Therapeutic Yoga and Movement for Parkinson’s Disease and Stroke Recovery.

If you find it hard to gain or maintain mobility, strength, and easy, pain free movement, I can help. After an injury, diagnosis of an illness, or a traumatic event, regaining as much normal functioning as possible is essential. An important way to do this is to learn how to make smarter movements. Using the neuroplastic potential of your brain-its ability to adapt and create new pathways for thinking and action-we play movement games designed to increase your sensation and build your body’s ability to move fluently and fluidly.Just as if you try to force a child to do something you often create a backlash, forcing your body when it’s not ready creates a backlash and resistance. And just as gently intriguing a child to behave differently allows for organic, lasting, even serene change, so it is with your body. As your body regains strength and resiliency, you gain confidence and poise.

Working with Body Wisdom, you could:

Increase mobility involved in everyday tasks.

Enjoy faster movement and loss of stiffness.

Increase cognitive power

Increase sensation and feeling.People who have experienced a stroke or increased neurological challenges often describe entire body parts as feeling numb. But actually, most people still experience some sensation, however small. When we identify and focus on the sensations you do have, together we actually encourage the brain to map out new connections to the area, which increases feeling. According to the latest neurological research, with adequate stimulation, the possibility of creating these alternate pathways always exists; we call this process “brain plasticity” or “neuroplasticity.”

Use gentle and relaxing movements to increase connections between the brain and affected body parts. It’s not enough to just feel sensation and pathways. Next, we work together on getting those “deadened” areas to move-smoothly, gently, and without causing pain-but still waking up the dormant parts and reminding them that open, comfortable movement is still a goal to strive toward.

Boost flexibility of the brain and motor coordination. As the brain becomes more flexible, new movements occur. For instance, a student of mine believed he had no movement in his affected hip. Through gentle motion and increased observation, he has now achieved full rotation of that hip joint-and with full rotation, he can sit and walk with more ease and comfort, and decreased pain.

Improve walking. Whether you’re walking stiffly or not yet walking again, working toward the goal of independent, steady walking is essential. One of the best ways to do this is to learn to let both legs support your weight equally. Another one of my students only put weight on one foot when we began our work. Now, she can now stand evenly on both legs; knowing that both legs can support her, she continues to work on reaching the point where she can once again walk naturally.

Learn to use canes and walkers as strengthening tools. I teach you how to use these assistive devices with the best posture possible and to use them to actually improve your abilities and develop your strength and coordination.

Regain balance. Learn how to stand up without tilting or falling so you feel more secure and use your muscles in a more balanced way.

Regain strength. When ever we discover new movements we exercise them to strengthen the muscles and make the movements faster and easier.

Stretch gently for relief of pain and stiffness. Body parts that compensate for lack of other movements can hurt. I teach safe, effective, and gentle stretches to relieve pain even as we work towards more balance in the body so that those parts of your body no longer risk injury by trying to compensate for lost abilities elsewhere. Similarly, stiffened body parts need to stretch out in order to prevent worsening!

Create the best possible postural adaptations so as to avoid long-term pain and compensation problems. Particularly when sitting for long periods of time, you can develop stresses, discomfort, and even injuries unless you learn healthy ways of sitting. Learn how to “sit with integrity and ease” so you can live pain free.

Become skilled in using your breath to relax in the midst of an overwhelming and difficult situation. The body and mind have all sorts of powerful tools and coping mechanisms; when you learn to tap into them, you can achieve more healing than you thought possible. Breath is one of the most powerful, but in our society, one of the most unused. You’ll learn to approach life in a healthier way, using your natural breath patterns.
Parkinson’s classes see event page.
For personalized instruction for stroke recovery or Parkinson’s in your home or Northampton, MA studio please call 413 230 1260.