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[culturalogique]

Motherhood III - My thoughts

Motherhood. Motherhood is a strange thing, it creeps up on you. Slowly. Even when you’ve known you wanted to be a mom for a long time, there’s no way you can see it coming. Now that I am a mom, I have had my baby and I’m on the other side. Three months now. I look at first-time pregnant women and shake my head. They just don’t know. There’s no way they can know. They can read everything, talk to everyone they know, do everything in their power to be prepared and there’s no way to know everything. It’s an infinite pool of knowledge and potentialities, the point is no one knows, even women on their fifth childbirth/rearing don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s a mystery, one of the last, true great mysteries out there. And yet every woman is completely and wholly prepared for what they are about to experience, because it’s made up exactly for them, for her, at this moment, at this time.

Back to my point. Motherhood sneaks up on you, it comes in layers.

 Some of the things I’ve noticed.

 Baby animals. Everything for your newborn is covered in natural elements, leaves, flowers, trees, giraffes, whales, wolves, raccoons, pooh bear, baby elephants, baby animals of all kinds. We celebrate them, we celebrate life and love and family. ‘Daddy’s little princess’ ‘I love mommy’. But out there in the real world, we are letting species die at an alarming rate. We wouldn’t dare give up our foreign vacation, our second car or strawberries in January. But when it comes to our babies, we know what’s good and wholesome. Life, the life that issues forth when babies are born. We recognize the value of the natural world, fresh air, bright colors, celebration.

 That was one of the first things that hit me after my daughter was born.

 Sad.

 Of course hormone’s are raging you at that time.

 My sister called it ‘You’re so happy you’re sad.’ That’s exactly, how I felt!

 No one tells you you’re going to have feverish night sweats for the first nights to a week afterward, no one tells you about the panic.

 My first re-occurring dream/nightmare was of waking and checking the baby to see if she was alright and then realizing that she wasn’t the real baby. And looking around in a panic for the real baby only to realize I was awake and the real baby was right in front of me and she was fine. Happened multiple times. My husband and I still joke about it.

 Not to mention my actual paranoid question if someone could have possibly looped footage of my baby sleeping comfortably into my baby monitor to trick me. I literally had to talk myself very carefully through this one… a) why would anyone do that, seriously you think someone is stalking you and specifically wants to steal your baby badly enough to infiltrate your house, b) how would they do it, the monitor was from my sister who had gotten it second hand from her sister in law, this thing had been through 5 kids, it wasn’t even connected to the WiFi! Pretty nearly impossible and c) those are her clothes, that is from today, you just laid her down, it’s fine, you’re just paranoid!

 That’s how much you love them, it’s irrational. You cannot control how you feel and what you want to do about it.

 Speaking of which I better go check on her right now. :D

 Ok, I’m back.

 In the beginning, my mother, her grandmother, would be worried she wasn’t breathing, truly worried and asking me to check. Mother of both myself and my sister, olympic swimmer, early child development specialist grandmother, was so connected to this new little being that she was doubting her ability to pick up on the subtleties that might mean loss of life.

 They scare you so much with SIDS and all the precautionary measures that it’s a miracle babies are even born. Of course it is a miracle.

 Everything is upside down and inside out. But, gradually, like a frog boiling in a pot of cold water.

 You become your child. Gradually, you start peeing your pants, you need to wear pads, like diapers. Your thighs start to chafe and stick and get rashes. You need diaper rash cream. You can’t reach your feet, you can’t clip your own toenails or coif your private area, you need help to do basic things. You have to eat small amounts, because too much will give you heartburn and an upset tummy. You’re uncomfortable, you wake up several times in the night. Not just to pea, also for no reason, you’re just AWAKE. Oh, and you’re nauseous, you puke, you can’t keep food down, you have a gag reflex and are super sensitive to foods, tastes and smells.

 You are becoming your baby. Pregnancy helps you feel what it feels like to be a baby. And to know definitively that your life will never be the same.

 This is the new normal. You have set sail.

 Of course, men and other partners/caretakers have no idea. The women who know are women who have given birth, recently being the best. Because they have not forgotten the truth of it.

 No one tells you you’re going to lose your core strength and the ability to control your urine, like maybe permanently.

 No one tells you about the fluids. I was expecting the pee, poop and spit up, but being imperceptibly soaked in a cold sticky fluid that is your own milk, soaking down into your shirt, your sheets, everything at any time.

 Or that you’re vagina may never be the same. Only afterwards will your girlfriends who are moms admit it. Oh yeah, I call it my ‘fin’ one friend laughs. Another recall’s going in for her 1 year check up, asking ‘what’s this’ and having it explained that this is now her vagina, it is healed after 2nd degree tears.

 Mine is more a valley or a divet. The tear came back together at the top but the bottom remains slightly open.

 Both my midwife and my primary care physician say it’s normal and that it will ‘granulate’ back together, gradually, of course.

 And what about sex? Hmmmmmm, well after the three+ weeks of bleeding profusely out your bottom, not being able to sit up and still too weak to go on long walks or to lift even moderately heavy things. Not to mention however your nipples and breasts feel depending on how nursing is going.

 Penetrative sex is not the first thing on your mind. Maybe a shoulder rub?

 But on the other hand, you know it’s important and for some lucky reason you do feel kind of horny. Thank goodness for that! You agree to it.

 And well, it kind of hurts. Not a lot but it’s very uncomfortable, especially in certain positions.

 Now I know why in certain religions they promise you 32 virgins, because a woman who’s had a child birthed out of her is going to tell you exactly what she likes and doesn’t. Out of necessity.

 My husband is a saint. He is so thankful we are sexing at all and so understanding of my courage, he only wants to do right by me and so we have a sex life, once again.

 Different than ever before but a sex life. This is the part where I remember our midwife telling us about sex after baby, ‘it’s like meeting again for the first time, everything is new’.

 And it is like that. Closer, more open, more understanding and compassion. More true love than ever before, this mutual purpose, this mutual accomplishment, precious beyond belief and yet fragile and needing constant faith.

No one tells you you’re going to be ravenous afterwards, wanting/needing to eat and drink even during the night – just like a baby.

 The truth is there’s too much to tell. And we new pregnant mom’s we don’t listen, we simply cannot take in that much information. On some level we just have to wing it and hope, pray and prepare for the best.

 Right after I gave birth the advice I had for women was – ‘Do your squats. Keep up with your yoga and your stretches. Walk every day.’ ‘This is an athletic event, better get your game face on.’

 Which reminds me of my daughter, when she was learning to latch on to my breast, she would sway her mouth back and forth on my nipple with her mouth open to locate the nipple and then she would get what I called her ‘game face’, which was part growl, part bite and part lunge and go for it.

 Mothers and babies, we’re more alike than we look.

 Now that my daughter is 3 months old. Today! Happy birthday Melissae, you’re a quarter of a year old already! I feel like I have not only set sail, I’m in open water, out of the sight of shore.

 Here’s to the best. For all of us.

[culturalogique]

Motherhood II - Birthstory for Melissae

Labor started at midnight on Sunday September 3rd. Right smack on your due date. I was lying in bed asleep and woke up @ about 11:45pm with what felt like contractions. I woke up your father + told him I thought I was having contractions. He thundered awake wanting to know if he should get my ‘scullcap’ to help me sleep? I reassured him that we still had some time + got up to see what my ‘when to call’ list from our midwife Laura said. Sure enough ‘Rhythmic contractions of 5 or more in an hour’ was on the list. So I started counting. At 12:58am after counting my fifth I called Laura. ‘Hello’ she said in a cheery voice. I told her what I was feeling + she said ‘go take your scullcap + go back to sleep and call me in the morning or if anything changes or if your water breaks.’ I said ok + your daddy went + got the scullcap out of our birth kit and started filling the hot tub. I took a dropperful and slept mostly off and on through + between uterine contractions that felt like moderate menstrual cramps through the night. The night before we had visitors arrive Julie and her two daughters Nyonchele + Naaye. Julie is a dear friend of mine from Portland, who also happens to be a midwife and a magical woman. We had planned the visit half joking that I’d likely go into labor seeing as it was your due birth date and that she’d get to be my midwife after all. And sure enough, here I was in labor. When I woke up your father and I decided to have as natural and normal of a day as possible but also restful + internal.

Outside was horribly smoky from the Chetco-Barr fire and other wildfires surrounding us here in the Rogue River Valley. The smoke was so thick you couldn’t see the mountains in front of our house. So we turned the AC on and sat inside eating, drinking water + teas and reading. Julie + her girls, despite the smoke went into town for the day to Lithia Park + Science Works to give us some time. Your dad called our friends Thom + Ashley to come over and help him with last minute preparations. I rested + read + ate good food + paused through the contraction. Laura + I talked + agreed to just see if + how things changed. That night around 8:30/9, about our bed time contractions started coming on a little stronger + I took two droppers of scullcap + tried to sleep. That night I labored through the whole night alone. Trying to sleep changing positions, drinking a lot of water + moaning. By the morning I was pretty exhausted. I called Laura and asked her to come over. I wanted to be checked and I wanted to have her monitor you as I had felt much less of you over the past several days. She came over + when she got there we had a full household, Julie + her two girls, who were running around the living room playing and having fun + Ashley + Thom. We were all talking + having a nice time after breakfast. For me, the contractions were lighter again over the night both in intensity + frequency. I noticed when I talked a lot in conversation with people the contractions would lessen + widen out. I knew I needed more quietude but I didn’t know exactly how to get it. Luckily Julie + her kids were leaving that morning + Laura agreed we needed to clear the house and make it more of a date between the two of us.

She also checked my cervix and I was 3cm dilated and my cervix was 90% effaced, or thinned out. She was happily surprised as was I. She also helped me craft a night plan so I always had someone with me when it got dark to get me things + take care of me + just be with me over the hard times. Ashley + Thom went home for the day with the plan of coming back that night around 9pm. Your dad + I then proceed to have a beautiful, romantic day, we took a hot tub and made love which was amazing and took a nap together. By dinner the contractions were getting a little heavier but still irregular. We mad yummy tacos for dinner and listened to music and danced. Earlier we had sat at the altar and cried + talked about how lucky we are + how much we loved you and each other + how lucky we are to have found one another to Jeff Buckley’s ‘Hallelujah’. It was a blissful easy day. I could only eat one of my tacos for dinner + went in to the altar to lay face down on the yoga ball your Dad had blown up for me just that day. Your dad came in to find me face down on the ball rocking back + forth or bouncing listening to music. It really soothed me. Your Papa came in and brought me coconut Bliss ‘mocha maca crunch’ and we ate it together, him feeding me it in spoonfuls. We both noticed a change in the contractions so he started timing. The contractions were lasting for close to 2 minutes + coming every 2-10 minutes. He texted Laura with this info and still she wanted to ‘wait + see’ for a little while longer or until my water broke. A couple of hours later I was ready to have her there with us and Ashley + Thom had arrived again for the night.

By the time Laura arrived around midnight, contractions were really rolling + it was hard to talk during one. After Laura arrived your Dad went down for a little nap + your Auntie Ashley + Uncle Thom woke up to be my helpers. For the first long while I labored in the hot tub taking contractions either squatting or floating on my belly. In between contractions I would sip water or electrolytes from a straw, then rest my head on a towel on the edge of the tub until the next contraction. At some point Laura recommended I reach up in my yoni and see what I could feel. Sure enough there was a bulging sac of your waters and if I pressed on it I felt your head. I was elated. You were close and I could feel you! I also felt my cervix and it felt like a thin slippery doughnut all around the sac. For the next several contractions I focused on relaxing and surrendering to the opening of my cervix so you could come through. Being under the trees and the fresh air + red (from the smoke) harvest moon was beautiful. Laura reminded me that right now around the world 300,000 other women were doing the same thing this gave me hope + strengthened and inspired me. We discussed the breaking of your waters but decided against it. Laura believes that things happen for a reason + indeed they did. At that point we also decided to wake up Daddy. I knew he wouldn’t want to miss any of this. When Daddy came he got in the hot tub and in between contractions I could rest back into his arms. It was almost heavenly. I could have stayed in there forever. But Laura reminded us that the air temp was getting pretty cold to birth out there and said that if I wanted things to progress I should probably get out and do some walking around. So after the next contraction we got out and I came inside.

Ashley fed me some peanut butter toast + I took a contraction in the kitchen. Then I had to go to the bathroom. While I was on the toilet I had another contraction and as was my habit I reached up into my yoni to feel for the sac only this time it broke. WHOA! That was an incredible sensation as the strength of the contraction literally quadrupled. I let out a loud long song of release and surprise. It was intense and amazing. And then it passed. I came out + told everyone that my waters had broken. For the next few I labored on the yoga ball but the contractions were super intense and I was feeling a lot of hip + back pain. When the tub was ready I got in + continued to labor in there. Again resting my head + drinking fluids in between. Your Dad was by my side + I was pushing now helping you move down lower + lower. After a while I started to get uncomfortable in the tub trying to relax + stretch in between + be in a squat for contractions. At some point I looked at Laura + I could tell she was wanting some thing different. I asked her what we should do and she recommended getting out of the tub + trying some other positions. She also wanted to check your position and our progress. By this time Laura’s assistant Veege was there + together they examined us and found that your head was all the way through the cervix and showed me how to push by applying pressure on my bottom and coaching me through a few. Shortly after this came a long pause, called quiscence. Where there were no contractions + we all just rested.

Once the contractions started up again I was on the birthing stool in front of the tub. About that time your Dad opened the front curtains. ‘It’s dawn babe our little Zama is almost here’. Again I was cheered and touched by this. It made my heart lift to think of how close you were. This is when the pushing truly began. I sat near the windows in the morning light + with every contraction I bore you down. The pressure was incredible but it was not painful. I re-positioned myself several times on + off the birthing stool, on one knee kneeling and each time I reached inside + felt your head making progress. Finally you began to crown. ‘Ring of fire, ring of fire!’ I called out as I began to feel you coming all the way through. It took several contractions for me to get your head all the way out and when I finally did it was pure bliss for one brief second before Laura started to dig with both hands into my vagina. ‘What are you doing?’ I asked. ‘I’m assisting the shoulders,’ she said. ‘Should I push?’ ‘Yes’ ‘Should I wait for the next contraction?’ ‘No, push now’ So push I did with all my strength + sure enough woosh you came jetting out along with a tidal wave of amniotic fluid, blood, meconium + there you were being placed on my chest pink + wet + beautiful covered with vernix. I kept asking ‘is she ok is she ok is everything ok?’ Your daddy was with me holding you too + crying as you took your first breaths. Veege was there checking your pulse + your breathing as you coughed up a tiny bit of fluid from your mouth + nose and started to make your first sounds. You were perfect of course + everyone rejoiced as Laura + Veege helped me birth the placenta. At that time we also noticed that you had a ‘true knot’ in your cord, which may have been why you chose to come gradually rather than rapidly. Uncle Thom was busy taking photos of your first moments.

After the placenta was birthed we moved me to the couch so I could hold you + Laura gave us 5min alone with you to coo and cuddle after helping me get you latched on my breast. When the midwives came back they examined my yoni + found I only had one small tear + the bleeding appeared normal. Earlier right after you came out they gave me several herbs to help with the bleeding. And now it was time to go upstairs + settle in for our first day with you and the long healing process. Because of the tear I was put on 5-7 days strict bed rest + Laura instructed us not to pass you around to too many visitors but to stay skin to skin with you as much as possible, eating + sleeping together as much as possible. For me the after care was some of the hardest part feeling so sore + vulnerable down there while also having to figure out how to nurse you + get a good latch + how to share responsibilities at night + keep up my energy with enough sleep + calories. By Friday we were pretty in the swing of things my  milk was in you were nursing like a boss and sleeping a lot at night. You are the light of my life with your peaceful, wise temperment and your shock of red/orange hair. I adore you and my love for your father grows stronger through you. This time of your birth, preparation for your birth and care afterwards has brought us all more deeply in love than we thought possible. Birth itself was both instructive + inspiring that something like that is possible with just the human body and a loving attendant(s) is both mind blowing + empowering in a powerful way. I’m already thinking about what I would like to do differently next time. What fun.

~ MELISSAE ZAMA IRIS STUART ~

Born Tuesday, September 5th, 8:22am

@ Home in Gold Hill, Oregon

Attended by Papa Nathanial Stuart, Midwife Laura Roe, Midwife Assistant Veege Rueteger, and Doulas Ashley & Thom Waymouth

[culturalogique]

Motherhood - Birth Poem for Melissae

The night is the dark thing

The night is what brings it on

Go into the night

Go into the night strong

Willing to enter the ring

The ring of fire

The ring of you

My darling

Coming into the world

You were nothing before

Now you’re somebody, some thing

It’s not that I don’t believe it

But it bears repeating

Now your some body

Honey bear harvest moon

Red haired phoenix

Bringer of the thunder + rain

Laying down the dark ashes

Like my black hair against

My face.

Getting younger as I go

Getting younger as I went

Through the dark of that night

Those nights.

It’s the dark that’s the dark

It’s the dark that’s the night

I forgot to listen but I remembered

To pant.

I hired my guides and I listened

I listened well

Like we do now to the thunder

Say our prayers to Thor.

Bringer of the lightening.

This is what the earth wants

Raindancer man.

This is why I come now

Through hazy skies

This is what I want

To do exactly that which you don’t

Want to do, which won’t feel good

to do. That might kill you or your loved one.

Because it’s the right thing to do

And the only way forward is

Through.

Take the pauses + the Wayves and

Ride them

Like an open book.

We listened, we danced

To a chorus of frogs + crickets + wildcats

Under a red harvest moon.

The light of which glowered not

Beamed.

Your depth is unknown

Like your dark shiny eyes.

While mine were shut closed

Prying and propping to get glimpses of love

But mostly I listened to you

Mastermind on the inside

It was an inside job

How from the least vantage point

You knew the most.

Talk about dark

Talk about night.

Only night, only dark

A deeper knowing, a deeper wisdom.

To the very cone shaped point of isness

Truly the only way

It comes down to this.

So you were speaking to me the whole time

But in silent letters that I didn’t read.

But rather felt + rode

Surrender.

The pauses were still mine/ours to

Orchestrate

The pulse of life.

The pulse of life coming down through

my yoni

Enlisting my uterus to touch heaven +

Earth. Spirit + matter, divine + mundane

I wish you well sweet earth warriors

All of you past present + now

The hill steeper than ever is perhaps

Even more worthy the climb.

I wish you well through your anxiety

And pain through obstacles and story

Emotion + fear, through doubt and

Surrender to your destiny, our

destiny. Just know that you do it

For us. For all of us. If you do

It at all.

Find your guides + hold on tight.

Look to yourself in the night.

And know that behind you are

Armies.

Armies of women with their arms folded + their eyes open.

They see you they know you and

They are all of us.

Before you is golden because it’s the

Future because it’s the dawn.

Don’t go it alone.

Have a night plan

Stack the odds in your favor.

Set up for success and never look back,

Feel your own cervix.

Talk her on down.

First born with the gnelven ears

What is your message what is your charge

I made your eyeballs yet you will

One day put me down.

The pauses were for me the pulsing

for you through you

Welcome the pulse like you welcome the

Pause. They both have their purpose, they

Both have their cause

Eating + drinking + brushing your hair

Welling and ebbing + bearing her down

The ultimate yin yang.

The stench of my effort lies dense on me now

As I leak rivers of blood

Keeping knees tight together.

The yoga, the squats, the shakes and the pills.

You’re an athlete now, like it or not.

But even your deep breath will take you into

The dark.

So light your candles + prep your tables, gather

Your beauty around you and get ready for

The shamanic ride of your life

Where you are both the shaman and the

drug, the conductor and the muscle.

One woman show. The only one like it on

Earth. Let your war cry sound + bring

Her on down. Good luck. Goddess Speed.

May the Great Mother watch over you

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 10 of 10) How I Healed My Spine

Under the steady care of Dr. Tara McHenry and Dr. Jason Lindekugel, I once again began making progress, I was following Gokhale’s posture while sleeping, standing, driving, sitting and lying. I quit my stressful desk job and was working from home. And, I had once again avoided a cortisone shot.

At this point, my nerve and muscle specialist Acupuncturist, Dr. McHenry, coached me into an even more aggressive physical therapy based on The Foundation Method, by Dr. Eric Goodman.

Goodman, another practitioner who evolved his field as a result of his own pain, was studying to be a Chiropractor, when, in his mid 20s, he experienced a herniation of the L4-L5 disc, the same disc that was the source of my chronic pain. His doctors recommended surgery, in his book ‘Foundation, Redefine Your Core, Break Through Pain, And Move With Confidence’, he remembers thinking, ‘I’m in school to be a Chiropractor, I can’t get surgery for back pain?!’ Instead, he developed a set of exercises that strengthen and lengthen the muscles and tissues of the lower back and brace and support the spine during regular every day activities like bending over or reaching for something. His exercises are aimed at activating and strengthening the posterior chain of the body, which he reminds us, is not just the muscles of the back, but rather the hips, gluts, hamstrings, calves and feet, as well. His exercises are one part yoga, one part deep breathing, which he develops into a method called decompression breathing, one part pilates and all parts Goodman. By practicing his method, he healed his own back without surgery and has been helping Olympic and other elite athletes reduce rates of injury ever since.

But the real breakthrough came a few weeks later, I was at a friend’s house for a dinner party, and she confessed to me that she also struggled with debilitating, hard to diagnose back pain. Hers lasted more than a year and was still affecting her, after dinner, she handed me a book. ‘Healing Back Pain, The Mind-Body Connection’ by Dr. John E. Sarno, MD.

Sarno, after decades of practice as an orthopedic surgeon and hundreds of diagnoses for herniations and other spinal injuries, began to see the problem was not 100% physical, rather included a strong mental component. Several things lead him to his unique diagnosis, including the frequent return of pain after surgery. Pain that ostensibly should be physically impossible for the nerve in question after the surgical procedure. As well as the fact that chronic back pain, though perhaps localized or originating in one part of the back, often moves around the body with ferocious intensity, one day in the hip, the next in the back, the next radiating down the leg, or even expressing in the upper back and/or neck. He proposes three things to support his theory, the chronic duration (chronic pain is anything lasting > 3 months), the return of the pain when it should be biologically impossible (such as after surgery) and the frequent shifting of the position of pain throughout the body.

After years of collaborative research, Sarno determined that the phenomenon of chronic back pain is one of the Mind-Body connection whereas the mind tricks the body into deoxygenating tissue around an already sensitive area, taking advantage of existing pain, perhaps originally triggered by disc degeneration or injury. It does this in order to distract and deter the psyche from unearthing long repressed emotions of anger, resentment, frustration, pain, suffering, trauma etc. He observed this often in mid-life, when many things are intersecting at a perfect crossroads, disc degeneration meets longterm emotional repression, meets stressful life event and/or injury/overuse. So just at a time in your life, when there might be nothing left but to accept things need to change, and that you are unhappy, or to admit the anger you feel about the way things are in your life, the mind creates a physical response far greater than anything psychological. Often these emotions are repressed for a reason, such as the underlying resentment a mother might feel towards her children, a feeling that is completely at odds with the love and pride she feels toward her children and of course, with her own and society’s expectations of her as a loving mother. No wonder we’re repressing this stuff.

A HUGE LIGHTBULB went on for me.

I was at a wedding of dear friends on the East Coast, the weekend I was finishing Dr. Sarno’s book. It was a hard pill to swallow, lying there in the dark of my hotel room buzzed on cocktails and love and trying desperately to figure out what it was I was truly angry about, who and what I resented, what traumas I was still holding on to. But somehow it all made sense.

This pain was bigger than me. And from the very beginning every doctor, every therapist had said that ‘stress’ was a major factor in the type of pain I was experiencing. Life altering pain, is how I experienced it. Not just physically but psychologically, how it warped your mind, how it took precedence over literally everything else. Dr. Sarno’s diagnosis and treatise on the Mind-Body connection related to what I was going through, made sense, and at least addressed the stress part of the equation.

I began to work his methods, resuming physical activities, getting back to my old habits, eating what I wanted, talking myself down from the pain, recognizing the pain as a ghost and a white flag taking me back to my heart and my emotions… what was really wrong here? What was I really feeling and wanting to acknowledge to myself,… so I could move on.

It was a powerful journey, and one I did all on my own, no therapist, I didn’t even keep a journal. Too much to document. Every morning, as has been my practice for the better part of ten years, I sit in meditation, sometimes listening to calming music, sometimes in silence, practicing mindfulness. Now I used this time as an opportunity to process. To feel, to emote, to admit things to myself. To surrender to what is, so I could take responsibility, forgive and move on.

I also came across a cassette tape a friend of mine had gifted me years prior, ‘Why People Don’t Heal, And How They Can’ a public broadcast interview with Medical Intuitive, Caroline Myss. In it, she talks about forgiveness and how our holding on to anger and hurt, only hurts us, by giving our power away to it. She talks about how the heart never really wants to forgive, so if you wait until you are feeling inspired, you’ll never get there. She says you have to force yourself to forgive, like ripping off a bandaid. And often in this forgiveness we see that we were never really victims in the first place, and we regain our power, both from the past as well from the present filled with negative emotion created to bolster our theory caused by an old trauma about the nature of a cruel world. ‘What will I talk about?’ asks one woman, as she learns she can no longer use her pain as a form of emotional currency.

A great humanity began to dawn in my heart, like ‘we are all one’, ‘one universal energy’, ‘God is in me and I AM God’, ‘be unto others as you would have them be unto you’, all the platitudes.

I understood now, that grimaced look on the face of a hobbled over elderly person, or the loud and pain smeared rants of a mental person on the street, people standing in line for prescriptions, people waiting in hospitals for other people in surgeries. We are all the same, give or take.

There is no immunity. Pain is real and it’s here to help us, to show us something. I thought I would be young forever. But now I am humble. Humble forever, initiated by my own pain, able to see now into the eyes of any condition, knowing I cannot understand. Just as one could not understand me, as I went through my pain.

Nine months later, I am still pain free. I don’t know if or when the next big pain attack will happen. Hopefully never.

But like one of my early psychotherapist’s informed me, … ‘panic attack syndrome’ is not the experience of multiple panic attacks, but the ongoing fear of having another attack. It is the same with chronic pain, the fear of having a recurrence of your condition can control you and limit your actions and enjoyment of life just as much, if not more, than the actual condition or symptoms themselves.

So, live on, I say. Viva!

Life is short, pain is guaranteed, let it in, let it change you, listen to what it is really trying to tell you.

Be humble. Be proactive. Believe in your body’s ability to heal.

You can do it.

In the words of Esther Gokhale, ‘Remember When it Didn’t Hurt’.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt 9) How I Healed My Spine

I also chose to see what’s called a Physiatrist.

This is an Orthopedist, who specializes in physical rehabilitation of the part of the body that’s not working. Again, no surgery.

The clinic, Rebound Chiropractic, is the same one that serves the Portland Trail Blazers, so I knew I was in good hands and I told the schedulers and the nurses my story of having already seen an Orthopedist who was not taking my athletic conditioning and willingness seriously and that I wanted a second opinion.

As fate would have it, somehow I triggered my third pain episode the day before going in to see Dr. Cotrell. By the time I got into his office, I literally had to take the appointment lying flat on my back on the floor with him looking at the X-Rays and talking to me on the floor. He also prodded and tested my flexibility.

The number one thing he said to me as I told him my whole story, ‘Wisteria, I want to be clear, all this activity and athleticism you’ve had your whole life and the acrobatics training and even touring, that probably served you and is serving you now, it’s not the reason you got sick, it’s likely the reason you didn’t get sicker sooner’.

That’s all I needed to hear, and though I walked away from there with an introduction to a surgeon, if I needed to go that route, and a prescription for a cortisone shot, I felt a) reassured about the location and the approach they wanted to take if I chose to follow-through with the cortisone shot and b) I felt like they understood me.

All along, I knew what I wanted to do was heal my spine, actually give the vertebrae and discs the time and space they needed to repair any damage that had been done by too powerful loads over and over again (acrobatics & touring) under misalignment (scoliosis & chronic bad posture) at the cross-roads of the stress of mid-life.

But that would take time and in the meantime, I was in tremendous pain and living in significant misery during and recovering from the multi-month pain episodes. Though surgery had not yet been recommended by anyone, I knew that if this pain kept up that would be the only logical conclusion.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 8) How I Healed My Spine

The pictures in Gokhale’s book say it all, Gokhale, herself an acupuncturist, had experienced severe lower back pain in the form of sciatica during her pregnancy and infancy of her first daughter, the doctors recommended surgery, and advised her not to have any more children. Within 12 months the pain returned and the doctors recommended more surgery.

She knew there must be a better way, she began studying posture around the world, archeologically and in infants. It turns out that back pain is a fairly new phenomenon and many traditional cultures around the world with a healthy kinesthetic tradition as part of their every day culture do not report the high rates of back pain which are up to 80% in the US, more than twice as common as in 1950. In her book she outlines the perceived causes of back pain, standing upright (vs. on all fours), leading sedentary lives (too much sitting, driving), stress, weight, height and age or degeneration, one by one she debunks these causes and instead points to our posture as the single point of entry into alleviating our symptoms, so it’s not that we sit too much, but how we sit, stand & lie that need to be re-evaluated.

In her book, she carefully and simply outlines methods for:

STRETCHSITTING

STRETCHLYING ON YOUR BACK

STACKSITTING

STRETCHLYING ON YOUR SIDE

USING YOUR INNER CORSET

TALLSTANDING

HIP-HINGING and

GLIDEWALKING

And there they are, the 8 steps, in their full glory, no special exercises, machines, treatments or diets, just a re-examination of how we sit, stand, walk and lie.

I started trying to follow Gokhale’s directions in the book, but I knew I was missing some critical pieces.

Inspired by my progress and still desperate for something that would help me feel better, I signed up for a 3 day basics workshop with one of Gokhale’s certified teachers here in Portland, Joanna Cowan.

The workshop was everything I needed, slow, steady and methodical. Joanna teaches you, hands-on how to stretchsit, stretchlie on your back and side, stacksit, hip-hinge, when you need to pick things up off the floor, tall stand and glidewalk.

It was revolutionary and I could tell immediately, that these simple methods that could be done all day, were giving my spine room to breathe.

Also at this time I switched Chiropractors, to a practitioner, Dr. Jason Lindekugel of Concordia Chiropractic, who was familiar with Gokhale’s principles and who I hoped could help me unravel this path for healing and re-aligning my spine.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 7) How I Healed My Spine

Dr. Tara McHenry represented a turning point in my therapy. She got it. She got the pain, she got that I wanted to get better, and that I believed in my body’s ability to heal. She was in full support of me getting all the information I could from all the various types of practitioners, while sharing my value of starting with the least invasive therapies first and withholding from the most invasive unless absolutely necessary. Cardinal rule of medicine: first, do no harm.

On my first visit to her office, I was in so much pain I could barely sit up while doing the intake. I cried both on and off the table that day trying to relay my story.

This type of pain shakes us to the core. I was shattered. I felt broken, I felt a loss of innocence that I knew I would never regain, even if miraculously I could start to somehow feel better. I would never be ignorant of this type of pain again. And I was pretty sad.

She understood. And better yet, she handed me a book.

‘8 Steps to a Pain Free Back, Remember When it Didn’t Hurt’ by Esther Gokhale

She sticky-marked two chapters, ‘Stretch Sitting’ and ‘Stretch Lying’ and sent me home, after an extensive acupuncture session lasting nearly 2hrs, with a borrowed copy of the book to read and experiment with.

That night, flat on my back, under the influence of Ibuprofen and alcohol (ironically one of the things still allowed under my anti-inflammation diet), I started to read and attempt the exercises in Gokhale’s book.

I knew I was on to something.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 6) How I Healed My Spine

I am not big into Western Medicine or invasive interventions, I believe first and foremost in the bodies ability to heal itself and in the power of what is popularly called ‘alternative’ medicine to get at and transform root causes of an imbalance or injury. Whereas, what I notice with allopathic medicine is that it tends to treat and focus on symptoms.

So everything told to me by health professionals, is scrutinized through my own personal R&D department, and tested in measure, only after extensive reading, seeking of alternative points of views and second and third opinions. I’m a Virgo to a tee.

I learned that cortisone shots for back pain were notorious for a) not working b) leaving you worse than before c) permanent tissue damage if done incorrectly and d) loss of efficacy if done in the same spot more than a few times over ones lifetime.

I was reticent to go shooting a powerful steroid into my spinal column as a diagnostic tool. In the words of George W. Bush ‘Not gonna do it, wouldn’t be prudent.’

However, an MRI to confirm soft tissue, disc related issues at the various nerve roots, in my lower back, sounded like a very good idea and one that would not cost my body any permanent negative impact.

Even with Obama Care, it came out to close to $300 to get my MRI.

OUCH! Thank goodness for my parents, who were there for me in every way, financially and otherwise last year.

With MRI in hand, I revisit my Orthopedist. This time he looks through the images, says pretty much word for word the same things: ’I’m surprised you’re not in more pain’, and ‘are you having any trouble walking yet? And again prescribes a cortisone shot, this time in a different location than he had recommended the first time (not bothering to ask why I chose not to follow through with his prescription for a cortisone shot following my first visit), and again for the sheer purpose of gaining more information. Even though, by this time, under the steady chiropractic care of Dr. Mantell, I was beginning to feel better and was nearly at a manageable threshold of pain.

Around this time, my sister recommended an Acupuncturist, Dr. Tara McHenry, a nerve & joint specialist. My sister was living with me at the time, and had the kindness to help me cut through my mental fog of pain and self pity and practically made the appointment for me. I’m not sure I would have gone otherwise. For this I am eternally grateful.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 5) How I Healed My Spine

Each Pain Episode lasted about 2-3 months, meaning from the day the intense debilitating pain came into my body until the first day where I did not experience significant pain, was approximately 90+ days. This is a significant amount of time, especially for someone who considers herself young, strong even, and resilient. Consider this, 3 months is one quarter of the year. I experienced pain episodes 3x in 2014, which means I spent nearly ¾ of last year in debilitating pain.

The thing about this kind of pain is that it’s silent, no one can really see that you’re sick, you can’t show anyone a broken bone, you don’t have any scars or medicine to take or even reliable treatments, you’re just in pain and that makes doing everything miserable.

I began to develop a deep sense of compassion for people who live with chronic conditions, illness and disabilities.

If you think you have low self-esteem, try feeling good about yourself in the face of not being able to wash your own dishes, tie your shoes or even lay comfortably in bed and read.

It was humbling to say the least.

So, here I am back in pain… get it ‘back’ haha! I can laugh about it now, but where was my magic bullet when I needed it?

My first episode was September 2013, by now it was March 2014 and I had miraculously managed to sign up for, and afford Obama Care. (Thank you Mom, who incessantly hounded me until I got the application in by the deadline, seriously, thank you, Mom.). Though I was skeptical of their options, I decided to see an Orthopedist for a second opinion.

My first Orthopedist was recommended to me (by my Physical Therapist), because he was ‘retired from doing surgeries’ which meant he was less likely to push you in that direction or recommend surgery without considering other options.

In his office, I submitted to another full set of X-Rays of my hips and pelvis. This exam being a little more thorough than at the Chiropractor, involved getting undressed and donning a little paper gown and laying spread eagle or in ‘bound ankle pose’ as the yogi’s call it, on the table while the big male nurse left the room to press the X-Ray button.

I started crying on the table, not only was I not a Mom, but I was busy frying my remaining eggs with radioactivity in a frog legged position while a stranger behind a protective screen pressed a button.

The Doctor basically talked to me for a long time, testing my flexibility and the limits of my somewhat significant pain threshold (being only a few weeks into pain episode #2). After looking at the X-Rays he exclaimed, ‘I’m surprised you’re not in more pain than you are’ and ‘do you have pain walking yet?’ According to him, that was likely on it’s way, if not soon, then a few years down the road. He prescribed an MRI and a cortisone shot, explaining the shot was a way to ‘get more information about where the pain was coming from.’ I took the referrals and left.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 4) How I Healed My Spine

My second pain episode, was just after I got back from vacation in Mexico in late February, 2014. I had friends visiting with a tiny toddler, less than a year old. They were good friends and the first morning, Dad brought baby Juno up to me, to cuddle with in bed and left us alone.

I happily obliged and enjoyed playing and crawling around the bed with 1yr old Juno until I decided it was time to go downstairs and make a cup of coffee. I scooped her up in my arms and headed down the stairs. As I carried her, a rushing sensation came into in my sacrum area, as if a bunch of blood was rushing down there and I became really light headed, but I was holding a toddler, so I knew I couldn’t faint or pass out, I steadied myself at the top of the stairs, centered and grounded. Then walked carefully down the stairs still holding the baby and went about my business making coffee.

Now, any normal person would have knocked on their friends’ door and told them what was going on and asked them to take their toddler back. But, being a superhuman kinda of person who rarely likes to admit weakness, and out of politeness, I had a pretty good idea what they were doing in there, and because I really wanted it to be fine, I said nothing.

Instead, I went back upstairs with the baby and a tray of coffee and waited for them to get up.

Later that day I had a client session via Skype. As we were talking and I was giving her a coaching session, and sitting in a chair, I felt the same squeezing and rushing sensation in my back, I knew intuitively I had an attack coming on.

At this point in my treatment with Dr. Mantell, my chiropractor, I had just gone down to the courageous 1x week for getting my back adjusted. And I had been feeling good. But now I was right back at square one. Ground Zero.

A full on PAIN ATTACK… TAKE 2.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (Pt. 3) How I Healed My Spine

Most significantly around my L4-L5 andL3-L4. ‘L’ stands for Lumbar, which starts just above your Sacrum, followed bythe Thoracic and the Cervical Spine, leading to your Head.

According to Dr. Mantell’s analysis (at the Everett House Healing Center), I likely had nerve impingement on the Right between L4-L5 and possible impingement on the Left between L3-L4. He said I had adolescent onset scoliosis in my lower back which was possibly contributing to my condition and it appeared that the lump on the left of my lower spine was being caused by the wing of one of my vertebra that was twisting counter clockwise causing the wing end to be closer to the skin. This explained why the lump was so HARD and also why I could move it around by focusing my attention on it and why it sometimes came and went.

My pain was expressing only on the right in the form of shooting pain in the right hip and down the right leg, and numbness in the right inner foot. Bending over to do anything was excruciating. And in the morning, I could often not walk or be upright for several hours. I was not sleeping through the night and was on constant Ibuprofen to keep the pain down.

Dr. Elliot adjusted me every day that week and put me on a program of 3x week adjustments for the first couple of months until my symptoms decreased, then a plan to go down to 2x week followed by 1x week, over the course of a year. Including a second set of X-Rays at the end of the treatment year. I signed a contract and he put me on a monthly payment plan.

He also prescribed and suggested a) I see a physical therapist, and b) consider getting on an anti-inflammation diet.

I did both of these things, especially after the Physical Therapist suggested the same thing about the anti-inflammation diet. My favorite was The Anti Inflammation Zone, by Barry Sears. I was also helped by a dear friend, Merrill Levine, who I remembered had switched to an anti-inflam diet the year before. Upon my inquiry she sent me a lengthy email full of helpful hints and tips down to specific recipes, cooking methods & brands to try. It’s times like these when good friends really make the difference.

For those of you who don’t know what an anti-inflammation diet entails, it basically consists of completely cutting sugar and all carbohydrates OUT of your diet, so MEAT & VEG ONLY, no sweets, no bread, no pasta, no rice, no crackers, no chips, no potatoes, no fries, well, obviously no fries, cause, no potatoes, but this bears repeating, no fries, no sugar, no cookies, cake, candy, chocolate (though I eventually cheated on this one with small squares of extra dark chocolate), no bananas, no orange juice, no juice basically, no breakfast cereal, no oatmeal, no granola, no soda, definitely no soda.

Amazingly, after a few weeks of adjusting to the new diet, and figuring out what to cook and bring with me to stay fed, and letting go of the initial sugar cravings, my body took to the new diet amazingly. I felt better than I had in a long time.

Suddenly morning joint pains, that I had at first thought were due to full-time training as an acrobat and then to the stress of touring and finally possibly, that these were just part of getting older, I was 40 now, after all… amazingly vanished, no more morning joint pain.

And slowly, under Dr. Mantell’s chiropractic care, I was feeling better…

I started sleeping through the night, sleeping on my stomach and pretty much all of my regular physical activities (outside of acro).

I even went on vacation out of the country.

One of the things ‘they say’ about back pain is that it is often related to stress and anxiety.

At the same time that I started going to Dr. Mantell for adjustments, I also resumed counseling therapy for the first time in many years. I was definitely coming to some mid-life conclusions which were difficult to make peace with.

I was 40 with a thriving career, but no husband or family in sight.

What had I done wrong?

Well, lots of things, but that’s for another article. What we discovered is that I was coping with a bunch of pent up anger and resentment towards myself and my choices, towards my parents and their awkward dysfunctionality and did I mention towards myself for fucking up the relationship thing and not even making it a priority at all, anytime along the way?

I was sad, frustrated, angry and feeling very helpless about the fact that I was 40 and alone and that I might not get to have a family of my own or to be a mother. Sure, I might someday be a wife… but I wanted and want to be a mom. I want to have a family and watch them grow up and evolve and tell them all the secrets I’ve learned along the way.

And somehow I had missed the memo. On top of it, I was sick or injured, or whatever it is you call it when you’re in so much pain for months at a time every day that it is hard to sleep through the night. And upon waking, it takes several hours to feel good enough to do anything. When making tea takes about 40 minutes because you have to lie down on the floor for minutes in between every step, breathing through the pain. The pain during this and the two subsequent ‘pain episodes’, as I came to them, was hallucinatory. The best and only way to describe it. The type of pain that makes you call out in pain, to moan, and to writhe, to cry out, to wail, to weep, to beg, to do anything you can to make it go away, to feel better, to be out of the pain. But nothing you do works.This was my reality.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (pt. 2) How I Healed My Spine

For the six months leading up to my 40th Birthday, both while I was touring for the puppet company, over Summer break and even into the Fall at a desk job, I had begun to notice nerve pain twinges down my right leg, often with tingling and numbness on the outside edge of my big toe. It wasassociated with low back pain on the left and I knew it wasn’t good. Still I did not seek help, instead I tried to heal it with yoga, stretching and ‘good’ posture.

But with party full of people on their way, there was nothing to do but see if I could get a chiropractic adjustment and connect with someone who could help diagnose my problem. I searched for ‘network chiropractic’ because I had heard they were gentler than some and found a place that offered network chiropracty and called themselves a spinal analysis center. And they had the capacity to do X-Rays.

I called the emergency number, but the Doctor was not available. It was a Saturday, but he had a colleague who could adjust me that day and I could make an appointment to see him on Monday. I Agreed.

Later that afternoon, I painfully drove myself downtown to the emergency chiropractor’s office, I was in so much pain, I could not bend down to tie my shoes or put on my socks. I was miserable, making audible exclamations and grimaces, in the waiting room, in the treatment room, getting in and out of the car etc.

Afterwards, I can say I felt significantly better and with Ibuprofen and willpower I was able to suffer through my 40th Birthday Party.

The next morning, I woke up at my house alone. Again in excruciating pain. In fact, I don’t think I had slept thru the night.

I somehow made it til Monday to see Dr. Elliot Mantell at Everett House Healing Center in Portland. He and his staff greeted me as I grimaced through their tests, I was in a lot of pain, and I was scared.

Dr. Elliot had me watch a video on sublixations, which is what it’s called when your spine is not properly aligned and blood flow and nerves are not able to function properly because of the misalignment.

He also took X-rays and discovered a spine riddled with challenges.

[culturalogique]

Back to Back (pt 1 of 10) How I Healed My Spine

On the morning of my 40th birthday party, I got out of bed, went downstairs and by the time I got to the kitchen, I was flat on the floor on my back, from pain. The night before I had felt some tension in my lower back, before going to bed, thinking it would help me feel better, I got in a hot bath. As I lowered myself down into the hot water, I immediately felt a jolt of pain travel up my spine, whatever was going on in my back it did NOT like the heat. So, thinking I was having an unusually strong muscle spasm like the ones I sometimes got in my upper back, I took two Ibuprofen and went to bed.

Lying there, that morning on my back in the middle of the kitchen floor, I realized I had a serious problem, and with a household of people arriving later that day to celebrate my birthday, I wanted desperately to feel better.

For years, I had noticed a strange lump on the left side of my spine just a few inches above my sacrum. I had several practitioners look at it, including a couple of chiropractors, massage therapists, a physical therapist, a naturopath and a rolfer. No one could quite identify what it might be and many warned that it might be a tumor or some other foreign growth in my body and recommended I have it X-Ray'd.

Still having no pain and able to function fully in all my physical activities, including hiking, running, gardening & yardwork, dance and a daily yoga practice, I saw no reason to seek X-Rays and in fact, decided to go back to school for theatre, at a school that specializes in physical theatre and acrobatics.

After a lifetime of being an athlete in discipline after discipline, I was training full-time as an acrobat.

Me, {Wisteria Fleming Loeffler} as my clown Charles, swing dancing with my clown soulmate, Daphne {Chase McNeill}, photo credit Anthony Arnista.

The year following my training as an acrobat, I was hired to play and tour a puppet show for a West Coast company, which is the year that led up to my 'injury'. I put this in brackets because, as you will come to read, it wasn't really an 'injury' at all, but rather a perfect storm of circumstances that manifested in a year of chronic pain in my back, hips and right leg.

That morning, all I knew was, I was in more pain that I had ever experienced and I had a party to host. And, I knew that I had something serious happening in and around my spine.

Stay tuned, for part 2 of Back to Back, How I Healed My Spine

[culturalogique]

FACEBOOK Do or Die

Over the End of Year Holidays I took a break from Facebook, starting Boxing Day, December 26th until today, January 1st, 2015, I only visited Facebook one time per day to check a performance group site for a gig on the 31st.

I made the decision to take a break on a whim, but also to take advantage of quietude in the time between holidays (christmas and new years) when the Western world slows down a bit and the darkness of Winter offers ample and dedicated opportunity for inquiry and creation.

I knew that if I didn't give up Facebook, my plan for a creative retreat, would be just that, a good idea, but nothing more.

Before quitting for a few days, I had come to notice that Facebook is like Television for me. I did not grow up with a Television in the house, so it is even more appealing, maybe, to fall into a mindless hour of random amusement and intrigue, channel hopping and self selecting with fervor.

It had become, a kind of daily, all day, constant. Starting in the morning, when I would check my emails, and also my facebook to see if there was anything new or interesting. I would spend a few minutes perusing and liking things, watch a few videos, laugh, be touched by a few photos, catch up on the happenings with a few distant friends and families and get back to work. Then I would check it over lunch, while I was eating. Then again an hour later, while trying to decide how to best spend the afternoon. Then after dinner, then again, a few minutes later, while trying to decide how to spend the evening, then again at night before bed.

The only real thing I have discipline for is the mornings. I religiously do NOT check facebook or any other social media until after coffee, meditation and breakfast. Ha!

IRONCLAD WILLPOWER.

So, needless to say, I knew that any wintertime creative retreat, I was about to attempt would benefit from a simultaneous Facebook retreat.

So what is it that makes Facebook so emotionally and intellectually satisfying?

In so many ways, there are parallels to draw with Television, the flickering screen, that within 30 seconds, takes the brain into relaxing alpha wave states, the ability to quickly choose and select different input based on mood & preference, and now with the invention of reality television and facebook, a media screen that is curated almost 100% by your friends.

In my case, as of today, that's 1198 people.

OK, for example, I just spent 10 minutes going over to Facebook to fact check exactly how many people I AM friends with right now. (I was one off).

And it took me 10 minutes.

That shouldn't take 10 minutes.

But I am pleased by the random interesting information, the funny, the inspirational, the personal, the touching, the tragic, the globally informative... all generated by people I actually know.

So I get drawn in and held. In a nest of connectedness, or the sensation of connection, of giving (a like or a sweet or witty, amusing comment, my witness), or receiving (new information, inspiration, an invitation, a validating response).

We are hooked.

So, I have entered a state of scientific inquiry. To ascertain the nature of the fascination, the feeling of hyper overdrive when on social media. And what to do about it.

It's like today, today was my first day back. I have been on and off of it all day, each time filled with seeing images of my friends enjoying the first hours of this precious new year, moments filled with intention, peace and joy, it's hard not to feel turned on by that.

And yet, it is all coming out of a screen, or out of me, but elicited by a screen.

I began to think about it, there are many studies coming out right now about the nature of Facebook in relationship to happiness, loneliness, social connectedness, alienation, jealousy, envy and depression.

But, the opposite argument is equally prominent, some researchers have found that it makes us happier. They also found that it increases social trust and engagement—and even encourages political participation. As Matthew Lieberman argues in his book “Social: Why Our Brains are Wired to Connect,” social networks are a way to share, and the experience of successful sharing comes with a psychological and physiological rush that is often self-reinforcing. The prevalence of social media has, as a result, fundamentally changed the way we engage with the world around us. As we're experiencing, we are thinking about how we’ll share the experience, and whom we’ll share it with. The mere thought of successful sharing activates our reward-processing centers, even before we’ve actually shared a single thing.

Whoa. Deep.

Looking at it from another angle. There is the issue of group size in humans. A seminal 1993 study by Dunbar, studying hunter gatherer tribes across the globe and comparing neocortex size in primates, discovered that the basic human group sizes are on average:

small living groups/overnight camps/bands: 30-50 individuals

village/culturally defined clan/lineage: 100-200

large population unit/tribe/subtribe: 500-2500

So perhaps in some strange, randomly selected, digital way, my 1198 'friends' on facebook represent the digitally active members of my tribe, which wasn't that the name of one of our lost social connection medias?

So, I guess we've come full circle. No wonder it feels so good to be on facebook. I'm with my tribe.

To be continued... look for inquiries into a) our social trust with facebook as a corporation and whether and how we can trust them with control and access to our tribal communication network and b) how the use of social media is influencing our actual community structure in real life.

[culturalogique]

B.K.S. Iyengar, in Memory

B.K.S Iyengar

Standing tall through your actions

Understanding Body, Breath totally

Never yielding to failures

Destroying all blemishes

Always alert and attentive

Releasing everyone's energy

Applying Asanas with variations

Rejuvenating tired bodies

Action and dedication as the only goal

Joy and Health as the focus

Attending to students' needs

Inspiring everyone by your presence

Yoga expounded by example

Exacting in discipline

Never compromising your teaching

Giving your best to the world

A celebration of your teaching years

Raja Guruave, Namo Namahai

~ T.K.V Desikachar (son of Sri Tirumalai Krisnamacharya (B.K.S Iyengar's Guru), written November 2006, excerpted from "Iyengar The Yoga Master", edited by Kofi Busia, 2007

In the year, 1998, I had a boyfriend who accused me of being 'not spiritual enough' and left me. I immediately decided to attend yoga classes, because I liked him very much, and I thought there must be something to what he had said. My first class was a few blocks from my house at a small and unassuming studio with a woman named Donnis. For about a year and a half I diligently attended her class every week. One day Donnis came to me and recommended I try taking a class from her teacher, Kofi Busia. The next week, I signed up to take one of Kofi's weekly classes at Yoga Center Santa Cruz. During one of my first classes with him, he came up to me, while quietly adjusting my posture and asked 'how old is this body?'. 'Twenty-five', I answered. 'Ah,' he said, 'We have time.' And time we did have. I studied with him methodically once a week at first, then 2x per week, then adding the quarterly week long intensives. Suddenly, I found myself to be a Yogini. When I left there several years later, I thought to myself, 'Ah, well, I will just have to find another teacher in the town where I am moving to continue my studies.' Coincidentally, the small Colorado mountain town of Crested Butte, did have a yoga studio. For several weeks, I explored taking classes with various teachers of various styles of yoga, to get a feel for what I liked and didn't like. I very quickly came to find that no teacher would ever compare to my teacher, who would later become my Guru, Kofi Busia.

Yesterday, August 20, 2014, my Guru's Guru, B.K.S. Iyengar, died. He was 95 years old. After surviving tuberculosis, typhoid, malaria and suffering malnutrition as a child, Iyengar credited yoga with saving his life. He is known as 'the father of modern yoga' and is credited as having brought Yoga to the West, primarily through his book, "Light on Yoga", the first illustrated instructional guide to the practice of Yoga published in 1966.

It included Black & White photos of each of the Asanas as well as instruction on their use and method of achieving them. This allowed students to practice a posture without the aid of a teacher.

My teacher, Kofi Busia was in England in the 1960's when Iyengar began to travel regularly to England to teach classes. Kofi Busia was one of Iyengar's first students and was issued an Iyengar teaching certificate, from B.K.S. Iyengar himself.

Many years later, during the time that I studied with Kofi, he was busy editing together a collection of essays, stories and interviews celebrating the life and great influence of the renowned yoga teacher, B.K.S. Iyengar, his Guru. I remember him distinctly saying that he wanted to do it while he was still alive, as a token of gratitude and appreciation for all B.K.S. Iyengar had done for him and so many, and in the hope that others may come to know him, as he had.

Though I never took the courage to study directly with B.K.S. Iyengar myself, I am humbled to call myself a student of his lineage and cannot express enough gratitude for the thread of consciousness he has laid out before me through the intentions and actions of his practice and teaching of Yoga and through my living Guru-ji, Kofi Busia.

In honor of you both, I sincerely applaud and thank you. May I ever walk in your footsteps of integrity and knowledge.

[culturalogique]

THE GREAT GODDESS

Goddess of Gagarino. Old Stone Age, c. 30,000-20,000 B.C.E. Stone. Musee de l'Homme, Paris.

Generator of All Creation

The oldest of all goddesses is known to historians of religion and mythology as the Great Goddess. She is the one supreme being, who was later subdivided into many lesser goddesses. She is all that existed at the beginning of time.

Art is widely believed to have been made first in Africa and then in Europe, when that region was first settled, perhaps fourty thousand or fifty thousand years ago. When and where did the Great Goddess first appear in art? We will never know exactly, but it was sometime during the Old Stone Age. The earliest temples of the Great Goddess were caves; to be inside the great earth was to be within the Great Goddess.

In the oldest times the Great Goddess had no name. One of the first names we know is Gaia, from the earliest creations myths of Greece. At least as old is Durga, in India, and Nu-Wa, in China. In the best-known Paleolithic images, such as the Goddess of Willendorf, the Great Goddess is represented as a fertile, motherly female. People, animals, plants, sun, moon and stars are all offspring of the Great Goddess. (excerpt from Goddesses, Lanier Graham, 1997)

Goddess of Laussel. Old Stone Age, c. 30,000-20,000 B.C.E Stone. Musee d'Aquitaine, Bordeuax, France. She holds a horn with thirteen marks, perhaps symbolizing phases of the moon.

Goddess of Lespugue. Old Stone Age, c. 30,000-20,000 B.C.E. Mamoth ivory, height: 5.5' (14cm). Musee de l'Homme, Paris.

Goddess of Savignano. Old Stone Age, c. 30,000-20,000 B.C.E. Serpentine, height: 8 5/8' (21.8cm). Museo Preistorico ed Etnografico Luigi Pigorini, Rome.

Goddess of Willendorf. Old Stone Age, c. 30,000-20,000 B.C.E. Red ocher on limestone, height: 4 3/8' (11cm). Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna.

Happy Spring Equinox 2014!

[culturalogique]

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony

Mahatma Gandhi