Recent terminology used in the press and by politicians to discuss the pandemic has reminded me of the saying 'what we resist, persists'. Paraphrased from the psychologist Carl Jung, this means when we attempt to resist anything within our reality or present, the more that thing will remain in our reality or present. The more thought, effort and energy we place on trying to stop that thing, the more power we give to it. Another way this is expressed is in the Law of Attraction. This philosophical approach states that positive thoughts (which are a form of energy or vibration) produce more positive thoughts. Conversely, negative thoughts produce more negative thoughts.

In the 70s-80s we had a War on Drugs followed by a surge of drug use, addiction and drug-related crimes and incarcerations. It is estimated that 21 million Americans aged 12 years or older has one form of substance use disorder. In the 00s there was the War on Terror which led to acts of terrorism around the world, major wars, thousands of people killed, and millions displaced. Despite all of this, the war has lasted for over 19 years.

Military terminology and metaphors have also infiltrated healthcare. We often hear that someone is “battling cancer” or someone is “fighting a flu”. This suggests that somehow there is a winner or loser in this battle, that the patient must be “strong” throughout their process or that they were not strong enough to overcome their disease. Now we have been told there is a war on an invisible and deadly virus. We must “suit up” in personal protective equipment and healthcare workers are described as working on the “frontline”.

We are all sensual beings, this is evident in the language we use – ‘a sight for sore eyes’, ‘hard ears’, ‘heart-warming’. Sensuality is ‘the enjoyment, expression, or pursuit of physical, especially sexual, pleasure’ or ‘the condition of being pleasing or fulfilling to the senses.’ The terms sensuality and sexuality are often used interchangeably however, sexuality refers to our ability to experience and express our sexual feelings. Our sensual experiences do not have to involve sexual activities, but we cannot have sexual experiences without sensuality.

Sensuality connects us with our senses and our sensory organs – sight, taste, touch, hearing, smell and affects the way in which we perceive the world and how we are perceived. As we can see, being in tune with and expressing our sensuality may involve far more than just sex or sexual experiences. It is about connecting us with our bodies, our emotions, our memories, and with our truest expressions of self.

Despite the festive cheer and merriment, the holiday season can be one of the most stressful and challenging times of the year for many people. Here are a few tips to help support your well-being this holiday.

How a few words made me incredibly aware of my physical being and helped shaped my view on beauty.

This year began with a seismic shift, which meant most mornings were spent with news of rising death tolls, feelings of frustration and helplessness as I felt my freedoms were being violated, and constantly trying to stay grounded under a blanket of fear of this invisible thing. It took me a while to navigate how to “be” during this time and I am still trying to understand it.

Now, the entire globe has turned its attention to the horrific atrocities that have taken place in the USA. These events are not merely headlines with second-hand accounts of what happened but have been filmed in sound and colour for the whole world to see. The murder of Mr George Floyd sent shockwaves around the world, igniting protests and riots, and it caused the debate of institutional racism and white privilege to overshadow a global health crisis. Similarly, as with the beginning of the year, I started to feel those feelings of frustration and helplessness, and constantly felt the need to stay grounded under a blanket of fear of this invisible thing. It took me a while to navigate how to “be” during this time and I am still trying to understand it. Same feelings – different monster.

Our everyday lives are filled with a considerable amount of uncertainty. How we choose to react may determine how we weather the storm.

It has rained for the past two days which is ideal for a little at home facial.

Although Cranio-Sacral Therapy is a very gentle modality, it takes a different approach to many other therapies and this can be quite daunting for some people who haven't experienced it before. With that in mind, I have answered some of the commonly asked questions about the CST treatment process. ⁣

After a self-prescribed week of no training to heal an injury, I was ready to rip someone’s head off. But I came to realise that health is a balance of doing the things that make us feel good and doing nothing so we can hear what our bodies need to feel good.⁣

You can't help but feel a huge sense of awe and gratitude when you sit in the grounds of Codrington College. However, today was especially magical because it was the last Sense - Mindfulness Session of 2019

I was fortunate to spend time in the company of some sprightly onagenarians, overlooking the north coast in St Lucy. In their 90’s, these women possessed a grace and spirit that was remarkable and inspiring.

This year marks ten years since I qualified as a Medical Herbalist. When I was planning to move to Barbados, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to source the herbs I was familiar with using and that I would be lost with the local herbs. During her recent lecture, the Healing Plants of the Ancestors, Dr Sonia Peter highlights how we are in danger of losing our biocultural knowledge.

And just like that Cranio-Sacral Therapy Awareness Week comes to a close.

A few years ago, I realised I had stopped singing and laughing. When I say ‘singing’, I mean singing in the privacy and safety of my kitchen or shower. I had essentially lost my voice. It was a gradual process, so I didn’t even notice it had happened, but I knew why it happened. I was in situations where I felt I couldn’t express my true desires, thoughts and emotions, mainly for fear they would be rejected or for disrupting the status quo.

A cascade of events then unfolded starting with enrolling on the Cranio-Sacral Therapy training. I had received Cranio-Sacral treatment for several years before this, but the training provides a very different aspect to healing and I was forced to confront the fact I couldn’t hear myself. Laughter, and singing in a similar vein, is a universal expression of joy. Joy is not a transient emotion or experience, it is an internal state of being where you are present, grounded and contented. In contrast, happiness is much more dependent on our external world and what is happening around us. If we get that new pair of shoes or if we win an argument with our partner, we will be happy. I had a roof over my head, I had a job, I could buy good food, but I wasn’t able to express an internal joy.

There are hundreds of stories around the world of couples, happily married for decades who, in old age, die within hours or days of each other. Take for example the case of Judy and Will Webb from Michigan who, at the age of 77, started to experience almost identical severe health issues. The couple who had been married for 56 years eventually died in hospice care on the same day from their illnesses. There are also similar cases of non-romantic pairs such as Carrie Fisher and her mother Debbie Reynolds. On 27th December 2016, Carrie Fisher died following a cardiac arrest. The following day her mother Debbie Reynolds, who she had an intense but close relationship with, died of a brain haemorrhage. Following their deaths, Reynolds son Todd Fisher said, “she wanted to be with Carrie”.

In the 1990s, Japanese scientist Dr Hikaru Sato began to identify signs and symptoms similar to a heart attack in people, usually women, who had recently experienced acute emotional stress. The condition became known as taktsubo cardiomyopathy, stress cardiomyopathy or broken heart syndrome. Although this condition is reversible and rarely results in death, bereavement or grief can cause serious physiological changes, some of which may be fatal. During times of increased stress, such as the death of a loved one, the body mounts an acute stress response including a surge of adrenaline, increased heart rate and blood pressure and reduced immune function. This may last for 6 months or a number of years. What is it that can cause a couple or close loved ones to die within hours or days of each other? The answer may not be taktsubo cardiomyopathy but it may still lie in the heart.

When we say ‘cranio-sacral’, a literal definition would be referring to the head or the skull ‘cranio’ and the base of the spine or the sacrum ‘sacral’. Cranio-Sacral Therapy focuses on all the bits in between and around, including the limbs, the organs, the nervous system, etc. The sacrum lies at the base of the spine and is made up of five vertebrae that are fused by adulthood. It provides support to the spine and strength and stability to the pelvis and therefore helps to anchor us when we are seated, and is vital to our posture and the way in which we walk and explore the world around us.

Psychoneuroendocrinology may sound like something straight out of a sci-fi movie but it is the interdisciplinary approach to “psycho” – psychology, psychiatry; “neuro” – neurology, neurobiology; and “endocrinology” – the study of our hormones. In a nutshell, the way in which our thoughts and emotions can affect our nervous, endocrine, immune systems and overall physiology. It is the butterflies we feel in our stomach before taking an exam or the racing heart when we see someone we are attracted to.

Psychoneuroendocrinology is a fairly new discipline that fuses together a range of health sciences that had previously overlooked the significance of the emotions in the onset, deterioration or improvement of disease. Stressful triggers, or our inability to adequately process them can be indicated in cases of asthma, eczema, digestive disorders and cancer.

One of the interesting things about this branch of medicine is that it helps us to understand, not only the way our emotions affect our own bodies, but also how our emotions can affect or be affected by others. For example, the hormone oxytocin is produced during breastfeeding. This conditioned response, the oxytocin reflex or “letdown reflex” may be produced when a nursing mother hears her baby cry or thinks about her baby. If the nursing mother is emotionally overwhelmed or in pain, the reflex may stop.

As many of us have, I have been indoctrinated with the mindset that work has to be gruelling, monotonous and stressful, and anything that deviates from that is wrong.

Work patterns, habits and locations have changed significantly in recent years, but has our conscience followed suit?