The fascia is the one “organ” that affects every single part of our body. It’s our architecture. It’s what’s below our skin, supplying the framework for our muscles, tendons and ligaments, connecting and protecting the arrangement of our internal organs, supporting our skeleton, essentially providing the fiber and glue for our entire being.
When the fascia is tight in and around a scar after a hip surgery for example, your opposite shoulder also may be “off”, and so we’re finding that fascial release is one of the quickest and most holistic ways to restore balance to the body.
I specialize in working with the body as a whole. I have an extraordinary skillset around the knowledge of the body as a whole, including working with the fascia, which we now understand creates the strongest structural architecture of our whole body head to toe.
For example, if you had a cesarian section, and there’s scar tissue on your abdomen, it may pull your hip out of alignment over time and result in chronic back pain. My patients often come in for one primary pain complaint, but then we uncover past injuries or sources of chronic strain that they have accepted will never resolve. I look for the connection between old and new, as they are most often related due to our overall functional movements on a daily basis.
I am a “holistic” practitioner meaning I work with you head to toe despite the fact that you’re coming to see me for a shoulder strain. The reason being is that I specialize in seeing the body as a connected unit, which explains my love and expertise in fascia, which is the largest organ in our body and which connects everything that we have.
As a physical therapist and professor, I’ve studied many modalities, from nutrition to yoga to structural integration, but perhaps the single thing that makes me different from other more traditional therapists is my focus on the myofascial system. Our bodies at the cellular level “remember” and store the trauma of our lives in our fascia, which can lead to a structural rigidity. When we can release the tension in our fascia and align ourselves with gravity we take a new stance, and not just in our bodies, but with our overall feeling of wellness.