Creating Health Series

Pilates for MS

How can a soup spoon, rolling pin, and tennis ball lead you to immense muscle pain relief? Find out in this month’s episode of our Creating Health Series with Leah Johnson as she shows us pilates for MS and how we can incorporate these simple household items into our home workout routines.

Pilates is a safe therapy for people with MS and can be beneficial on any number of symptoms. Many of the exercises, stretches and massage techniques can be done directly at home with just a few aids – some of them might already be in your kitchen!

Tips on Using Pilates for MS

If you are looking for tips to relieve aches, pains, and tightness, then check out some of Leah’s quick pain-relieving tips for MS here:

Using only a lacrosse or tennis ball get relief in your Pec Muscles, Upper Trapezius Muscles, and your Forearms. 

Need relief in your leg muscles? Try baking some Thighs Pies. 

Leah taught us how to transform two tennis balls and some duct tape into a DIY peanut massager which is fantastic at alleviating lower back pain. Need a reminder on how to make your own? Click here.

The only physical therapy aid that most likely won’t be in your kitchen is the Thera Cane Massager. After using this cane shaped massager for about 30 seconds, you’ll be able to feel it start work on easing aches and pains. This is a simple tool used in Pilates that can help with many of the discomforts of multiple sclerosis.

Leah showed us just a few examples of what is possible.  As with most therapies, individual work on the particular issues and discomforts you are working through is most beneficial.  We hope you enjoyed the episode and got some ideas on ways to work on releasing discomfort.

For more information about Leah and all the incredible work she is doing, visit her at https://www.goodformpilates.com.

This presentation is part of the Creating Health series.  If you would like to receive these presentations in your inbox, subscribe to our newsletter.  To watch them live, follow our Facebook page.

Supercharging Your Copaxone

People diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) are usually taking some form of medication, supplements, diets… something they hope will remedy their MS. This article on MS challenges you to think about what you are taking, and most importantly, with what attitude are you taking it.

What if there is a way to have more control over how your body responds to the treatments you choose?

In this video we do just that: Supercharge whatever you are taking for your health – be it Copaxone, CBD, vegan diets, etc. – to improve its effectiveness.

Are you hoping it will help or are you expecting it to work?

Most people take their medication and supplements in the hopes it will help.  They don’t realize that that attitude mingled with doubt can keep their bodies from responding optimally.  Additionally, not being very convinced also leads to less compliance and continuity with your treatment regime. So how to change that?

The New Science of Psychoneuroimmunology

Change your mindset.  The science of psychoneuroimmunology (PNL) studies the interrelationship between the states of the mind, the immune system, and the nervous system.  This science has shown how the mind – what we think, believe, expect, etc. – can influence the body.

In one early study of PNL,  Ader gave mice an immune suppressant mixed into sugar water.  When the mice had taken the suppressant for a short period, he stopped providing them with it but continued to provide them with the sugar water.  Their bodies continued to react to the sugar water as if it had the suppressant and many of the mice died.

In a recent case study, a pediatrist had a young girl who was deathly ill.  He had to give her a very powerful immune booster to help her body heal.  The drug, however, had very detrimental side effects that he knew could cause organ failure to his patient as she was already so weak.  So he gave her the drug mixed in with a very peculiar tasting water for only a short time and then continued to have her drink the peculiar tasting water alone.  The body responded to the water as if it was still receiving the immune booster without overloading her body with side effects.

Placebos

The expectation the mice and the girl had to the water has been coined conditioned response.  It might just be that conditioning that has made placebos more and more powerful.  We are so conditioned to take medication when we are sick, that that expectation is half of the reason they work.

The strength of this conditioning and expectation also influence the success of surgery, even when the surgery is a placebo. 

Belief That it Will Work and You are Halfway There

PNL has shown that the mind’s influence can be just as powerful if the patient is aware it’s fake.  Ellen Langer proved that in her Counterclockwise Study.  In this study, 70-year-olds pretended they were 50.  They stayed at a retreat center for one week. They talked, shared old memories as they had just happened, watched old shows, and read magazines that existed at the time they were 50. The mere acting as if they were 50 created physical changes in their bodies after only a week.  Their hearing, memory, and grip strength improved.  They even looked noticeably younger.

In another study, also by Ellen Langer, hotel chambermaids where shown that the work they did all day was equivalent to going to the gym 8-hours a day.   After 30-days of thinking about their work as exercise, the chambermaids had lost weight, had improved waist to hip ratio and body mass index, and a decrease in blood pressure.

How You Think About What You Take Can Effect Its Effectiveness

In essence, this article on multiple sclerosis wants you to understand that how you think about what you do for your body and your health can influence the outcome. So how do you supercharge your Copaxone?

1. Make a list of your remedies

Take a moment to write down what you are taking for your multiple sclerosis.  Make sure to include everything from medication, supplements, naps, physical therapy, diets, and prayer.

2. Review Your Mindset

Are you taking these items to heal or taking it to avoid getting worse? Are you hoping they will work or are you expecting them to?

3. Create an Intentional Healing Mindset

Decide what you are going to take that will help you get healthy.  Hold that intention every time you take it.  Make sure that your attitude, while you are taking it, is positive and moving towards health.

One way to do this that Eva M Clark explains in the video is to understand how your mind knows something will work and then applying that same attitude to what you are taking for your MS.  For example, if you know that Tylenol works for your headaches or fennel tea for indigestion, use those as examples of remedies you take that you know work. Think about those remedies one at a time and notice how you think about them.  Do you envision how good you will feel afterward?  Is it like a movie of you getting better and better? Or a snapshot of you jumping out of bed? Or, when you think about how you know that they will work, are you remembering all those previous times they worked like pictures in an album or like videos in a rear view mirror?

Now apply that same way you think about remedies that you know will work to the items you are taking to help your body heal from multiple sclerosis.

The act of changing your mindset and how you think about what you are taking will improve their effectiveness and create greater health.

More Articles on MS

This video and article on MS is part of our series, Creating Health. If you would like to receive these videos in your inbox each month as we create them, please sign up for our Newsletter.

If you are following the series, please share your experience with others. Doing this in community makes the journey so much better!

This series for multiple sclerosis health is being recorded at the National MS Society Self-Help MS Group in Santa Cruz, CA. The National MS Society respects the rights of people with MS to obtain any and all information they want related to MS, including information on wellness, medical treatments or complementary therapies, and products or services. The information presented at these meeting does not necessarily reflect the views or official position of the Society, nor carry the endorsement or support of the NMSS.

When my clients diagnosed with MS come to my office, they always come with one pressing question “Why Did I Get Multiple Sclerosis?”  So I wanted to write this article on multiple sclerosis to lay out what my clients discover.

Before I begin, I wanted to explain briefly what I do.  I am a medical hypnotherapist. It is not a known field, even within hypnosis professionals.  In medical hypnotherapy, we not only help relieve symptoms, stress and change bad habits, we also communicate with the subconscious, kind of like in a waking dream, to discover what has caused the body to react and create disease.  So this article on multiple sclerosis is going to review what my clients with MS have discovered in these  “Why Did I Get MS?” sessions.

To lay out the groundwork of this article on MS and understand where MS came from, we need to take into account that “why did I get MS?” won’t be just prior to the first exacerbation or experience of symptoms. As Gabor Mate, M.D. says in “When the Body Says No”:

“Multiple sclerosis is not an abrupt new development in adult life, but a culmination of life long processes.”

That incident, or group of incidents, such as a divorce, your partner’s addiction getting out of control, getting fired or stressed you’d be laid off, a loss of a family member or other extreme stress was only the last straw.  The roots of it began, most probably, in childhood and the decisions made about life, ourselves, and how we need to be in the world.

What My Client’s Learned from Their MS

To explain in this article on multiple sclerosis what they learned, I will take a few clients cases, change A FEW genders and other details so that their privacy remains intact, and share their bodies messages:

Client 1

At first, this particular client’s MS began the “Why Did I Get MS?” session expressing the problem: it was an object moving around, alert, trying to see anything that is happening.  It constantly needed to be on watch. It hoped that then it would be able to find peace, calm and quiet and know that it is safe.

This coping strategy, of constant alertness, came in in childhood after the loss of a loved one.  My client had felt alone and lost and needed to regain a sense of safety and protection and not be alone.

Her subconscious explained to her that the symptoms of MS showed up 25 years later as a way to not allow my client to always give 150%. If multiple sclerosis had not come in, my client would never have stopped but kept running and running.

“Know that you are ok just the way you are rather than trying to be better all the time.” 

The MS also wanted my client to not always try to please everyone.  Multiple sclerosis wants her to be all of herself.  All sides, not just the nice, friendly, and intelligent but also the sad, weak, afraid, playful and insecure. She needed to learn to accept them for these aspects are creative and balancing, beautiful and melancholic. Playful even.  They are part of what makes music and art. They give inspiration, deepness, and calm. She does not need to be strong all the time.  These parts hadn’t been welcome.

You don’t always have to be strong and tough.

It asks her to focus on herself.  Ask herself what she is feeling in regards to what she is doing, how she is emotionally and her body.  Is she doing ok?  It is feedback and will give her a greater sense of self.  It will allow her to confirm if she is doing well, if she should continue or if she should do something else rather than not stopping.  Her subconscious does not want her to ignore the body or be deaf to its needs. If she experiences a symptom, do something. The body is communicating it is not comfortable.  Take action.

MS told her that she can be in control by making her own decisions based on her values.  Try to figure out what really matters rather than listen to other people’s opinions, values, and expectations.

It didn’t want her to always meet expectations, her own and those of others.  She didn’t have to be perfect.

Client 2

MS kept this second client from being responsible for her life and to not be criticized.  It was an outlet to not have to meet other’s high expectations.

My client had a deep desire to not be dependent on others.  The subconscious explained that is not the solution. The solution is healthy interdependence and balance.  Then he can discover he can trust other people.

Love yourself. And love everybody else. Let go of being angry.  Put your needs first.

His multiple sclerosis explained that it is not selfish to put his needs first and that he will not be abandoned or alone if he does.  It will give him the freedom to be able to do what he wants to do when he wants to do it with balance (which is what he had been striving for by being so independent).

MS let him know that life doesn’t have to be hard.  Don’t try to figure it all out.  Focus on being happy and content.

Client 3

This client’s MS took us to a time when my client was 25.  She was sad yet wanted to just be light. She didn’t feel safe in her thoughts.  She had gone through a tragic loss of a parent.

MS told her that she didn’t have to be strong all the time.  At 25 she had she run from herself to be strong. It was ok to be so sad. Allow any and all emotions. ”You be you”.

The purpose of the MS symptoms was for her to stop running.  To make her soft and slow her down. MS wants her to be less mean to herself and more forgiving of herself and more focused on her dreams and wants and remember what is important.

“Do what you love to do. Just do it.” It asked her to stop putting so many deadlines on herself.   “Time keeps going.  We always have it. It will keep coming, it doesn’t stop. There’s never going to be the right time.”

Client 4

In this case, this client “Why Did I Get MS?” session presented her client, in the dream-like state of hypnosis, with a box full of photos. It says it represents everything that is her. What she knows and doesn’t know. The pretty and not so pretty. She had wanted to get rid of the ugly and fight to ignore it but it’s needed.  It’s all a part of her.

MS is there to help her see herself and accept everything. Then she will find peace.  It explained that she doesn’t want to even think about the ugly. Over emphasizing expectations so that everything looks good.   By doing that she separates from what is really going on around her. Negatives are actually positive.

MS is there for her to understand she is not all powerful.  That she needs more than just herself and that it is ok. Slows her down. She is not to be it all.

Her body wants her to know she is a good person.  She needs to accept herself and treat herself better. It doesn’t want her to not even be on her to do list or the last thing she considers.

Client 5

MS first appeared as a person that was constantly controlling and monitoring the fear of failure.  Always all the time. It explained that it was my client’s strategy to find safety and peace.

Stop fearing failure and being concerned with what others think.

The purpose of MS was for my client to have to change.  To correct the path from avoiding failure and always bettering oneself to one of finding joy, loving self, and others, of enjoying the present, and of calm.

The Body Reflects Our Minds

These are what is called, in medicine and science, psychosocial factors behind chronic disease.  These factors, beliefs, and behaviors put additional stress on ourselves and that gets reflected in our bodies. As you read the cases above, you can see there are common beliefs and behaviors.  With other chronic diseases, other beliefs and behaviors appear.

I wanted to write this article on multiple sclerosis – “why did I get MS?” to share these messages in hopes you might find some insights into what your body is reacting to. Do these messages resonate with you? Do you share some of these behaviors and beliefs?

Article on Multiple Sclerosis – A Brief Summary

This is only a brief summary of just a few of my clients and what they discover.  The changes they made weren’t immediate. It took hard work and much deprogramming of old beliefs and fears. They spent a year transforming and developing a healthier mindset and connection to their bodies. And through it, they experienced profound changes in their symptoms, increased energy and balance, eliminated incontinence, lowered pain and gained greater trust in their ability to manage not only their bodies and its needs but also their lives.

If you want to explore if medical hypnotherapy can help you understand why you have MS, contact me.