I am just finishing up one of my summer reads on parenting called the Gospel Centered Mom. Don’t judge friends, this mom needs all the help she can get, LOL! One of the last chapters ended with the statement, “…when you’re desperate for change, you’re willing to try things you’ve never been open to before.” This statement has proven true in my life, particularly in the realm of health and wellness. I am going to be honest, if you asked me 10 years ago about what I thought of CranioSacral Therapy, I would have said it is a bunch of nonsense. In my defense, my traditional Physical Therapy education did not encourage holistic treatment alternatives. If I am being honest, it really didn’t support them at all.
So how does a classically trained Physical Therapist who has been drilled to only accept “evidence based practice” end up opening her own Physical Therapy practice specializing in CranioSacral Therapy, a holistic treatment alternative.
What made me desperate for change? What made me willing to investigate styles of treatment that I was never open to before?
- Seeing people suffering with pain and/or dysfunction despite traditional physical therapy.
- Witnessing people accept pain and dysfunction as their “normal”.
- Witnessing people lose hope because the traditional medical model was not addressing their very real problem.
- Acknowledging the healing power of a hands on/manual treatment approach and recognizing that it was slowly being pushed out of the clinic because of insurance, billing and patient volume requirements.
As I began to seek out other avenues of patient care, CranioSacral Therapy fell into my lap. My traditional education coupled with my many years of clinical experience in traditional Physical Therapy settings made the transition to CranioSacral therapy challenging on one hand and exciting on the other. My desperation to provide hurting and frustrated people with the healing and hope they deserve pushed me to continue investigating, studying, and praying about CranioSacral Therapy. I was desperate for change, so I was willing to try things I was never open to before.
This is what I can tell you from the mere 3 years I have been investigating and studying Alternative or Holistic forms of patient care, specifically CranioSacral Therapy:
- I believe that every patient deserves effective, personal, high quality care that is customized to their individual needs.
- I believe that complete healing flows out of treating the whole body and not just the symptomatic area.
- I believe that if you do not address the mind-body connection, you are doing a disservice to your patient.
- I believe that pain is not a symptom we are meant to “live with”.
- I believe that our bodies were designed to heal themselves and that CranioSacral Therapy can facilitate that healing, restoring in people real hope of regaining and maintaining their desired level of function.
- I believe everyone deserves the hope of healing.
I have seen the power of CranioSacral Therapy touch the lives of so many of my patients, restoring in them both healing and hope. I think often about how many more people I could have helped if I would have opened myself up to CranioSacral Therapy almost 20 years ago when I began my career as a therapist. When you give someone hope, the possibilities are limitless!
I am going to be honest, the patients that find me are usually those desperate for change, and willing to try something they have never been open to before. Imagine if we didn’t wait until we felt “desperate” to seek out health and wellbeing? Imagine if we began to invest in our health and approach it preventively rather than reactively! . . . A topic for another day.
