Movement Education: Wellness in Motion – by Lara Evans Bracciante

Someone may tell you it’s all in your head. Yet you know it’s not, because you’re feeling it, in excruciating detail, in your body. Movement education pioneers agree that it may have started in your mind–way back when your body and your brain were learning together how to crawl, stand and walk–but it didn’t end there. Movement education theorizes that when the body establishes responses to its emotional or physical environment, those responses are carried forward long after the original stimulus is gone. In other words, that pain in the neck, back, or head may just be the latest chapter in a story that began long ago.

Learning New Patterns

Movement education–an umbrella term also known as re-education movement, somatic movement education, repatterning, and movement therapy–employs the philosophy that one’s body structure and movements get stuck in habitual, unhealthy patterns. Movement approaches unwind the patterns and teach the body, as well as the mind, anew. This is done through a series of sessions where practitioners may use hands-on manipulation to teach the student different ways to move, sit, stand, reach, bend, lift, and walk. This type of bodywork is especially beneficial for people suffering from chronic difficulties, but also for anyone trying to achieve higher levels of physical and mental wellness. Athletes, dancers, and musicians have credited movement therapy for enhanced performance. There are many variations of movement modalities, including the ones featured here. Similar in their goals. they offer subtle differences in technique and philosophy. …Click here for complete newsletter: Summer 2008-cc

Whiplash: Healing a Pain in the Neck – by Hope Bentley

Getting rear-ended in traffic. Face-planting at the bottom of a ski slope. Tumbling over the handlebars on your bike. Whiplash comes in many forms and can become a long-term problem if not treated correctly. Fortunately, massage and bodywork can address the ache and discomfort that come with whiplash and prevent chronic pain down the road.

Understanding

Whiplash

The term “whiplash” came into use in 1928. Doctors will sometimes use “hyperextension injury,” to describe it, but “whiplash” is a more visceral account of what has happened to the victim’s neck. The neck itself has made a whip-like motion bending first towards and then away from the point of impact. As the head moves rapidly in one direction, the muscles in the neck receive the message to contract. The momentum of the head can cause strain or sprain to the muscles and ligaments in the neck as the head reaches the end of its movement.