What Can I expect from my initial Spinal Flow Consultation?

This appointment is roughly 70 – 75 minutes long. Every follow-up thereafter is between 35-40 minutes.

 In all Spinal Flow treatments your clothes remain on. Soft clothing is recommended, but especially pants/skirt/shorts that are not thick or have heavy mid-back seems. This is essential to access the correct dural attachment points around the sacrum (base of the spine area).

Firstly I briefly go through your history from the form you would have filled out before coming in. I explain what Spinal flow is and how it works. Here you are welcome to ask any questions.

 I start by doing a postural assessment which we use to refer back to after about 12 sessions to track postural changes. This takes about 10 minutes.

 I then do a blockages assessment. This is done with you lying face down on the bed. This is also about 10 minutes after which you will sit up and I will explain what I have found and how it may relate to your symptoms. I explain what a blockage is, and how I am going to help these blockages to soften and go away. I then also explain what I am about to do and what you can expect. If you still have any questions, you may ask me then.

I then take you through a 30-35 minute treatment session and we briefly discuss your session afterwards.

 What could I expect to feel like after my session?

Most people feel something in their first consultation, and it only grows from there!

Common comments after treatment are the following:

  • Feeling lighter

  • Feeling at peace

  • Feeling deeply relaxed

  • Being able to breathe easier/ take deeper breaths

  • Sleeping better

  • Having more energy

  • Feeling happier

  • Racing thoughts start to lessen, and their mind gets quieter

  • Less Hypervigilance

  • Less Nervous tension

 

Often after a few sessions people often report the following:

  • Noticing an increased resilience to stress

  • Feeling like you can cope better

  • Not getting as easily triggered

  • Having a different outlook on life, your problems and your relationships

  • Body aches and pains start to improve

  • Anxiety eases

  • Depressive symptoms improve

  • Physical symptoms lessening/ improved posture/ less pain

 Please also note, sometimes certain symptoms can get worse before getting better. THIS IS A GOOD THING as it shows that things are shifting. A good example may be like seeing a psychologist. You may feel great after your first session, you may not feel too much at all and still be apprehensive of the benefits to come, or you may feel worse as you unpack things. My hope is that this example may be helpful.

 These points are just a few, and every person is different. The body decides what it is ready to let go of first, and when. Hence some people notice improvements in areas of their lives or in their bodies which were not their main reason for initially seeking treatment, and then those main symptoms sometimes only clear later.

 But all the time layers of stored tension in the body are being released and blockages in the spine are softening bringing you back to how you are ment to function and feel.

 If you are very blocked or disconnected from yourself, you MAY feel little if no change in your first treatment session. PLEASE DO NOT GIVE UP if this is you. You may still experience huge benefits from Spinal flow Technique.

Be assured, shifts will still be happening in your nervous system. If you aren’t feeling anything initially, this is one of the main aims of Spinal Flow; to bring your mind and body back into connection with each other and for your nervous system to feel safe again to feel and to let go. For some people this may take a bit longer than for others.

What will I need to do in treatment? What is expected from me?

The wonderful thing is, you don’t have to do anything but turn up. I facilitate your spinal energy and flow to increase through specific access points which are rich in nervous tissue supply. By doing this I communicate with the brain through the nervous system, and it sends messages of ease, safety and comfort to your brain and body.

 Your body is AWESOMELY designed and it wants to get you back to harmony and equilibrium, it just sometimes needs some help. The body is designed for homeostasis. With a bit of nudging from Spinal Flow Technique, it knows what to do and it does the healing and restoring for you.

 Can I just come for one session and still get results?

Spinal flow is not usually a once off treatment. Although many people have benefitted hugely from their first treatment session.

Spinal Flow Technique works on recalibrating the nervous system back to a state of ease, to a place where your body and your mind feel safe again. This can take some time.

Also, you can stop anytime on your wellness journey depending on what symptoms for you have gone or improved enough that you are satisfied, and on realistic things like time and finances. You can always pick up treatment session again whenever you feel like you are needing support, whether physically like from an accident or surgery, or from an emotional trauma or increased stressful life events.

 What is a blockage?

Blockages are areas in joints in the spine that feel tight or restricted. These areas block your bodies neurological transmissions in your spinal cord and spinal nerve roots, which in turn decrease and dampen the vital energy in your body supplying your oragns and thus affecting your biochemistry and body functioning on a cellular level.

Am, I going to move a lot and not be in control of my body like I’ve seen in some Spinal Flow videos?

 Firstly, you are always in control of your body!

If you do move, it will be because your body feels like it is wanting to. You can force it to stop but then you are forcing your bodies natural expression of flow to be dampened. Think of a stretch and yawn. You can stop it, but you don’t want to because it feels so good!

 Only some people move. Your body can experience the flow differently at different times as well. People can go from perception flow, to breathing flow to moving flow and then back to perception flow sometimes, and EVERY session has a massive shift in the deeper layers of the nervous system. As long as I can see your flow in increasing, that your blockages are softening and that your layers of tension are lessening, this is all that matters.

 It is really important to know that no matter how your body expresses and experiences the flow, whether it if moves, or if you feel the flow as a breathe up and down your spine, or if your flow is subtle (known as perception flow) if feels more like a dreamlike state, that none is more effective than the other!

What if I feel I feel I am sabotaging my treatment / I can’t stop my mind from racing/ I feel like I need to do something to make the flow happen? Will this make the treatment ineffective? Can I mess the treatment up?

You would not be alone in having these thoughts or feelings. We are in a society where there are always lists of things we need to do, and if we don’t do them, we can’t expect to get outcomes. Although this can be very necessary in many areas of life, on the table when you have spinal flow, you don’t have to do, or not do anything.

You are encouraged to stay in your body (what you are feeling physically and where I am touching), but this is difficult for many people, especially when you are holding a lot of tension or trauma, and similar to meditation, this will become easier with sessions. This IS one of the very reasons one may choose to come for treatment. To calm the racing mind, to get out of the thinking mind and drop  into the feeling body and to:

·       feel safe again

·       feel enough

·       feel whole just as you are.

 This is what clients refer to as a feeling of ‘coming home’ or ‘coming back to themselves’.