Open Source Cranio

Tag: Chronic Fatigue

Cranio Sacral Therapist and Student Newsletter 18

November 14 – 2006

Questions and comments for this issue:

+ Where I bang on about Jet Lag and treating yourself.
+ Chronic Fatigue – looking for the meaning of symptoms.
+ Palpation broken down into Symmetry, Amplitude and Quality.
+ Is bone ‘set’?

Hello ,
I have some very important findings to share
with you about jet lag. As you know I’ve just
moved back to Ireland. The night we arrived here,
my wife Mege said she had a backache and asked me
to have a look at it.

Now here’s the interesting bit. When I tuned
into her system, I found that her cerebro spinal
fluid was all over the place.

No, I don’t mean in an ‘Aliens’ sort of way. I
mean her system felt like one of those snow domes
that had been shaken.

What’s a snow dome?

You know, one of those little glass domes
filled with water that you shake and it looks like
snow falling on the inside.

Why was her CSF so disturbed?

Well, as I stayed with her system, it revealed
that the source of the disturbance was, and this
is from her CSF’s perspective, the sudden movement
across a huge distance.

Wha?

I know,
but there was a really strong sense that the
connection between her CSF and it’s external
environment had been disturbed greatly by the
change in location. It was in turmoil because it
had nothing to orient itself with.

Orient itself?

Yes, there was definitely a sense of her CSF
sloshing around trying to find reference points to
attune with.

And in that effort to orient itself, it was
very clear to me how linked our CSF is to it’s
environment on a local and global level.

It reminded me of the way bats use sonar for
navigation in the dark. They emit a high pitched
sound which bounces off the surrounding terrain.
The bat can tell where it is by how long it takes
the sound to bounce back to it.

It doesn’t feel like our CSF emits something,
it feels more like the sort of connection that we
as therapists make when we entrain with a patients
system.

It’s the same with our CSF, it entrains with
the energetic rhythms of it’s environment.

This is probably obvious but I’ll mention it at
this point, the moon stood out as the main point
of triangulation for our systems.

The moon?

Yeah, it felt like the moon was crucial to
orientation. It worked something like this.

The first point of orientation was the system
itself. The second point was the systems position
on earth. These two reference points, while
crucial didn’t seem to provide enough dimension.
It felt like the moon provided a third point of
dimensional reference and so triangulated the
system in space.

The disturbance in Mege’s system felt like it
was caused by the sudden change in two of the
reference points.

So what did I do about it?

Well, like most things, seeing what the problem
is is 90% of the solution.
I acted as a sort of conduit for her system. I
consciously attuned to the locality.
As soon as I started to do this her system
paused. It felt like it was listening to a rhythm
my system was drawing its attention to.

Then I consciously attuned to the location of
the moon. Within minutes her system had settled
into deep harmony with itself, and its current
location. Mege popped off into a deep sleep.

I was able to partially orient my own system
but not completely. As to why that is I can only
include it with all my other experiences of trying
to treat myself. Never with much success.

It could be just me but I suspect it’s the same
for everyone. A classic example is in the release
process, which as you know, involves the
practitioner holding as the patient’s system
encounters its restrictions.

The patient needs to let go, the therapist
needs to hold. It doesn’t make sense to me that
you can do both at the same time. None the less,
never being one to allow good sense to get in the
way of having a go, I tried it anyway, a few
times. Always the same result.

Just when I was about to release, one of two
things would happen. The part of me that was
releasing would take over and my whole system
would go into letting go, including the part that
was supposed to be holding.
End result = No release.

Or the part of me that was holding would stay
in charge so my system would never let go.
End result = No release.

So as I said I didn’t have as much success
attuning myself to the new time zone.

Mege, on the other hand, woke up the next
morning feeling FANTASTIC! Over the next few days
she commented, more than once, on how everyone had
greatly exaggerated the effects of jet lag. She
couldn’t see what the big deal was.

If you get a chance to treat someone who has
moved time zones recently, can you include what I
have described in your treatment and let me know
if you find something similar. I suspect you
will.

There is a great opportunity there for someone
who is interested in pursuing the commercial
applications of treating jet lag. Think of all
the business people who travel through time zones
regularly. You could set up in an airport, nay
airports around the world and help all these
people deal with their jet lag in a more painless
way.

No, don’t thank me, it’s the least I could do,
what are chums for. Royalty cheques accepted
graciously.

Also, I finally got the therapist listing up.
Have a look at it here.
http://www.open-source-cranio.com/therapists/listing.html

If you have sent me your details, have a look at
your listing to make sure I spelled your name
correctly etc. Have a look at some of the other
listings also to see what you could add to yours
to make it more representative of you.

If you haven’t already sent me your details
have a look at the others and see what you are
missing out on.

If I had any doubts about whether it was worth
my while to go to the trouble of creating this
resource, I got an email last week that clinched
it for me.

24/10/06

Hello John,

On Sunday, I spoke to the cranio therapist who is
listed for Ipswich, Queensland. From one
conversation I have regained some hope that my
daughter can be healed. I am a healer, although an
untrained one, but all the symptoms have baffled
me for a long time. I have decided on how to
manage her pains but have had no idea how to
remove them altogether.

When my daughter colours in those body pictures
doctors have that let them know where pain is
located, she colours in every little bit then
darkens the areas that hurt most. It often brings
a smile or chuckle to the doctor but it always
brings such sadness to me. None of them believe
she could possibly be in that much pain.

Since speaking to this practitioner I am daring to
hope that we may be on to something that will
work. My daughter is afraid to hope; there’s just
been one too many times of trying. But we will
start treatments next week. I am reassured after
reading your website. I like how you think and I
like that it matches my philosophies about health
and wellness. Thankyou J

Warmest regards,

Denice.

Get your listing up now and get it as good as
you can. It WILL make a difference.

Alright, on with the mailbag.

***QUESTION***

Hi John,
I have a question for your newsletter: Chronic
Fatigue. Do you have any pointers for what to
check or work on with patients with this syndrome?

Best regards,

Eva Kuhl Bornefelt
Central Coast

MY COMMENTS:

That’s a great question as always Eva and
thanks for asking it.

Talking about chronic fatigue gives me an
opportunity to go into the sort of process I go
through when I look at any set of symptoms.

I ask myself what is this condition trying to
communicate to the person. What is it saying?

Why this condition and not another? Why
chronic fatigue and not fibromyalgia or arthritis
or irritable bowel?

Of all the conditions this person could have,
why do they have this one?

Each set of symptoms add up to a very specific
communication.

So don’t worry about the physical
manifestations?

Not at all. It’s very important to deal with
them but dealing with them alone won’t necessarily
solve the problem. Looking at the condition in
this way points you towards the deepest reason for
the condition.

You may not know what the deepest reason is but
at least you will be looking in the right
direction.

Then getting a sense of what the deepest cause
of the condition is will inform you how to deal
with the physical manifestations.

So let’s put it into practice. What is chronic
fatigue communicating?

It’s a syndrome so it contains lots of
different symptoms and few people exhibit all the
symptoms all the time.

The main symptom is in the name – fatigue. The
person has no energy to do anything. Sometimes
they will need to sleep a lot, other people are
tried but can’t sleep.

Generally they will have to stop working, stop
their hobbies, significantly reduce their social
life.

So what does this all add up to?
In short the person’s life grinds to a halt.

What is this aspect of the condition
communicating?

Stop.

Stop what?

Stop everything.

Why do we communicate, ‘stop’ to someone?

Generally it’s because there is something about
what the person is doing that we don’t like and we
want them to stop doing it.

No kidding Sherlock. Is this what chronic
fatigue is communicating?

Generally speaking I’ve found that it’s a main
part of the communication.

For example, if a person has a condition that
is annoying but doesn’t give them too much
discomfort, the communication is generally about
getting their own attention.

‘This is bothering us and we
need our attention about it.’

But it has a, ‘When you can get to it.’ sort of
vibe.

Whereas Chronic fatigue has a, ‘Stop everything
and deal with this NOW!’ sort of vibe.

So look for what is so important to the person,
that when it is in disharmony, they will put their
whole lives on hold until it is resolved.

Another thing to consider when treating someone
with chronic fatigue is their capacity to stay
sick.

Let me explain. The amount of energy required
to create chronic fatigue is huge. The people I
have treated for chronic fatigue have usually worn
out about 5 or 6 therapists by the time they get
to me.

If you are very attached to quick results then
maybe you shouldn’t take them on because these
people have huge endurance. It’s a little
paradoxical. Someone with chronic fatigue having
huge endurance. But don’t be fooled by the lack
of energy issues. I have found they have lots of
energy for keeping their lives on hold.

I have found it most helpful to see my role as
facilitating them to discover what the disharmony
that is causing them to press the ‘Pause’ button
on their life is. And no I don’t necessarily mean
having long, probing, regressive, conversations
with them about it.

The other useful thing when actually working
with their systems is to sit very comfortably in
the timeless aspect of our work.
By that I mean, the depth at which we work.
All going well when you work with someone you will
be in a very meditative state and in that state,
time pauses. We descend into the moment and in
that, it is eternal.

This is a very handy space to be in with a
condition that has therapists for breakfast. As
you sit with the person and your system entrains
with theirs. Your system conveys a quality of
timelessness. The subtle communication from your
system is, ‘I could stay here forever.’

You can’t fake this. It has to be real for
you. If it’s not you need to meditate more until
it is.

I have found that when someone with chronic
fatigue comes to see me and our systems entrain and
their system gets this, ‘I can wait forever.’
Quality from mine it gives up on the endurance
test and starts to avail of the support to deal
with the underlying disharmony.

***QUESTION***

Dear John,
Thanks for your great newsletters. I really
appreciate the different areas you talk about.

I’m still struggling with the nuts and bolts of
palpation.

Can you give me some pointers on how to filter out
all the different things I feel when I try to tune
into someone.

Thanks
Pete
Brisbane.

MY COMMENTS:

No worries Pete and thanks for the feedback.

Placing your hands on another person’s body for
the purpose of assisting in their healing process
is a privilege. Approach each person as if they
were a baby. In many ways our bodies relate to
touch as babies.

The majority of people you treat will have had
at least one traumatic medical experience. The
memory of that trauma is locked in their body.

The person may be your best friend or lover but
once they lie down their body will become
cautious, running a dialogue something along the
lines of,

“Hang on a minute. The last time I lay down on
a bench like this and there was another person in
the room who was standing up, IT HURT! WARNING!
WARNING! ALERT! ALERT!”

It’s not like the person is going to jump off
the table and run away, but they will be
defensive. Don’t take it personally.

From the time you opened the door of your
treatment room, the patient’s body has been
checking you out to see if you are safe. That
scanning process continues throughout treatment.

The patient’s body will test you to see if you
are there to ‘DO’ something or to be available to
assist it in what it is trying to do.

When you contact a patient’s body it is good to
hold the following intention in your communication
to their body.

‘What are you trying to do?
How can I help you?’

As you know, the contact of the hands on the
body in cranio sacral therapy is exceptionally
light, often described as a Butterfly Touch. Like
the touch of a butterfly alighting upon the body.

A butterfly is not a moth. A moth has an
agitated almost frantic quality. In trying to get
the Butterfly touch happening it is easy to
develop the touch of the moth which is as bad as a
heavy touch.

Now lets break up what you are feeling when you
tune in. Think of it like this. As you listen to
a piece of music, many different dimensions of the
music are conveyed to you. Volume, stereo
balance, tempo, mood etc. Describing the music in
words won’t duplicate the music; it will merely be
words following an experience.

Tuning in to a person’s cranio sacral system is
like listening to music, something is conveyed in
the contact with their body. In refining your
cranio sacral palpation it’s necessary to identify
each aspect of what you’re feeling with your
hands. This serves the purpose of highlighting
aspects of the communication that you may not have
noticed.

Sounds hard. Why bother? Why not just go with
the feeling?

Well, the more you can interpret the rhythm the
more you will get a sense of the whole Cranio
Sacral System and where the restrictions are.

It also helps you note subtle changes in the
patient’s body.

It also helps you communicate your palpation to
other Cranio Sacral therapists.

One way to help refine cranio sacral palpation
is to divide it into three aspects; Symmetry,
Amplitude and Quality.

SYMMETRY

Symmetry relates to whether the rhythm is
stronger on one side than the other. Like the
stereo balance of the music. With your hands on
the person’s feet you may feel the rhythm stronger
in one foot than the other. That is called an
asymmetry. Taking note of symmetry can help you
build a total picture of the whole Cranio Sacral
system.

AMPLITUDE

Amplitude refers to the power and frequency of
the Cranial rhythm. It is described with words
like
* Strong or weak
* Powerful or faint
* Steady or erratic
* Fast or slow

Amplitude can indicate the location of a
restriction in localised areas. If the general
amplitude in the body is strong yet very weak in
one leg, palpation of that leg will reveal a point
at which the amplitude will change from weak to
strong. This can indicate the site of
restriction.

Amplitude also includes how the power and speed
of the rhythm relate to each other. A very slow
rhythm in the whole body can indicate a weak
system. A very fast local rhythm can indicate a
restriction in the system in this area. A fast
rhythm manifests in areas that are cut off from
the rest of the Cranio Sacral rhythm through
direct injury or restriction. A very fast and
powerful amplitude will be more ready to release
than a faint slow rhythm.

QUALITY

Quality refers to the mood, atmosphere or
feeling of the rhythm. Like music, this aspect of
palpation is quite subjective. One person’s
passionate song of freedom is another’s anarchic
scream from hell. When you first palpate for
quality it may present itself to you as having a
predominant attribute like :

* tight or loose
* active or passive
* tense or relaxed
* hard or soft
* solid or fluid
* warm or cool
* agitated or calm
* dynamic or lethargic
* powerful or weak

Usually a cranio sacral system will have a
combination of attributes. For example it may be
like a dense, liquid softness.

How poetic.

Start waxing lyrical because your job is then
to refine these attributes making them as specific
as possible. A way of doing this is to relate the
attributes to something that is in your
experience. You do this by asking yourself the
question, ‘Like what?’ In the above example you
would be asking yourself
‘A dense, liquid softness like what?’

The answer to the question ‘Like what?’ can
take many forms.

* Objects – chair, engine, cage, sponge,
* Elements – fire, earth, air, water
* Substances – wood, metal, wool, lava
* Sound – bells, boom, lullaby, scream
* Fragrance – mildewed, putrid, flowery, fresh
* Light – bright, dark, mottled, pulsating
* Taste – bitter, sweet, sour, tangy

Keep refining the quality until it is as
specific as possible. Using the same example your
conversation with yourself should go something
like,

‘A dense, liquid softness like what?’
‘Honey.’
‘What kind of honey?’
‘Honey that has been mixed with milk, but not
watery milk.’
‘What kind of milk?’
‘Condensed milk.’
‘How has it mixed with the honey?’
‘With a barmix.’

This may seem pedantic but it’s important to be
this specific so that you will be able to sense
the beginning of a release. This may be signaled
by something as subtle as a feeling that the
condensed milk is becoming more viscous as it then
transforms into fresh milk.

GENERAL QUALITY AND LOCAL QUALITY

Each Cranio Sacral System will have an overall
or general quality but within that bigger picture
there will be local areas of different quality.

In a strong solid system, one leg may feel weak
and fragile. This inconsistency highlights a
possible restriction. The difference between
general and local quality can take the form of a
general quality of, for example wood and a local
quality in the neck of metal. This communicates a
disharmony to you.

APROPRIATNESS

It is rare that a patient will be aware of
their own quality. Regardless of how dramatically
it presents itself to you, do not describe it to
them in the terms above. We use this form of
description to help us focus our attention and in
that it has purpose. But it won’t mean the same
to a patient and is likely to disturb them.

Telling your patient that their brain feels
like a fungus covered soft cheese is not going to
go down well. Trust me.

Symmetry, amplitude and quality inter-relate to
give you a comprehensive sense of the cranio
sacral system under your hands.

***QUESTION***

Hello John,
I got your book last week and found it incredible!
What a velvet hammer. Those innocent little
questions at the end of each chapter really got
me.
Very well done.
I am recommending it to all my patients.

Now here is my question. If a pattern of
restriction has ossified in the cranium, is that
it? Is it set for good or is it worth treating?

Best wishes.
SP
Arizona.

MY COMMENTS:

Most of our experience of bone is of dead bone.
The sort of stuff that looks like bone china –
dry, brittle, fragile. As cranio sacral
therapists we are involved in communication with
the body. It’s therefore most effective to
communicate with bone as it is, which is alive.
Live bone has some qualities which are not
immediately apparent.

For example, live bone is WET. It’s full of
blood.

Also, it behaves like PLASTIC. Meaning it
responds to the pressure put upon it. Wolf’s law
and all that. Consider the mastoid processes of
your temporal bones. You didn’t have them when
you were born. They were pulled out by the
sternocleidomastoid muscle as you were learning to
hold your head erect.

Bone is not stone; it is renewing itself all
the time. You can use this knowledge to help it
renew itself in a new direction.

There’s a good example of this in one of the
case histories here.

Here’s another thing, bone doesn’t become
restricted in isolation. This is particularly
relevant in the cranium. If a bone is restricted,
99 times out of 100, it’s because there is
something pulling it into a restricted state,
often membrane. The bone doesn’t become
restricted in isolation. Always look for the
pattern of restriction.

That’s all for now Kate,

If you still haven’t got your copy of my book,
‘Why Do We Get Sick? Why Do We Get Better? – A
Wellness Detective Manual.’ then do yourself a big
favour and get it. It’s taken me years to learn
and refine the material in that book.
It will help you become a better therapist and
it will make your job easier when your patients
read it.
Read about it here.

You can be reading it in just a few minutes and
discovering the sorts of conversations I have with
patients everyday.

Till the next time.

Your Mate,

John D.

September 2, 2009
Cranio Sacral Therapist and Student Newsletter 23

May 06 – 2007

Questions and comments for this issue:

+ How to convince Doctors of the validity of cranio sacral therapy?
+ Migraine question.
+ Do you have to get ‘hands on’ when treating post vasectomy pain?

Hello,
I’m just back from a trip to Brisbane where I
was delivering my ‘Core Success’ seminar.
How did it go?
Very well, thank you for asking.

It was great meeting old friends and some new
ones too. Some of the very first students I taught
in Australia were there, though they are seasoned
therapists now, and some therapists I hadn’t met
before, some of whom flew up from Sydney especially
for the event.

Jenny Palmer, who organised the seminar, is
going to write something about it so I will pass it
on when she does.

Lastly I want to point you to this wonderful picture I came across in the National Geographic. The man lying in the hospital bed is only days after open-heart surgery. He is having cranio sacral therapy. I like the picture because it is confirmation of where cranio sacral therapy is heading. But I’m getting ahead of myself, as you will see when we get into the first letter in the mailbag.

***QUESTION***

Dear John,
I recently had a patient who told their Doctor they
were having craniosacral therapy. The Doctor
dismissed it out of hand saying there was no
scientific basis for it and discouraged her from
‘wasting her money’.
My patient told me she wasn’t keen to continue
treatment.
I intend to visit the Doctor in question and see if
I can’t change his mind.
I know Dr John Upledger has done some scientific
studies on CST, I am just wondering if you know of
any other studies or can suggest some good
arguments for the validity of CST.
Thank you for your newsletters.

C.S.
Sydney.

MY COMMENTS:

I was only talking about this at the seminar in
Brisbane the other day. The simplest way to
explain it is to ask you to look towards the
future. About one or two hundred years in the
future.

Medicine will look very different. The
exclusively mechanical model that is currently in
vouge will have expanded to include an appreciation
for the body’s ability to fix itself. Cranio
sacral therapy, or whatever it is called then, will
feature largely.

Every ambulance and para-medical team will
include a cranio sacral therapist. Emergency rooms
will include cranio sacral therapists as standard
members of staff. Maternity wards, and in
particular, delivery rooms will all have cranio
sacral therapists. Every child born will receive
cranio sacral treatment within the first hours of
life.
Rehabilitation facilities will be dealt with
predominantly by cranio sacral therapists. The
treatment of chronic pain and illness will rely
heavily on cranio sacral therapy to provide lasting
solutions.
Inmate rehabilitation programs in prisons will
include cranio sacral therapy. Children with
learning difficulties will receive cranio sacral
treatment as part of their special care. The main
treatment for autism will be cranio sacral therapy.

On a hill there will be a golden castle where I
will ride out on my favourite unicorn, Tabatha.
No, hang on.
That last bit was a dream.

Now let’s come back to the present. At the
moment, we are ahead of our time. We are the front
runners, the pioneers.

The thing about being a pioneer is that it is
difficult. Just ask anyone from the turn of the
century who was saying that one day humans would
walk on the moon. Or someone from the middle ages
who was saying that one day people would travel by
air.
Think about all the things that we take for
granted now, like radio and TV and the internet.
At one time they all seemed far fetched ideas. Now
they are commonplace.

The flaws in the current medical model are
becoming more and more apparent to the general
public. When you think about the future it doesn’t
make sense to seek the approval or ally yourself
with a model that is failing. This is one of the
reasons that I have never tried to convince a
Doctor of the validity of Cranio Sacral Therapy.

Another reason is that the methods of evaluation
and the science are not sophisticated enough yet to
measure what we do. When they are sophisticated
enough than there will be more of a bridge for us
to talk.

Another reason is that we have not got our act
together enough as cranio sacral therapists. There
is way too much infighting and ‘my-way-is the-
right-way’ sort of thing going on. Too many 4-day
courses after which you can call yourself a cranio
sacral therapist. Too much cranio sacral therapy
as an adjunct to other approaches. We can’t even
stick to one name for crying out loud.
By the way I am renaming what I do, cranio-
vision-quest-bio-morphic-angelic-sacral-therapy-
approach.

Catchy, no?

Moving on.

It is like the underlying fear and insecurity
that often drives therapists to associations. The
thinking being that if we all band together we will
be taken more seriously.

Which leads me to ask, by whom?
Doctors? I don’t think so.
The public? I doubt it.
In my experience the public will go with a
referral from someone they trust over any number of
qualifications and association memberships.

So I would discourage you from confronting the
Doctor. Instead I encourage you to trust in the
part of your patient that brought her to see you.
It will do the right thing for her.

Also trust in the Doctor to acknowledge your
successes.

Your work hinges on your trust in the human
body’s ability to correct itself. I am encouraging
you to trust in the body of humanity to correct
itself too. It really is no different.

***QUESTION***

Hi John,

As always, these newsletters give me great insight,
so thank you for supplying us with it!

I just thought I’d give you some feedback about the
chronic fatigue client I posed a question about in
an earlier newsletter.

I treated the person before the newsletter reached
me, so didn’t have the added help from your
insights. I had been treating this woman for other
things for a while, when the time came to deal with
the chronic fatigue directly. In the space of only
3 weeks the whole issue seems to have been
resolved.

It started off with really good communication with
the hypothalamus, pituitary and membranes where
they were able to correct themselves and stay good.
Next week several past life traumas and associated
local restrictions needed to be released after
which chakras 1 and 2 were able to start releasing
their restrictions. The biggest problem was in the
2nd chakra where lots of damage had been done when
the client as a newborn was given drugs to
counteract kidney failure.

Those drugs caused damage to the nervous system,
which lasted for quite a few years. The result was
a very big block in the energy flow in the area.
I’m sure there were other contributing causes for
the chronic fatigue starting up 7 years ago, but it
wasn’t necessary to go into them. After one and a
half sessions over 3 days with work only with the
2nd chakra there was a definite endpoint, where her
whole body came to peace and I got a very strong
communication that that was the end of it.

She didn’t jump up and down like a two-year-old
right away, but has continued to get stronger and
more energetic every week since. She hasn’t had any
relapses since those treatments in November.

Question.
A friend of mine suffers really bad migraine and
I’m about to start looking for the reason. I don’t
know if it is always the same thing that is wrong
or if the causes are many and varied. I happened to
be there when my friend got really bad with the
migraine, so I tried to help. Someone else who was
there said migraine comes from the stomach
meridians being blocked and building up too much
pressure, giving pain behind the eyes (linking in
with the light fenomena sufferers experience) and
vomiting.
But when I sat with my sick friend and started to
tune in I got the feeling that that is only the
symptom, that the cause lies elsewhere, and her
pineal gland was very persistently engaging with me
and giving me the idea that the cause may have to
do with the pressure of fluid inside the head.

What is your experience in finding and treating the
cause of it?

Eva Kuhl Bornefelt
Central Coast
Australia

MY COMMENTS:

Thanks for the feedback Eva. I am glad your
chronic fatigue patient made such a good recovery.

The first thing that stood out to me about your
migraine question is when you said, ‘I’m about to
start looking for the reason.’ I encourage you to
change this approach. I have found it much more
effective to let the reason find you.

Instead of actively looking for the reason,
which is a very active dynamic, I encourage you to
trust the persons system and be available for the
reason to reveal itself to you.

On the nuts and bolts department the pain behind
the eyes can often indicate tentorial tension.
This happens because of the recurrent, meningeal
branch of the mandibular branch of the trigeminal
nerve. It can be referred pain from the tentorium.

If you were being drawn to the pineal gland then
I would go with that. Because you also mentioned a
feeling of pressure I would check the integrity of
the aqueduct of Sylvius. If it is restricted it
can cause back-pressure problems. You can read
about a woman I treated with this very problem
http://www.open-source-cranio.com/cases/intracranialtension.html

***QUESTION***

Hello John,
A guy is coming to see me next week to see if I can
help him with his vasectomy pain. Have you had any
experience with this? And if so do you have to
treat it ‘hands on’ so to speak. I’m not
homophobic or anything but I’m really hoping that
you don’t have to.

Thanks.

B.A.
Perth.

MY COMMENTS:

A hundred cheap jokes swirl around my mind but I
am a bigger man than that and much as I might like
to, I will resist.

Fear not. You can have excellent success
without having to get hands on. A lot of the
problems with vasectomy pain come from trauma
inflicted during the surgery where the surgeon tugs
over zealously on the vas deferens to get it clear
of the scrotum so they can get on with the
procedure.

When you look at the anatomy of the vas deferens
you will see that it travels from the testes
superiorly into the lower abdomen where it makes a
hairpin bend in the inguinal area before
descending to the prostate.

I have found that the trauma gets stuck in this
bend. Working in the area of this bend is roughly
where you would have your hands when working on the
pelvic diaphragm. You can help whatever
restriction is present to release with this
contact. You can also help any restrictions
further down or in the testes themselves from this
contact using your . . . intention.

So breathe a sigh of relief and be glad you
learned about intention.

So that’s it for this issue.

Cheerio for now.

Till the next time.

Your Mate,

John D.

August 23, 2009
Cranio Sacral Therapist and Student Newsletter 30

December 24 – 2007

Questions and comments for this issue:

+ Terry Collinson on Stillness Trainings
+ Is fibromyalgia similar to chronic fatigue?
+ How do I get a mentor?
+ Question about shingles.

Hello John,

Apparently it’s the season to be jolly – I
didn’t realise I was out of step the rest of the
year. If you know what I’m supposed to be doing
in the other seasons, can you let me know.

So in the spirit of the season, here’s a little
gift for you. john@wellnessda.com

No, don’t thank me, it’s all part of the
service and as I said ’tis the season. Why is
everything to do with Christmas in Olde English?
‘Hark, tis the postman. I see him on yonder
hill.’

Anyway pop that little beauty, john@wellnessda.com
in your email address books and when I send you
updates from my Wellness Detective Agency they
won’t bounce off your spam filter and you will
actually get them.

Updates from my what I hear you ask. Well the
notion of being your own Wellness Detective is
gathering momentum and to keep up with it my
website has become a resource for people who are
taking responsibility for their health and
happiness.

It starts with adopting the perspective that
nothing in your life happens by accident. If
nothing is random then everything is a clue. As
well as the Wellness Detective Agency email
updates, in the New Year I will be releasing audio
and video segments too.
http://www.WellnessDA.com/

Speaking of gift giving, if you are looking for
a present for the person who has everything, then
you could always about get them a personal genome
map. All you need is a swab from the inside of
the mouth and $1000 USD. https://www.23andme.com/

Aw, you shouldn’t have. No really, you
shouldn’t have.

Anyhu, let’s get on with the
mailbag. The first letter is from Terry Collinson
of stillness trainings. I really like the way she
talks about the training she teaches with Brendan
Pitwood from New Zealand.

***TERRY’S LETTER***

Hi John,

Lovely to hear from you. Hope all is well with you
and your new life in Ireland.

Our training (Stillness Trainings) began early
this year with 12 wonderful students. They are
loving the teaching and the work and Brendan and I
are heartened with our efforts and with the way it
is all going.

We put in place so many aspects to nurture and
support the students learning and process, as well
as that of the teaching team. As you know the
teaching is of the ‘biodynamic’ approach, but we
also keep it very pure and true to Paul’s teaching
of Resonance, plus our development or deepening of
being in relationship from Brendan’s training with
Ray Castellino (pre and perinatal psychology).

We are lucky to have four assistants who graduated
in Australia with Resonance Trainings – Sarah,
Tanya, Michelle and Glenn. We spend two days
before each seminar to grow ourselves as a team
and our own process so that we are ‘healthy’ and
bonded and are able to deeply support each other
and so then the group.

Because of our course/school accreditation with
PACT we have added nutrition to the teaching, and
we decided to add applied pathology throughout the
course, which as added a great dimension to the
work we had not foreseen.

Thank you for your encouragement and support to go
ahead and teach what I/we have to offer.

with love
Terry

***QUESTION***

Hello John

Your website is simply brilliant! I don’t know why
I hadn’t seen it before.

I am a newly qualified craniosacral therapist
(biodynamic model) and the info on the student
newsletter is very helpful. I have a new client
with Fiobromyalgia and wondered what tips you had
for working with this?

I feel this condition is similar in some respects
to chronic fatigue ME with the reduced thresholds.
I have a sense that facilitated segments also have
a role here.

Working with stillness is so wonderful but this
isn’t always possible initially as the person and
their system needs to be met where they are.

I qualified in July and want to develop my skills
and experience by doing an apprenticeship of sorts
by working alongside a very skilled and
experienced CST practitioner. I have been trying
to find a host practitioner to do this in the UK
but my enquiries have drawn a blank as people
appear not to want anyone else within their client
space. I am a CSTA UK member.

Any suggestions please?

Do you do any student mentoring yourself?

I look forward to your reply.

Many thanks for a very useful website.

DP
U.K.

MY COMMENTS:

Thank you for your kind words about my
websites. I’m glad you found them helpful.

I have found often the root of Fibromyalgia can
be located in the cerebro spinal fluid itself. It
has a particular quality to it. A bit like static
electricity or fizz in the cerebro spinal fluid.
When the person has an ‘attack’ this static-fizz
quality can be felt radiating out along the nerve
pathways, particularly the intercostal nerves.

I have found the underlying root cause can be
similar to chronic fatigue in so much as they both
put the persons life on hold.

The similarity stops there as the mechanics feel
different to me. Fibromyalgia has a much more
aggressive quality. There is usually a lot of
pain involved and this sets up a very different
dynamic within the person than chronic fatigue.

As I think about the people I have treated with
Fibromyalgia, what they all have in common is that
the root cause has nearly always been very core.
So while it important to work with the physical
and emotional expressions of the disharmony,
without addressing the core issue, the results
will be temporary at best.

I know – core stuff – heavy jelly – who needs
it? Such is our work. Best not to resist it and
know that if you couldn’t help they wouldn’t have
come to you.
How’s that for a double negative.

In relation to your mentoring question, I think
most practitioners will be reluctant to allow you
to be in their room when they are working. This
is because they have heard about all you and let’s
face it, you’re trouble!

Just kidding, couldn’t resist. They will be
reluctant because of the intimate nature of the
work and the trust that builds up between the
therapist and patient.

One way around this is for you to bring the
experienced practitioner into YOUR session. Bring
a patient to their rooms and work with them as
they tune into what you are doing.

You can do this in two ways. You can bring
someone you have been practicing on. Someone who
is NOT ill. You can get feedback about specific
techniques from your mentor as you are doing the
technique. You can use this way to get feedback
about any aspect of your practice that you are
unsure about. Obviously the person you bring
will need to be very comfortable with hearing
where you need improvement.

Don’t bring a fellow student or therapist. I
have found that their intention makes it very hard
to assess what is going on. For example, if you
are getting feedback about your frontal lift, then
person’s intention will be involved immediately in
lifting their frontal bone. For that reason it is
better to bring someone who knows nothing about
cranio.

The second way is to use your mentor as a
‘second opinion.’ For this you would be bringing
one of your own patients. You can get your
mentors help in a couple of different ways. They
can tune into the person and help you deepen and
enhance your sense of what the root cause of the
problem is.

You can have your mentor tune in as you treat
the person.

You can treat the person and have your mentor
work with you as your assistant.

You can have your mentor be the lead therapist
and you act as their assistant.

In all the different permutations of this
second way the common thing is that you don’t
discuss the person in front of them.

The only thing your mentor should say to the
person is to confirm whichever aspect of your
treatment are going in the right direction and add
the different expanded bits they may want to add.

Anything else won’t be appropriate. Talking
about technique and how you can improve will
undermine you in the eyes of your patient.

The thing to remember is that they are your
patient. They have come to you because they
recognise that you can help them. I don’t mean
this in a territorial way but more on a larger
scale about how patients find who they need.

And yes, I do mentoring.

Speaking of which, I intend to include a list
of mentors in addition to the therapist lists I
have on my websites. Being a mentor basically
means making yourself available for a student on a
one to one basis.

You should get paid for it at the very least
what you charge for treating people. Time wise
that is. Let me know if you are interested in
being included in the mentor list.

***QUESTION***

I am Training in craniosacral therapy, a friend
has shingles around the sacrum, in the past she
had shingles on the brain and almost died. Do you
suggest any holds or ideas on treatment.
Thank you M – Australia.

MY COMMENTS:

Shingles is one of those conditions that evoke
the hands thrown up in horror kind of response.
Like the poor person has got something strange,
foreign or alien that the rest of us don’t have.

So just in case you didn’t know – if you’ve had
chickenpox as a child you will have latent
varicella zoster virus lying dormant in your
dorsal root and cranial nerve ganglion.

Should it become activated it will travel down
your axon causing a lot of pain along the way and
finally erupt on the surface of your skin in very
painful blisters – and at that point it will be
called shingles.

SHINGLES!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!

Once you understand this then you can see that
the question you need to be asking yourself is why
has this person’s immune system become so low as
to allow the reactivation of this virus.

One thing that can do it is stress. Physical
stress like working too much and not playing and
working some more and still not playing and
generally being a dull boy.

What I have seen more often is emotional
stress. The kind of impossible emotional dilemma
sort of stress like being sick of taking care of
the kids but having no way out. Hating the job
but needing the money. Not wanting to take care
of the aging parent but not wanting to put them in
a home either.

Another useful question to ask yourself is, ‘Of
all the symptoms this person could have got, why
did they get such a painful one?’ I’ve never had
shingles myself but from what I am told and have
felt, it is very painful.

The good news is you are in with a winning
chance from the get go. As you know cranial work
has this wonderfully soothing effect on the
nervous system. All that focus on the cerebro
spinal fluid and still points and what not.

Because shingles is closely involved with the
nervous system it can respond very quickly. The
person should get enough of a relief to think that
this cranio thing is top notch and will keep
coming to see you as you both work through the
deeper, less fun, if I can use that expression,
reasons why they had these particular symptoms in
the first place.

Lastly, a high proportion of people who get
shingles are over 50. I bring this to your
attention because their immune system may simply
be clapped out from years of abuse.

That’s it for this issue. I wish you a very merry
Christmas and a fantastic new year.

Cheerio for now.

Till the next time.

Your Mate,

John D.

July 28, 2009
Cranio Sacral Therapist and Student Newsletter 35

August 2 -2008

Questions and comments for this issue:

+ Report on feasibility study on the effectiveness of cranio sacral therapy on migraine.
+ Open letter from Cranio Suisse®, the Swiss cranio sacral association.
+ Comment from Al Pelowski in response to Joyaa Antares and maxillae.
+ Comment from Cathryn Nitschke in Australia about her Osteopathy training and how it compares to cranio.
+ Question about therapist burnout.
+ Question about talking about emotional issues.

Hello,

Well it’s a positively groaning newsletter this
Time it is so full. Lots happening in the world
of cranio sacral with a report on migraine and an
interesting initiative from the Swiss cranio
sacral association but more on that later.

I have spent quite a bit of time reworking the
training part of the Open Source Cranio website,
making it a better learning tool. I have begun to
add my training notes and to lay out a learning
schedule.

One of the new features is a search function
which should make it easier to search the site for
specific topics.

Another new function is the comments feature.
This allows you to leave comments directly on the
site, under specific articles. You have to click
the comments tab. So you can comment on the
article and letters in this newsletter directly on
the site if you want.
I encourage you to leave comments or send me an
email letting me know what you think. The more
feedback I get the better I can make it.

I also encourage you to send me articles that
you think might help someone in a developing
country who is using the material to begin their
cranio sacral learning and I will post them.

I have fixed the problem with the newsletter
subscription block so if you tried to resubscribe
before and it didn’t work it’s working now.

Speaking of learning let me direct you to a
website I came across and intend to use a lot in
teaching. It is called the Visible body and is an
online 3D anatomy viewer. You can view the demo
for it here.
http://www.open-source-cranio.com/sacral-training/3d-anatomy/
If you like the look of it you need to go to
their site and register and then you can use the
models yourself. If you’re a Mac user forget PC
only. Discrimination rears its ugly head again,
sigh, pout.

Rightio, let’s get on with the mailbag.

***REPORT***

Below is an extract from a press release I
received about a proposed test for the
effectiveness of cranio sacral therapy on
migraine. They propose to use low-strength static
magnets as the control group.

Double blind studies are not my field of
expertise and is it just me or what, but I think
people would know the difference between a
therapist and a magnet.

Ah well, they’re trying.

————————————————–
Craniosacral therapy for migraine: protocol
development for an exploratory controlled clinical
trial.

Migraine affects approximately 20% of the
population. Conventional care for migraine is
suboptimal; overuse of medications for the
treatment of episodic migraines is a risk factor
for developing chronic daily headache.

The study of non-pharmaceutical approaches for
prevention of migraine headaches is therefore
warranted. Craniosacral therapy (CST) is a popular
non-pharmacological approach to the treatment or
prevention of migraine headaches for which there
is limited evidence of safety and efficacy.

In this paper, we describe an ongoing feasibility
study to assess the safety and efficacy of CST in
the treatment of migraine, using a rigorous and
innovative randomized controlled study design
involving low-strength static magnets (LSSM) as an
attention control intervention.

Methods: The trial is designed to test the
hypothesis that, compared to those receiving usual
care plus a treatment with low-strength static
magnets (attention-control complementary therapy),
subjects receiving usual medical care plus CST
will demonstrate significant improvement in:
quality-of-life as measured by the Headache Impact
Test (HIT-6); reduced frequency of migraine; and a
perception of clinical benefit. Criteria for
inclusion are either gender, age >11, English or
Spanish speaking, meeting the International
Classification of Headache Disorders (ICHD)
criteria for migraine with or without aura, a
headache frequency of 5 to 15 per month over at
least two years.

After an 8 week baseline phase, eligible subjects
are randomized to either CST or an attention
control intervention, low strength static magnets
(LSSM). To evaluate possible therapist bias,
videotaped encounters are analyzed to assess for
any systematic group differences in interactions
with subjects.

Results: 169 individuals have been screened for
eligibility of which 109 were eligible for the
study. Five did not qualify during the baseline
phase because of inadequate headache frequency.

Nineteen have withdrawn from the study after
giving consent.

Conclusion: This report endorses the feasibility
of undertaking a rigorous randomized clinical
trial of CST for migraine using a standardized CST
protocol and an innovative control protocol
developed for the study.

Subjects are able and willing to complete detailed
headache diaries during an 8-week baseline period,
with few dropouts during the study period,
indicating the acceptability of both
interventions.

Author: John D Mann, Keturah R Faurot, Laurel
Wilkinson, Peter Curtis, Remy R Coeytaux,
Chirayath Suchindran and Susan A Gaylord

Credits/Source: BMC Complementary and Alternative
Medicine 2008, 8:28

Published on: 2008-06-10

You can read the full report here.
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6882/8/28

***OPEN LETTER FROM CRANIO SUISSE®.***

I was forwarded this open letter from Cranio
Suisse® who have launched an initiative to
encourage communication between different schools
and therapists which, as you know, I am all for.

Their website is not in English so that limits
the initiative immediately but other than that I
think it’s great.

If you want to read their site in English you
can run it through Google translate.
http://translate.google.com

You need to scroll to the bottom of the page and
enter their web address.
http://www.craniosuisse.ch/

————————————————

*International Networking for the Advancement of
Craniosacral Therapy*

Dear collegues,

All the schools and therapists for Craniosacral
Therapy in Switzerland have organized themselves
in a new association – Cranio Suisse®. We are now
number two among the associations for
complementary therapies. The goal of this
organization is to bring together all the
different approaches of Craniosacral Therapy
within Switzerland and to guarantee a good quality
of schools and therapists. Cranio Suisse® is the
official representative of Craniosacral Therapy
towards governmental institutions and health
insurance companies. In short, Cranio Suisse® is
supporting and promoting Craniosacral Therapy
within in the Swiss Health System.

Furthermore the association acts as connecting
link between patients and therapists. You will
find more details under http://www.craniosuisse.ch/

This year Cranio Suisse® established a new *study
group for international contacts and research*. My
task within this group is to establish contacts
with associations/schools all over the world, thus
building the basis for an efficient networking
beneficial to all of us.

I should therefore be very grateful if you could
let me know whether you are interested in such an
exchange of thoughts and knowledge.

We would suggest the following procedure:

*Step 1*: We put together a list of all
associations/schools interested in putting up a
Craniosacral “Knowledge Network”.

*Step 2*: Evaluation of the importance and
positioning of Craniosacral Therapy within the
health system of each country (questionnaire). The
final goal will be to exchange research reports
and study designs or even realize common research
projects to get more and broader evidence based
facts about Craniosacral Therapy.

Are you interested in such a project and if yes,
do you agree with the proposed procedure or do you
have different suggestions?

We are convinced that an exchange of knowledge
like this would create positive synergies for all
of us, whether it be with regard to the handling
of public health aspects for complementary
therapies in general or strengthening the position
of Craniosacral Therapy specifically.

We are looking forward to your feedback. If you
feel that there is some other institution, school
or person who could be interested in the above
project, please let us know.

Thank you for giving our ideas a friendly,
constructive thought.

With best regards

Barbara Liniger

praxis@barbaraliniger.ch

Member of the study group for international
contacts and research of Cranio Suisse®

http://www.craniosuisse.ch/

PS: Between July 8 and August 24 I will not be
able to answer any emails. I will get back to you
in September as soon as possible. Thank you.

Contactaddress:

Barbara Liniger

Praxis für klassische Homöopathie und
craniosacrale Osteopathie

Alpenstrasse 14
6300 Zug

Tel 041 720 03 20

praxis@barbaraliniger.ch
www.barbaraliniger.ch

Barbara Liniger

Praxis für klassische Homöopathie und
craniosacrale Osteopathie

Alpenstrasse 14
6300 Zug

***COMMENT FROM AL PELOWSKI IN RESPONSE TO JOYAA ANTARES AND MAXILLAE***

Joyaa query, comments:

Maxillary hypoplasia, where the maxillae have not
grown properly, as distinguished from impaction,
is a feature of some craniosynostotic syndromes.

We see quite a few babies with that here in
Africa. I had a query on that yesterday in fact.

In these cases you find hydrocephalus, premature
closure and ridging of the sutures, bulging vault
bones, protruding fontanels, webbing between
fingers and toes, and distorted distal phalanges,
all in varying degrees. The maxillae can be
unable to hold in the eyes.

I had one case a few years ago where I had to push
an eyeball back in..! Most of these kids end up
with craniofacial surgery and shunts. Some of
them can respond to cranio! But by no means all.
Many die young gagging with oropharynx
restrictions.

As to possible causes and complications I could
speculate at length, but it wouldn’t amount to
much (estrogenic pollution, dioxins, severe
malnourishment in mother during 1st trimester,
etc..).

I would be interested if any of your readers have
come across this and worked with it.
Al in Joburg

***COMMENT FROM CATHRYN IN AUSTRALIA***

Dear John
Thanks for the link. I have just had a quick wizz
through the site and I think what you are doing is
brilliant, worthy and highly commendable. Good on
you.

I first met you maybe around 2002 or 3 when you
were still in Brisbane. I did one of your
introductory CST courses and really enjoyed it. I
believe that the school wound down shortly
thereafter (my memory is not the greatest so
perhaps this is not quite the case). Anyway, I was
keen to look more deeply into CST which led me to
doing Patricia Farnsworth myofascial release/cst
course and then Roger Gilchrist came to Australia
for 4 years to teach biodynamic CST.

I have also studied with Mike Boxhall in England,
who I think is wonderful and have made contact
with Charles Ridley whose writings really inspire
me. Since then I enrolled in osteopathy at RMIT in
Melbourne, thinking this would take me more deeply
into the world of CST. I have just finished my
first semester there and it has been somewhat of a
let down. I really hear you when you talk about
problems with CST training or training of any
hands on healing modality. I find that the push
towards health degrees and measurable outcomes is
taking away from the power of the apprenticeship,
“hands on” model and I lament this.

I had studied at university before, but this was
in the arts faculty in the early 90’s. The
science faculty as I find it in the late noughties
is a very different world. The lecturers are
generally not very competent or inspiring teachers
and they seem to find students a nuisance rather
than an opportunity. One of them told me I was
only allowed to ask one question per semester and
seeing as I had already used up my quota in the
first week, that was it.

I thought he was joking, but he wasn’t! This was
disappointing because he is a very knowledgeable
anatomist and I wanted to pick his brains, but
obviously this is not meant to be. Some of the
osteo lecturers find my questions challenging and
potentially threatening, especially the ones
firmly entrenched in the biomechanical model.

On the first day of practical osteo classes, we
practiced range of motion on the lower lumbars.
The technique left me with an instant sore back
and I had to self-treat with cranio work for the
next two days to relieve it! I thought, do I
really want to learn and be subjected to this? I
enjoy the philosophy and principles of osteopathy,
however, the prac classes seem pretty basic and
archaic compared to CST. I feel like it is a
backwards step for me. However, I have enjoyed
delving more deeply into the anatomy and
physiology, so my intention is to continue with
the medical sciences part of the course and drop
the osteopathic parts. Did you know that
osteopathy in the cranial field is only briefly
touched upon in 5th year? All the rest of the
time is spent on HVLA, MET, counterstrain,
myofascial release, etc.

Many of my CST colleagues lament that they never
studied osteopathy and they seem to hold it up as
the holy grail of osteopathy. This is not my
experience I can now say and I am glad that I
checked it out. I noticed that osteopaths in
Australia all have a pretty similar and extensive
training but in my experience there are some
pretty ordinary osteos around.

I am obviously not a fan of the “rub and crack”
school. And I have found a few gems whom I highly
admire and have as mentors. So this makes me
ponder what makes the difference b/w the
practitioners I adore versus the ones whose
treatments either leave me feeling worse or at
best, like I didn’t even have a treatment. I put
this down to the more subtle realms that CST takes
the time to unpack and explore. Consciousness,
presence, empathy, openness, etc. Such vital
qualities in a health practitioner of any
persuasion in my opinion.

So really what I want to say to you is good on
you. I admire the time and energy you put into
your newsletter and website to expose more people
to CST and encourage a discussion around all
things CST. I think this is vital work to bring
together a sense of community and to share ideas.

I notice the osteos have a very close knit
community and I think there is strength in that. I
love the opportunity to exchange ideas,
information, experiences with other health
practitioners with a biodynamic bent (gentle and
holistic). Also, I think that osteopathy is held
up as something quite exclusive and prestigious in
comparison to CST. They go to great lengths to
align themselves as primary practitioners with a
solid medical training. It seems that in turn, the
medical world rejects them and they are not really
embraced by the ‘natural therapies’ brigade
either. They are positioned in a potential no-
man’s land or on the flip side a potential
powerful middle way.

My greatest wish is to study this ‘stuff’ with a
mentor, one on one. I think anyone can teach
themselves certain things like anatomy and
physiology out of a book, but the influence of
someone who has walked the path before is
invaluable to point out some of the pitfalls, the
shortcuts and which bits of the scenery are worth
lingering on.

I have a chiropractic friend who I have great
discussions with, and he maintains that he could
teach me the ‘guts’ of the chiro 5 year training
in an afternoon and I believe him. This work isn’t
hard, as such, but the universities certainly turn
it into a cerebrally challenging exercise filling
the students heads with reams of facts at the
expense of understanding.

A phrase that speaks so much to me is “lose the
techniques” as I heard from Gangaji. After all the
study, to let it all go, and see what arises, to
follow the heart and the gut and the fingers and
the senses and feelings and to give the mind a
rest. This is what I love and see as the power of
biodynamic CST.

So in conclusion, I think any monkey can be taught
the techniques, the vital part is how they are put
together in the final package, the quality of the
touch and the presence and care of the
practitioner.

I wish you all the best with this project.
kind regards

Cathryn Nitschke
somewhere between Brisbane, Melbourne and
Adelaide.

MY COMMENTS:

Thank you for all your kind words Cathryn.
What a great letter. I cannot agree with you more
about the mentors, they are vital.

I think I was lucky because that whole,
‘osteopaths are a more exalted form of cranio
sacral therapist’ thing was nipped in the bud for
me early in my training.

Liz Kalinowska (http://www.craniosacralstudies.co.uk/about/frames.html)
was one of my tutors. She told me that she
had become an osteopath first because she thought
it would prepare her to become a cranio sacral
therapist. She spent 7 years becoming an
osteopath. She told me she felt she had wasted
her time. If anything she had to unlearn some of
what she was taught.

I have found over the years that it is very
hard to resist the temptation to ‘pop’ something
back into place if you know how. I am lucky
because I never learned how to do any thrusting or
strong techniques so I don’t know how to ‘pop’
things back into place. I am forced to sit and
wait and that is one of the reasons why I, and the
people I have trained, get such great results.

***QUESTION***

Hi John

Thank you for the very valuable information shared
by you and other CS therapists. I’ve been a
little out of circuit lately – life’s little
challenges – so even though you may have not had a
response from me, I’m still keen to remain
connected.

My preference would be more frequent shorter news
rather than the other.
Kindly advise what the donations will be used for.

Any suggestions for therapist burn out? A long
awaited holiday is needed, I know ,and am busy
working toward one. My forearms are taking strain
and was told that Kinesiology NOT treatment can
help. I’m pretty good at caring for myself but
what with juggling teaching yoga, CST, VM and my
latest baby, doing readings it has all suddenly
caught up with me. I keep the yoga, therapy and
readings for separate days giving me enough time
to replenish. Please throw some light (energy) on
this subject.

Kindly yours

Peni in Cape Town

MY COMMENTS:

Hello Peni,
There are lots of different energetic
considerations when considering burnout but the
one that stands out to me, from what you have
written, is that you are doing A LOT!

It may be nothing to do with any of the
therapies that you are doing individually. It may
be that you are doing so many plus your new baby.
I’m getting tired just thinking about it.

It sounds like you know what I am going to say
next but I’ll say anyway. It’s important to find
a way, that works for you, of removing any
residual energy after you treat someone.

For some people this means a full shower for
others it is simply letting water run over their
hands.

Avoid seeing too many people in a week. I have
found that somewhere between 12 and 18 adults is
about as much as most people can treat with cranio
sacral therapy without burning out very quickly.

Even if you find a way of removing excess
energy after each person and you don’t see too
many people you will still need to take a break
every 3 months for at least 7 days.

On top of all that you need to take a long
break, around 6 months, every 10 years.

It took me 12 years to figure that one out.

What will the donations be used for?

Well mainly to keep me in cigars and wine, oh
yes and also to help me run open source cranio.
It takes a lot of time and I do have to pay for
things like web hosting etc. I also plan to put
teaching videos on the site and these all cost
money to make.

Primarily the ‘donate’ button is an opportunity
for people to give back. This is good for me, not
just because of the cigars and wine, but also
because it’s important to be able to receive, me
included. I have found that if you can’t receive
comfortably then you can’t really give.

***QUESTION***

Dear John,
Thank you for your wonderful newsletters they are
so helpful. I find your wellness detective agency
idea novel and very useful.

I have a particular patient with chronic fatigue
and Fibromyalgia for 6 years. She is in a lot of
pain. The cranio sacral treatment itself is going
reasonably well but I feel she has emotional
issues that make her condition worse.

I have broached exploring the emotional causes of
her condition with her but she becomes very
defensive and then frustrated and then despairing.

Do you have any suggestions on how to approach
these issues with her.

Thanks again.

PM
Perth.

MY COMMENTS:

The secret weapon of cranio sacral therapy is
silence.

Personally, I can talk a lot about the other
stuff. Why the person might be sick and so on.
I can talk about that stuff so much I wrote a book
about it for crying out loud.

But for some people talking can only make
things worse. They will usually have been sick
for some time, like your patient, and will usually
have seen quite a few other therapists. They will
have a number of theories crashing around in their
heads as to why they are ill. Ironically each new
‘helpful’ perspective you might offer can push
them deeper into confusion rather than helping to
clarify.

That’s when silence really works. Just let them
get on the table and begin your work. You can
chat with them but don’t initiate it or keep it
going. Eventually silence descends and in that
silence and the depths of your work, changes will
percolate to the surface from the depths of them.

Over time deep changes will occur and no one
will talk about it. Sometimes if you are lucky
they will tell you an insight they may have had
and when they do it will usually have a deep ring
of truth to it.

So that’s it for this issue.

Cheerio for now.

Your Mate,

John D.

July 28, 2009
Chronic Fatigue – looking for the meaning of symptoms.

+ Chronic Fatigue – looking for the meaning of symptoms. – Nov 06

***QUESTION***

Hi John,
I have a question for your newsletter: Chronic Fatigue. Do you have any pointers for what to check or work on with patients with this syndrome?

Best regards,

Eva Kuhl Bornefelt
Central Coast
Australia

MY COMMENTS:

That’s a great question as always Eva and thanks for asking it.

Talking about chronic fatigue gives me an opportunity to go into the sort of process I go through when I look at any set of symptoms.

I ask myself what is this condition trying to communicate to the person. What is it saying?

Why this condition and not another? Why chronic fatigue and not fibromyalgia or arthritis or irritable bowel?

Of all the conditions this person could have, why do they have this one?

Each set of symptoms add up to a very specific communication.

‘So don’t worry about the physical manifestations?’

Not at all. It’s very important to deal with them but dealing with them alone won’t necessarily solve the problem. Looking at the condition in
this way points you towards the deepest reason for the condition.

You may not know what the deepest reason is but at least you will be looking in the right direction.

Then getting a sense of what the deepest cause of the condition is will inform you how to deal with the physical manifestations.

So let’s put it into practice. What is chronic fatigue communicating?

It’s a syndrome so it contains lots of different symptoms and few people exhibit all the symptoms all the time.

The main symptom is in the name – fatigue. The person has no energy to do anything. Sometimes they will need to sleep a lot, other people are tried but can’t sleep.

Generally they will have to stop working, stop their hobbies, significantly reduce their social life.

So what does this all add up to?
In short the person’s life grinds to a halt.

What is this aspect of the condition communicating?

Stop.

‘Stop what?’

Stop everything.

Why do we communicate, ‘stop’ to someone?

Generally it is because there is something about what the person is doing that we don’t like and we want them to stop doing it.

‘No kidding Sherlock. Is this what chronic fatigue is communicating?’

Generally speaking I’ve found that it is a large part of the communication.

For example, if a person has a condition that is annoying but doesn’t give them too much discomfort, the communication is generally about getting their own attention.

‘This is bothering us and we need our attention about it.’

But it has a, ‘When you can get to it.’ sort of vibe.

Whereas Chronic fatigue has a, ‘Stop everything and deal with this NOW!’ sort of vibe.

So look for what is so important to the person that they will put their whole lives on hold, if it is in disharmony, until that disharmony is resolved.

Another thing to consider when treating someone with chronic fatigue is their capacity to stay sick.

Let me explain. The amount of energy required to create chronic fatigue is huge. The people I have treated for chronic fatigue have usually worn out about 5 or 6 therapists by the time they get to me.

If you are very attached to quick results then maybe you shouldn’t take them on because these people have huge endurance. I know it’s a little
paradoxical. Someone with chronic fatigue having huge endurance. But don’t be distracted by the lack of energy issues. There is plenty of energy in their systems it’s just directed into keeping their lives on hold and there is very little left for the person for having any kind of a life.

I have found it most helpful to see my role as facilitating them to discover what the disharmony that is causing them to press the ‘Pause’ button on their life is. And no I don’t necessarily mean having long, probing, regressive, conversations with them about it.

The other useful thing when actually working with their systems is to sit very comfortably in the timeless aspect of our work. By that I mean, the depth at which we work. All going well when you work with someone you will be in a very meditative state and in that state, time pauses. We descend into the moment and in that, it’s eternal.

This is a very handy space to be in with a condition that has therapists for breakfast. As you sit with the person and your system entrains
with theirs, your system conveys a quality of timelessness. The subtle communication from your system is, ‘I could stay here forever.’

You can’t fake this. It has to be real for you. If it’s not you need to meditate more until it is.

I have found that when someone with chronic fatigue comes to see me and our systems entrain and their system gets this, ‘I can wait forever.’ Quality from mine it gives up on the endurance test and starts to avail of the support to deal with the underlying disharmony.

April 22, 2009