Where Does Healing Unfold?

“Cure is the prerogative of the organism.” These are the words of G. D. Hulett, Osteopath and nephew of Andrew Taylor Still, the founder of Osteopathy. Hulett lived, practiced, and taught in Kirksville, Missouri and wrote these words in 1904.

When I first read this quote in the late 1990s, I was both inspired and relieved. I didn’t have to be a miracle worker. I was never comfortable with the idea that any one person could be so powerful as to cause the cure or healing of another person. I was never drawn to the idea that someone else had the ability to change the course of my body's functioning, and I didn't want that power or responsibility over others. Upon reading this quote, I felt confident and reassured that my responsibility as an Osteopath and physician was to diagnose and treat my patients, and to educate them in order to create the conditions that their bodies needed to further their own healing process.

I don't mean to minimize what it takes to offer a good Osteopathic treatment. It takes years of dedication, training, study, and practice to hone one's perceptual and manual skills, and to learn to hold the space for others. It is an ongoing, lifelong endeavor to be a good Osteopath. But no matter how gifted the Osteopath is, the response to that treatment unfolds in the patient's body. Jim Jealous, DO used to say that the fulcrum of a treatment is in the patient, not in the Osteopath. To reword Hulett's quote, "healing only occurs when the patient responds to the treatment." 

I encounter so many people these days who just want to go to a practitioner and have them “fix” or heal them. Many people want to lie down on the table and have someone make their bodily troubles disappear. It just doesn’t work that way. The best that someone else can do for us is to help create the conditions for our own body to do what it needs to do to remodel, adapt, or learn to compensate for what has changed due to age, illness, or injury. 

I have devoted my life to the exploration of healing. I’ve had plenty of my own healing experiences to test my philosophy and approach personally, and then I practiced for 25 years as an Osteopath and had the opportunity to see how it all unfolded for other people.

My conclusion is absolutely clear; no one heals another. We can help each other find the conditions, causes, and situations that prevent our health from fully expressing itself, but then it’s our own body, our organismic being, that has to respond to the input. 

I have been studying Osteopathy since 1981, and I am always searching for ways to deepen my understanding and educate people about how to duplicate and support the treatment experience. So many of the problems I encountered in my Osteopathic practice could have been easily remedied by my patients themselves if they could have re-learned to interweave their bodies’ natural tendency to breathe, move, and rest into their busy lives. Development of our kinesthetic sense—the sensation and awareness we have of our own movement—is the key to this process. In my experience, Continuum is the only approach I’ve found that elicits something powerfully healing and reverent that parallels Osteopathic treatment, and it empowers each participant to access the ability to heal themselves.

If you want to explore with me in person, please consider coming to my workshop, Embodiment Through The Senses, October 30 - Nov 4 at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in western Massachusetts. Here is a link: https://kripalu.org/presenters-programs/embodiment-through-senses-transformative-self-care-retreat

If you would like to explore this and other Osteopathic concepts, please listen to the new podcast I'm doing with Steve. Here is a link to our homepage where you'll find all the details: https://osteopathyunplugged.com/

Introducing Osteopathy Unplugged...and a quick Health Update

After 25 years of being together, Steve and I decided to have a podcast. We've named it "Osteopathy Unplugged" because the type of Osteopathy we practice doesn't require electricity.

Over the years, we've explored all sorts of philosophical issues over what we call our "morning hot brown liquids" (coffee, tea, hot chocolate, etc.) and we realized that rather than write it all down in a book, that we would be modern and pass on our ponderings via the 21st century oral tradition of podcasting. The younger Osteopaths we work with are excited about listening to a podcast, rather than reading a book. It seems as if everyone loves listening to podcasts these days.

We hope you listen and we welcome your feedback. We are in the early stages of expressing the art, the craft, and the tech of podcasting, and we hope to learn from our listeners.

Here is a link to our homepage where you'll find all the details: https://osteopathyunplugged.com/

The foundational episodes (about 8 episodes) will be free of charge, and will be available on our website, Patreon, Apple, Google, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Four episodes are already available.
After the foundational episodes, the complete collection will only be offered at Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/OsteopathyUnplugged
If you’d like to support us, you can sign up on Patreon.

We want to share our Osteopathic world view with anyone who is interested in Osteopathy. This includes: Osteopaths, Osteopathic Physicians, students, other healthcare practitioners, Continuum practitioners, patients, and anyone curious enough to listen and willing to dive deeply into the complexities of healing. Help spread the word.

be well, listen deeply, and stay curious.


HEALTH UPDATE - "SCANNING FOR FUN & PROFIT"

I can joke about the PET scan that I had last week, because it looks pretty good. It wasn't exactly fun, but I did hang my sign that reads, "The Tunnel of Love" on the outside of the scanner before they fed me into the tube. We all had a good laugh. And they did profit, as they billed Medicare nearly $10,000 for the procedure.

Great news! 95% of it is improved from the last one. The questionable area is probably due to reaction from the radiation therapy I had in January, and it is not a big deal. I do still have a small breast tumor and it didn't grow larger, but it is a bit more metabolically active. No one knows exactly what this means. I have grown and gotten rid of 9, yes NINE previous breast tumors, so I don't worry about this one.

All of this information supports decreasing the dose of my treatment with palbociclib (Ibrance). I begin my next treatment cycle in a week and I’m hoping it will be easier, as well as just as effective at the lower dose.

Learn About Life By Acquainting Yourself With Death

You can learn a lot about life by acquainting yourself with death.

Pause now, and notice if you are triggered by my opening sentence. If you aren’t, that’s very encouraging. If you are upset by this sentiment, let’s explore what that’s about. Did you assume this means I have bad news about my health? Relax. I don’t. Are you squirming in your seat with the uncertainty towards which this opening points? Here is something I am certain about; I am going to die someday, and so are you. Now that we’ve established that, can we please accept this fact of life and learn to appreciate the preciousness of what we have now while we are here together?

Many people who teach about death as a way to more deeply appreciate living, say some version of this opening remark. Lately I have been reading, listening, watching, or being in a Zoom box with several of these kindred spirits: Frank Ostaseski, Francis Weller, Marilyn Schlitz, Stephen Jenkinson, Kim Rosen, and others who share their insights into living and dying.

Some of my friends and loved ones have asked me if I’m being morbid or prematurely preparing for dying. Their asking me this question shows me how important this exploration is in our death-phobic culture. Dying is not something that happens in a faraway time we call “later.” It is a process and it begins the moment we are born. Dying doesn’t spread like an infection; it’s not contagious; it’s part of living. Talking about death won’t make you more susceptible to it. Life and death are a two-for-one package deal. Why not befriend mortality?

Accepting that someday I will die allows me to more fully appreciate being alive. Acceptance is not the same as liking, agreeing with something, giving up, surrendering, or letting go. Acceptance is one of my greatest motivators to show up and be as fully present and engaged as I can be. When I forget that my life won’t last forever, I get lazy, I procrastinate, and I take things for granted.

I acknowledge the limits of my body, as well as the possibilities and potential that present themselves even in the midst of living with cancer. It’s one of life’s paradoxical qualities, where two things seem opposite, but both can be true. If I stop trying to fight with what is, I can relax and listen more intently. I can more clearly hear the messages from my body that guide me to make choices about how I care for myself. Acceptance allows me to creatively compensate and adapt. Accepting the limits of my life sparks my longing to fully embrace being here and making the most of it all now.

I had a PET scan on March 1st that showed how well my body is responding to my new treatment. Most areas of cancer activity have decreased in metabolic activity. A few spots are unchanged. There’s nothing new or worse. That’s the best scan I have had in years! Living with metastatic cancer is like a rollercoaster ride. I’ve had 12 years of ups and downs, but it’s always there, whispering in my ear, “Wake up, live now!”