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Understanding Medical Trauma: The Hidden Impact of Surgery   Is Surgery Considered Medical Trauma? For many individuals, the smell of bleach, the site of a medical appointment on the calendar, an image of a doctor, or seeing a hospital can trigger severe anxiety and panic. These reactions often stem from what is known as medical trauma.   What is Medical Trauma?   Medical trauma refers to the psychological distress and emotional upheaval experienced by individuals who feel ov

I am often asked, “What helped you to get better, to overcome pain?” There are many things from a healthy diet, yoga, stretching and exercising, to certain medical treatments like prolotherapy. Those helped me physically. What helped me emotionally cope with chronic pain, and still does, all started many years ago at an event that taught me about the power of our perceptions. I almost did not attend because I knew that one hour of laying on the floor instead of my

The warmth from a heating pad is a wonderful way for pain relief and muscle relaxation, to open blood vessels and increase oxygen flow, to self-regulate into relaxation, to relieve cramps, and to warm up on cold nights. I used to put a heating pad on my lap when I worked at the computer or in bed with me at night to help raise my body temperature and fall asleep faster. Warm vs. Moist Heat. What's the Difference? I am bias to moist heat. Why? Because it penetrates muscles mo

What does it mean to accept living with chronic pain? And forever? How do people do that? Should they? I struggled with these questions for

The other day I saw a client who was feeling #anxious and complaining of shoulder and low back #pain. Instead of performing manual therapy to relieve her pain, I took another approach that I am going to call Emotional Body Mapping.  I asked her to write a list of all the ‘negative’ thoughts she most often has. Then, I asked her to repeat each statement aloud one-by-one and notice what emotion was connected to that statement and where she felt it in her body. She felt three of

Let’s be blunt. #Pain sucks. It really sucks. It interferes with every aspect of a person’s life, and it affects others around us. So, what is pain?  Our body has “danger detectors” called nociceptors that send messages through nerve roots to the spinal cord, which, in turn, decides to send or not send messages, or to alter and not send all messages to the brain. The brain reads and processes these messages, compares it with our emotions, thoughts, expectations, beliefs, memo