What is CranioSacral Therapy?
It is a ‘hands on’ therapy. For treatment, you will usually lie on a treatment table and experience the very light touch of the therapist’s hands. You may feel a deep sense of relaxation, and possibly become aware of heat, tingling, pulsations or other sensations.
This extremely gentle therapy uses no manipulation. The therapist listens, via the hands, to what is going on in your body, and in this way both identifies and relieves pains or tensions held in the body.
CranioSacral Therapy is client-led. Your body will set the pace of work, so you will remain comfortable, in control and able to integrate the changes that occur.
CranioSacral Therapy is becoming much better known these days. It is based on a number of findings about the body’s subtle physiology, which were made by osteo- paths in the USA nearly 100 years ago.
These findings show that every cell in a healthy body expresses a rhythmic move- ment which is fundamental to life – and which has been called craniosacral motion.
At the core of the body the cerebrospinal fluid, which bathes and cushions the brain and spinal cord, expresses this motion in a tidelike ebb and flow, while bones organs and other structures and tissues in the body each follow their own particular pattern of movement. This motion is so subtle that it is barely measurable with instruments, but the hands of a trained therapist are able to perceive and subtly interact with it in a therapeutic way, which brings about self (and cell) re-organisation and healing in the various tissues and systems as well as in the different layers of the body’s energy field.
As the implications of these findings were realised, during the first thirty years or so of this century, CranioSacral Therapy gradually developed. Since then the therapy has been refined and further developed into the subtle, deep healing process which is available today. The processes bring about self (and cell) re-organisation and healing in the various tissues and systems of the body as well as in the different layers of its energy field.
How does CranioSacral Therapy work?
In repsonse to physical knocks or emotional stress, the body’s tissues and subtle energy fields contract. Sometimes, particularly when the shock is severe or occurs within an emotional situation, the tissues or energy field stay contracted.
Any stresses, strains, tensions or traumas which have been “stored” in the body in this way will restrict the body’s functioning and may give rise to problems over the years. The effects may be both physical (such as back pain, migraine or digestive disorders) and emotional (such as anxiety or depression). Typically any person will have a number of these restrictions intercon- necting in a complex web in all the physical and subtle layers or sub-layers of the body (physical, emotional, mental, spiritual etc). See simplified drawing of main layers below.
Restrictions in the body’s functioning show up in the way that craniosacral motion is expressed, or not expressed. CranioSacral therapists are trained to feel this subtle motion or absence of motion or connection in the body, and can use it to identify areas where there is congestion, distortion of flow or restriction. In this way they can identify the possible origin or series of origins of a problem and its consequent compensatory problems.
Then, using the hands to reflect back to the body the pattern it is holding, the therapist provides an opportunity for the body to let go of its restrictive pattern and return to an ease of functioning.
This happens at a deep, unconscious level within the body, but it occurs in the same way as we might take other, more con- scious decisions. For example, if someone holds a mirror in front of you when you are frowning, you suddenly become aware of your expression and may well choose to relax your eyebrows.
As well as releasing the body’s tensions of tissues and energy fields, it frees up the energy which the body was previously using to hold itself in contraction. There- fore, one of the benefits of the therapy is an increase in the overall level of energy available.
Since it is your body (rather than your mind, or the therapist’s mind) that sets the priorities, you may find that the reason you came for treatment is not what changes first. Also, some people find that it can take a few sessions to connect with or identify what they are feeling. Wether you can feel them or not, the body responds and makes the changes. In order to gain the full benefit of CranioSacral Therapy and its cumulative effects you may need to consider having a series of treatments. Most clients have a number of issues they would like help with and they may have had them for a long time. The body may need a shorter or longer period of sessions to work with those issues.
Can CranioSacral Therapy help me?
CranioSacral Therapy is so gentle that it is safe and suitable for people of all ages, from babies to the elderly, and also in fragile or acutely painful conditions.
Indeed, it is often appropriate when other therapies may be unsafe, such as during pregnancy, after an operation, accident, fall or injury, and for young babies or for children experiencing difficulties with development or learning. As a whole body therapy, CranioSacral Therapy may aid people with almost any condition, by raising the vitality and enabling the body’s own self-healing processes to be utilised. It can greatly improve your quality of life either
But you don’t have to be ill or have any particular symptoms to benefit from CranioSacral Therapy. The alleviation of life’s stresses, and the increased sense of vitality and well-being that CranioSacral Therapy can bring are welcome to most of us at any time. It can also serve to free your body (physical and all the subtle layers) up from restrictive emotional and mental thought patterns, aiding in your overall emotional, mental and spiritual wellbeing and development. CranioSacral Therapy should not replace allopathic medicine, but can favourably be used alongside it or when it didn’t manage to solve the problem.
4H CranioSacral Therapy
A four-handed session is done with two therapists working together on one client. The changes and integration able to happen when two skilled therapists work in synchrony with a client far exceeds what is possible in a single session performed with only one therapist.
On avarage a 4H session can equal 3-4 single sessions. Typically, if you receive a series of 4H sessions, the sessions can be spaced further apart than with single sessions, as you will get much further with your body’s inherent treatment plan in each session and your total progression is faster.
You do not have to worry about being “overdone” in a 4H session, since your body decides how much it can cope with and is willing to release at any one time.
CranioSacral Therapy for Babies
One of the joys of treating babies is that they tend to respond so well to treatment,and more quickly than adults. Many infant problems, like colic, sucking problems, breathing difficulties, restlessness and irritability, may result from craniosacral imbalances caused during the birth process or from the time in the womb.
Although, over time, these conditions may abate, there are often restrictions left that may later on cause problems, such as developmental, learning or attention issues, or structural problems in the head, spine, shoulders, hips, legs and feet.
Treatment of young infants or children may help to relieve such problems as they are occurring or to prevent these from becoming bigger problems later on in life.
4H CranioSacral Therapy for Mother & Baby or Mother & Child together
Even with an uncomplicated labour the mother’s body experiences big changes during pregnancy and labour, which need to rebalance after the labour process, such as pelvic shape and positioning, spine and body alignment, pelvic soft tissue changes and hormonal adjustment, all of which may be much aided by CranioSacral Therapy.
Mother and baby share the same energy field before and after birth and are imprinted with each others experiences of the birth. Physical and emotional trauma of varying degrees to mother and baby often result from the birth process alone, wether there are complications or not. Likewise physical or emotional trauma experienced by the mother during the pregnancy will also imprint in the baby’s cellular memory.
Although grown from a baby into a child, the shared traumas may persist causing linked physical problems or complicating the emotional aspects of their relationship or the child’s physical, emotional or mental unfolding into an adult.
CranioSacral Therapy on Horses, Dogs & other Pets
Please see CranioSacral Therapy for Horses & Dogs in the menu.
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