Yoga Therapy?

[FauxLiz]

@BoN-bOn I have done some research on Yoga for Trauma and there are alot of the experts including van der Kolk that really believe it can be helpful. After reading his book I want to far as to order Yoga DVD from the Trauma Center as I have trauma issues related to group exercise classes. My T and I have used it a couple of times in session and I have tried a couple of times at home but I found it too triggering. I think that as I continue down my road of healing I may attempt again but right now my T and I have agreed that I would try private Krav Maga training. I am able to really get into my physical body by doing a major workout and for the first time in years I am finding a way to feel and channel the anger I have never let myself feel. Just a different opinion and the DVD is another option for people that would like to try Trauma focused Yoga but don't have classes available in their area.

 

[LadyZane]

I cried during the class

I have cried during yoga too! Years ago before I started really processing any of this.

I agree with everyone else who finds yoga really stabilizing. I need it! Especially since I made the transition to a desk-based profession about five years ago. Sitting all day just makes my body attack itself, and I am very prone to physical manifestations of stress and anxiety. Yoga helps keep all that from happening. I don't consciously "participate" in the meditative aspect of it but the great thing about it is, a lot of the time just concentrating on the physical movements accidentally puts your mind into that meditative place without you having to try, and you get the benefits of it. I've read that people with PTSD and trauma sometimes have a really hard time practicing mindfulness meditation -- I know that for me, just lying on the floor concentrating on my breath or whatever often really annoys me or even makes me feel actively aggravated and pissed. I have a hard time shutting off my thoughts -- I don't want to! It's boring and irritating! Yoga gives you something a little more active to focus on, as you're making sure all your muscles and joints are working together the right way and that you're not holding your breath, that you're breathing deeply in and out of your nose, etc. Your thoughts just kind of clear up as an unintentional byproduct at some point and boom, meditation.

I would NOT recommend trying to do yoga alone at home with videos if your'e a beginner, though. There's too much you need to learn in order to be able to practice safely without injury. The vast majority of yoga teachers that I've encountered are verrrry patient, calm, and non-competitive or judgemental -- that's not what yoga is about! They can coach you on correcting your posture, they call out general pointers and things that beginning and intermediate students often need to pay attention to, etc. I went to classes for probably four or five years before I started practicing at home. Sometimes teachers do touch you to correct your positioning, but if you aren't comfortable with that, let them know discreetly before class begins -- they're usually extremely "zen" people who are understanding and accomodating, and don't find this unusual at all.

 

[Clc122]

This is pretty much what my therapy is. My T is a dance movement therapist and a bunch of other letters. We do some talk, some yoga--probably about 70/30 split. I was skeptical but it has helped me more than regular talk therapy did. A lot more. It's actually been quite a bit of hard work but I can feel the results in both my head and my body. Plus, I get a trunk full of grounding tools, which is what I need the most help with sometimes. Best of luck.

 

[jedikit]

Yup I've done Trauma Sensitive Yoga for 1.5 years with a RYT-500 from JRC. I did a year in a ladies group but my T now has me in a private lesson since becoming more "present" & less dissociated -- I tend to get pretty keyed-up in group (example; the ladies would be doing savasana and pretty much all blissed out while I'm against the wall hyperventilating).

My experience: Instructor is a M.Ed in Special Needs, train-the-trainer yogi since '95, does NLP & Reiki (though not with me). We start the class off with "whatcha-been-up-to" chit-chat, where-are-you-at-today discussion (I dunno, here I guess), then she asks what I wanna work on that day (shrug my shoulders each week so you'd think she'd be done with asking, lol).

I set up my space, back to the wall. Have a standard foam yoga mat, 2 cork blocks, a folded wool blanket (my elevated seated "throne") and a cushion-y bolster (like a hard body pillow). She sits a good 5 feet away with our mats facing each other but a little offset so I don't have to make eye contact much when I get antsy.

Occasionally she'll play her singing-bowls for a minute or so (more-or-less okay with 'em). Sometimes she plays Indian piano & flute music from Spotify, other times it's silent except for her voice. Room is comfortably lit (not dark), good carpeting, no mirrors, windows stay covered with dark shades.

She starts me off with pranayama breathing (although for the most part I'm not so much on all the fancy-pants yogic names of stuff). She'll guide me verbally through 3-part breathing, stomach/lungs/chest, and she's all the time coming up with some other new kind of breathing for the week. Lots of grounding & resourcing. "Let's return to your breathing"-kinda stuff. Sometimes do Lion Breath -- look it up, it's hilarious!

My 'go-to' pose is Seated-Circle Rolls; hands on knees, sitting criss-cross/apple-sauce style, roll my upper body forward and backward, left to right, matching my inhaling and exhaling. Then do some neck rolls. She has me return to these each time she catches when I start to hold my breath; directs me to put my tongue against the back top row of my teeth to stop clenching.

We do some seated body twists, legs to the side, outward extended, flexed, butterfly, stretch the hips, modified forward folds, breathing into the body space. Each pose is held for 3-5 minutes and she keeps a steady chatter the whole time so I'm not left to the space in my head. Each pose is mirrored on both sides of the body for balance. Nothing is what I'd consider painful or stressful. She tends to ask for feedback on a particular pose, where I felt it in my body (or if I could feel anything at all). Sometimes I answer her, sometimes not; she's totally cool with it. She gives me time to babble on about nothing sometimes, movies or TV when I get to a particular hard (for me) pose; other times she has me stop the pose I'm in and return to breathing when she notices I'm checking out.

A lot of the class feels very hippy-dippy to someone pragmatic like me but I've learned to roll with it as much as I can (love my instructor!). Instead of pure meditation she's trying to get me doing some yoga nidra for 3-5 minutes at the end of class; she names the 61 points of the body -- love this because she goes so fast I don't have time to focus on anything negative and can stay present (early on in my yoga process, I'd checkout entirely during meditation time -- hated it). She'll guide me to setting an "intention" and counting my breath in my head (I'm up to '5'-ish before losing focus and having to start back over at '1').

I have some physical limitations and some poses I get super mentally activated on. Still learning which poses I like and which I don't. Mostly I only do floor work but we'll occasionally do some 'harder' stuff like plank, pigeon, or reclined nidra with a cushion slanted up a wall. Problem I'm having is trying to understand/accept that yoga is supposed to be a "support" and not to just white-knuckle through the poses I'm not mentally ready to do yet. If I don't get a migraine, throw up or check-out, it was a good class that day!

I'm pretty bendy & in-shape but that hour each week utterly kicks my butt -- I leave drenched in sweat like I'd run a marathon and pretty much exhausted rest of the day. Too much mind rewiring stuff. The poses I do are extremely basic; it'd probably just look like floor stretching to anyone peeking in. I know most TSY classes are 90 min standard everywhere, but that's personally too much interaction with someone in a closed-in room for me. I'm up to a solid 38 mins of being able to mentally stay with it though, a personal high for me (irritates me she actually times me, but I guess I'm supposed to be proud of the progress).

YMMV obviously but I like my yoga practice. Instructor stays in weekly communication with my T. She gives me homework and I can contact her via email (haven't, but nice to know I can). I know my experience doesn't sound like much, but work with your instructor to make it fit for you.

 

[Gs172003]

I have an app on my phone called down dog that has begginer yoga on it and you can get it for free. I also like Gaia.com. it's pretty cheap. There are some very detailed instructors that teach beginners very well on there.

 

[LadyZane]

a trunk full of grounding tools

YES. If it weren't for yoga I never would have learned how to do deep abdominal breathing. Yoga teachers always say that it "calms the nervous system and shuts off the fight-or-flight response," and I'd think yeah, sure, ok. But then last week I was reading about why some emotions cause physical pain -- that "heartache" feeling in your chest and/or your stomach -- and read that it's caused by the vagus nerve. This nerve carries signals from your brain to every major organ in your body -- it goes all through you. More and more research is pointing to the vagus nerve as the key to the sort of "mind-body connection" that practices like yoga tap into, but that Western medicine hasn't had the ability to get much insight into until now, when advancing technology makes it possible to look at bodily processes we couldn't study before.

Guess what one of the vagus nerve's most important functions is? Regulating the fight or flight response. Guess what every medical article I read about it said was the fastest way to activate the vagus nerve and switch fight-or-flight off? Deep abdominal breathing. As hippy-dippy as yoga can sometimes feel, I really believe it's grounded in stuff that works, even if Western medicine doesn't always understand exactly why.

 

[Lola Nocheprieta]

It is so interesting to hear about others' experience! My Trauma-Sensitive Yoga for Depression & Anxiety class goes like this:

• Weekly, on Fridays, for 90-minutes. I work from home on these days.
• Yoga teacher is also psychotherapist in psychiatry department. She also does a new mothers post-partum depression yoga group, so sometimes we have 1-2 infants in the class with us, which is actually quite lovely
• Starts with warming up/waking up the feet/body with self-massage using pinky Spaulding balls. Teacher passes around white tiger balm, very grounding scent
• We are in a circle so we can all see each other and no one is behind anyone else, ie, everyone has their back to the wall, so feels safer, less hypervig
• Then start with "vinyasa flow" -- the poses. Always LOTS of ways to modify, including sitting out the pose and just imagining it in your mind. Lot of people with medical conditions, chronic pain.
• She plays a variety of music, Indian chanting, easy going and inspirational hip hop, some gospel, it's pretty cool and upbeat.
• I usually have flashbacks (FBs), body memories, and anxiety attacks during poses that either spread the legs, open the hips, or reminds me of other "positions" I've been in when being physically or sexually abused. The hardest is "happy baby." I simply don't even attempt it at this point. The physical position and the very name of it drives me to the brink. Also, using the strap around my legs is difficult, due to having been tied down before, and also feeling like I am "displaying" my genital area to everyone. I am trying to work on that at home, instead. I've been doing the yoga class about 9 months, and trying to do it at home for about 1-2 months.
• Next, Savasana (corpse pose or resting pose) -- instant hypervig! Everyone else is resting and I'm freaking out, lol! The teacher goes around and places a lavender eye pillow on your eyes. I can tolerate that because I love my teacher and I do mostly feel safe in the class, BUT it increases my anxiety and hypervig.
• During the long resting phase, the teacher goes around and offers touch and gentle adjustment to anyone who wants it. This has been hard for me, and after having some very negative experiences, I mostly decline. But I have done it a few times. It's funny, it feels better after she does the adjustment, it's just that the touch startles me and sends me into instant body memories/FBs. I usually cry and shake during Savasana. Not very restful! I try to focus on my breathing, deep, slow abdominal breathing with a longer exhalation than inhalation to calm the vagus nerve and switch from sympathetic to parasympathetic nervous system. I am not the only one who cries during Savasana.
• Then, during Savasana she asks for a volunteer to help her prepare tea. After Savasana we have tea and she plays the harmonium and we do some Hindu chanting. She explains the science behind chanting and says it's not a religious thing. But we do talk about the meaning of the chants. It's all call and response.
• Then, at the very end, we go around and say our names and share one "rose" and one "thorn." You can always pass. Often, my thorn is "memory" and my rose is the class itself.

The teacher really makes the class. She is not just skillful and compassionate, she is very intuitive. I have spoken with her one on one after class even though she is not my T. I just love her, and she makes the class a very safe space to just feel what I am feeling, and to realize that I can *feel* scared and in danger in my body while at the same time *knowing* on a deep level that I am in fact 100% safe. I can sit with most of the feelings, and eventually hope to work up to those poses I currently avoid. This form of somatic treatment has been an excellent counterpoint to the rest of my treatment (T, meds, skills group.)She is getting some training soon with Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score, and I can't wait to see what she brings back to the group.

I was referred to the yoga class by my T (whom I also adore), and going to class and doing poses at home is part of my in vivo exposure homework. We are very invested in the treatment goal of being in my body and feeling safe/being able to move my body in whatever way/position I want to without having FBs and panic attacks.

 

[BoN-bOn]

Thank you so much for all of the feedback!! I can't wait to get started, even though I'm already teary-eyed thinking about all of the positions I think it would really benefit me!

 

[Clc122]

The vast majority of yoga teachers that I've encountered are verrrry patient, calm, and non-competitive or judgemental -- that's not what yoga is about!

I totally agree with this. My T is about as chill as I've ever met. It's more than just the therapist you-can-say-anything-and-i-wont-flinch manner, also. It works for me because I'd like to plow through therapy as quickly as possible and achieve sanity, tomorrow. Just tell me what to do, I'll do it. So, it is good to have her rather relaxed style to counter that. (But the idea of competitive yoga really made me chuckle...that is definitely the opposite style of what I've become used to)

 

[NorthernBare]

At the counseling center that I go to, there is a yoga therapy group that I am considering. I know tha...

I took basic yoga class. Now I do at home. I have an app on my phone that helps remind me of the moves. I find it easy and reduces my stress...the breathing helps for me...good luck.

 

[Lola Nocheprieta]

I took basic yoga class. Now I do at home. I have an app on my phone that helps remind me of the m...

What's the app called?

 

[Sweet_E]

Yup I've done Trauma Sensitive Yoga for 1.5 years with a RYT-500 from JRC. I did a year in a ladies group but my T no...

Wow! Thank you for sharing all of this!

I am currently in 200 hr yoga teacher training. I am doing it to help my own personal yoga practice - not necessarily for ambitions to teach. I would like to use some elements of yoga to help people with PTSD some day, along with other modalities like aromatherapy and DBT techniques.

My studio also trains for Yoga Therapy. I may take that training for the knowledge of it but I am skeptical about the program in general. For one, these people would not necessarily have other credentials in the mental health field. I also don't agree with their active listening philosophy. Basically, they discourage the practitioner from showing empathy - that's a whole different thread.

But your practitioner - Wow! She sounds like she is top notch! It also sounds like you have gotten a lot of benefit from the sessions. Do you happen to know where your practitioner did her training? I may want to look into it.