pilates is a modern exercise system, very suitable for people after injuries, or who are not fans of the gym. Pilates for beginners can be the best exercise for toning of the core muscles, which makes it very suitable for people with sedentary jobs and for anyone with some low back complains. But as they teach you also how to co-ordinate your breathing with your movements, a Pilates class for beginners can be also used for stress relief.

Tai Qi is a martial art and I have never tried it. But the classes for lay public teach you to focus on balanced movements, which must be good for de-stressing and relaxation!

Qi Gong (self-healing in motion) has become my favourite the minute I was introduced to it. Having reached the level of Master in Reiki (energy healing), I found Qi Gong to be something like Reiki in motion as we move the energy along the line of the chakras. Later I realised that in Qi Gong we move the energy along the Meridians, the invisible channels via which the energy in our bodies flows, according to Chinese medicine.  Qi Gong invigorates me and I prefer doing it for a short time in the morning or during the day. It also makes me more focused, my mind seems to be clearer, my decision making seems to be more efficient. It is good to join a group, so you can learn it and later perhaps you can do it on your own. Well, energy healing in a group has its own benefits, so it is always good to go to groups, too.

Reiki I prefer doing on myself in the evening, for relaxation before sleep. Although I like it most when I can have it done on me by other people  I often do short sessions on myself as I realise the importance of self-healing. I wish everyone could do it for themselves! In order to do Reiki, you need to be attuned by a Reiki Master. I know somebody who is very good and experienced at teaching Reiki and attuning people, and I would refer to her anybody who is interested!

Meditation is the best for “detoxing of the mind”. The meaning of the word is “thinking”, “reflecting”. In the modern world, meditation is understood as  cleansing the mind of thoughts. If you try just to stop thinking without any training, you will find it impossible. But when going to groups to learn meditation, they teach you to focus on one thing and not to allow other things (thoughts) to distract you. This is not easy to achieve straight away. This is why the teachers usually start with “guided” meditation, they talk you through focusing your thinking on one thing or on repeating the same action, so you can clear your mind of the other thoughts. I have done guided meditation with people while they had needles in their ears. Many reported felling “almost asleep”, I observed others having a nap for some time during the session. Falling asleep is not the purpose of meditation, but some people are too tired and too needy of relaxation. Once you have learned meditation (or visualisation) in a group, you can do it on your own, which means you have an excellent self-healing tool in your hands. For most people a short session every day would be enough, others would need to get much deeper in order to obtain stronger healing effect. It has been found that meditation can change the gene expression and even help cancer patients heal. (Read my Christmas entry). This is why it is worth learning it.

So, in order to lose weight, and for general well-being, start resting well!

 

I wish you all what you wish for yourselves!

So, be careful what you wish for!!!

Well, Just take it easy!

Many people put so many desires on their New Year’s Resolution list, that they make it impossible to be fulfilled!

This is why I say: take it easy!

It is still the middle of winter! Up to here we were running high on the energy the Sun has given us during the summer. But the tiredness of the season demonstrated itself in our overindulging in food, drink, laziness during the Christmas/New Year’s break. I am saying this not to give you guilty conscience. On the contrary, we have done it because we needed it, so next thing is to forgive ourselves and to carry on!

It is tough going back to work after a season of easy!

But there is a way to do even this nice and easy!

Worried about the few pounds on top of our normal weight? I know the gyms are most active now in inviting to get a membership and to start sweating out the extra calories you have enjoyed during the festive season. But, bear in mind, you don’t need to get mad about it. If you love the gym, do more toning exercise without putting a very ambitious program in front of yourself. Right now you don’t want to put too much stress on yourself (from a lazy or overindulging in food and drink period, enrolling on a heavy exercise programme together with going back to work, can prove quite stressful.)  When people are too stressed, their hormones actually prevent them from forming muscle. And, when we say “weight loss” we mean losing the extra fat and fluid and forming some lean muscle, yes? So, we need to do it in such a way, as to make it possible for our organism to achieve it. We don’t need to torture ourselves while getting very little result or even no result at all. This is why for a long time I have been advising my clients who intend to start a weight-loss programme:

Do de-stressing and detoxing first.

Worried about having to catch up with paying the bills? Of course, we still have to take care of them, but a calmer mind will be able to see the opportunities and make the decisions better than a worried mind. I have observed huge decrease of the cognitive abilities in people who have been under stress. Apparently, the stress hormones can make us less clever. So, for keeping our mind clear and well-focused, we need to keep stress at bay. If we cannot reduce the stress levels, we can reduce the effects of stress.

My treatments can do miracles for de-stressing and detoxing.

A discovery!

As usual, during the festive season around Christmas and New Year my direct work with clients gets gradually reduced until they fully disappear. Then they turn up again in the mid of January, quite tired of their “break”, during which many have been over-indulging in rich food and alcoholic drinks. With the winter still in full blow, the demand for my detoxing and relaxing treatments, which helps them make the bridge back to work and keep them going shoots up again!

So, I use my “vacation” during the festive season to recharge my own batteries with some Qi Gong and meditation while at the same time I catch up with some reading and writing.

This  time it is the video called “The connection: Mind your body” I would like to draw your attention to. It was made a bit over a year ago by the Australian journalist Shannon Harvey, who filmed prominent medical doctors, professors from USA and Australia speaking about the Connection of the Mind and the Body!

Great!

Finally, the modern doctors are getting reminded by some colleagues of theirs, that since the beginning of medicine, Mind and Body were inseparable, the ancient healers treated people according to this principle. Somehow, along the way of development of the modern medicine, which nowadays is reinforced by very advanced technology, this unity was lost. Then arrived a new breed of therapist, the so called alternative therapists, who kept upholding the principle of mind and body unity. Nowadays called complementary therapists, we have been doing this for ages, and finally, here are some medical doctors, who are asserting that the stressed mind can contribute to developing an illness and that when this mind is de-stressed, it can initiate the self-healing! And, they have the scientific proof for that!

Hurray! Finally some doctors are on our side!

Actually, I am somebody who does not need the reinforcement of an authority for something I firmly believe in. I have seen it working so many times!  And, for the past eighteen years working in the field of the complementary medicine, I have noticed that slowly but surely we are getting there, we are getting closer to the so called integrated medicine. Just a few facts: When I started as aromatherapist, we were called “alternative” therapists, now we are part of the complementary medicine. Recently, on my acupuncture course I met quite a few GP-s, which is also telling.

I am not afraid for my existing clients, neither, because those who followed me in my belief that “prevention is better than cure” are the ones who grew and kept brilliant careers despite the stressful life-style that comes with that.

My thoughts now are how helpful this film is for the undecided members of the public, who keep suffering the stress, for those who find it hard to decide going for the complementary therapy without the scientific proof (or celebrities endorsements). By getting the specialists talking about their work and some patients (who also happened to be medical specialists) telling their success healing stories, Shannon has done a brilliant job for those undecided people!!! Thank you Shannon!

I am not paid to advertise it, but as I think that everyone should see the film, here is where you can find it: https://www.theconnection.tv

Not only is it full of interesting scientific information but viewing this video gives you peace of mind. Apparently, a small price needs to be paid for downloading it, and for those of you to whom this is an obstacle, keep reading my digest and comments. (You can visit the website and press the button About in order to get more acquainted with the people who participated (for free).

So, here it goes:

Herbert Benson, MD, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the author of the book “Relaxation response” reminds us that in the older days (especially in the East) there was no separation of the body and mind. But the modern scientific approaches were so awesome that they over- powered any mind-body approaches.

Esther Sternberg MD, Professor of Medicine University of Arizona College of Medicine, Research Director Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine adds that modern medical science requires measurable proof before believing in anything and now that this proof is available we can use it in the integrated medicine. In her presentation on the website and  out of the movie, Esther Sternberg mentioned that after starting her working life as a GP, she noticed that half of her patients were with some rheumatic condition and she went on to qualify as a rheumatologist. She has also noticed that depression is high in people with rheumatic arthritis, and she started asking herself if the brain’s response to stress could be causing an autoimmune, inflammatory disease and her research in the 80s confirmed that. Bless you, Esther, for telling me this now, I have been guessing for some time already that there is a strong connection between stress, worry, anxiety and arthritis, an autoimmune rheumatic disease!!! During my long time working with extremely stressed people I have noticed that the majority of them had some form of arthritis or some rheumatic symptoms, if not formally diagnosed. Initially, I was putting it down to the high acidity created in the body due to their proven bad diet. Later I was guessing about some connection between the stress hormone cortisol and the arthritis, and now I know for sure there is an important role the stress hormones adrenalin and cortisol play in the autoimmune diseases! It feels so good knowing that my intelligent “guessing” is actually supported by the findings of scientific research!

Craig Hassed, MD, senior lecturer Monash University Faculty of Medicine, Inaugural president of the Australian Teachers of Meditation association is a follower of Hippocrates, the ancient Greek physician and father of modern medicine, who based his work on the principle that the mind and the body are connected. Greg Hassed says: “The body is always responding to what the mind tells it to do. If the mind is tense, the body is tense.”

In my long practice with extremely stressed people, sometimes I had to massage muscles as hard as tight ropes! On many occasions, clients thought and requested “deep” massage, hoping this would be the solution. But actually it was the rhythmical, repeated many times massage strokes, which would in fact induce the so needed relaxation of the mind and then the muscles would respond very well to the treatment.

Some interesting studies have found out that there are millions of neurons (cells which are found in the brain) in the gut. So we have a second brain in our gut. No wonder sometimes our gut has mind of its own, remember the expression “gut feeling”? It has been long time I have been emphasising to my clients the importance of the digestive system for the overall wellbeing. I recall a high flying professional once telling me that focusing on her diet would take too much time of her life. I told her that yes, it takes some time diet planning and shopping and food preparation for a month or two, afterwards it becomes a habit, as long as you embrace it. Now I know I was right to insist! Taking good care of our digestive system will help our “second brain” functioning appropriately!

Creig Hassed also talks about the “fight or flight” reaction, which is the human response to a perceived danger. It was designed (by the Nature) as an adaptation mechanism and for life saving: fight for your life or run for your life! I have been educating my clients about the long-term effects of fight or flight reaction. It is preparing the body for moving fast, so, the stored in the muscles and in the liver sugar is released in the blood circulation, this way made available to be used for energy. The high dosage of adrenalin is released, it makes the heart pump faster and the lungs breath faster so the oxygen can reach the limbs fast. The blood gets thicker and gets to clot easily, so the bleeding from a possible injury could be minimised. The digestive system is shattered, so no energy is wasted there at the crucial momrnt (some people feel urgent need to go to the loo when stressed, this is the way body gets rid of excess fluid and any weight). When designing it Nature had in mind for this reaction to happen very occasionally. It is the so called stress response. But nowadays this reaction can get triggered way too often, as people perceive many things as serious threats in their life (fears of losing job, health, etc). And, after the stress response has been triggered too often for too long, constant anxiety follows and the aforementioned physiological changes become the norm, not an exception as they were meant to be. Then we hear about perfectly healthy and quite young people getting diabetes, high blood pressure or even a heart attack, as it was in the case of Creig Duncan, who shares his experiences in the film. Creig made changes in his life style sticking to healthy eating, regular exercise and different types of meditation because, as he said, he is not ready “not to be around”

Greig Hassed cuts in to emphasise on the importance of managing stress.

I have been teaching the public of the importance of interrupting the vicious circle of stress, so the energy could be replenished and the person can still carry on with their stressful life. Basically, I have been asking them to STOP and rest for a while, then carry on. My observations during the many years working with extremely stressed clients has proved my guess that with the build-up of stress, something gives in, the weakest link gets broken and the person gets an illness. Many of my highly stressed clients had not one, quite a few illnesses listed in their medical records. But none of them was able to comprehend the importance of changing their own attitude and their own reaction to stress. Teaching them to use their mind for managing their stress was a task too large for the short time I had for treating them. So, I used my programme minimum, which included introducing them to treatments (hands-on, different types of massages), ear acupuncture,( which also works on subconscious level), teaching them to do simple breathing techniques and affirmations. I can report only what I was able to observe with my eyes: immediately after my treatments, the “crazy” sparkle in the eyes disappeared, the clients looked mellow, relaxed, they shared they felt sleepy (And believe you me, getting to sleep is a big deal for an anxious person !). During the sessions of ear acupuncture, many clients sleep. During the one session of acupuncture with guided meditation for clearing the chakras with male only group – all slept, despite their definite declared prior to the session disbelief in things like meditation and chakras.

I knew it was working! Only, I am not a scientist, not a doctor! But now, I have them backing me up! And their findings even raise my own appreciation of the treatments and practices I have been doing for my clients so far!

Greig Hassed said something very interesting:” We know that in high stress periods, for example studies on university students show that they get more DNA damage or DNA mutations during high stress periods; and the students who are coping poorly with it lose the capacity to repair the DNA as effectively. So more DNA damage but less DNA repair.”

Well, if I help reversing (to an extent) the detrimental effects of stress on my clients, I feel proud! With my hands-on treatments I do it in the opposite direction: first relaxing the body which then leads to relaxing the mind. Meditation and all similar techniques (including my ear acupuncture) work directly on the mind. So, I could be helping their DNA health! Brilliant!

Herbert Benson tells us about his experiment. Meditation brought about dramatic physiological changes: decreased metabolism, heart rate, rate of breathing, brain waves. This proves the human ability for relaxation response, the opposite of the stress response. Finally, some scientific proof, something measurable.

When talking about some measurable results, Dr. Sara Lazar PhD, Assistant Professor Harward Medical School is at the cutting edge of research into the affects of meditation and yoga on brain activity and changes in brain structure. She tells us that the MRI scans of the brain have shown that  amygdala, the part of the brain, which goes larger when we are stressed, goes smaller with meditation. I wish somebody would bother measuring the size of amygdala in people after regular acupuncture, or massages, or reflexology, perhaps I could persuade Dr Sara Lazar?!

Herbert Benson’s short explanation how to evoke the relaxation response :

1.   Repetition

2.   Disregard of the other thoughts that came to mind

Basically, by focusing on one thing and not allowing any distraction. This approach is not new, it is thousands years old, traditional approach, we can see it in religion, in meditation.

On the screen we see groups of people from different religions praying together and this reminds me I was right when instructing my clients to learn meditation. Here again, I was using the gradual approach, by first giving them a very simple, short affirmation to do very night before sleep. Then I would tell them they could incorporate it in their prayer (most of my clients belonged to different religious denominations, but have admitted to not praying regularly). Last, I would suggest they could start again going to pray together with others. Then I would talk to them taking some exercise, and I would recommend Tai Qi, Qi Gong and Yoga as good both for the muscles and for relaxation. I would emphasise that when practicing, they would pay attention to the breathing techniques and that this is very beneficial for their minds and overall well-being. I have fallen in love with the Qi Gong my tutor, the well -known acupuncturist John Tindall teaches because being a Reiki master myself, the first time I have done it, it felt like Reiki in motion. Later I found out it is self-healing based on the Meridian system in Chinese medicine and it can be used on regular basis for improving arthritis, asthma, diabetes.

Yoga and his perseverance helped Jason Wachob’s back pain, which was so bad he could barely walk. He was a high flyer, with very tight business schedule, he travelled a lot, he was spending long hours in uncomfortable sitting position. All this mental and physical stress caused him damaged disks and the crippling back pain. Doctors recommended surgery, but luckily one of them suggested yoga. His then girlfriend, now a wife, supported him on that and here he is: talking in front of the camera, no operation has ever happened to his back.

He started simply. Every day, twice a day for fifteen minutes, he would do the same five poses. After just one week he started to feel better. After a month he was walking for two blocks without pain. It started to work. Jason calls Yoga Meditation in motion, very well said.

Lucky Jason for having this girl-friend next to him!

My own example is a young wife, to whom I was giving fertility Reflexology. Basically, she was over-worked and over-stressed. My treatments were putting this beautiful young woman to sleep in the early evening! One day she asked me if I would give her husband massage. He was a city trader and he was on the mend from his pre-marriage life-style, which was consisting of long hours work, lots of alcohol and very little food and sleep. Apparently his wife knew that both members of the couple need to de-stress in order to conceive a healthy baby. The miracle happened only just a few months later and I saw her again once or twice after the baby was born. She was self-employed and although she was at home with the baby, she still had some contracts to work on!

Jon Kabat-Zinn, Professor of Medicine Emeritus, University of Massachusetts Medical School, Founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction tells us about his experiment with patients with skin condition. Those who meditated, healed at the rate four times higher than the rate of the others. Another measureable effect!

On yoga, Jon Kabat-Zinn is clear, it is the integration of mind and body, which makes it so good! It has been around for thousands of years and it is working, that’s why it has survived.

Herbert Benson is adamant that as long as stress can be causing any disease, by reversing the stress activities, we have the capacity to treat these diseases and that this treatment should be given the same rate of respectability as treating with drugs or surgery, “because that was scientifically proven.”

Alice Domar, Executive Director of the Domar Center for Mind/Body Health

Director of Mind/Body Services at Boston IVF tells us that infertile women have higher rate of depression, in comparison to fertile women. It can reinforce the infertility problem. Her Fertility Mind Body program doubles the fertility rate, perhaps this is why Alice is called “Fertility Goddes”.
David Spiegel Willson Professor and Associate Chair of Psychiatry & Behavioural Sciences, Medical Director, Center for Integrative Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine

Dr. David Spiegel never meant to stir up a storm when he published a study in The Lancet. He had found that women with breast cancer who attended a support group lived twice as long as women who didn’t. In the film he mentions his article in the journal Clinical oncology, where he writes that depression in women during breast cancer determines how long they are going to live. The study has excluded other risk factors, so its conclusion is precise. He adds that at least we can do something about depression, if not so much about the cancer itself. But the faster the depression is dealt with , the longer years on Earth the patient has is my conclusion from his words.

Dean Ornish says studies show that people who are lonely and depressed and isolated are three to ten times more likely to get sick and to die prematurely. Well, more or less this is known by the lay public, but still – here is a measurable confirmation.

Scott had melanoma and he was referred by his doctor as a terminal patient. Chemotherapy with expected rate of success of 5-10 % was offered as a palliative treatment.

And there the conversation goes in the direction of how doctors need to communicate with patients, so they can promote healing and not vice versa.

David Spiegel mentions the old GPs who understood the need for emotional support and comforting their patients. I recall the saying my father often repeated that if you feel half cured after your visit to the doctor, it was a good doctor.

Damien Finnis, MD Associate Professor University of Sydney Pain Management Research Institute, Royal North Shore Hospital, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Griffith University informs us about  trials in Italy, which proved that morphine was only half efficient if patients didn’t know they were administered it.

So the conversation goes around the placebo effect, and Esther Sternberg says it can contribute 30% to 50% of any biological cure.

Placebo effect, or the belief in healing is what triggers the healing response.

Ian Gawler tells his story of having an aggressive bone cancer in 1975, which spread so fast that his leg had to be amputated. Ian decided to take his own healing in his own hands, so to say. He made changes in his diet, got some healing (to me it looks he is receiving Reiki on some old film), he got into group healing etc. But he still had some doubts about his complete healing. After he met the Indian holly man who told him ”You are already healed, don’t worry” Ian felt he was OK.

So, perhaps Scott’s doctor wasn’t a good one, as he told him he was a terminal patient. Perhaps, this was exactly what Scott needed, so he decided to stay alive against all odds. We will never know. Facts are that Scott made the changes in his life, which he considered good for him, he completely embraced his new life-style of good nutrition, regular meditative exercise and all this together with the chemo therapy lead to his complete healing. Scott is not sure if these practices alone could have cured him without the drugs, but he acknowledges the fact that the drugs were not working on their own. The “miracle” that happened to him, Scott puts down to the hard work he’s been doing.

In my practice, the willingness to do the hard work has been always the indicator, which showed me how my highly stressed clients were going to do in the future. Every time I have heard a client to say to me; “I have tried it and it doesn’t work for me!” or “It is too much to do!” I knew this person hasn’t put their health, their life first yet. They would try my hands-on treatments where they are passive receivers of energy, but they would not use this to propel themselves to the next level, where they are the active generators of their own energy. Of course we know, stress can reduce the cognitive capacity of a person. Also, these clients were not with me for a period long enough for getting to lower the stress level first and then to start being more proactive in their own healing.

David Spiegel, who is a medical doctor,  cannot ascertain that cancer patients could get healed completely without taking any drugs, but he says that the central nervous system effects could modulate the body’s response to the insult the illness does on the body.

Genetics! Our genes contain the information, which rules our lives. It has been long known that we inherit them from our parents and many people still believe that if you were born with “bad” genes, this is it, there is nothing you can do. But Dean Ornish, who for the past 36 years has been conducting a series of research studies, knows different. He says that on the changes in diet and life-style have the power not only to prevent, but also to reverse disease. Yes, there is something you can do – changing your life-style! According to his researches, the genes responsible for promoting prostate cancer, breast cancer and colon cancer can be changed.

It turns out, genes can be switched on and off!

Furthermore, epigenetics studies showed that the gene expression can be passed to the next generations, e.g. the way your grand-grand mother lived could be affecting your life.

Recent research on the Relaxation Response has taken us to a new level of knowledge: Genetic expression of genes of people who meditate can be changed. (So, I think, we don’t need to worry about our grandma’s life-style).

Herbert Benson tells us that these changes happen after the first time we meditate. But, he adds, the more times during the day we do it, the more intense the relaxation response and the change in genes expression.

So, obviously, his recommendation is daily meditation. I recall trying to get my clients into doing daily affirmation on their own. Using the gradual approach, I was also advising them to start going to a meditation group once weakly, to learn how to do it and to carry on during the week on their own. Well, I know it is extremely hard to turn your own healing power on when you are at the deep of a crisis. But as it is the most important ingredient of the healing process, we need to use every boost to trigger it. What better than practising healing techniques in a group?!

A very good example of how the changes in his life-style led to his full recovery is the story of George Jelinek, MD, the first appointed Professor of Emergency Medicine in Australasia. He had inherited the MS genes from his mother  and at the age of 45, when he was at the high of his career and under very intense stress, the disease stroke. He analysed “Why now?” and after he realised he was way out of balance, he changed to very healthy life-style: good diet, meditation, swimming, counselling when things get tough, time for good friends and family to keep him emotionally healthy. George Jelineck thinks he has recovered from MS and although in medical circles the term recovery from MS does not exist as MS is considered incurable, he suggests that it is time we start considering recovery.

The genetic theory of ageing states that DNA ages due to shortened telomeres (repeated segments of DNA, occurring at the end of chromosomes, and chromosomes are the thread-like parts of DNA chains that carry the genetic information). So, with the ageing, the telomeres get shortened and this can increase the risk of getting cancer, heart disease, dementia. (Note, all these previously considered only old age diseases!)

But as research of University of California headed by Dr Elizabeth H. Blackburn showed that stress affects the rate of DNA ageing, we now have a reasonable explanation to the question why so many younger people get cancer and heart disease. (I have no much observation on dementia and Alzheimer, but I would not be surprised if there is statistics showing lowered age of appearance of the first signs)

Dean Ornish reports about his pilot study, which showed that even the ageing effect of stress is reversible when people embark on a healthy living programme which incorporates dietary changes, stress management, meditation, exercise.

Sharon, the author of this film adds it has been ten years since she was first diagnosed with an auto-immune disease and she is not on medication, she is not in a wheel-chair. She also says that in a way, she is grateful for the illness, which pushed her to make the journey, to meet so many new people and most importantly – to understand that she needed to get better.

Dean Ornish adds that many of his patients shared with him that their illness was the best thing that could happen to them because it made them make changes in their life, which lead to them experiencing things so meaningful and so beautiful, which they were going to miss otherwise.

So, basically, it is all about the quality of life we can give to ourselves, when diagnosed with a scary illness, rather than worrying about dying or other stuff.

Herbert Benson emphasises that now, when we have the evidence that mind can heal, it should be added appropriately to the healing process together with drugs and surgery.

Esther Sternberg adds that with an experienced practitioner, who can guide you through the process, you should be able to find the best formula for yourself to help you heal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have an example of a man in a similar position, only it was his Achiles, who did not chose reducing his stress and dong the remedial exercise, so he ended up with an operation. But this is an English man, who was raised up to keep stiff upper lip and who felt guilty for receiving a back massage occasionally together with taking the painful treatment on his calf and Achiles.

 

 

 

 

 

My example of Refl and Needles